Re:I'm Not Convinced the AI Bubble Exists
by marzchipane on Monday November 09, 2026 @04:07AM
(#50423029)
To be fair, Jevons suggests that as prices fall, novel use-cases are unlocked. The things you or others currently do with AI might not need frontier models or loads of tokens, but if prices fall or capabilities increase, new applications might arise to exploit that.
Re:I'm Not Convinced the AI Bubble Exists
by Panzer04 on Monday November 09, 2026 @09:47PM
(#50435465)
Yes, this reasoning has been used to justify the absolutely gigantic amount of spending going into AI right now.
I'm not convinced it's true. It just seems to be taken for granted that demand for intelligence is unlimited and that its cost limited, which just doesn't seem true to me.
Re:I'm Not Convinced the AI Bubble Exists
by origini on Monday November 09, 2026 @04:14AM
(#50423093)
The problem is, that its not just AI for a niche thing, its AI together with compute.
People are already using AI to build them some things with CAD. Electronics too. But now what does AI need to be very good in it without an expert? Simulation and Optimizers. This again needs more compute.
And the agentic layer will be added to all big products out there. Everything you will do will consume AI tokens
SW can use a ton of AI. Lots of other applications can't, and they don't need the super smart frontier versions either. We just don't need all that much compute to serve AI for these applications, and people won't need to pay the margins necessary to get access to that AI.
I don't buy brand loyalty either. If I can pay 1$/m for the same thing from someone as I pay OpenAI or Anthropic 10$/m for, I'll do that, which almost zero barrier to entry.
The buildout is paying stratospheric prices on the assumption they can charge that much on the other end, but if demand tapers off (or model efficiency doubles again), prices will start falling. Everyone talks about Jevon's, but I don't really see why I'd spend more on AI than I need to do the things I want. I already run out of stuff to ask it to do on a basic subscription, I hardly need more.