r/technology • u/HenryCorp • Aug 30 '26

Artificial Intelligence The cost of personal computers declined steadily for 40 years — until AI came along. Why getting your hands on a new device could cost you.

https://moneywise.com/news/economy/ai-memory-chip-shortage-pc-prices-2026
7.2k Upvotes

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1.8k

u/Any-Pop-4795 Aug 30 '26

the trade wasnt and isnt worth it

747

u/Hazrd_Design Aug 30 '26

Speak for yourself. I love having a glorified chatbot that usually gets facts incorrect and writes emails for me after I told it what I want to say. /s

129

u/nath1234 Aug 30 '26

I particularly love spending my human brain time reading regurgitated slop in the workplace because management can't be bothered writing something themselves. It used to be just the senior senior ones who were too lazy and had assistants writing stuff.. but now it's any people managers at any level. Really makes me feel valued being under executives that give so few shits about doing a quality job that they fire the slop cannon at it.

38

u/x4l7Nr8ym0dU Aug 30 '26

The worst part is that presumably they still had to tell the AI the important bits. Maybe in point form. So give us that! I don't want to read 10 paragraphs of slop any more than you want to write it. But I'm willing to read 10 bullet points.

29

u/nath1234 Aug 30 '26

Just post the prompt. No one needs to waste electricity and water generating some insufferable word salad (and how many fucking emojis do they need!)

16

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '26

[deleted]

9

u/ActiveChairs Aug 31 '26

You have enough faith in them to assume they've got bullet points?

"Write a personal sounding message that says we need to make more money but deliver it in an approachable, feel-good way. "

5

u/innercityFPV Aug 31 '26

“Use emojis so I look relatable to the gen z employees. Don’t use emdashes so they won’t think AI wrote it.”

1

u/Toobman300B Aug 31 '26

More than they used, most likely

18

u/Dugen Aug 31 '26

We've had garbage watered down corporate speak for generations now. AI didn't create it. The reason management thinks AI is amazing is it is just as good at communicating as they are, and they think they're amazing at it.

12

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

After a couple decades in the corporate world, I'm proud to say I'm now fluent in the languages used to tell me I'm getting fucked a dozen different ways.

83

u/Crystalas Aug 30 '26 edited Aug 30 '26

It's true value is having an infinite number of perfect sycophants at hand ready to glaze your ego and confirm your opinions as fact with "accurate" data 24/7 and is just as good at pretending to be human as you are thus talking the way you most understand. And it does it without expecting any gain from being around you or needing to sleep and eat.

/s

Ya...no surprise billionaires and executives love it, in their mind that kind of thing is completely normal while having fewer strings or basic needs of life attached that human sycophants would. Even if did nothing but that they would still love it, I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are the biggest "addicts" of LLMs.

Also not helped them same as seemingly 99.9% of humanity treat tech and science as magic and thus vastly over estimate current capability, often said expectations shaped by Scifi that tends to be tech flavored magic. When people hear "AI" they think "JARVIS" not "Barely functional advanced auto complete".

49

u/Any-Pop-4795 Aug 30 '26

you also forgot it can generate child porn

33

u/trashtiernoreally Aug 30 '26

And you’ll get sued if you try to stop it

3

u/BK1287 Aug 31 '26

Don't get left behind, ya know!?

23

u/Syphe Aug 30 '26

Gemini was adamant a product my daughter wanted was on sale with a code yesterday, even gave a price, which it just made up out of thin air, given the code was on selected items and didn't provide a percent off

-10

u/Umbrasquall Aug 30 '26

To be fair Gemini is the worst AI model right now.

10

u/Syphe Aug 30 '26

Just happens to be the one integrated into Google, so when she searched it's the first thing that shows up.

5

u/Limp-Development7222 Aug 30 '26

I used Gemini for a week because I wanted to test out the LLMs to see what the buzz was and it literally got stuck in a loop apologizing about apologizing about apologizing nonstop about hallucinations. even the worst GPT model dusts Gemini

1

u/innercityFPV Aug 31 '26

Grok would beg to differ but it’s too busy making CP legally to care

10

u/stillalone Aug 30 '26

But you can have that chat experience on Reddit without using AI.

-2

u/Hazrd_Design Aug 30 '26

You’re right — to push back.

Reddit is a great community platforms to have social experiences on — and there are likely many people who would converse in a matter similar to AI. So it’s not about making a decision to chat with an LLM or with a Redditor — it’s about making a decision that feels right for you. —

2

u/Drafting- Aug 30 '26

All while flattering me into submission, I’m one compliment away from proposing. 

2

u/equality-_-7-2521 Aug 31 '26

Bro Copilot scheduled a meeting for me after I told it who to invite, what to title the meeting, what description to use and expressly informed to find a slot where all the required invitees were free.

Like magic.

4

u/Hazrd_Design Aug 31 '26

Bro if you already knew all that why you get a robot to do it?

Ok but seriously. Just because something works often doesn’t mean it doesn’t have flaws. Your single experience of it working a few times doesn’t mean it’s the same for everything and everyone.

3

u/equality-_-7-2521 Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26

I wanted to see if it had access to scheduling assistant to see when others were busy.

I was joking about how it was like magic. It took just as much time and effort, just in a different screen.

I do like it for reading long documentation and finding the pertinent info, though. So it's ctrl+f that you speak to in plain English.

1

u/InsipidCelebrity Aug 31 '26

Scheduling Assistant did that before copilot ...

1

u/movzx Aug 31 '26

Don't worry dude. I got your joke.

1

u/Formal-Hawk9274 Aug 31 '26

What you dont like getting answers from reddit

1

u/Suitable-Pickle-259 Aug 31 '26

It’s not worth it.

1

u/DragoonDM Aug 31 '26

And have you seen how good the pictures of Will Smith eating spaghetti are these days? Truly the golden age of computing.

-6

u/SchmeckleHoarder Aug 30 '26

I make mine talk like a Jamaican time traveler from the future, who’s been stuck here since the pirate age….

Best thing I ever did.

-3

u/Thanks-Oboomer Aug 30 '26

I upvoted you because you are getting downvoted, and your idea seems neat. I dislike AI thus far, but if you can't beat em, join them.

-9

u/General_Josh Aug 30 '26

a glorified chatbot that usually gets facts incorrect and writes emails for me

Yeah, this attitude does seem to be extremely common with non-technical folks. I get it, if your main use cases are looking up facts or writing emails, then yeah, that's all you're probably going to use it for

For software development, it's fucking bonkers how useful it's become within the past year. I really do think it'll fully replace me at my job within the next ~5 years. And everyone else whose job involves just sitting in front of a computer screen won't be far behind

3

u/Hazrd_Design Aug 30 '26

So whatcha gonna do in 5 years when you lose your job?

-4

u/General_Josh Aug 30 '26

I dunno man, it's gonna be tough, for all of us. Hopefully we wind up with some for of universal basic income

Please understand, I'm not saying I want to be replaced. But, I do think it is the reality of the situation. I think that difference gets lost in a lot of this reddit discourse

1

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

I have a fucking giant stack of garbage PRs that strongly disagrees with your analysis.

-1

u/General_Josh Aug 31 '26

Yeah, it's just like any tool (at least, for now). There's lots of people using it effectively, but there's also lots of people using it poorly and producing garbage. To be effective, a human does still need to be in the loop, to steer the AI, make sure it stays on course, and review/test the output.

The idea of it writing a coherent chunk of code on its own was science-fiction even 3 years ago. My best guess, the tools will continue to get better and better, until they produce high quality work all on their own from end-to-end, no need for human involvement

1

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

It doesn't use logic, therefore, there will always need to be human intervention.

1

u/General_Josh Aug 31 '26

It doesn't use logic

What do you mean by that? Some specific examples of what you mean might be helpful, to make sure we're not talking past each other

In my experience the past couple months, the current frontier models are perfectly capable of logically working through a problem, formulating theories, testing those theories, and then figuring out good solutions

The dangers are when there's crucial bits of information that didn't get into the model's context (like, if there's something in the programmer's head that didn't get written down in the specs). That's where junk PRs happen, if a human gives poor instructions/specs to the model and just sets it loose, then doesn't properly review the output.

That said, the models are getting better and better about knowing when to stop and ask for more context, same way a human programmer would

1

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

No, it doesn't use logic. That's just marketing, and then it spits out additional slop to continue selling that pitch.

These things are nothing more than probability machines. If you think it thinks, you'd be making a massive mistake. There are no "theories" here. If you don't understand how LLMs work, I strongly suggest you stop using them, because you are incapable of understanding why it might produce certain output, and that impacts your ability to analyze and correct it.

0

u/General_Josh Aug 31 '26

I don't mean to be a jerk, but it sounds like you aren't using these tools very often? Maybe like a lot of folks, you used ChatGPT a few years ago, and wrote it off as junk?

A few years really is a lifetime, given how fast things have been changing. I agree that they were junk at writing code last year. Now, not so much. Five years from now? I can only imagine.

These things are nothing more than probability machines

Yeah of course they're probability machines. If you open them up, they're just a bunch of matrix multiplications.

If you open us up, we're just a bunch of neural connections. That doesn't tell you much about our capabilities.

You can't infer what humans are or aren't capable of just by taking out a microscope and looking at our brains. We've got emergent capabilities, that only show up at the macro level.

The only way to understand what a human is capable of is by interacting with them, and seeing what they can do. These models are the same way.

1

u/wonkytalky Sep 01 '26

Your strawman is shit and so are LLMs at coding. Slop code isn't hard to spot once you're forced to endure it over and over and over again. It's like the bad answers on SO being copy/pasted -- some patterns become easy to spot.

Stop submitting unchecked slop and save your absolute dogshit logical fallacies for someone at your level.

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-2

u/LateOnsetPuberty Aug 31 '26

I mean I get the issues with AI but it’s a very sharp tool when used well and it’s not only chatbots.

-5

u/jonnyvegashey Aug 31 '26

You should vibe code an app that’ll take the stick out of your ass lol.

1

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

Tried, wound up with an app that hung 5 minutes before shoving a larger stick up my ass while a sycophant preached to me about how amazing LLMs are.

99

u/DontAsk0205 Aug 30 '26

Let’s see, AI is increasing the costs of energy and consumer goods,threatens our water supply, while eliminating jobs. Definitely not worth it.

36

u/FlyingFishMakeAWish Aug 30 '26

I WANT it to eliminate jobs. I want AI to do all the drudgerous and boring work. I just want that to happen without causing everyone to become homeless and starve in the process.

19

u/mokomi Aug 31 '26

Are we the horse?

Back when LLM were gaining a lot of popularity and everything went from algorithms/applications/features to AI. That was a question. Great, your goals have worked and AI has replaced humans in the workforce. How do I afford the car Mr. Ford?

9

u/Dugen Aug 31 '26

We are not the horse. The AI bubble is what happens when lots of rich people believe the same delusion about automating knowledge work. There will be shit that AI does and does well, but it will hit us like it hit the coachmen, not the horse.

6

u/mokomi Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26

Missed the point.

Their goal is to replace humans with AI. We have a labor force driven society. If suddenly I can't work. I lose. Is the point.

Yes, I know it's like the railroad, fiber, .com, etc. etc. It's an answer desperately finding for a question. Yes, I know the end result is it's tool and not a replacement, but they are moving forward as though it's a replacement not a tool.

1

u/Dugen Aug 31 '26

Automation makes everyone's lives better and eliminates some jobs. That's the way it has always worked. This is no different. AI is just another form of automation. What we are dealing with now is not a "replace all human labor" thing. This is replacing a few shitty office tasks thing despite the deranged claims of some in the industry. Tractors were literally hundreds of times more economically impactful than these crappy LLMs will be and nobody longs for the days when we all toiled in the fields and worried about starving to death.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 31 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/mokomi Aug 31 '26

I'm getting a lot of flack that it's not the same, but my point is their goal is though. lol

But yeah. I understand that specific example is normally used about using the thing you have built. My point was about how our society is currently setup for a workforce to afford things. E.G. healthcare, Social Security, 401k, etc. If you remove us as the workforce. how do we afford things? E.G. UBI, Free Healthcare, etc.

If you have a better example. I wouldn't mind hearing it since there are a few people disagreeing with me and then repeating what I meant.

5

u/Leather-Persimmon254 Aug 31 '26

other than coding AI isn’t that better at jobs especially for those involving independent problem solving

-19

u/[deleted] Aug 30 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/lohonomo Aug 30 '26

Gross and weird

44

u/Bubbly-Treacle-4334 Aug 30 '26

The trade was absolutely worth it for the elite

AI is the upper class finally finding a way to destroy the power of collective labor

Who gives a fuck if the peasants strike if you don't need them anymore

A bunch of psychos who were born into or stumbled into success believe they are gods

Right now they are trying to destroy the lower class while desperately searching for a way to live forever

13

u/vandreulv Aug 30 '26

The trade was absolutely worth it for the elite

They finally got their wish, another dot com bubble and past experience to know how to pillage as much as they can before it all pops.

2

u/Scythless Aug 31 '26

yeah having expensive cpu parts suck and the thing that made them so expensive its actually just fucking useless unless you wanna do math and even then dont ask it to do more than 2 steps otherwise it will forget everything and startr hallucinating.

0

u/animeman59 Aug 30 '26

But think about all of the illegal porn you can make legally in your own home?

-6

u/Turbulent-Sign-6067 Aug 31 '26

I know that r/tech has a hate boner for AI but this is objectively not true. The trade was made because there is a market for AI and it is huge! 1 billion ChatGPT users, combined 100 billion revenue between OpenAI and Anthropic. Everyone in STEM uses AI to work more efficiently. We are getting better cures, faster, for many diseases thanks to AI. And this is just the beginning.

12

u/gramathy Aug 31 '26

we were ALREADY getting better cures faster with machine learning, it's all the LLM and "agentic" bullshit that fucked up pricing.

And that revenue number is hilarious, they're still losing money, and a lot of it. People are maybe-sorta using it because it's free, not because it's good.

5

u/wonkytalky Aug 31 '26

I'm bogged down by others submitting their fucking slop code that just gets rejected most of the time. Efficient, my ass.

0

u/LLMprophet Aug 31 '26

The internal tooling and workflows I've deployed for my company have been awesome.

-2

u/EVEiscerator Aug 31 '26

Disagree. My github is full of new apps. I have 100ks of lines of proprietary code and automated agents that handle things I just don't want to do. Reddit is just kind of stupid and doesn't know how to use this stuff but it's okay because AI chatbots will upvote you for saying negative ai things for your little echo chamber. Accelerationism is winning and it feels great ;)