this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2024
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Companies are going all-in on artificial intelligence right now, investing millions or even billions into the area while slapping the AI initialism on their products, even when doing so seems strange and pointless.

Heavy investment and increasingly powerful hardware tend to mean more expensive products. To discover if people would be willing to pay extra for hardware with AI capabilities, the question was asked on the TechPowerUp forums.

The results show that over 22,000 people, a massive 84% of the overall vote, said no, they would not pay more. More than 2,200 participants said they didn't know, while just under 2,000 voters said yes.

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago

They'll pay for it. When the tech companies decide, it's a thing to make money off & advertise it, all the good ants will buy, buy, buy and the rest of the time they will work, work, work for it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Can't help but think of it as a scheme to steal the consumers' compute time and offload AI training to their hardware...

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I still don’t understand how the buzzword of AI 10x’d all these valuations, when it’s always either: a) exactly what they’ve been doing before, now with a fancy new name b) deliberately shoehorning AI in, in ways with no practical benefit

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Isn’t that the entire point behind what most business people do? The whole goal is to upsell some schmuck by speaking too fast, and mentioning a lot of words that don’t really mean anything. Except the difference now is that the business person in this case is the leadership behind most of the tech industry

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

AI enhanced anything is pointless when everything seems intended to separate you from your money.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

It just doesn't really do anything useful from a layman point of view, besides being a TurboCyberQuantum buzzword.

I've apparently got AI hardware in my tablet, but as far as I'm aware, I've never/mostly never actually used it, nor had much of a use for it. Off the top of my head, I can't think of much that would make use of that kind of hardware, aside from some relatively technical software that is almost as happy running on a generic CPU. Opting for AI capabilities would be paying extra for something I'm not likely to ever make use of.

And the actual stuff that might make use of AI is pretty much abstracted out so far as to be invisible. Maybe the autocorrecting feature on my tablet keyboard is in fact powered by the AI hardware, but from the user perspective, nothing has really changed from the old pre-AI keyboard, other than some additions that could just be a matter of getting newer, more modern hardware/software updates, instead of any specific AI magic.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

I guarantee most this AI bullshit is nothing but a backdoor to harvest more user info, anyway.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

I have no clue why any anybody thought I would pay more for hardware if it goes with some stupid trend that will be blow up in our faces soon or later.

I don't get they AI hype, I see a lot of companies very excited, but I don't believe it can deliver even 30% of what people seem to think.

So no, definitely not paying extra. If I can, I will buy stuff without AI bullshit. And if I cannot, I will simply not upgrade for a couple of years since my current hardware is fine.

In a couple of years either the bubble is going to burst, or they really have put in the work to make AI do the things they claim it will.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Why would I pay more for x company to have a robot half ass the work of all the employees they're gonna cut?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

So the trades have been unknowingly fucking with AI for decades, because of the time honored tradition of fucking with apprentices.

A lot of forums are filled with absolutely unhinged advice, and sprinkled in there is some good advice. If you know what you're doing, you can spot the bullshit.

But if you don't know anything about it, the advice seems perfectly reasonable. There's a skill in giving unhinged advice. Literally you can't get your master cert without convincing at least one apprentice to ask where the board stretcher is.

Do I actually have a dedicated vise for Vaseline when I run a tap cycle or is that old timer bullshit? HOW WOULD YOU POSSIBLY KNOW??

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 month ago (1 children)

AI for IT companies is looking more and more like 3D was for movie industry

All fanfare and overhype, a small handful of examples that do seem a solid step forward with millions others that are just a polished turd. Massive investment for something the market has not demanded

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It's just a gimmick, a new "feature" to justify higher product prices.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

barely a feature, just a buzzword

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

People don't want the hardware if the software sucks.

Why would I need a GPU if the only games that exist to play on it are the equivalent of WildTangent malware games?

If AI matures into something that people actually like, you'll get a different answer here.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago

I would pay extra to make sure that there is no AI anywhere near my hardware.

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