> We may reach a point where the only ones able to afford compute are AI companies

Nah. I think "good enough AI for 95% of people" will be able to run locally within 3-5 years on consumer-accessible devices. There will be concentration of the best compute in AI companies for training, but inference will always become cheaper over time. Decommissioned training chips will also become inference chips, adding even more compute capacity to inference.

This is like computing once again. In 1990 only the upper class could afford computers, as of 2000 only the upper class owned mobile phones, as of now more or less everyone and their kid has these things.

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hn_acc1 2 hours ago | parent [-]

1990? We were solid lower-middle class, and I got a computer for Christmas in 1983. I bought my own, from $$ saved by working in 1987.

	▲	Karrot_Kream an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Computers were roughly ~ $1000 in 1990. How did your lower-middle class family justify a $1000 expenditure inflation adjusted to $2565 today? Average minimum wage in the US is $11.30 so that's 29 days working at minimum wage. My family was on the border of upper-lower and lower-middle and we bought a computer once and used it for 10+ years. I dumpster dove later to scavenge parts for upgrading until the mid 2000s when cheap computers became available.