Silicon Valley Is Buzzing About This New Idea: AI Compute As Compensation
- Reference: 0180948352
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/03/10/200253/silicon-valley-is-buzzing-about-this-new-idea-ai-compute-as-compensation
- Source link:
> Silicon Valley has long competed for talent with ever-richer pay packages built around salary, bonus, and equity. Now, a fourth line item is creeping into the mix: AI inference. As generative AI tools become embedded in software development, the cost of running the underlying models -- known as inference -- is emerging as a productivity driver and a budget line that finance chiefs can't ignore.
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> Software engineers and AI researchers inside tech companies have already been jousting for access to GPUs, with this AI compute capacity being carefully parceled out based on which projects are most important. Now, some tech job candidates have [2]begun asking about what AI compute budget they will have access to if they decide to join .
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> "I am increasingly asked during candidate interviews how much dedicated inference compute they will have to build with Codex," Thibault Sottiaux, engineering lead at OpenAI's Codex, the startup's AI coding service, wrote on X recently. He added that usage per user is growing much faster than overall user growth, a sign that AI compute is becoming even scarcer and more valuable. That scarcity is reshaping how engineers think about their work and pay.
"The inference compute available to you is increasingly going to drive overall software productivity," said OpenAI President Greg Brockman.
The report cites a recent compensation submission from a software engineer that listed "Copilot subscription" as part of the pay and benefits. "OpenAI and Anthropic should create recruitment sites where their clients can advertise roles, listing the token budget for the job alongside the salary range," said Peter Gostev, AI capability lead at Arena, a startup that measures the performance of models.
Tomasz Tunguz of Theory Ventures predicts AI inference will be the fourth component of engineering compensation, alongside salary, bonus, and equity. "Will you be paid in tokens? In 2026, you likely will start to be," Tunguz said.
[1] https://slashdot.org/~sziring
[2] https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-compute-compensation-software-engineers-greg-brockman-2026-3
Re: (Score:2)
just "disable javascript on this site".
Re: More fucking ads (Score:2)
Perhaps use the ret*** AI to generate an app to block the advert?
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You can if you use the logger and create a blocking rule through that for a suspiciously named js.
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I had to right click on the ad, then choose block element, then choose "pick", click the ad with the mouse, then move the right slider to 1 to get the ad to disappear. I also had to block the sticky ad that persists as you scroll.
Not compensation (Score:3)
This isn't compensation, if it is something necessary to do the job at the levels they require, any more than asking if the building has HVAC in the summer is negotiating benefits.
They sell the idea that using AI is necessary for the position, and then try to sell access to that AI as a perk? That's rich up there with working in a coal mine and being told you can only use company tools, and that for some positions they supply the tools and some they don't.
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No kidding, how is this any different than saying "The laptop we provide to you, which is required to do your work, is considered part of your compensation. But no, you don't get to take it with you when you leave."
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Indeed. Same as putting mandatory company apps on your phone. The last time somebody tried that, I told them they were free to give me a company phone, but they would not be getting inside my personal security border. Turns out they could live without me having their apps.
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Yep. Essentially a scam. Tools for the job are to be provided by the employer, no matter how expensive. And they can get very expensive.
I guess they can get a few true AI believers cheaper that way. But do you really want to hire such people?
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"Tools for the job are to be provided by the employer, no matter how expensive. And they can get very expensive."
That's often not true. Many professions expect a workman to have his own tools. Auto mechanics, carpenters, musicians, electricians, plumbers, photographers, and so on.
Re: Not compensation (Score:2)
It also betrays that the raw cost of AI outstrips any efficiency gains.
OpenAI needs to pay someone less for it to be worth using their product. One would think if the gains outstripped the cost they'd pay someone more, or at least let them use the tool with equal pay.
you get 16 tons (Score:3)
of Co2
Good grief. Giving them ideas. (Score:2)
If the techbros think they can get by with "compensating" people by giving them compute to do the job.... I got nothing. Even worse, people are ASKING for that as part of their compensation package? That'd be like a person in 1995 saying part of their take-home would be a desktop computer at their desk to do their coding on. This just seems like a weird reflection of the "AI GOD IS COMING, YOU MUST BE A PART OF AI GOD" mentality that's pervading all of tech.
I'm more than a little skeeved out by it being fra
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This all sounds like desperate BS to me. The AI bros looking for ideas to implement hoping to make more use of their slop machines. I highly doubt people are asking for AI as compensation.
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I have no doubt that applicants are asking about what tools are used and will be available.
But the only people looking at these tools as part of the compensation package are the executive team members. I don't even think middle managers would be stupid enough to look at this as part of the applicant's compensation.
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Especially when 'tokens' are a consumable and sessions are typically auditable.
There likely have been cases, back when PCs and workstations were expensive and endpoint auditing and management were typically fairly light, when computers were used to sweeten the deal at least for certain sorts of lower level nerds; but because it was fairly easy to just turn a blind eye to recreational use off hours and relatively difficult to have random endpoint hardware doing something productive 24/7.
With 'cloud' re
How about charging everyone the true cost first? (Score:2)
By now everyone should be paying the real cost of running their little AI project - including energy use, build-out cost, and R&D cost. Let people see just how much their little 'AI do my homework' query actually costs the world.
This story is why I believe IP must be abolished (Score:2)
Global mergers/acquisitions heading toward all technology being the proprietary possession of a small coterie of Barons.
You will be technically "free" to live as you wish, the same way the poor schmucks who took the Red Pill exited the Matrix and were free-- to scrabble out their depressing MRE-hardtack existence hiding in the dark crags of subterranean tunnels.
You will, on paper, philosophically speaking, have all your freedoms, but they won't be worth exercising. Because if you want access to the producti
Not needed (Score:1)
The AI inference scam is going to come to an end. Thanks to smaller and smarter reasoning models, one does not need to buy most inference subscriptions nor pay for tokens anymore. That whole industry is going rekt soon.
Compete for resources ... (Score:2)
... you'll need to do your job. Sounds like a place I'd love to work.
> One out of two gets rifle.
> The one without, follows him!
> When the one with the rifle gets killed, the one who is following picks up the rifle and shoots!
> - Enemy at the Gates
Ah! I missed that at first... (Score:2)
This is from TFA, and should have been in TFS:
> As a coder in the AI era, if you don't have access to massive compute, you might end up producing far less software than your colleagues, threatening your career prospects .
When I read that, I couldn't help thinking that software development will move farther and faster toward every project being its own gig. Any company benefits beyond those making an employee more effective will be sacrificed by said employee in the pursuit of more dollars and a better resume to help land more - and more lucrative - gigs in the future.
I didn't use the word 'gig' carelessly. I predict that if what TFA is talking about ever gains real traction, it
Life balance?? (Score:2)
Yeah, fuck you too, where's life balance?
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don't worry, you will live at the company town and get paid in company scrip
also: FUCK SLASHDOT ADS.
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"also: FUCK SLASHDOT ADS" - I really had to play around with uBlock this time to get this latest ad to disappear. I agree: #FUCKSLASHDOTADS