Sam Altman has sparked a humorous online backlash after discussing the global allocation of memory chips during an interview on the Cheeky Pint and Stripe YouTube channel.
At around the 29:20 mark, the OpenAI CEO said: “From a global allocation perspective, actually it's quite terrible to have everybody have a bunch of the world's limited DRAM supply sitting in their own computer.”
Altman was making a broader point about the ongoing memory shortage, and the conversation took place after he had been drinking beer. Even so, the remark landed awkwardly at a time when consumers are facing higher prices for electronic devices that use RAM, as demand for AI computing places additional pressure on memory-chip supplies.
Online users responded with memes portraying Altman as trying to take RAM away from home computers, phones and tablets. The prevailing reaction was that people should keep their own memory, particularly after paying high prices for relatively modest amounts such as 16GB.
The interview covers artificial intelligence more broadly, but Altman’s comments about DRAM became the most shareable moment, turning a discussion about resource allocation into a joke about personal computer ownership.
Sources: Mashable.