[walterbell]

It took about 25 years for the cycle from Napster -> MP3 players -> flash memory -> smartphones -> big data -> big GPUs -> LLMs and generative AI -> OpenAI buying 100% of remaining memory wafer capacity from SK Hynix and Samsung = little left for the edge, with 100% price hikes for consumer DIMMs.

https://openai.com/index/samsung-and-sk-join-stargate/

> Samsung Electronics and SK hynix plan to scale up production of advanced memory chips, targeting 900,000 DRAM wafer starts per month at an accelerated capacity rollout, critical for powering OpenAI’s advanced AI models.

We need a new "Napster moment" to restart supply chain investment and business models at the edge. Humanoid robotics might qualify, since robots will need low-latency responses to local sensor input.

Another factor in edge vs. mainframe economics is the cost of energy in each location.