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IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

businessinsider.com

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Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#531

Post by jacquesm »

simianwords wrote: post #509
jacquesm wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good question. During the .com boom everybody was investing in 'the internet' or at least in 'the web'. And lots of those companies went bust, quite a few spectacularly so. Since then everything that was promised and a lot more has been realized. Even so, a lot of those initial schemes were harebrained at best at the time and there is a fair chance that we will look in a similar way at the current AI offerin…

I still don’t get it. What at a personal level is making Sam Altman make a suboptimal choice for himself if it is so obvious it won’t work out for him?

On a personal level it will work out for him just fine. All he has to do is siphon off a fraction of that money to himself and/or an entity that he controls.

He's like Elon Musk in that respect: always doubling the bet on the next round, it is a real life Martingale these guys are playing with society on the hook for the downside.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martingale_(betting_system)

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#532

Post by jrflowers »

stevenjgarner wrote: post #240

"It is 1958. IBM passes up the chance to buy a young, fledgling company that has invented a new technology called xerography. Two years later, Xerox is born, and IBM has been kicking themselves ever since. It is ten years later, the late '60s. Digital Equipment DEC and others invent the minicomputer. IBM dismisses the minicomputer as too small to do serious computing and, therefore, unimportant to their business. DEC…

> IBM has not exactly had a stellar record at identifying the future.

This would be very damning if IBM had only considered three businesses over the course of seventy years and made the wrong call each time.

This is like only counting three times that somebody got food poisoning and then confidently asserting that diarrhea is part of their character.

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#533

Post by blablabla123 »

Despite the flashy title that's the first "sober" analysis from a CEO I read about the technology. While not even really news, it's also worth mentioning that the energy requirements are impossible to fulfill

Also now using ChatGPT intensely since months for all kinds of tasks and having tried Claude etc. None of this is on par with a human. The code snippets are straight out of Stackoverflow...

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#535

Post by andruby »

Archelaos wrote: post #419

Gartner estimates that worldwide AI spending will total 1.5 Trillion US$ in 2025.[1] As of 2024, global GDP per year is 111.25 Trillion US$.[2] The question is how much this can be increased by AI. This describes the market volumn for AI. Todays investments have a certain lifespan, until they become obsolet. For custom software I would estiamte that it is 6-8 years. AI investments should be somewhere in this range. T…

To increase the GDP you also need people to spend money. With the general population earning relatively less, I'm not sure the GDP increase will be that substantial.

It's all going to cause more inflation and associated reduction in purchasing power due to stale wages.

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#536

Post by ta12653421 »

EagnaIonat wrote: post #524
stevenjgarner wrote: post #240

"It is 1958. IBM passes up the chance to buy a young, fledgling company that has invented a new technology called xerography. Two years later, Xerox is born, and IBM has been kicking themselves ever since. It is ten years later, the late '60s. Digital Equipment DEC and others invent the minicomputer. IBM dismisses the minicomputer as too small to do serious computing and, therefore, unimportant to their business. DEC…

I read the actual article. He is pointing out that the current costs to create the data centres means you will never be able to make a profit to cover those costs. $800 Billion just to cover the interest. OpenAI is already haemorrhaging money and the space data centres has already been debunked. There is even a recent paper that points out that LLMs will never become AGI. The article also finishes out with some other…

>> There is even a recent paper that points out that LLMs will never become AGI.

can you share a link?

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#537

Post by simianwords »

jacquesm wrote: post #531
simianwords wrote: post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don’t get it. What at a personal level is making Sam Altman make a suboptimal choice for himself if it is so obvious it won’t work out for him?

On a personal level it will work out for him just fine. All he has to do is siphon off a fraction of that money to himself and/or an entity that he controls. He's like Elon Musk in that respect: always doubling the bet on the next round, it is a real life Martingale these guys are playing with society on the hook for the downside. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martingale_(betting_system)

How would he siphon off? He has no stake in OpenAI. And any other stake must be public. Or are you suggesting something more shady?

Elon is the complete opposite of martingale. He has helped produce value beyond just bets. Spacex, Tesla and so on.

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#538

Post by raducu »

beambot wrote: post #512
elnatro wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Were Xerox, Dec, or Apple burning investor money by the billions of dollars?

Xerox is clearly crushing it in 2025... /s

That's completely beyond the point, though? Kodak invented the digital camera, did not think anything about it and others then ate their lunch. Those others are also not crushing it in 2025. The point is IBM is not the go-to to listen about AI. Also not saying they are not right, even a broken clock is right 2 times a day.

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#539

Post by jrflowers »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #514
stevenjgarner wrote: post #240

"It is 1958. IBM passes up the chance to buy a young, fledgling company that has invented a new technology called xerography. Two years later, Xerox is born, and IBM has been kicking themselves ever since. It is ten years later, the late '60s. Digital Equipment DEC and others invent the minicomputer. IBM dismisses the minicomputer as too small to do serious computing and, therefore, unimportant to their business. DEC…

> IBM has not exactly had a stellar record at identifying the future. IBM invented/developed/introduced magnetic stripe cards, UPC Barcodes, the modern ATM, Hard drives, floppies, DRAM, SQL, the 360 Family of Mainframes, the PC, Apollo guidance computers, Deep Blue. IBM created a far share of the future we're living in. I'm no fan of much of what IBM is doing at the moment but it could be argued that its consultancy/…

> IBM invented/developed/introduced magnetic stripe cards, UPC Barcodes, the modern ATM, Hard drives, floppies, DRAM, SQL, the 360 Family of Mainframes, the PC, Apollo guidance computers, Deep Blue. IBM created a far share of the future we're living in.

Well put. “IBM was wrong about computers being a big deal” is a bizarre take. It’s like saying that Colonel Sanders was wrong about chicken because he, uh… invented the pressure fryer.

Re: IBM CEO says there is 'no way' spending on AI data centers will pay off

#540

Post by bayindirh »

Aperocky wrote: post #522
helsinkiandrew wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> IBM has not exactly had a stellar record at identifying the future. IBM invented/developed/introduced magnetic stripe cards, UPC Barcodes, the modern ATM, Hard drives, floppies, DRAM, SQL, the 360 Family of Mainframes, the PC, Apollo guidance computers, Deep Blue. IBM created a far share of the future we're living in. I'm no fan of much of what IBM is doing at the moment but it could be argued that its consultancy/…

The other way to look at it is that the entire consulting industry is teetering on catastrophe. And IBM, being largely a consulting company now, is not being spared.

IBM was making "calculating cheese cutters" back in the day [0].

I'm sure they can pivot to something else if the need arises.

[0]: https://imgur.com/a/ibm-cheese-cutter-Rjs2I

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