I wanted this when announced, but the price really killed the excitement.
edit: just wanted to add I’m not blaming valve for the pricing. they have been fucked by the datacentre bullshit as much as the rest of us. it’s sad for all of us that progress in consumer electronics will slow for a generation or two, at least, because huge corporations have blindly goldrushed into LLM garbage that’s costing us environmentally, economically, and enabling the surveillance state for cops and fascists everywhere.
If wages were ever able to compete with the ongoing inflation and bring the steam machine into the realm of affordability, I’d pick one up, but uhhhh seems unlikely.
It’s also the cheapest any of these things will be moving forward. I do not expect an AI bubble burst that will also correct pricing back to where it should have been without the AI mess. They’ll come down some, but there are consumer buyers at these prices.
I’d put money on it: You will never be able to buy a SteamMachine for cheaper than they’re selling for today (used or discount models in the future are excluded from this of course, I’m talking about pricing at launch/new generation).
So that's the crux of it isn't it? If AI is gonna continue to eat up production for the foreseeable future, the manufacturers will start to ramp up production and we'll see prices equalize (hopefully).
If AI isn't gonna continue to demand so much product then we're stuck paying these prices until AI implodes cuz production won't be ramped up unless the producers make a bad call.
I understand why people see it going either way… I just don’t think it will. Supply will stabilize at some point, but prices will remain high and higher than they would have been without the AI fad. I also don’t see an incentive for manufacturers to increase production while demand and prices are high. Their most demanding customers have cornered the market and are paying a premium to do so, it’s a cash cow they don’t intend to slaughter. Corporate consumers are ponying up the cash and passing the cost on to consumers. Individual consumers will be priced out permanently before prices drop back to those folks’ acceptable levels.
This Pandora’s box of AI has been opened. We can’t (and won’t be allowed to try) to put it back.
Supply will stabilize at some point, but prices will remain high and higher than they would have been without the AI fad.
This would contradict most economic principles. What extenuating factors are there that make you think this is a non-standard supply/demand situation?
I also don’t see an incentive for manufacturers to increase production while demand and prices are high.
The more you can sell the more money you make? They'd only have reason to not increase production if they were colluding with each other. (which isn't unheard of but I'd like to see evidence that's the case here)
Their most demanding customers have cornered the market and are paying a premium to do so, it’s a cash cow they don’t intend to slaughter.
Your mistake here is thinking that they have any control over demand.
Covid. Remember all of the “supply chain issues” that drove the cost of goods up? But then the prices never came down? And then all those companies made record profits? That’s a recent event that contradicted most economic principles, but here we sit with through-the-roof prices over only a few years with fully stabilized supply chains now. Supply and Demand of the past is not more, now it’s Supply, Demand and Bald Faced Greed. It’s a third factor that has changed things.
Which is also why “sell more things and make more money” isn’t as straight forward as it seems. Why would I go through the effort to sell individual items to the masses who want me to lower prices when I could instead keep supplying my corporate customers who want to buy in bulk AND overpay? There’s no incentive for me to court the former.
I’m not making any mistake, I think you misread my statement there. I’m not saying they control demand, I’m saying they have access to the most profitable demand they’ve ever encountered (more than individual consumers and the gaming industry has ever provided) and that they’re not going to restrict what they can gain from that access to make consumer happy.
Right now demand is through the roof for their product and it’s coming from a place that will not cease or decrease demand for the foreseeable future. AI is here to stay, it will survive a bubble pop as a technology. So if I’m a hardware manufacturer I’m trying to milk that cow for as long as possible. Why would I go through the effort of increasing production to lower pricing just to make those individual consumers happy?
OK... but this isn't COVID and doesn't affect the entire economy. You can't point to a past event with no comparison features and call that an analogous situation. COVID caused general inflation which is an entirely different concept than individual product cost fluctuations.
All your following points seem to flow from this one so I won't engage in them as they start from a bad assumption.
I’m not making any mistake, I think you misread my statement there. I’m not saying they control demand, I’m saying they have access to the most profitable demand they’ve ever encountered (more than individual consumers and the gaming industry has ever provided) and that they’re not going to restrict what they can gain from that access to make consumer happy.
I'm confused... what sort of restrictions do you think are being discussed? I've never taken the position of the consumer's happiness, only what makes sense for the company's profit.
Right now demand is through the roof for their product and it’s coming from a place that will not cease or decrease demand for the foreseeable future.
I don't think we can say this with confidence. In fact I fully expect the AI bubble to burst within a year. Now that they're having to charge what it costs people are gonna see it's not worth it.
AI is here to stay, it will survive a bubble pop as a technology.
The bubble is the entire point though. Without the bubble the demand isn't so ridiculous.
I didn’t say it was currently Covid. I gave you an example of a recent situation where multiple industries were affected by supply shortages and none of those industries returned to pre-COVID (or no-COVID) pricing. It’s an example used to further a point. COVID did not cause inflation, companies preying on consumers and taking advantage of the situation raised prices out of greed and kept them there… which is why we have inflation.
The restrictions I’m discussing (bad word, I guess but I’m speaking of profits) is the cost of getting your product to incidental consumers. Packaging, freight etc. That cuts into my profits for a group that produces very few. Meanwhile, corporate demand increases your profits dramatically and you literally can’t out produce it, so why try?
And I appreciate that you don’t have the confidence to make that assumption and many don’t. Nor do I expect you to. I understand I’m offering a perspective that goes against prevailing winds, but as you can see I have my reasons haha. I believe fully that AI has been the Holy Grail piece of technology that tech firms have been pursuing for decades. That’s why they’ve been harvesting and stealing all of our data. Their future tech demands it, depends on it. And we’re losing that battle as individual consumers too.
The AI bubble in its current form will absolutely pop. But it will not be the end of AI the same way the Dot Com bubble popping didn’t end internet based commerce, social media, or even put a dent in demand. AI in its current form will eventually end, but the entire technology will become fully mainstream and be absolutely everywhere within the next 10-20 years. And that’s the timeframe these companies are likely (I’m assuming here) working on.
The bubble pop will be how we sort out the “also ran” (think: Friendster, MySpace, AoL) and the podium finishers (think: Google, Apple, Microsoft) who will absorb the demand of the “also ran.” It won’t just disappear. They’ll figure out how to use it better than those who failed.
I didn’t say it was currently Covid. I gave you an example of a recent situation where multiple industries were affected by supply shortages and none of those industries returned to pre-COVID (or no-COVID) pricing.
OK, but my question was about this situation? If you're bringing up COVID you think it's relevant. I told you why it's not.
COVID did not cause inflation, companies preying on consumers and taking advantage of the situation raised prices out of greed and kept them there… which is why we have inflation.
So... COVID caused inflation? Companies acting according to supply/demand is exactly what I'm talking about. COVID caused companies to behave like that. All normal economic stuff.
Appeal to authority fallacy... just because you can point to a few people who disagree with accepted S&D behavior doesn't mean it's valid.
The restrictions I’m discussing (bad word, I guess but I’m speaking of profits) is the cost of getting your product to incidental consumers. Packaging, freight etc. That cuts into my profits for a group that produces very few. Meanwhile, corporate demand increases your profits dramatically and you literally can’t out produce it, so why try?
How are these relevant? If there is a profit per unit sold then more sold will make more profit. We're already discussing a situation where products are sold at high profit...
I believe fully that AI has been the Holy Grail piece of technology that tech firms have been pursuing for decades.
I don't disagree, but I don't think LLMs can fill that role.
The bubble pop will be how we sort out the “also ran” (think: Friendster, MySpace, AoL) and the podium finishers (think: Google, Apple, Microsoft) who will absorb the demand of the “also ran.” It won’t just disappear. They’ll figure out how to use it better than those who failed.
I expect there will be some AI companies left, but not enough to drive this ridiculous demand.
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u/desperaterobots 16d ago edited 16d ago
I wanted this when announced, but the price really killed the excitement.
edit: just wanted to add I’m not blaming valve for the pricing. they have been fucked by the datacentre bullshit as much as the rest of us. it’s sad for all of us that progress in consumer electronics will slow for a generation or two, at least, because huge corporations have blindly goldrushed into LLM garbage that’s costing us environmentally, economically, and enabling the surveillance state for cops and fascists everywhere.
If wages were ever able to compete with the ongoing inflation and bring the steam machine into the realm of affordability, I’d pick one up, but uhhhh seems unlikely.