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As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

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Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#401

Post by rainsford »

One aspect of this I don't see mentioned all that often is that AI is competing for computing resources that are at least somewhat limited in the short to medium term while being pretty inefficient at utilizing those resources compared to alternatives.

A medium end gaming PC can display impressively realistic graphics at high resolutions and framerates while also being useful for a variety of other computationally intensive processing tasks like video encoding, compiling large code bases, etc. Or it can be used to host deeply mediocre local LLMs.

The actual frontier models from companies like Anthropic or OpenAI require vastly more expensive computing resources, resources that could otherwise be used for potentially more useful computation that isn't so inefficient. Think of all the computing power going into frontier models but applied to weather forecasting or cancer research or whatever.

Of course it's not either or, but as this article and similar ones point out, chips and other computing resources aren't infinite and AI for now at least has a seemingly insatiable appetite and enough dollars to starve other uses.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#402

Post by LogicFailsMe »

bogzz wrote: post #379
api wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In previous eras there were many purists who considered photography not-art, sequencer and synthesizer made music not-music, other forms of (non-AI) digital art less legitimate than their more manual classical counterparts, etc. This is the same discourse all over again. Is electronic music where the artist composes it on a screen and then hits 'play' music? I think it is, of course, but I have had experiences where…

I don't believe that there is near enough room for creativity to shine through in the prompt-generation pipeline, and I find the mention of a talent like Ansel Adams in this context asinine. There is no control there, and without control over creation I don't believe that creativity CAN flourish, but I may be wrong. Electronic music is analogous to digital art made by humans, not generated art.

Defining art in this way is like defining intelligence as the possession of a degree from Stanford. It's just branding.

Art shouldn't make you feel comfortable and safe. It should provoke you and in this sense AI art is doing the job better than traditional art at the moment here.

Other than the technological aspect, there's nothing new under the sun here. And at its very worst, AI art is just Andy Warhol at hyperscale.

https://wbpopphilosopher.wordpress.com/2023/05/07/andy-warho...

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#403

Post by wmf »

abhi555shek wrote: post #308

This is where government can jump in and take advantage of the less supply by opening large semi conductor factories quickly and helping people in avoiding this bottlneck.

Opening large semi conductor factories quickly isn't possible. Governments also can't stomach risking ~$20B.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#404

Post by vee-kay »

rainsford wrote: post #401

One aspect of this I don't see mentioned all that often is that AI is competing for computing resources that are at least somewhat limited in the short to medium term while being pretty inefficient at utilizing those resources compared to alternatives. A medium end gaming PC can display impressively realistic graphics at high resolutions and framerates while also being useful for a variety of other computationally in…

(Sharing a comment I recently posted on a similar thread..)

For last 2+ years, I've noticed a worrying trend: the typical budget PCs (especially Laptops) are being sold at higher prices with lower RAM (just 8GB) and lower-end CPUs (and no dedicated GPUs). Industry mandate should have become 16GB RAM for PCs and 8GB for mobile, since years ago, but instead it is as if computing/IT industry is regressing.

New budget mobiles are being launched with lower-end specs as well (e.g., new phones with Snapdragon Gen 6, UFS2.2). Meanwhile, features that were being offered in budget phones, e.g., wireless charging, NFC, UFS3.1 have silently been moved to the premium mobile segment.

Meanwhile the OSes and software are becoming more and more complex, bloated and more unstable (bugs) and insecure (security loopholes ready for exploits).

It is as if the industry has decided to focus on AI and nothing else.

And this will be a huge setback for humanity, especially the students and scientific communities.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#405

Post by Pet_Ant »

bogzz wrote: post #395
Pet_Ant wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't believe that there is near enough room for creativity to shine through in the prompt-generation pipeline I mean you are building a prompt and tweaking it. I mean even if you didn't do that you could still argue that finding it is in itself a creative akin to found art [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Found_object

I suppose. You're "finding" something that didn't exist and that nobody ever cared about. Something that you wrote, mashed against the tensors trained on real artist creations, and out came the thing that you "found". I'm genuinely amazed at how some people perceive art.

To me art has always been "an interesting idea". Decorative things that take skill to me are crafts. Sure, it's a water color of your garden, but what does it tell us about the human condition? Sure, it's skilled... but it's empty. Give me Jackson Pollock or Picasso. Give me a new way to see the world. Pure skill to me is as impressive as cup-stacking personally.

Not saying you have to agree, but it is a distillation of how some portion of the world sees the world.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#406

Post by bogzz »

LogicFailsMe wrote: post #402
bogzz wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe that there is near enough room for creativity to shine through in the prompt-generation pipeline, and I find the mention of a talent like Ansel Adams in this context asinine. There is no control there, and without control over creation I don't believe that creativity CAN flourish, but I may be wrong. Electronic music is analogous to digital art made by humans, not generated art.

Defining art in this way is like defining intelligence as the possession of a degree from Stanford. It's just branding. Art shouldn't make you feel comfortable and safe. It should provoke you and in this sense AI art is doing the job better than traditional art at the moment here. Other than the technological aspect, there's nothing new under the sun here. And at its very worst, AI art is just Andy Warhol at hypersca…

I Ghiblified a photo of my dog when chatgpt 4 came out. I was utterly horrified by the results.

It's exciting being able to say that I am an artist, I always wondered what my life would have been had I gone into the arts, and now I can experience it! Thank you techmology.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#407

Post by BobbyJo »

rainsford wrote: post #401

One aspect of this I don't see mentioned all that often is that AI is competing for computing resources that are at least somewhat limited in the short to medium term while being pretty inefficient at utilizing those resources compared to alternatives. A medium end gaming PC can display impressively realistic graphics at high resolutions and framerates while also being useful for a variety of other computationally in…

Define "efficient" in this context.

The point of the gold rush now is that a large number of investors think AI will be more efficient at converting GPU and RAM cycles into money than games or other applications will. Hence they are willing to pay more for the same hardware.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#408

Post by pureagave »

vee-kay wrote: post #404
rainsford wrote: post #401

One aspect of this I don't see mentioned all that often is that AI is competing for computing resources that are at least somewhat limited in the short to medium term while being pretty inefficient at utilizing those resources compared to alternatives. A medium end gaming PC can display impressively realistic graphics at high resolutions and framerates while also being useful for a variety of other computationally in…

(Sharing a comment I recently posted on a similar thread..) For last 2+ years, I've noticed a worrying trend: the typical budget PCs (especially Laptops) are being sold at higher prices with lower RAM (just 8GB) and lower-end CPUs (and no dedicated GPUs). Industry mandate should have become 16GB RAM for PCs and 8GB for mobile, since years ago, but instead it is as if computing/IT industry is regressing. New budget mo…

I don't think we need "industry mandate". I suspect the electronics specs are dictated by the very efficient market and the consumer is being squeezed in many ways. So device manufactures are just meeting the pricing needs of the consumer and dropping the expensive things that are less understood like GPUs and extra ram.

Re: As AI gobbles up chips, prices for devices may rise

#409

Post by xgulfie »

api wrote: post #376
bogzz wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure how, or even if, it does stop. I assume once the hot air from LLM company CEOs starts being treated as the flatulence that it is, things will wind down. The sentiment against generated content is not going away.

In previous eras there were many purists who considered photography not-art, sequencer and synthesizer made music not-music, other forms of (non-AI) digital art less legitimate than their more manual classical counterparts, etc. This is the same discourse all over again. Is electronic music where the artist composes it on a screen and then hits 'play' music? I think it is, of course, but I have had experiences where…

> AI slop is to AI art what point and shoot amateur photography is to artistic photography.

Sorry... It's all slop buddy. The medium is the message, and genAI's message is "I want it cheap and with low effort, and I don't care too much about how it looks"

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