[tcdent]

Something people don't seem to see, and not that it's placed directly in front of you, is that pacing the release and adoption of AI is already happening.

Cost-per-token determines the economic viability of tasks that AI gets applied to. How many tokens would it take to automate all of the responsibilities of a gas station clerk? Probably more than their hourly wage. Job safe.

A slightly larger stretch, that most people attribute to profit margins (labs do not have profit margins, they have unlimited invested capital and no expectation of short-term returns), is the flat-rate billing plans of most code products. Why doesn't Anthropic have a 50x or 100x Max plan? Not that it's impossible, that it releases tokens into the workforce at a greater rate (note that their are hour, day, week limits across most of these services as well).

Hypothetical, but reasoned, and I do not expect most agree with me. If compute as a variable is inferred, this supports the incorporation a deliberate (redundant) one as well.

[alach11]

I agree with the substance of your comment that token economics pace the diffusion of AI into the labor market. But I think they have a much smaller influence over the pace of the frontier, right?

[tcdent]

Fair point! I guess I read "pacing the frontier" as "pacing the release of the frontier" surely no lab's internal research team is just going to stop innovating?