Toby Ord: AI revenue growth mixes capability, apps, and lags — 100x headroom
tobyordoxford · x · 2026-11-10
Oxford philosopher Toby Ord, in discussion with Ben Todd and Ramez Sreekantaswamy, argues current AI revenue growth is a messy mix of three sources: (a) raw AI capability (e.g., ECI-style measures), (b) better apps and APIs, and (c) lags — even if AI training stopped, total revenue might still grow 100x or more as deployed capabilities commercialize. He suggests fancy natural experiments or measurement techniques could help disentangle these factors, a key question for assessing whether AI capex is justified.
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