It takes time to build out capacity to increase HDD production, but when operating margins are approaching 30%, somebody is going to want cash in. If the new reality is that every company wants to harvest and retain as much data as possible at all times in case it has potential as training data at some point in the future, then additional capacity will eventually be built to tap into that.

I know it sucks if you need storage now, but I think the smart decision is to hold off until the market stabilizes. You might even get lucky; the bubble might burst and the market will be flooded with cheap excess HDDs.

Ford’s $30,000 EV truck is supposed to be here fairly soon as well, although it looks like that will only be available as a crew cab, sadly.

You wouldn’t, but that’s what governments are effectively asking be done, lending validity to the analogy.

I don’t want it to happen, but I don’t see any real scientific reason why machine learning won’t eventually subsume jobs at a faster rate than new jobs for humans are created. That might take 15 or 30 years to really hit, but it’s certainly something that needs to be planned for extensively.