Big Technology Podcast Are AI's Economics Unsustainable? — With Ed Zitron
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Jul 23, 2025 
Ed Zitron, owner of EZPR and host of Better Offline, dives into the unsustainable nature of the generative-AI boom. He critiques OpenAI's massive burn rate and examines the financial viability of AI search technologies compared to traditional giants like Google. The conversation also tackles the soaring infrastructure costs linked to AI projects, the rise of AI companionship, and the ethical concerns surrounding it. Zitron emphasizes the urgent need for transparency and a reality check on AI's economic landscape.
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AI Industry's Unsustainable Economics
- OpenAI and the AI industry are losing billions annually with no clear path to profitability.
- Current revenues are tiny compared to the massive infrastructure and capital expenditures involved.
Search as Product vs. Business
- Search as a product differs sharply from search as a business with massive advertising infrastructure.
- OpenAI’s ChatGPT is better at understanding queries but lacks the full advertising and infrastructure model Google has.
Limits of AI Code Co-Pilots
- Code co-pilots offer value by speeding developers but do not replace them due to model hallucinations.
- AI coding tools improve productivity but will not disrupt the software engineering profession entirely.