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I think the median country GDP is something like $100 Billion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o

I think the median country GDP is something like $100 Billion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) Models are expensive, but they're not that expensive.

telotortium 1y ago
LLM model training costs arise primarily from commodity costs (GPUs and other compute as well as electricity), not locally-provided services, so PPP is not the right statistic to use here. You should use nominal GDP for this instead. According to Wikipedia[0], the median country's nominal GDP (Cyprus) is more like $39B. Still much larger than training costs, but much lower than your PPP GDP number. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomi...
amelius 1y ago
Maybe it checks out if you don't use 1 year as your timeframe for GDP but the number of days required for training.
kordlessagain 1y ago
The median country GDP is approximately $48.8 billion, which corresponds to Uganda at position 90 with $48.769 billion. The largest economy (US) has a GDP of $27.7 trillion. The smallest economy (Tuvalu) has a GDP of $62.3 million. The 48 billion number represents the middle point where half of all countries have larger GDPs and half have smaller GDPs.
- hoseja 1y ago
  Well then you have to agree that $48.8 billion IS "something like $100 billion".
Nicook 1y ago
does anyone even have good estimates for model training?
marcosdumay 1y ago
$100 billion is the best estimate around of how much OpenAI took in investment to build ChatGPT.
- programjames 1y ago
  Maybe for an Australian billion? But in American English it would be $100 million.
  - ash_091 1y ago
    In both Australian and American English a billion is 1,000,000,000 (one thousand million).
- Eisenstein 1y ago
  A top of the line consumer desktop, the Mac Pro, costs $7000. The commonly acknowledged first non-mechanical computer, the ENIAC, cost $400,000, which adjusted for inflation is $6,594,153 (see note). Will AI models follow the same pricing trajectory? Probably not but they no longer cost even close to $100 billion. Note: 1946 CPI = 19.5, 2025 CPI = 321.465 which makes for an increase of 16.49.
  - marcosdumay 1y ago
    > Will AI models follow the same pricing trajectory? If the article is correct, and this is the best way to make them, their price will explode.
    - mr_toad 1y ago
      Step 1: Spend hundreds of billions on AI Step 2: ? Step 3: Profit. It’s not enough to have the biggest model, or the best model per dollar spent, you still need to figure out how to make money with it. It’s not clear than vastly increased expenditure will produce a good ROI.
  - ayewo 1y ago
    It seems all you did was use this formula: CPI{2025} / CPI{1946} * Price{1946} = Price{2025} to obtain the price adjusted for inflation? That is the only way I was able to arrive at the same number you got: $6,594,153.846. TIL.

telotortium 1y ago

LLM model training costs arise primarily from commodity costs (GPUs and other compute as well as electricity), not locally-provided services, so PPP is not the right statistic to use here. You should use nominal GDP for this instead. According to Wikipedia[0], the median country's nominal GDP (Cyprus) is more like $39B. Still much larger than training costs, but much lower than your PPP GDP number. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomi...

amelius 1y ago

Maybe it checks out if you don't use 1 year as your timeframe for GDP but the number of days required for training.

kordlessagain 1y ago

The median country GDP is approximately $48.8 billion, which corresponds to Uganda at position 90 with $48.769 billion. The largest economy (US) has a GDP of $27.7 trillion. The smallest economy (Tuvalu) has a GDP of $62.3 million. The 48 billion number represents the middle point where half of all countries have larger GDPs and half have smaller GDPs.

hoseja 1y ago
Well then you have to agree that $48.8 billion IS "something like $100 billion".

Nicook 1y ago

does anyone even have good estimates for model training?

marcosdumay 1y ago

$100 billion is the best estimate around of how much OpenAI took in investment to build ChatGPT.

programjames 1y ago
Maybe for an Australian billion? But in American English it would be $100 million.
- ash_091 1y ago
  In both Australian and American English a billion is 1,000,000,000 (one thousand million).
Eisenstein 1y ago
A top of the line consumer desktop, the Mac Pro, costs $7000. The commonly acknowledged first non-mechanical computer, the ENIAC, cost $400,000, which adjusted for inflation is $6,594,153 (see note). Will AI models follow the same pricing trajectory? Probably not but they no longer cost even close to $100 billion. Note: 1946 CPI = 19.5, 2025 CPI = 321.465 which makes for an increase of 16.49.
- marcosdumay 1y ago
  > Will AI models follow the same pricing trajectory? If the article is correct, and this is the best way to make them, their price will explode.
  - mr_toad 1y ago
    Step 1: Spend hundreds of billions on AI Step 2: ? Step 3: Profit. It’s not enough to have the biggest model, or the best model per dollar spent, you still need to figure out how to make money with it. It’s not clear than vastly increased expenditure will produce a good ROI.
- ayewo 1y ago
  It seems all you did was use this formula: CPI{2025} / CPI{1946} * Price{1946} = Price{2025} to obtain the price adjusted for inflation? That is the only way I was able to arrive at the same number you got: $6,594,153.846. TIL.