alt Hacker NewsOK got it. I guess this is a good call out or whatever then from you all, but, I gotta say, the point can't help but feel a little incommensurate to the $8.8 billion elephant in the room.. Like even in the original article, this is like a passing point to the overall thing, right?
Like its you want to both say that you agree with the overall point here, but also can't trust that very same conclusion because one part in the article reveals an obvious ignorance. Except no one has been able to actually state the exact ignorance here other than the suggestion that Microsoft is in fact the one losing $3 billion dollars, which doesn't really feel very far from Zitron's original implication anyway given all the stuff he writes!
The problem is that you can't be considered a credible critic of this stuff when you either don't understand accounting or are dishonest to make a point.
Zitron makes too many "mistakes" like this to be taken seriously. In other words, he just isn't the right person to make the "huge AI bubble" argument because he doesn't understand (or he's being dishonest about) the financials.
I wouldn't consider OpenAI's financials to be pretty. There's circularity in the market that is a bit concerning. And while OpenAI's unit economics have improved it's still questionable as to whether the R&D and capex expenditure ever aligns to the business.
But Zitron is too sure of his argument (without the credibility to support that confidence) and is trying to pretend that there's absolutely nothing of value here. My best guess: there's some "irrational exuberance" and malinvestment but there is something real here and the unwind of the irrational exuberance and malinvestment won't be nearly as painful as Zitron believes for a variety of reasons, including the fact that there just isn't enough leverage in play.