How the AI Bubble Will Pop • Hacker News Board

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#351

Post by y0eswddl » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:43 PM UTC

emp17344 wrote: post #150

donatj wrote: post #123

I feel kind of like a Luddite sometimes but I don't understand why EVERYONE is rushing to use AI? I use a couple different agents to help me code, and ChatGPT has largely replaced Google in my everyday use, but I genuinely don't understand the value proposition of every other companies offerings. I really feel like we're in the same "Get it out first, figure out what it is good for later" bubble we had like 7 years a…

Agreed… I feel increasingly alienated because I don’t understand how AI is providing enough value to justify the truly insane level of investment.

That's because it isn't. What's happening now is mostly executive fomo. No one wants to be left behind just in case AI beans turn out to be magic afterall...

As much as we like to tell a story that says otherwise, most business decisions are not based on logic but fear of losing out.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#352

Post by Quarrelsome » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:44 PM UTC

hamburgererror wrote: post #138

Until recently everyone was bragging about predicting bitcoin's bubble. To the best of my knowledge there was no huge crash, crypto just got out of fashion in mainstream media. I guess that's what's going to happen with AI.

the argument of the OP doesn't discount this idea, the suggestion is there's a crash but then following that crash it _does_ pay off. Its a question of a lack of patience.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#353

Post by sejje » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:45 PM UTC

throaway1988 wrote: post #330

weregiraffe wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A foot of snow, black ice, a sand drift. What else, a meter of lava flow? Forest fire? Tsunami? Tornado? How about pick conditions where humans actually can drive.

he’s describing conditions that exist for every area in the world that actually experiences winter!

Most places clear the driving surface instead of leaving a foot of snow.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#354

Post by emp17344 » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:45 PM UTC

ACCount37 wrote: post #331

emp17344 wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have evidence to support any of this? This is the first time I’ve heard that LLMs exhibit understanding of theory of mind. I think it’s more likely that the user I replied to is projecting their own biases and beliefs onto the LLM.

Basically, just about any ToM test has larger and more advanced LLMs attaining humanlike performance on it. Which was a surprising finding at the time. It gets less surprising the more you think about it. This extends even to novel and unseen tests - so it's not like they could have memorized all of them. Base models perform worse, and with a more jagged capability profile. Some tests are easier to get a base model t…

There are several papers studying this, but the situation is far more nuanced than you’re implying. Here’s one paper stating that these capabilities are an illusion:

https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3610978.3640767

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#355

Post by Quarrelsome » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:46 PM UTC

jacknews wrote: post #83

I think these articles slightly miss the point. Sure, AI as a tool, as it currently is, will take a very long time to earn back the $B being invested. But what if someone reaches autonomous AGI with this push? Everything changes. So I think there's a massive, massive upside risk being priced into these investments.

> But what if someone reaches autonomous AGI with this push?

What if Jesus turns up again? Seems a little optimistic, especially with several leading AI voices suggesting that AGI is at least a lot further away than just parameter expansion.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#356

Post by 9rx » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:48 PM UTC

therealmarv wrote: post #46

It reminds me what I said to somebody recently: All my friends and family are using the free version of ChatGPT or something similar. They will never pay (although they have enough money to do so). Even in my very narrow subjective circles it does not add up. Who pays for AI and how? And when in the future?

> Who pays for AI [...]?

Venture capital funding adding AI features to fart apps.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#357

Post by y0eswddl » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:48 PM UTC

maxglute wrote: post #274

donatj wrote: post #123

I feel kind of like a Luddite sometimes but I don't understand why EVERYONE is rushing to use AI? I use a couple different agents to help me code, and ChatGPT has largely replaced Google in my everyday use, but I genuinely don't understand the value proposition of every other companies offerings. I really feel like we're in the same "Get it out first, figure out what it is good for later" bubble we had like 7 years a…

See kids hooked on LLMs. I think most of them will grow up paying for a sub. Like not $15/m streaming sub, $50-100/m cellphone tier sub. Well until local kills that business model.

I think the reason ads are so prolific now is because the pay-to-play model doesn't work well at such large scales... Ads seem to be there only way to make the kind of big money LLM investors will demand.

I don't think you're wrong re: their hope to hook people and get us all used to using LLMs for everything, but I suspect they'll just start selling ads like everyone else.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#358

Post by tempodox » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:49 PM UTC

therealmarv wrote: post #46

It reminds me what I said to somebody recently: All my friends and family are using the free version of ChatGPT or something similar. They will never pay (although they have enough money to do so). Even in my very narrow subjective circles it does not add up. Who pays for AI and how? And when in the future?

> Who pays for AI and how?

The same way the rest of webshit is paid for: ads. And ads embedded in LLM output will be impervious to ad blockers.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#359

Post by ModernMech » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:50 PM UTC

weregiraffe wrote: post #296

donatj wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Find me an FSD that can drive in non-Californian real world situations. A foot of snow, black ice, a sand drift.

>A foot of snow, black ice, a sand drift. What else, a meter of lava flow? Forest fire? Tsunami? Tornado? How about pick conditions where humans actually can drive.

Snow (maybe not a foot but enough to at least cover the lane markings), black ice and sand drifts people experience every day in the normal course of driving, so it's reasonable to expect driverless cars to be able to handle them. Forest fires, tsunamis, lava flows, and tornados are weather emergencies. I think it's a little more reasonable to not have expectations for driverless cars in those situations.

Re: How the AI Bubble Will Pop

#360

Post by mokoshhydro » Thu, Oct 02, 2025, 2:50 PM UTC

eek2121 wrote: post #175

donatj wrote: post #123

I feel kind of like a Luddite sometimes but I don't understand why EVERYONE is rushing to use AI? I use a couple different agents to help me code, and ChatGPT has largely replaced Google in my everyday use, but I genuinely don't understand the value proposition of every other companies offerings. I really feel like we're in the same "Get it out first, figure out what it is good for later" bubble we had like 7 years a…

In my eyes, it'd be cheaper for a company to simply purchase laptops with decent hardware specs, and run the LLMs locally. I've had decent results from various models I've run via LMStudio, and bonus points: It costs nothing and doesn't even use all that much CPU/GPU power. Just my opinion as a FORMER senior software dev (disabled now).

Still waiting for laptop able to run R1 locally...