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Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 1d

Tomorrow: The AI Bubble is built on impossible promises. GPUs die in 5 years, nobody has built a 1GW data center, and they have the power to do so. Stargate Abilene won't have enough power before 2028.

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edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo...

Everybody is very casual with how they talk about Sam Altman’s theoretical promises of trillions of dollars of data center infrastructure, and I'm not sure anybody realizes how difficult even the very basics of this plan will be.
Nevertheless, everybody is happily publishing stories about how “Stargate Abilene Texas - OpenAI’s massive data center with Oracle - is open,” by which they mean two buildings, and I’m not even confident both of them are providing compute to OpenAI yet. There are six more of them that need to get built for this thing to start rocking at 1.2GW - even though it’s only 1.1GW according to my sources in Abilene.
But, hey, sorry - one minute - while we’re on that subject, did anybody visiting Abilene in the last week or so ever ask whether they’ll have enough power there?
Don’t worry, you don’t need to look - I’m sure you were just about to, and had simply been busy! - but I did the hard work for you and read up on it, and it turns out that Stargate Abilene only has 200 megawatts of power - a 200 megawatt substation that, according to my sources, has only been built within the last couple of months, with 350 Megawatt of gas turbine generators that connect to a natural gas power plant that might get built by the end of the year in the event that one of the multiple construction firms involved . Said turbine is extremely expensive, featuring volatile pricing (for context, volatility fell in Q2 2025…to 69% annualized, meaning that if you had these prices across the entirety of a year you’d see swings of 69% up or down) and even more volatile environmental consequences, and is, while permitted for it (this will download the PDF of the permit), impractical and expensive to use long-term.
Analyst James van Geelen, founder of Citrini Research recently said on Bloomberg’s Odd Lots podcast that these are “not the really good natural gas turbines” because the really good ones would take seven years to deliver due to a natural gas turbine shortage.
But th…

$Stargate Abilene does not have sufficient power to run at even half of its supposed IT load of 1.2GW, and at its present capacity - assuming that the gas turbines function at full power - can only hope to run 370MW to 460MW of IT load. I’ve seen article after article about the gas turbines and their use of fracked gas - a disgusting and wasteful act typical of OpenAI - but nobody appears to have asked “how much power does a 1.2GW data center require?” and then chased it with “how much power does Stargate Abilene have?” The answer is not enough, and the significance of said “not enough” is remarkable. Today, I’m going to tell you, at length, how impossible the future of generative AI is. Gigawatt data centers are a ridiculous pipe dream, one that runs face-first into the walls of reality. The world’s governments and media have been far too cavalier with the term “gigawatt,” casually breezing by the fact that Altman’s plans require 17 or more nuclear reactors’ worth of power, as if building power is quick and easy and cheap and just happens. I believe that many of you think that this is an issue of permitting - of simply throwing enough money at the problem - when we are in the midst of a shortage in the electrical grade steel and transformers required to expand America (and the world’s) power grid. I realize it’s easy to get blinded by the constant drumbeat of “gargoyle-like tycoon cabal builds 1 gigawatt data center” and feel that they will simply overwhelm the problem with money, but no, I’m afraid that isn’t the case at all, and all of this is so silly, so ridiculous, so cartoonishly bad that it threatens even the seemingly-infinite wealth of Elon Musk, with xAI burning over a billion dollars a month and planning to spend tens of billions of dollars building the Colossus 2 data center, dragging two billion dollars from SpaceX in his desperate quest to burn as much money as possible for no reason. This is the age of hubris - a time in which we are going to watc…$

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Reposted by mid hatfield

Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 1d

Every single AI data center is a toxic investment, with most of its value tied up in GPUs that will be multiple generations behind by the time these things turn on - and then die in 3-5 years.

All to build for AI demand that doesn't exist.
edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo...

Actually, wait - how long do GPUs last, exactly? Four years for training? Three years? The A100 GPU started shipping in May 2020, and the H100 (and the Hopper GPU generation) entered full production in September 2022, meaning that we’re hurtling at speed toward the time in which we’re going to start seeing a remarkable amount of chips start wearing down, which should be a concern for companies like Microsoft, who bought 150,000 Hopper GPUs in 2023 and 485,000 of them in 2024.
Alright, let me just be blunt: the entire economy of debt around GPUs is insane.
Assuming these things don’t die within five years (their warranties generally end in three), their value absolutely will, as NVIDIA has committed to releasing a new AI chip every single year, likely with significant increases to power and power efficiency. At the end of the five year period, the Special Purpose Vehicle will be the proud owner of five-year-old chips that nobody is going to want to rent at the price that Elon Musk has been paying for the last five years. Don’t believe me? Take a look at the rental prices for H100 GPUs that went from $8-an-hour in 2023 to $2-an-hour in 2024, or the Silicon Data Indexes (aggregated realtime indexes of hourly prices) that show H100 rentals at around $2.14-an-hour and A100 rentals at a dollar-an-hour, with Vast.AI offering them at as little as $0.67 an hour.
This is, by the way, a problem that faces literally every data center being built in the world, and I feel insane talking about it. It feels like nobody is talking about how impossible and ridiculous all of this is - it’s one thing that OpenAI has promised one trillion dollars to people - it’s another that large swaths of that will be spent on hardware that will, by the end of these agreements, be half-obsolete and generating less revenue than ever.
Think about it - let’s assume we live in a fantasy land where OpenAI is somehow able to pay Oracle $300 billion over 5 years. Said money is paying for access to Blackwell…

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Kill James Bond! @killjamesbond.bsky.social · 10h

BA DA BA DAAAAA

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HOW MANY CIGARETTES?????????? @howmanycigarettes.com · 4d

Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999) - 1:11:58
Dir. Michael Patrick Jann
Runtime 98 minutes
🚬 x 39, or one cigarette every 2.51 minutes
⚠️ REAL SMOKER MOVIE ⚠️
https://howmanycigarettes.com/drop-dead-gorgeous/

A cigarette from Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999) - 1:11:58

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HOW MANY CIGARETTES?????????? @howmanycigarettes.com · 1d

Heavy Metal Parking Lot (1986) - 0:03:30
Dir. Jeff Krulik, John Heyn
Runtime 17 minutes
🚬 x 30, or one cigarette every 0.57 minutes
⚠️ REAL SMOKER MOVIE ⚠️
https://howmanycigarettes.com/heavy-metal-parking-lot/

A cigarette from Heavy Metal Parking Lot (1986) - 0:03:30

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HOW MANY CIGARETTES?????????? @howmanycigarettes.com · 11h

The Beatles: Get Back - Episode 2 (2021) - 2:15:24
Dir. Peter Jackson
Runtime 173 minutes
🚬 x 138, or one cigarette every 1.25 minutes
⚠️ REAL SMOKER MOVIE ⚠️
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A cigarette from The Beatles: Get Back - Episode 2 (2021) - 2:15:24

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soft, black underbelly @upfromsumdirt.bsky.social · 22h

*shameless plug*

patsy graces the cover of crys's memoir with recipes, Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts and is the anchor for the essays within it.... available every single where.

makes a great holiday gift! 😊

photo of two brown hands holding a hardcover copy of the book, Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts by Crystal Wilkinson, featuring a picture of 4 golden brown biscuits beside a vintage sepia-toned photo of a black woman in a dress.

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heck's maniac @bug-deal.bsky.social · 11h

these goofballs! it's almost like they aren't motivated to win!!

Matthew Sheffield @matthew.flux.community · 12h

You may not realize this, but Democrats have *more money* available to them than Republicans do.

But Republicans are fucking masters at efficiency and network marketing. They maximize every dollar.

Democratic organizations keep hiring the same failed consultants. They need new blood.

Kamala Harris raised $488 million more than Donald Trump | World News - The Times of India

US News: Explore the dramatic fundraising figures between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in the 2024 Presidential race. Harris raises $633 million, while Trump secures $145 million. Discover key donor...

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

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heck's maniac @bug-deal.bsky.social · 11h

huh. weird. they sure are making silly mistakes!! by accident!! forever!!

Matthew Sheffield @matthew.flux.community · 11h

The most galling fact about obsolete Democratic spending is that instead of helping build up a center-to-left ecosystem, 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐜𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬𝐥𝐲 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭-𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚.

Most Dem ads go to local TV news. They are putting billions of dollars in the pockets of Fox, Sinclair, Nexstar, etc!

WTAF

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Molly! @ DS9 @mollinko.bsky.social · 24d

Bonus

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Molly! @ DS9 @mollinko.bsky.social · 24d

DS9 DOODLES #startrek #ds9

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Appalachian Mycologist @mycologist.bsky.social · 15h

Making a lion's mane based "crab" bisque (vegan version) tomorrow night from a recent forage.

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Rowan @dalzell.bsky.social · 12h

Yellow split peas, way nicer than green, plus a honkin ton of baby potatoes and then whatever else, who cares. It thickens up to damn near solid, I love it so much!

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 11h

YUM! I do something similar but with red lentils, potatoes, and a ton of ginger & curry powder

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 13h

Oooh, hell yeah. That sounds amazing.

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Lt. 👻 Ripley @emilias.bsky.social · 16h

Red lentil with everything (vegan)

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Renée has an MA @artemisnee.bsky.social · 16h

I’m not the only one using the phrase SOUP SEASON! I’ve already made paste e fagioli and chili (southwestern style).

mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 17h

SOUP SEASON! Where my soup heads at? Please tell me about your favorite soups for fall.

Chantal James @chantalalive.blacksky.app · 18h

The chill is here. And no it's not just a chilly day. It's chilly now. It's the season of chill.

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Freesh Avocadoo @elliotthausen.bsky.social · 17h

I just made a pinto bean, kielbasa, and “clean out the fridge of veggies” soup in the crock pot yesterday

mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 17h

SOUP SEASON! Where my soup heads at? Please tell me about your favorite soups for fall.

Chantal James @chantalalive.blacksky.app · 18h

The chill is here. And no it's not just a chilly day. It's chilly now. It's the season of chill.

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 15h

HELL YEAH, DOGG

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 15h

Oh man, I should check to see if my favorite Mexican place has started its seasonal pozole yet 🤤

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Reposted by mid hatfield

Katie Jercov’s Ghost @kate678.bsky.social · 17h

Pozole
Tom Kha Gai
Bun Bo Hue
MD crab & corn
Leftover smoked turkey gumbo
Pastrami end borscht
Chowdah
Tonkotsu ramen
Ham hock & beans w/greens
French Onion
Southwestern black bean
L’escudella amb carn d’olla
Sopa de ajo
Caldo verde
Picana

send $$ bc ig now I have to make groceries

mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 17h

SOUP SEASON! Where my soup heads at? Please tell me about your favorite soups for fall.

Chantal James @chantalalive.blacksky.app · 18h

The chill is here. And no it's not just a chilly day. It's chilly now. It's the season of chill.

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 15h

Oooh, that looks delicious

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Reposted by mid hatfield

Scott agrees: FREE LINK @scottdagostino.ca · 17h

Potato Bacon, there’s nothing more hearty 🥣

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mid hatfield @midhatfield.bsky.social · 17h

Yum! I do love anything soup based and/or potato based. I cohabitate with a vegetarian, so I'm typically doing a cheddar broccoli potato soup. Always delicious.

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🐼 max panda 🐼 @mojoquix.bsky.social · 17h

soup is my favorite. i eat it all year. every week i make something i call wizard soup. it’s always a little different but i’ve always got my cauldron and wooden spoon, a pound of heirloom beans, onions, garlic, carrots, celery and then it’s just what i have around and vibes. soup is pure magic.

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