Technology

My most recent hobby has been an old Suzuki Samurai that I dragged out of the woods a few years ago. It doesn't use much RAM. It doesn't even have fuel injection.

I've also been getting back into archery with my kid.

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I think that making it harder to get a computer and play games is a huge miscalculation. If everyone is distracted by Call of Battle: Dutyfield then you have fewer bored assholes casting about for something to do, and if people can still play Factorio, you don't end up with bored, autistic, organized assholes casting about for something to do.

What if the unintentional consequence of hardware hoarding by AI companies is we have fewer devices being made that spy on us, like smart TVs and appliances.

The reason RAM prices went up 4x is that a massive amount of not-yet-manufactured memory was bought with money that doesn't really exist to be put into GPUs that haven't been made yet, to be installed in data centers that haven't been built, powered by infrastructure that may never exist, to satisfy demand that isn't actually there, in order to generate profits that are mathematically impossible.

😎

I think sir misunderstands how malleable my hobbies and interests are and completely fails to see where my priorities are. You can't eat RAM and it will never love you back. It's almost irrelevant even when it's not supply crunch'd.

I already bought all I need for the next 4 years back in 2024. Hopefully it all continues to work.

. . . And then the market will be flooded with RAM that companies preordered and can't pay for, because the AI bubble burst before it could be manufactured.

Hey, I can dream, right? And seriously, I would be quite happy if this causes an increase in dumb appliances, devices, and cars in the meanwhile.

Laughs in AC/DC Model Trains and Battletech

"everything you care about" - Time to change hobbies and care about things that don't have RAM then.

I find myself at a point where I don't actually want any new computing devices, partly because of this, and partly because, well, what I have works fine for me.

I have an M2 MacBook Air that is still as solid as the day I got it (Sequoia for life) for the majority of my personal needs, plus a 2014 Mac mini running Mint as my home server, an M1 Mac Mini my dad gave me that runs my Home Assistant, and an old(er) PC that has a GTX 1060 GPU that's capable of playing most of the games I care to play. My phone is a Pixel 9 running Graphene which is a year old and nowhere needing a replacement, and I have an iPad mini that I barely use these days anyway.

I guess I'm lucky enough that my shit is new enough that it's still usable, and my use-case is light enough on resources that the older gear still works perfectly well for what I need.

My wife, however, needs a new PC...

I would LOVE to believe this will force automakers to return to using buttons instead of touchscreen.

Yeah, I know. But I'd sure love to believe it.

All that means is that I'll start caring about something else. It's RAM, not food or shelter.

On the bright side it's being used to artificially prop up a technology that nobody actually needs or even really wants