News, Ethics & Drama
Be Polite to ChatGPT? It’s Costing OpenAI Millions, Says Altman
Think being polite to ChatGPT is just good manners? According to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, those extra “please” and “thank you” additions in your prompts are actually costing the company tens of millions of dollars.
Responding to a query on X (formerly Twitter) about the financial impact of user politeness, Altman acknowledged the significant cost but framed it as “tens of millions of dollars well spent,” adding a slightly cryptic, “You never know.”
Why does politeness cost money? It comes down to compute power. Chatbots like ChatGPT run on large language models (LLMs) powered by thousands of energy-hungry GPUs in massive data centers. Longer prompts – even just by a few polite words – require more processing, which consumes more electricity.
Estimates suggest generating a single AI response can use around 0.14 kWh of energy – a notable amount when scaled across billions of daily interactions. The energy demands of AI data centers are a growing concern, already contributing significantly to global electricity consumption.
Interestingly, while it costs OpenAI more, some AI experts believe being polite to chatbots actually yields better results. Kurtis Beavers at Microsoft noted that respectful prompts tend to “help generate respectful, collaborative outputs.” Research also shows that a large majority of users (around 67% in a US survey) are polite to AI, either because they feel it’s right or, perhaps jokingly, as a precaution against a future AI uprising.
Our Take
Okay, this is pretty wild – Altman basically saying our manners are costing OpenAI millions. It really shines a spotlight on the massive energy and compute costs behind these sophisticated AI models. Every extra word, even polite ones, adds up when you’re operating at that scale.
It makes you wonder about the future push for efficiency. Will we eventually be encouraged to be super blunt with AI just to save energy? Or is this just a fascinating tidbit about how human social norms interact with the raw economics of running cutting-edge tech? Either way, it’s a pricey reminder of the resources AI consumes.
This story was originally featured on New York Post.