Slate Daily Feed What Next: TBD | Is the A.I. Bubble Bursting?
Sep 5, 2025
Ed Zitron, author of the newsletter Where’s Your Ed At and host of Better Offline, shares his critical insights on the current state of artificial intelligence. He discusses the potential bursting of the A.I. bubble, drawing parallels to past tech booms. Zitron highlights the financial struggles of companies like OpenAI and the unrealistic expectations investors have about generative A.I.'s profitability. With a sharp focus on the skepticism surrounding inflated valuations, he warns of the societal implications if these technologies aren’t implemented sustainably.
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LLMs Are Economically Unsustainable
- Large language models (LLMs) are economically unsustainable and have become a load-bearing but unprofitable part of the economy.
- Ed Zitron argues they steal value, burn environmental resources, and require massive subsidies to run.
Hype Without Revenue Signals A Bubble
- Companies hype AI's future value while avoiding clear revenue disclosure, repeating bubble dynamics from crypto and the metaverse.
- Zitron warned in 2024 that AI investment has become a runaway speculative bubble.
Backlash For Early Bubble Warnings
- Ed Zitron faced strong backlash for predicting an AI bubble and was called a crank and contrarian.
- He remained vocal because he believes the hype ignores fundamental economic problems.