跟读练习: Is the AI Boom Just Another Bubble? - 通过视频学习英语口语

Hey there! I believe most of you here have  heard of AI or even used it, like ChatGPT, Gemini, and others. Maybe you use it to help  with your tasks, ask questions, make pictures, create videos, and some people are even getting  married to it. Everything feels AI-hyped right now. Many companies are starting to build  their own AI too. Google, Microsoft, Elon, and many others are making it, using it, and  pouring billions of dollars into it. You might also see AI-related stocks like Nvidia going crazy  over the past few years. Investors are happy, so they pour in even more money. And then, suddenly,  you stop and think… wait, hold on. Isn’t this starting to feel like a bubble? Everyone seems  way too excited and is throwing billions into AI almost blindly. People have been saying this for  a long time, and now you’re probably wondering, is it really a bubble? Well, in this video, we’re  going to talk about how bubbles really happen, why so many people say AI is a bubble, the infinite  circular money glitch, whether this is the dot-com bubble 2.0, and finally, whether AI will really  burst and crash. Alright, let’s get started.

Section 1. How bubbles really happen.  So, when everyone says AI is in a bubble, some of you might ask, what is a bubble? A bubble  is like this. Everyone starts buying the same thing because they think it will be super valuable  later. At first, only a few people buy it. Then more people copy. Soon, everyone is buying it just  because everyone else is buying it. Nobody really stops to ask if it’s actually worth that much  right now. So, the price goes higher and higher, even though the real value hasn’t changed  much yet. And when people finally realize it’s not as amazing as they imagined, they  stop buying. That’s when the bubble pops.

And bubbles have happened many times before.  In fact, many major economic crises were also linked to bubbles. For example, the 2008 housing  bubble, when everyone rushed to buy houses and it eventually popped, played a major role  in causing a global crisis. There was also Japan’s economic bubble, which is one reason its  economy stayed weak for decades. And of course, the dot-com bubble in the early 2000s,  which was driven by internet hype. So, bubbles have happened many times, in many  countries, and with many different technologies.

Section 2. Why so many people say AI is a bubble?  Mostly because it feels very familiar. People remember what happened during the dot-com era,  when the internet was new and exciting. Back then, prices went up fast, excitement went crazy,  and everyone believed the future had already arrived. That memory never really disappeared. And because both are transformative technologies with similar hype stories, people connect  AI to the dot-com bubble. For example, ChatGPT needed only 2 months to reach 100 million  users, much faster than platforms like TikTok, which needed about 9 months, or Instagram,  which needed 2.5 years, or Facebook, which needed more than 4 years. AI tools  are being used by professionals and regular people across many industries. So, you might  think, if platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Google made tons of money, then AI tools  like ChatGPT should make even more money, right?

Well, that’s the problem. Many AI companies are  still not clearly profitable, especially OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT. AI is extremely  expensive to run. Training models, buying chips, running servers, paying engineers, and doing  constant research all cost huge amounts of money. AI needs GPUs, which are special machines  that handle the heavy calculations, and that is super expensive. Some estimates suggest training  GPT-4 may have cost tens of millions of dollars, and possibly over $100 million. And that’s not even the end of the cost. Every time you use ChatGPT online, all  the calculations happen on OpenAI’s servers.

That means electricity, cooling systems (often  water-based), and maintenance all add to costs.

At the same time, users expect AI to be cheap or  even free. For example. When many people saying something simple in ChatGPT like “thank you”  actually cost millions for OpenAI. Of course, one “thank you” costs almost nothing, but billions  of them add up to millions of dollars. Some reports and estimates suggest OpenAI may have  lost around $11.5 billion in a single quarter in 2025! With this situation, it starts to make  sense why so many people call this an AI bubble.

Section 3. The infinite circular money glitch. One  of the biggest reasons people worry about an AI bubble is something called circular investment.  The idea is simple. Big AI companies invest in each other, then buy from each other, which  makes growth look much bigger than it really is.

Here’s an over-simplified example with  numbers so it’s easy to see. Remember, this is an over-simplified version. So, a chip  company like Nvidia designs the most important chips for AI. An AI company like OpenAI needs  those chips to run ChatGPT and train new models.

So, let’s say Nvidia invests $10 billion into  OpenAI, either directly or through long-term deals and partnerships. OpenAI now has  more money and more computing power, so it spends a large part of it on  cloud computing for more powerful AI.

Now look at where that money goes. OpenAI  spends $8 billion on cloud services from companies like Oracle or other AI cloud  providers. Those cloud companies use that $8 billion to buy GPUs and hardware, mostly  from Nvidia. So, a big part of the original $10 billion flows back to Nvidia as chip sales. So, Nvidia sees higher revenue. OpenAI shows growth. Cloud companies see higher sales. On  paper, everyone looks like they’re winning.

And again, this is an over-simplified  version, because the real scenario looks like this. Yeah, quite different and  more complicated but the idea is same.

From the outside, valuations go up and revenues  look strong. But the uncomfortable question is this: how much of this money comes from real users  and businesses paying from outside the system, and how much is just the same tens of billions  of dollars moving in a circle? If one part of that loop slows down or stops, the pressure  spreads quickly to everyone else. Even though big companies like Nvidia, Oracle, and Microsoft  are quite diversified beyond AI, the idea of money just moving around still makes people worry. Section 4. Is this dot-com bubble 2.0? So, as I mentioned before, in the early 2000s there was a  bubble called the dot-com bubble. The internet was the new hype, and investors threw money at almost  any company with “.com” in its name, even if it had no profits and no real business model. At its  peak, over 400 internet companies went public, and the Nasdaq, which is heavily focused on  technology stocks, jumped by over 600% in total.

So, is this just the same scenario, with  a different mask? The short answer is, there are indeed similarities. Because of that  history, people today look at AI and feel uneasy.

Like the internet in the past, AI is also a new  technology. AI-related stocks have pushed tech markets sharply higher again in recent years.  Excitement is high, investment is massive, and expectations are huge. While many AI-leading  companies like Nvidia, Microsoft, and Google are making huge profits and are strong, cash-rich  businesses, very different from dot-com companies, where many didn’t even make a single penny, but  other companies like OpenAI are still burning tons of money with unclear profit potential. This makes  people wonder: how long will this trend survive?

Section 5. Will the AI bubble burst, and what  happens next? So, the big question is, will the AI bubble actually burst? The honest answer is, it  might. There’s a real possibility it will happen.

But that doesn’t mean AI will suddenly disappear.  When bubbles burst, what usually breaks first is not the technology itself, but the hype around it. If AI does burst, the first thing that happens is that money slows down. Investors become more  careful. Companies stop throwing money at every AI project just because it sounds cool. AI companies  that don’t make real profit will struggle, while the ones that survive will rise again. But here’s the important part. AI itself doesn’t go away. Just like after the dot-com bubble,  the internet didn’t disappear. I mean, you’re literally watching this video on the internet  right now. What disappeared were unrealistic business models, like Pets.com, a company selling  pet products that earned hundreds of thousands but spent millions. That didn’t last. But companies  that proved their businesses could survive didn’t die. Many people forgot that Amazon, eBay,  and Cisco are all dot-com bubble survivors.

Are they dead today? No. They’re giants. And if you’re investing in tech stocks, this is why it’s important to understand  what you’re actually investing in. Always do your own research. If you want to learn  more about market crashes, you can check out my other video on what happens when the stock  market crashes. The link is in the description.

So, in conclusion. AI is a real and revolutionary  technology that’s already changing how we work and live. But when a powerful new technology  shows up, money often moves faster than reality.

Some AI companies may fail and some hype may  disappear, but AI itself won’t vanish. Just like after the dot-com bubble, the companies that  actually make sense are the ones that survive. So, don’t panic, and don’t blindly hype it either.  If you want to invest in tech, always do your own research and don’t just follow the crowd or FOMO. Help us keep making videos like this by becoming a member and unlock some exclusive perks too. If you want me to make other videos explaining these topics, please like and  subscribe. Thanks for watching.