TAM - part the sixth

This is starting to feel like shooting ducks in a barrel. (I wonder whether the kiddies even know that sentence???) Yet more reporting on AI, but from a distinct perspective: ok vendors, you've gulped from the AI punch bowl to make a cheaper (may be?) and/or better product. God damn it, give me a lower price!!! I don't give a shit about your market share, only my wallet's share.

Now that AI is firmly entrenched in the business of killing off every last God damned white collar worker on the planet, let's have us some Shakespeare.

The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers.

Well... apparently not first, but they were the first to suck Ayatollah 49% Don^©'s dick, as you may recall.

First, of course, the ambulance chasers boast about embracing AI

Outsiders often cite law as an industry under threat from artificial intelligence. But the nation's biggest firms are eager to show off how they've embraced the technology.

After OpenAI announced a version of its latest A.I. model for lawyers last week, for example, a handful of top-tier firms proudly unveiled new tools.

Then, they get hoisted on their own petard; karma's a bitch

Some clients are using A.I. to make their argument for A.I. markdowns. Jennifer Leonard, the founder of Creative Lawyers, which advises law firms and corporate legal departments on adapting to A.I., said some law firms and their clients used A.I. agents to spot line items in bills where A.I. could have saved hours. "They literally have struck that out, and say, 'I want a discount on this, we don't want to pay for this part of the work anymore,'" she said. "Or, 'We know you have this new A.I. tool in house because we saw your splashy press release.'"

How will they pay for that summer house in the Hamptons???

I Told You So - 22 September 2026

Well... it's been rather a long while since I took up the mantra: "It's the Senate, stupid!!" The logic to that being, naturally, that gerrymanders don't (at least directly) affect state wide votes.

Now, the great and powerful Nate Cohn more or less agrees.

James Talarico has led every recent survey of the Texas Senate race, with polls showing him ahead among Hispanic voters by at least 20 points. Although his lead is often mostly dismissed as a reflection of the profound flaws of his Republican opponent, Ken Paxton, the polls also show the Democrat Gina Hinojosa to be surprisingly competitive in the race for governor against the incumbent, Greg Abbott, who leads by an average of three points in recent polls.

Now, of course, TX is, as always, an anomaly but nevertheless points to the obvious: state wide is easier to defeat than the gerrymander. There also remains the chance that the gerrymander in TX will come up short, so to speak

In a sign that the G.O.P. itself doesn't consider the races safe, Republican groups are spending in all six of these seats — which include four of the five districts Republicans thought they could flip with their new gerrymander.

Chocolate sauce on your pudding.

The Democratic Party's chances of having a truly exceptional midterm election — one that yields a large congressional majority and control of the Senate — could depend on whether Democratic gains among Hispanic voters translate into breakthroughs in Texas and Florida.

TAM - part the fifth

Well... the news keep on coming. It is my duty to carry on, when the news fits my agenda, of course. This new report on the angst amongst the Moneyed Class doesn't explicitly cite TAM for the tightening of sphincters amongst that class, but one need not read too deeply between the lines to see what's driving the angst.

But some investors are voicing increasing skepticism about the growth expectations for data centers and the risks associated with their build-out, forcing industry executives and their advisers to recalibrate their plans to raise tens of billions of dollars in public markets.

That bit, "growth expectations", is just another way to bleat "what's the TAM going to be when this shit goes live???!!!???" Really now. Who's going to pay out of pocket for AI porn when there's a torrent of free stuff? Not that I've dined at that table, mind you. But investing, and even staying in business past the expire date, depends on customers buying your shit. If anyone has a detailed justification for a TAM worthy of multiple trillions of Bongo Bucks investments, I'm all ears. Like Clark Gable.

Thought For The Day - 21 September 2026

Shit. I suppose it was inevitable, but now the thieves just have to follow the buzz to get free stuff. Capitalism at it's finest.

"What's happening in Richardson is about to happen all over the country, and people are finally going to believe us that having all these drones flying around is actually a big, big problem," said Scott Bratcher, who is the president of his homeowners' association in a Richardson neighborhood that residents have called a drone highway.

Ya think???

Brian Rowe, an executive in tech and cybersecurity, has shown up to City Council meetings to complain. He has considered many methods of clearing the drones above his home, even looking into commercial anti-drone technology. But that technology, mostly for military use, costs tens of thousands of dollars, he said.

"What can we do?" Mr. Rowe said.

This is Texas, right? Home of the rollercoaster next to a house? Lots o guns in TX. An AR-15 with a good silencer would do the trick.

Building the roller coaster did not require any special permits from the city of Kemah, City Administrator Bill Kerber said. Since all setback requirements were met and the city has no zoning, a building permit for the coaster was issued without any variances. No public hearing was required to inform area residents.

Freedom!!!!!

TAM - part the fourth

One series, but different targets it's turning out. There are so many and so little time. Here's a new report on the fight against obesity. Keep in mind: obesity is a First World Problem, given that 25.8% of the world's propulation is, at the least, food insecure. Ok, so that's mostly in shithole countries, so who gives a shit? Oh, that's right; just woke assholes.

And, as has been reported with more frequency as Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists^{©(a Tesla investor)} make war on the poor, about 50% of USofA consumer spending comes from the top 10% of us. Makes one wonder whether Eccles still holds.

What might happen to Novo's investment when Bone Spur Samurai^©'s debt fueled indulgences kick the shit out of the economy and thus obesity's TAM??? Hmmm?? What happens if Our Malignant Narcissist^{©John Gardner} decides to write an EO ending Medicare and Medicaid? As he has said, he's the President and can do anything he wants. The Gang of Six has shown little enthusiasm for enforcing the plain language of the Constitution. And, what should be obvious by now, what he wants is the Capital K-Shape economy/society of the pre-War of Northern Agression USofA era; redux. Have a nice day. Almost the equinox and SAD times. Boo hoo.

[update]

Well... not quite Medicare and Medicaid but yet a bit closer

Slowly I turned. Step by step. Inch by inch.

That's, of course, from the Three Stooges.

Traditionally, the N.I.H. selects projects based on expert review of their scientific merit. But Mr. Trump has sought through a series of recent directives in his second term to bring that process under political review, arguing in part that the government has been funding "woke" liberal priorities.

The Barbarians have sacked Rome.

I Told You So - 20 September 2026 -- Bigly

Well... that didn't take long. Wasn't so long ago that these missives opined that Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists^{©(a Tesla investor)} will nationalize AI, and quoted a MAGAnaut who opined that He and His would use AI for mass surveillance. Here we are.

Mr. Trump did not make clear whether he envisioned the new A.I. Force as a military command or a civilian agency or department. White House officials did not respond to an email seeking clarification.

Of course he did.

President Trump is so enamored of the Space Force, a military command he created in his first term, that he keeps its flag by his desk in the Oval Office. He took personal interest in the design of its uniforms, which bear close resemblance to those of Galactic Empire officers in "Star Wars."

On Saturday, Mr. Trump proposed a follow-on to Space Force: a new "A.I. Force." But he left to earthbound speculation what, exactly, it was supposed to do.

Of course we know. The same as the Galactic Empire. D'uh.

Warsh Spits in His Eye

Well... he done did it. Boy howdy. Now, Bone Spur Samurai^© doesn't know shit about econ, despite having (so he says) some kind of $.25 degree in a niche corner of econ as a two year undergrad at Wharton. He wants the unenlightened to assume he has the coveted (even when he spent two paltry years there) Wharton MBA. Not a chance.

The bedrock of inflation: where does it come from. At the macro level, there's too much demand (folks have more moolah than they should have, for some definitions of 'more' and 'should') and there's too little supply (where producers are too scared to make product, and don't). The Covid-19 inflation was mostly the latter on the way out. The in-Covid-19 inflation was both. Because so much of the global economy was ham-strung, supply slackened. OTOH, some Damn Gummints suplemented household incomes due to so many people being out of work, but producers were chary of supplying. So, we gots some inflation.

One might argue that we've been riding the slack-supply bronco ever since. Turns out, there are data sources. Here's one. There's some really simple, pretty, and informative graphs which lay out the situation.

Warsh et al have spit in Bone Spur Samurai^©'s eye, but, as is obvious from the graphs (and, just to remind, it's FED graphs) that we're still in a slack-supply inflation at nearly all data points since Covid-19. Bone Spur Samurai^© is a plain idiot. But he's kinda right, but mostly wrong. The Fed can't make producers market more product. Xi and Kim and Vlad can, of course, but it wouldn't be in Bone Spur Samurai^©'s interest to actually jawbone his billionaire buddies to lessen the problem. The Goldfinger way to get rich; destroy the "others" production and the value of yours rises. You tink he's upset about the reduction of global oil? Not a bit of it. Domestic oil is making a killing. Ah, the beauty of unfettered capitalism.

Putting the brakes on when supply lags demand, is exactly the wrong thing to do. What a Damn Gummint can do is a bigger issue, beyond my pay grade.

Thought For The Day - 14 September 2026

Well... some of the AI oligarches are getting all sweaty in their sphincters. They're not really sweaty about the threat of unrestrained AI has to the rest of us. They're sweaty about losing the ability to rule the world.

And, if they're paying attention, they're sweaty that they'll lose control of their AI systems to Our Malignant Narcissist^{©John Gardner}. I mean, he's going to turn down the ability to control the whole population? Hell no. There'll be an EO soon nationalizing, aka confiscating, all the AI companies and putting Hegseth in control. Just you watch.

The Shadow Knows

A few times in these missives, it has been mentioned that I spent some time on the staff of Jack Anderson while he was still relevant. Got a two day report out of it. Yay me. Got to meet some spooks out in Bethesda, too. They stand up really straight.

One fact, and it isn't just "speculation", is that NSA really does hoover up all electronic comms across the globe. American grifters routinely get caught up in the dust bag, just because they aren't immune if they're talking to Vlad in Moscow or at his dacha. The Shadow knows how much Vlad helped get Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) elected in '20 and '24. The reach is infinite.

So now we get Bibi getting outed for being asleep at the switch leading to Oct. 7. And denying, of course. If you believe him, your also asleep.

The report in the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, which The New York Times could not confirm, said that Mr. Netanyahu had a 45-minute phone call with Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, the president of the United Arab Emirates, in late September 2023, and was told about a plan by Hamas to attack Israel and destabilize the region. Mr. Netanyahu's office has denied the report.

You can bet both gonads the NSA has every single second of that call. Will Batshit J. Fucking Moron^©Tillerson push Bibi to fess up?? Will Congress go all 25^th on him with his totally unhinged diarrhea of the Id that makes up an increasing volume of his postings?

The rat-a-tat of ever wilder, ever more outrageous posts each weekend has become a fixture of the president's second term, seen more and more as a barometer of his mental state. Mr. Trump's critics, who never considered him a model of stability in the first place, now point to these frenetic bursts of fantasy and vanity as proof that the 80-year-old president is deteriorating further with age.
...
It feels like we're genuinely watching his brain rot in real time.
-- Sarah Matthews

Only The Shadow knows.

TAM - part the third

Well... that didn't take long. Yet more reporting, with data, from NYT.

There is, in the econ biz, an acrnonym TANSTAAFL which stands for There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. Origin not known, although some/many/most sources go back to 19^th century taverns - "free lunch" if you spent enough.

The AI, as currently implemented, craze has been operating, if not "free", at least way, way below cost.

This latest report from the NYT explores evolved GPT models, driven by the same request. The models are 3.5, 4.o, and 5.5, the number offered for each is the number of "tokens" to process the request. So, here we go:

3.5 448 at $0.00

4.o 771 at $.01

5.5 6,463 at $.19

The report goes on to explain how each is, to all intensive porpoises, just a black box. There have been some reports that not all systems/models/developers actually know what's going on inside these Black Boxes.

Justin Summerville, an executive at the company, said many businesses "spent the past year yelling at their employees to use A.I., use A.I., use A.I."

But that's come at a cost, he added. "And now the finance organizations are waking up and saying, 'Whoa — this is a big number,'" Mr. Summerville said.

Dontcha just hate the bean counters? Always ruining the party. What was that the Wicked Witch of the West said? "I'm melting!" Just as fast as the AI TAM.

Here's another take, similar but not identical, to address the issue.

Faced with escalating variable costs, enterprises are capping their cloud consumption. The financially viable alternative is shifting to owned server architectures. By deploying open-source AI models on proprietary hardware, organizations bypass restrictive and costly subscriptions entirely.

With a grain of salt, naturally. The report is from a stock analyst with a bone to pick someplace. But, if it happens that there does emerge a significant shift from AI-operator operated models to in-house "open source AI" on owned hardware? More melting for the likes of OpenAI, et al.

TAM - part the second

So, Ok, how's it going for the AI TAM? According to recent reporting (today in my dead trees version) in the NYT, not so well. As stated before, any product falls (mostly, generally) into one of two buckets: intermediate good which is incorporated into a final user product, and, as you might surmise, a final user product. With AI, the latter, so far, is mostly adding steroids to web search, aka Gemini mostly. As to the former, this report deals largely there. And there isn't good. At least from making Bongo Bucks profits, that is.

Is there any evidence, or even logic, that makes a case for search on steroids as a Market? IOW, is it reasonable to expect that Google, et al (to the extent that there is an et al) will reap even more advert revenue traceable to AI function? My guess is just, no. At some point Google, et al will have to fess up.

On the next hand, there've been reports of various AI being used to generate technical papers, of questionable veracity. That's a Brave New World.

[T[here's a [sic] been a growing wave of AI-generated and AI-assisted academic papers hitting journals and preprint services like arXiv. It's a trend that is both hinting at new forms of research and discovery, and threatening to overwhelm academic literature with a tsunami of pseudo-intellectual AI slop.

An earlier report said this

But that level of AI use does not come cheap. Just months ago, many businesses encouraged employees to use AI for nearly everything, a trend known as "tokenmaxxing." Now, as the bills arrive, some are introducing limits and asking whether all that usage is actually producing enough value.

That's an example of the intermediate goods situation. The NYT report is even worser.

As A.I. costs skyrocketed, Andy Markus, the company's chief data and A.I. officer, looked for cheaper alternatives. He landed on "open" models, which can be downloaded and modified without payment or approval.

By May, open models accounted for 20 percent of AT&T's A.I. use. That has since risen to 40 percent and may jump to 60 percent in the coming months, Mr. Markus said in an interview.

"We believe it could go much, much higher," he said, adding that AT&T was saving up to 80 percent on A.I. costs compared with earlier this year.

Where do we go from here? One avenue -

At AT&T, the telecom company is now taking open-weights models and customizing them to make new tools that can transcribe calls and facilitate customer service, Mr. Markus, the company's chief data and A.I. officer, said.

Once again, the intermediate goods venue, which depends on firing humans to generate "savings" Bongo Bucks. What happens after you've fired the Last Man? Good question. Where's that part of TAM? It's Nowhere Man. "Making all his nowhere plans for nobody".

So, beyond the recent and continuing euphoria with The Latest New Toy, what's the long term TAM for AI? I don't think anybody knows, cares, or thought about it. I still think it ain't anything worthy of Trillions of Bongo Bucks. The bubble may well break before the first Trillion is booked. One can only hope; the fall won't be as far or hurt as much.

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Grift

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Gimme Shelter

So, if any in the audience thinks that AI, as currently implemented, may be regulated by Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor), think again. Real hard. Having the Fascists in control is the goal, as described here. That's the NYT review of what happened, and it surely caused every manjack of the Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) to get an instant hardon.

Just think of how simple and easy it will be for Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) to totally control The United States of Alabama. Putin and Hitler would be proud. For as long as it lasts, since Batshit J. Fucking Moron^©Tillerson will drive the economy over a cliff. And he'll depart to Moscow with his Bongo Bucks safely in Switzerland.

This time, the A.I. collective didn't seize a military network, hack a hospital or shut down an electrical grid. This time, humans regained control.

Next time, we might not be so lucky.

Next time, we won't be so lucky. Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) will be the humans in control. Only for themselves.

Cruelty is the point.

That's Entertainment

A few times in the course of these missives, I've mentioned that measures of "economic impact" of various consumer-optional entertainment are basically bogus. Here's a long piece from the NYT on the economics of the US Open tennis program. It does make the case, but only indirectly, that value of such activity matters only if measured spending is from consumers outside of the locale in question. One might be picky and assert that the appropriate venue is the USofA in toto. Why? Because of what we in the econ space call substitution effect. Or, as one skeptic put it (near the bottom of the piece, of course)

Some are skeptical of these kinds of projections. Andrew Zimbalist, a professor emeritus of economics at Smith College and an expert on the economics of sports, has not seen the study. But he cautioned that there are ways to make data fit a narrative.

"It's quite possible that there is some positive impact," he said, adding that money spent by New Yorkers at the tournament is money that most likely would have been spent elsewhere in the city — on Broadway, at a Yankees game, at a restaurant — and now won't be. "In that sense it's a net negative," he said.

A spokescritter for a restaurant org went on to say that benefit outside of the immediate area around the center doesn't amount to much. Duh.

Exactly how much Damn Gimmint Bongo Bucks were used to create the current facility, I haven't found. But it was built, apparently for free, on city land. There is an audit from 2019, which shows that USTA isn't exactly being taken to the cleaners by NYC on an annual basis. The report says the US Open is worth $1,200,000,000 to NYC each year. The City Gummint doesn't get but a few pennies. Sweet heart, I luv you so!

One can site casinos and data centers as boons to the local economy. Which never seem to work out that way; Atlantic City, I'm talking to you. And how many uneducated shitkickers are going to work in those centers in fly-over country? Yeah, right.

TAM

For those not knee deep in bidnezz, that's total addressable market. If you're not some scammer or grifter (hard to find such, given these days of Grifter In Chief ), then the first thing you do when you want to move some new (or importantly updated) widget into Mr. Market is figure out how many end users (aka, buyers) you expect exist. In the pharma world these days, drug companies are actually looking for a TAM that's tiny thanks to Uncle Sugar, who passes on some substantial benefit to them if FDA approves a drug for very limited number (200,000 ... well sorta, kinda) of patients. Although gaming continues as ever. This is one segment of the economy where the TAM is sorta, kinda explicit. And being 'small' is good.

For AI, as currently implemented, it's a bit different. And that difference has been recited here a bit. And it matters, given that Big Tech is spending some non-trivial Billions of Bongo Bucks on hardware (data centres) alone. Who are the patients to be served? Do they have, taken as a whole, enough Bongo Bucks to recoup all those trillions of Bongo Bucks, plus a bit of profit? Here's a recent assessment. As predicted in these missives, the arithmetic looks awful. And, some of the tech bros are worried.

At one point this year, Meta internally projected that it could spend as much as $10 billion annually on Anthropic's A.I. models, said two of the people, who declined to be identified discussing private information. That would have formed a major chunk of Anthropic's yearly revenue, which the start-up estimated in July would pass $65 billion.

Now, that cash flow is wonderful for Anthropic and all of the AI vendors out there. But Meta, and Google, and Microsoft, and the like are buying what we econ types call 'producers' goods'; IOW, stuff that the buyer turns around and uses to make some finished good which Americans on Main Street, Anytown, USofA actually pay for. Well, Meta et al, ain't selling any new thing to Americans on Main Street. Remember, so far as Meta goes, the user is the actual product, sold to advertisers. Microsoft, is more or less, the exception (no one uses Bing).

As of April 2024, Bing holds the position of the second-largest search engine worldwide, with a market share of 3.64%, behind Google's 90.91%.

So, where is the flood of Bongo Bucks to make it all worthwhile? It's a verity that Real Producers always bitch and moan about the Bean Counters ruining the party. I suspect the Real Producers will lickety split concoct some tale to blame the Bean Counters when it all goes Pop.

Mr. Zuckerberg has described Hatch as Meta's next breakthrough, a personal "agent" that works "24/7 on your behalf to help achieve your goals and improve your life, your health, your relationships, your finances."

(By the way, what was the last New Product that Meta made that was a Bigly Win? Just asking for a friend.)

OK. A semblance of recognizing that somewhere, somehow a real live Human (American or otherwise) will use an AI derived service/product. But will such a Human pay a user's fee for the privilege? And, if so, how much? Or does The Zuck assume that Hatch will somehow, some way entice his real customers, advertisers, to pay more and more often? In either case will end users or advert makers generate enough new revenue to make it all make sense? How would you bet on Kalshi?

It's been mentioned here and there that, given existing accounting rules, all this data centre spending is hidden in corporate capital budgets. IOW, very little of it hits their current financials. There will be a reckoning and there will be blood.

Thought For The Day - 28 August 2026

The hits keep coming. More like attack drones than top 10 songs, though. Latest grift

Companies Can Tell Investors Less Under Proposed S.E.C. Rules

Insiders can make an even bigly boodle. Won't take long for Grifter In Chief to trade ever more eagerly. And, of course, his best billionaire buddies. The USofA is looking more and more like any Eastern Europe -stan.

I Told You So - 27 August 2026

Well... you've heard it before: people vote with their feet. I heard it from Dr. McElhone in an earlier, less nasty, shrinking of the Damn Gummint. Here's a longish piece on the ongoing exodus.

"I used to live in the country that I thought was the most enthusiastic about the prospects for science improving the human condition, of any country in the world," said Phillip Zamore, the chair of RNA Therapeutics Institute at the University of Massachusetts. "And I woke up one day and that wasn't true anymore."

Not quite Jewish brainiacs fleeing Germany in the 30s, but just you wait. If the The Gang of Six^© stall long enough to let Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) let only Rednecks vote, there won't be a educated person left here. That your average Redneck has neither birth certificate (and likely no idea who his Baby Daddy is) nor passport won't forestall the local vote folks from letting Billy Joe Bob from making his X on the registration card.

Thought For The Day - 25 August 2026

While I've not seen or heard from any of the usual Lamestream Pundits opining what Kim Don-Felon and his Merry Band of Fascists (so says this Tesla investor) might be up to with the escalating tariff war with Canada. For myself, it's self evident. Bone Spur Samurai^© is taking the next step to annexing Canada. And to be careful: just one huge state, not one per province, of course. Alberta is just dumb enough to go full MAGA, but not the rest. And let's not touch the language issue. Spanglish all over here, and now French? This is really a white belly English place, as everybody knows.

Here's his deal: we'll tariff Canada into bankruptcy. Or they can become the 51^st state. Take it or leave it. Can Batshit J. Fucking Moron^©Tillerson pull it off while he's still alive, kicking, and El Jefe? May be, or may be not. But it doesn't matter. Jared will carry on the dynasty and git er done.

Thought For The Day - 11 August 2026

So far, none of the Lamestream Press (that I know about) has raised the really important point: MAGA is breaking as we watch. Supposedly close allies in his retinue are giving up the dumb fuck without even thinking about it. Hiding in a catering cart!! Except, of course, that isn't true and makes Garfield 2.0 (a step closer) much more likely. It was a catering container; not nearly as cramped. But, if you go looking, you'll find AI deepfakes of him squished into an aircraft cart. The palace guard is turning.

Thought For The Day - 10 August 2026

There's been a tsunami of ink spilled on AI and data centers of late. But I've not run across the nasty issue: if MAGAnauts write the laws and rules such that Batshit J. Fucking Moron^©Tillerson and his successors get control of AI, then truth (social!!) goes out the window. Just as with crypto: he was agin it until someone (Miller??) whispered in his ear - "you can make billions!! the greatest grift of all time!!" And so it was. Everything will be MAGApropaganda 24/7. Just like Orwell predicted. Ayatollah 49% Don^© has done so much to eliminate truth and intelligence already. So, not only the billions, but full control of the population. Just like Kim and Putin and Hitler and Mao. What to give the dictator who has everything.