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xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

martinalderson.com

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Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#561

Post by burnerRhodov3 »

rmeara wrote: post #519
burnerRhodov3 wrote: post #516

Anthropic deal is 1.25B a month for half a gigawatt, with it rising up to 1g.(total deal size 2-2.5B a month) add on this google $900m a month and you get 3.4B a month. Starship cost is probably something like (y = (400m - 20m (0.85)^t + 20m, where t is times starship is launched. At 30 launches, they are close to their target of $20m. A single nvidia NVL72 rack's peak performance is around 135w so 1gw (1,000,000 kW…

The math currently works given a lot of rosy assumptions about xAI's ability to develop Starship + orbital cooling but no way it works in 5 years. There's a huge GPU shortage right now, so prices are inflated. In the long term what matters is that cost of launch + space hardware Electricity is only about 10-15% of the cost of running a terrestrial AI datacenter, so that doesn't give them a lot of room to undercut the…

What terrestial competitors? It is illegal to build datacenters in the states without getting sued to death.

10-15% opex over 5 years, gives you what?

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#562

Post by albedoa »

hsgwveeheu wrote: post #379
throwawaypath wrote: post #378

Sounds like a sound strategy to actually profit in during the AI craze, no?

If it is a craze then no. You want to sell shovels, not buy overpriced land during a gold rush. That said details matter. Can the DCs be reused for other in-demand things?

lmfao did you create a new account just to reply to yourself.

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#563

Post by solumunus »

hdgvhicv wrote: post #434
somenameforme wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The overwhelming majority of the labor force remains service, manual labor, and other such stuff that LLMs will have no real effect on. So the economy will be fine, but I do agree with you from a different angle. The entire goal of LLMs seems self destructive. If they're successful then the endgame is completely removing the barriers to entry to producing software and other digital tech. But if we do reach that endga…

Llms either reach the point where they can quickly design and build physical robots to take on that service industry or they stop exponential growth. Both of those are devastating for their valuation. Stopping growth means open modes catch up in a year or so. Continuing means end of the current economy.

There’s a good chance physical humanoid robots will always be more expensive than humans, especially in this new hypothesised reality where there’s an enormous labour surplus.

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#564

Post by somenameforme »

solumunus wrote: post #563
hdgvhicv wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Llms either reach the point where they can quickly design and build physical robots to take on that service industry or they stop exponential growth. Both of those are devastating for their valuation. Stopping growth means open modes catch up in a year or so. Continuing means end of the current economy.

There’s a good chance physical humanoid robots will always be more expensive than humans, especially in this new hypothesised reality where there’s an enormous labour surplus.

China is advancing robotics at a crazy pace, and hitting typical Chinese prices. This [1] robot is available starting at $6k. And of course what matters isn't the up-front cost, but the maintenance. If their maintenance costs are lower than human wages+taxes, then robots win.

The biggest practical issue will be that if these robots ever did start replacing people on a large enough scale, then you'd have a lot of angry, desperate people with a lot of time on their hands. So that alone will probably work as the primary mediating factor.

Quite an interesting time to be alive because the future is so completely impossible to predict. The world just a decade from now could look entirely different, or it could just be self driving cars all over again.

[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1Q4Su54iho

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#565

Post by Seanambers »

williamdclt wrote: post #495
nl wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Memory is unlikely to drop in price before mid-2027 when new capacity starts to come online. The GPU shortage looks to be even longer lived.

So, temporary situation then. That's a pretty short period with no paradigm shift, just a delay in capacity.

Temporary until its not.

It's the new normal, get used to it.

The MAG7 isn't pumping all their FCF + new debt issuance into DC's just for fun.

The world is seemingly moving into a era where compute is becoming expensive and scarce.

Only thing that can possibly change this is LLMs hitting a vertical unscalable wall.

More AI compute = more CPU, memory, storage needs.

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#566

Post by _1100 »

Seanambers wrote: post #565
williamdclt wrote: post #495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, temporary situation then. That's a pretty short period with no paradigm shift, just a delay in capacity.

Temporary until its not. It's the new normal, get used to it. The MAG7 isn't pumping all their FCF + new debt issuance into DC's just for fun. The world is seemingly moving into a era where compute is becoming expensive and scarce. Only thing that can possibly change this is LLMs hitting a vertical unscalable wall. More AI compute = more CPU, memory, storage needs.

Do you think we will recognize any walls? Or is there a point where the output might look different with respect to different paradigms / modalities we throw at it, but we won't be able to understand the quantitative differences as good/bad/scalable?

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#567

Post by sameersri2004 »

The data center or compute has now started acting more like a real estate or mutual fund, where people are treating it more like an investment than a commodity. I guess in the near future the only exchange for intelligence would be the amount of compute.

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#568

Post by emodendroket »

sawjet wrote: post #470
emodendroket wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. It seems to be the best at understanding current events. Maybe due to X integration, or some other tool call optimization in the backend? I don't know, but I often ask about things going on, and the other models have outdated info, give unhelpful answers, etc. That makes sense, but occasionally you ask about an issue where it's clearly received political instruction from the commissar and it acts totally lobotom…

Do you have an example of this?

Which "this"?

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#569

Post by declan_roberts »

mcmcmc wrote: post #534
declan_roberts wrote: post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an investor it's really important for me to see this kind of bearish sentiment widely. It's actually a positive for the stock in my opinion, not a negative.

Those are the worlds of a cult member, not someone who makes responsible financial decisions. I hope you don’t have anyone depending on you

Cult members regularly seek out negative sentiment for the cult. Makes sense.

Re: xAI is looking more like a datacentre REIT than a frontier lab

#570

Post by throwawaypath »

albedoa wrote: post #562
hsgwveeheu wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is a craze then no. You want to sell shovels, not buy overpriced land during a gold rush. That said details matter. Can the DCs be reused for other in-demand things?

lmfao did you create a new account just to reply to yourself.

Very cool and worthwhile way to spend your one fleeting existence dude: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48471322

lmfao did you search my history to find my comments to reply to because youre butthurt.

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