He says it’s “terrible” to have “a limited amount of DRAM in the world” in people’s PCs.
AI data centers have gobbled up so much of the world’s RAM reserves that the prices of memory units – and all electronic devices equipped with them – have skyrocketed. So when OpenAI chief Sam Altman sat down for an interview with YouTuber Cheeky Pint and Stripe, the conversation naturally turned to the RAM shortages affecting the entire tech industry. His opinion? He thinks it’s “pretty terrible” for people to have “a lot of the world’s limited amount of DRAM in their own computer” and use it five percent of the time.
He added: “For example, you want maximum utilization in the cloud if you’re trying to deal with this very supply-constrained environment. And somehow, many people’s intuition is the opposite of that. » Now, to be fair, he was talking specifically about local inference, which is what you call it when you run AI models on your own computer.
Perhaps it should come as no surprise that he shares this view and speaks from a “global allocation perspective,” as the leader of one of the largest AI companies on the planet today. But he also shouldn’t be surprised if people call him tone deaf, given that OpenAI has tied up around 40% of the world’s RAM production through various deals.
Additionally, it doesn’t account for the fact that people buy and use RAM for anything other than simple local inferences. People who game on their PC, broadcast live streams, edit high-definition videos, and perform other resource-intensive tasks need more RAM than the average user. As the AI industry monopolizes the global supply of RAM, everyone faces shortages. Since most electronic devices contain some form of RAM, their manufacturers pass on higher memory prices to consumers by raising their prices as well.
Gn bussni
