NYT wrote: Tech companies, governments and their partners around the world will spend nearly $3,000,000,000,000 on data centers by 2028, according to analysts at Morgan Stanley. To make that happen, they will borrow nearly a trillion dollars from banks and other financial institutions.
…
Because that debt is held by a wide array of financial institutions — including private credit lenders as well as traditional banks — experts are struggling to understand how much risk is in the system.

Adding to worries, critics say some of the deals OpenAI has made with chipmakers, cloud computing companies and others are oddly circular. OpenAI is set to receive billions from tech companies but also sends billions back to the same companies to pay for computing power and other services.
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Goldman Sachs has estimated that Nvidia will make 15% of its sales next year from what critics also call circular deals.

Many companies justify their spending because they’re not just building a product, they’re creating something that will change the world: artificial general intelligence, or A.G.I., a machine that can do anything the human brain can do. The rub is that none of them quite know how to do it.

But Anton Korinek, an economist at the University of Virginia, said the spending will all be justified if Silicon Valley reaches its goal. He is optimistic it can be done.

“It’s a bet on A.G.I. or bust,” Dr. Korinek said.
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Even among some executives of Silicon Valley’s wealthiest companies, however, the money sloshing around is worrying.

Sundar Pichai, the chief executive of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, said in an interview with the BBC this week that the spending and skyrocketing valuations were driven at least in part by “irrationality.” If the market crashes, he said, the damage will be widespread. “I think no company is going to be immune, including us,” he said.

Tech industry veterans often compare the A.I. boom to the dot-com bubble of the 1990s. When that bubble burst, hundreds of start-ups disappeared and established companies that were selling technology to those young outfits experienced huge losses. But other start-ups found lasting success and did, in fact, change the world — most notably Amazon and Google.

“When bubbles happen, smart people get over-excited about a kernel of truth,” Mr. Altman told reporters earlier this year. “Are we in a phase where investors as a whole are over-excited about A.I.? My opinion is yes. Is A.I. the most important thing to happen in a very long time? My opinion is also yes.”

jfv wrote: Tue Sep 23, 2025 11:47 am

jfv wrote: Thu Sep 18, 2025 8:55 pm

Gramsci wrote: Wed Sep 17, 2025 2:21 pm https://youtu.be/UclrVWafRAI?si=GWh2XYQrqIua10iL

An interesting watch. I have no idea if the interviewee is right. I normally avoid the host. But worth watching.

I watched the first 25 minutes. I said previously I should withhold my comments but I’m now +2 beers.

It alternates between hard-hitting truths, weird analogies (guessing intentional, knowing there will be many people watching who don’t know AI from a hole in the ground), and bombastic predictions that are WAY TOO SOON in the future (though will probably eventually happen).

I might watch more later, but I anticipate more of the same, and I know how it ends..

It’s pretty crazy that I interviewed this guy 5 years ago.

"Ooh, look at me! I have 6.4M views!" barf