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The number of people in this comment thread defending this gargantuan energy footprint for a technology that currently in large measure is being used for a trem

The number of people in this comment thread defending this gargantuan energy footprint for a technology that currently in large measure is being used for a tremendous amount of dogshit things (and oceans of visual/text spam) is amusing considering the hysterics that this same energy use problem caused when it came to crypto. I guess it becomes okay when the companies guzzling the energy are some of the biggest tech employers in the world, buttering your bread in some way.

admiralrohan 1y ago
Good that you connected it with crypto boom. But problem is it's hard to rewind these kind of trends once started. Human nature.
- pjc50 1y ago
  NFTs are dying and link rotting. ICOs are out of fashion. VR is back in its niche. 3DTV .. I've not seen that marketed for quite a while now. Things that are fads will die out eventually. Crypto meanwhile is in an odd space: everyone knows blockchains are too much of a hassle and that the volatility is too high, so they're using centralized exchanges and "stablecoins" (shadow dollars). There's still a huge amount of money there but not quite as much as the stadium ads / FTX peak.
  - alnwlsn 1y ago
    I wish you could still buy 3D TVs. Why? We used them to build a truck simulator which had a driver and passenger. The view out the window is different for each person. They were perfect for that, but it's too small a niche to keep making new TVs.
    - ben_w 1y ago
      Have you considered DIY-ing it with a normal TV/monitor and a lenticular lens?
  - dragonwriter 1y ago
    > 3DTV .. I've not seen that marketed for quite a while now. Its probably coming back in a few years via lightfield displays, though for some reason Google seems to think the killer app for those is videoconferencing.
vanschelven 1y ago
At least in the case of AI the _theoretical_ benefits are there, whereas crypto is wasteful _by design_. Whether the cost/benefit works out in the case of AI is another question.
- phillipcarter 1y ago
  Yeah, it's a different compute/cost curve worth considering. On one hand, the cost of compute per token has gone down a lot, and will continue to go down, because that's exactly the economic incentives at play. We had a little short-term nonsense where "the bigger the better" was all the rage, but inference was never this way, and now training is also pushing in this direction. But on the other hand, less compute per token means it can be more broadly deployed. And so there is likely more energy use, not less, in the long run.
- DavidSJ 1y ago
  I agree with you that AI has much larger theoretical benefits than cryptocurrency, but I don’t think it’s fair to say cryptocurrency is wasteful by design. Bitcoin’s proof of work serves a vital function: securing the network from double-spending attacks. At the time of bitcoin’s invention, it was the only known solution to that problem, so it’s no more “wasteful by design” than a bank hiring a security guard. There are admittedly alternatives to proof of work today; I’m unsure how well they work by comparison, but even if they suffice for security, that only means that bitcoin is wasteful due to being more primitive technology, not by design.
  - DonaldFisk 1y ago
    See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_stake#Energy_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_stake#Energy_consumpt...
- drdrey 1y ago
  Proof of work is wasteful by design
- ddq 1y ago
  Meanwhile the theoretical potential existential risks of advanced AI massively eclipse the capacity of crypto for catastrophic harm. The _good_ ending is if we merely waste a bunch of energy on slop machines to put millions of people out of work for the technofeudal overlords; an actual AGI breakthrough capable of exponential intelligence growth could go horribly wrong in ways already innumerably theorized and illustrated in science fiction and the mad scientists of silicon valley are enchanted by the siren's call, taking the warnings as instructions. Economic chaos is one thing, Skynet is another. And then people with the power are stupid and evil. Joy.
ezfe 1y ago
Crypto energy usage (bitcoin, proof of work) is literally a waste lol
- DonaldFisk 1y ago
  Bitcoin, yes. But Ethereum uses proof of stake, which has around 0.1% of proof of work's energy requirements. If only there was a way of reducing AI's energy requirements by a similar amount.
  - ezfe 1y ago
    The comment I'm replying to is referring to proof of work crypto so better things like Ethereum are irrelevant.
skybrian 1y ago
Unlike Bitcoin, which burns more energy for the same usage as the price goes up, LLM inference prices are dropping rapidly [1] because AI companies have big incentives to cut costs. Companies like Apple and Google are both building data centers and trying to make on-device AI a thing. Unfortunately, they also keep inventing new, more expensive algorithms. It’s at least plausible that most LLM use will become cheap enough to run on battery-limited devices like laptops and phones, though it’s not what most people are betting on. [1] https://epoch.ai/data-insights/llm-inference-price-trends https://epoch.ai/data-insights/llm-inference-price-trends
jrochkind1 1y ago
I remember when the tenor on HN comments toward crypto was very positive. It was not always negative.

admiralrohan 1y ago

Good that you connected it with crypto boom. But problem is it's hard to rewind these kind of trends once started. Human nature.

pjc50 1y ago
NFTs are dying and link rotting. ICOs are out of fashion. VR is back in its niche. 3DTV .. I've not seen that marketed for quite a while now. Things that are fads will die out eventually. Crypto meanwhile is in an odd space: everyone knows blockchains are too much of a hassle and that the volatility is too high, so they're using centralized exchanges and "stablecoins" (shadow dollars). There's still a huge amount of money there but not quite as much as the stadium ads / FTX peak.
- alnwlsn 1y ago
  I wish you could still buy 3D TVs. Why? We used them to build a truck simulator which had a driver and passenger. The view out the window is different for each person. They were perfect for that, but it's too small a niche to keep making new TVs.
  - ben_w 1y ago
    Have you considered DIY-ing it with a normal TV/monitor and a lenticular lens?
- dragonwriter 1y ago
  > 3DTV .. I've not seen that marketed for quite a while now. Its probably coming back in a few years via lightfield displays, though for some reason Google seems to think the killer app for those is videoconferencing.

vanschelven 1y ago

At least in the case of AI the _theoretical_ benefits are there, whereas crypto is wasteful _by design_. Whether the cost/benefit works out in the case of AI is another question.

phillipcarter 1y ago
Yeah, it's a different compute/cost curve worth considering. On one hand, the cost of compute per token has gone down a lot, and will continue to go down, because that's exactly the economic incentives at play. We had a little short-term nonsense where "the bigger the better" was all the rage, but inference was never this way, and now training is also pushing in this direction. But on the other hand, less compute per token means it can be more broadly deployed. And so there is likely more energy use, not less, in the long run.
DavidSJ 1y ago
I agree with you that AI has much larger theoretical benefits than cryptocurrency, but I don’t think it’s fair to say cryptocurrency is wasteful by design. Bitcoin’s proof of work serves a vital function: securing the network from double-spending attacks. At the time of bitcoin’s invention, it was the only known solution to that problem, so it’s no more “wasteful by design” than a bank hiring a security guard. There are admittedly alternatives to proof of work today; I’m unsure how well they work by comparison, but even if they suffice for security, that only means that bitcoin is wasteful due to being more primitive technology, not by design.
- DonaldFisk 1y ago
  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_stake#Energy_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_of_stake#Energy_consumpt...
drdrey 1y ago
Proof of work is wasteful by design
ddq 1y ago
Meanwhile the theoretical potential existential risks of advanced AI massively eclipse the capacity of crypto for catastrophic harm. The _good_ ending is if we merely waste a bunch of energy on slop machines to put millions of people out of work for the technofeudal overlords; an actual AGI breakthrough capable of exponential intelligence growth could go horribly wrong in ways already innumerably theorized and illustrated in science fiction and the mad scientists of silicon valley are enchanted by the siren's call, taking the warnings as instructions. Economic chaos is one thing, Skynet is another. And then people with the power are stupid and evil. Joy.

ezfe 1y ago

Crypto energy usage (bitcoin, proof of work) is literally a waste lol

DonaldFisk 1y ago
Bitcoin, yes. But Ethereum uses proof of stake, which has around 0.1% of proof of work's energy requirements. If only there was a way of reducing AI's energy requirements by a similar amount.
- ezfe 1y ago
  The comment I'm replying to is referring to proof of work crypto so better things like Ethereum are irrelevant.

skybrian 1y ago

Unlike Bitcoin, which burns more energy for the same usage as the price goes up, LLM inference prices are dropping rapidly [1] because AI companies have big incentives to cut costs. Companies like Apple and Google are both building data centers and trying to make on-device AI a thing. Unfortunately, they also keep inventing new, more expensive algorithms. It’s at least plausible that most LLM use will become cheap enough to run on battery-limited devices like laptops and phones, though it’s not what most people are betting on. [1] https://epoch.ai/data-insights/llm-inference-price-trends https://epoch.ai/data-insights/llm-inference-price-trends

jrochkind1 1y ago

I remember when the tenor on HN comments toward crypto was very positive. It was not always negative.