AI costs millions of dollars to be humble.
Open CEO Sam Altman last week confirmed that the open -power bill was “tens of millions of dollars” because people’s humble chat is polite.
Last week, an X -user posted: “I wonder how much money the Open has lost in power costs from people saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’.” This post has been viewed 5.7 million times as per press time.
The next day, Altman replied: “Millions of dollars spent tens – you never know.”
Tens of millions of dollars spent well-you never know
– Sam Altman (@SAMA) April 16, 2025
In February, a publisher, a Future, said 67 % of people using AI in the United States are polite for a chatboat. One of the five respondents of this group (18 %) said they say “please” and “thank you” to protect themselves in the event of a possible AI coup. The remaining 82 % said they were polite just because it was “good” for someone, AI or man.
Being polite AI can have a practical purpose. Microsoft Design Director Kurts Beavers noted in the Microsoft Blog Post that “using the humble language makes a tone for AI’s response”. In other words, when you are polite to AI, it is likely to answer.
Related: Google’s new report revealed the hidden cost of AI
However, this politeness costs energy. According to a May 2024 report by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), Chat GPT requires 10 times more energy to ask a question or sends a comment on it compared to the standard Google search without reviewing the results in the upper part of the search page.
Researchers from the Best Brokers of the Site for Financial Advisory found that Chat GPT requires an average of 1.059 billion kilograms of electricity each year. This will only be equivalent to annual costs of about $ 139.7 million on energy costs for AI chat boot.
AI also needs plenty of water to cool the servers. Research from the University of California, River Side shows that Chat GPT requires 1,408 ml water, or about 16 16.9-oz bottles to produce 100 words email for GPT. Chat GPT takes 40 to 50 ml of water to produce three words “Welcome” response.
Related: Is Chat GPT better than Google? I tested a new search engine to find out.
Meanwhile, Openi AI can bear tens of millions of dollars in electricity costs. Earlier this month, the largest private tech deal so far collected $ 40 billion at $ 300 billion. Openi noted that it has 500 million world weekly users, which was 400 million in February.
