The massive computer clusters powering artificial intelligence consume vast quantities to answer the world’s queries, but how is Big Tech redressing the balance?

Writing a 100-word email using ChatGPT (GPT-4, latest model) consumes 1 x 500ml bottle of water It uses 140Wh of energy, enough for 7 full charges of an iPhone Pro Max

  • pyre@lemmy.worldEnglish
    121·
    1 month ago

    i think you’re not thinking about what efficiency means for corporations.

    • XIIIesq@lemmy.worldEnglish
      32·
      1 month ago

      I think it’s exactly what I’m thinking about, unless I’m missing something specific that you’d like to put forward?

      If I own a bottled drinks company and the energy cost is 10p a bottle but a new, more efficient process is invented that would lower my energy cost to 5p a bottle, that’s going to be looking like a wise investment to make. A few pence over several thousand products adds up pretty quickly.

      I could either pocket the difference as extra profit, lower my unit price to the consumer to make my product more competitive in the market, or a bit of both.

      • areyouevenreal@lemm.eeEnglish
        21·
        26 days ago

        It seems basic logic like this doesn’t actually work on these people. Most really can’t get their heads around the fact that energy costs money and companies want to use less of it wherever possible and practical to do so.

        • XIIIesq@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          26 days ago

          The mob is fickle, brother.

          The hive mind has concluded AI=bad and any comment that doesn’t go along with the consensus is going to get downvotes.

          It’s really not that different from the beginning of the industrial revolution, when cotton mills first started to implement the spinning jenny, leaving many workers out of a job who’d go in to the factories at night to smash the machines up.

          No one wants to go back to spinning cotton all day now though and it will be the same with jobs taken by AI.