But Ed Zitron is not it. Here's an example [1] of him fumbling on simple arithmetic. He's also perpetually bearish without any sense of principles on his message.

This is what he wrote in 2024 [2]

> You can fight with me on semantics, on claiming valuations are high and how many users ChatGPT has, but look at the products and tell me any of this is really the future.

I think the industry really needs someone better with principles.

[1] https://x.com/binarybits/status/2034376359909130249

[2] https://www.wheresyoured.at/never-forget-what-theyve-done/

Edit: here's another example https://x.com/blader/status/2031216372169191678

I get that people make mistakes but it really does seem like there are no principles behind the guy. It seems like he can write whatever.

> Isn't it weird how there is no huge industry pushback on all this new AI datacenter power need, as there was about electrifying vehicles?

The article says 240 Gigawatts of capacity is allocated for AI datacenters.

New York City draws about 10 Gigawatts in the hottest months of the year due to extra load from AC use.

So am I understanding correctly that these people want to foist upon the power grid 24 NYCs?

The other question I have is... who exactly is doing all of 1. Using AI right now 2. Making substantial money on it or getting real value and 3. Capacity constrained? Who is actually going to productively soak up all this capacity? It seems to me that bringing all this stuff online can't really make things much cheaper than they are now because the fixed costs aren't going anywhere, and if anything, trying to jam so many projects through all at once just raises those fixed costs even higher. It's not like they triple data center capacity (and increasing AI capacity by, what, 10x? 20x?), stick them full of AI systems, and into that 10x+ greater AI capacity they can sell it at the prices they are now. Higher capacity would crash the selling price but the costs would be as high or higher than now.

I am at a complete loss as to how the numbers are supposed to work here. You can't build a company in 2026 on the economy and tech infrastructure of 2036 anymore than it worked to build a company in 1999 on the economy and tech infrastructure of 2019, no matter how rosy the numbers look on the projections based on conveniently ignoring the fact the company passes through "death" in a year and half. Everything promised in 1999 happened, but trying to artificially accelerate it onto Wall Street's time line burned money by the billions. I'm sure 2036 will have lots of AI in it, but you can't just spend money to bring it forward 10 years by sheer force of will. It has to happen at its own pace.

As someone who only has a passing interest, there isn't anything distilled enough in this article for me to comment on as the central point. Everyone seems to be reporting impossible numbers, and buying dramatically more hardware than they can install in a reasonable timeframe given the pace of the industry.

My current model for understand for how AI will scale out is that we'll move through the following choke points:

AI chip makers -> Data center infra and construction -> regional power companies

Right now we're firmly in the "AI chip makers" part of the expansion, with everything else in the beginning stages. AI is useful, but whether it's hyped or not, it's hard to deny that not being able to build and power data centers will impact how this plays out.

Its true this article isn't the most concise, but it might not deserve the flagging that people are giving it on here.

I believe that Ed Zitron plays a very important gadlfy role in all of this.

However, if you look at his subreddit, it appears that he has created a 100% AI denier following. My gut makes me worry for them, but I wonder where the truth really lies.

For those of us involved with code, Sonnet 3.5 was a revelation, and Opus 4.5 scared the crap out of many, and converted some of us to believers in "the exponential."

Now, in other verifiable output fields like finance/spreadsheets in general, Claude is scaring even more people.

I really do respect Ed, but I feel like his schtick might make too many people complacent, thinking that this is all fake. Also, I could be wrong.

> And that number is a fucking disaster.

To me that number is reassuring. I was worried that all this Sam Altman plans to build 12GW per month stuff was going to fry the planet.

If the whole lot so far runs on less than one Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant then that actually seems kind of reasonable. Also I'm skeptical the path to AGI is ever larger data centers - there seems much that could be done in terms of better algorithms and design. I don't think human brains update every neural connection for each word when training which is probably partly why they get by on 20W rather than 20KW.

I see another impassioned, fervent cry daily about how it’s all going to collapse like a house of cards (as if smart money doesn’t know it and some podcaster is the first to realize data centers take a long time to build).

But unless I missed something, I didn’t see him disclose any financial positions that would indicate him betting on the collapse he is so clearly calling for.

I think that should be required to take any of these articles seriously - if your portfolio doesn’t reflect your stated opinions, your stated opinions aren’t what you really believe.

But I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for introspection from that camp. It seems that AI maximalists, like so many other players these days, see it as end-game time. There are no bounds or rules: pick a side, and go. And then eat the rest.

Sure, not everyone sees it this way. There are highly competent, human actors working in their joy toward a better way forward with all of it. But I don't think you'll find that spirit unbridled inside any profit-seeking corporation of any significant standing (though I would be happy to be proven wrong). If it existed there, it is being choked out by selfishness and survivalism.

And then there's Thiel and ilk waxing eschatological, adding a whole other layer to the scheme.

A literal "virtuous cycle", if you will.