4 ms·
> Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. That is not true. Running, maintaining, etc the IT infra
by Torwald 8y ago
> Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing.
That is not true. Running, maintaining, etc the IT infrastructure is costing money, electricity etc. It doesn't come for free.
- matheusmoreira 8y agoSuppose that a copy takes 1 second to complete and the computer's power supply unit draws 400 W of power during that 1 second. How much does it cost to complete that copy? Hawaii has the most expensive electricity¹ in the United States, averaging at 29.23 cents / kW * h. Let's use 30 cents / kW * h. If we have 400 W sustained for one second, that equals 0.000111111111 kW * h. (400 Watt * second) * (30 cents / kWh) = 3.33333333 × 10^-5 U.S. dollars. In Hawaii, that one copy would cost $0.0000333333. If one were to make 100 000 copies of that same data, it would cost $3.33333333. ¹ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/
- rootlocus 8y agoThis is a very large strawman you've constructed.
- matheusmoreira 8y agoPlease explain what the problem with what I wrote is.
- ttoinou 8y agoMarginal and transaction costs are very low. But you are right on the principle : storing, copying and transferring data always costs energy (in physics, temperature, energy and change of entropy are linked together)
- Torwald 8y agoOK, maybe you still have a point. What then, would be the threshold for saying: now, at this point, the costs of X are not marginal anymore but substantial enough to be taken into account?
- matheusmoreira 8y agoAccording to Wikipedia, the best selling video game is Tetris: it has sold approximately 170 000 000¹ copies. If copying Tetris takes 1 second, the computer draws 400 W of power and electricity is rated at 30 cents/kWh, it would cost approximately $5667 to create 170 million copies of Tetris. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_gam...
- dragonwriter 8y ago“Marginal costs” are the additional cost for each additional unit delivered. They can be high or low, but with modern, non-custom software they tend to be extremely low.
- ttoinou 8y agoDepends on what you are thinking about ? Such cost always need to be taken into account, but IMHO in general we must always differentiate material things (that are formed from matter and its organization) and information (i.e. concept of entropy, ideas, thoughts, songs, language, jokes etc..) which have temporary physical supports but exists apart from them
- Torwald 8y agoGood distinction, I agree. This leads me to this: If, for example a song, is not written down anywhere, but some brains contain it, this means there some people who could reproduce this song by singing it, this song would still exist. Is a brain a temporal physical support unit in our sense?
- ttoinou 8y agoYes of course. As long as we have electricity in our brains we can store and process information. The very precise implementation of this would require to study biology (it's already interesting to see that we run on electricity like computers!).