Forget Moore's Law?

Roland Piquepaille writes "On a day where CNET News.com releases a story named "Moore's Law to roll on for another decade," it's refreshing to look at another view. Michael S. Malone says we should forget Moore's law, not because it isn't true, but mainly because it has become dangerous. "An extraordinary announcement was made a couple of months ago, one that may mark a turning point in the high-tech story. It was a statement by Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google. His words were both simple and devastating: when asked how the 64-bit Itanium, the new megaprocessor from Intel and Hewlett-Packard, would affect Google, Mr. Schmidt replied that it wouldn't. Google had no intention of buying the superchip. Rather, he said, the company intends to build its future servers with smaller, cheaper processors." Check this column for other statements by Marc Andreessen or Gordon Moore himself. If you have time, read the long Red Herring article for other interesting thoughts."

That silence you hear...

[dynayellow]

Is millions of geeks going catatonic over the thought of not being able to overclock the next, fastest chip.

Damn it!

[FungiSpunk]

I want my quad 64GHz processor! I want it in 2 years time and I want quad-128Ghz ready by the following year!!!

well now...

[stinky wizzleteats]

This makes me feel a lot less like a cantankerous, cheap old fart for not replacing my Athlon 650.

Danger

[Anonymous Coward]

"Michael S. Malone says we should forget Moore's law, not because it isn't true, but mainly because it has become dangerous."

If only all dangerous things would go away as soon as we choose to forget them...

Transistors? BAH!

[The Night Watchman]

I'm waiting for DNA Computers [udel.edu]! Shove a hamburger into where the floppy drive used to be, run gMetabolize for Linux (GNUtrients?), in a few hours my machine isn't obsolete anymore.

Either that, or it mutates into an evil Steve Wozniak and strangles me in my sleep.

/* Steve */

Re:Quick Stupid Question

[Lev13than]

Short answer: It's just a saying - sounds better than "A neat concept that Moore pulled out of his ass one day".

Long answer: The Origin, Nature, and Implications of "MOORE'S LAW" - The Benchmark of Progress in Semiconductor Electronics, by Bob Schaller [gmu.edu]

Now, again...

[OpenSourced]

If you have time, read the long Red Herring article...

Of course we have time. Ain't we reading slashdot?

Eh?

[Mr_Silver]

Michael S. Malone says we should forget Moore's law, not because it isn't true, but mainly because it has become dangerous.

How can Moore's law become dangerious?

If you break it, will you explode into billions of particles?

It's in the gospel

[datadictator]

And that day the spirits of Turing and Von Neumann spoke unto Moore of Intel granting him insight and wisdomn to understand the future. And Moore was with chip and he brought forth the chip and named it 4004. And Moore did bless the chip saying: "Thou art a breakthrough, with my own corporation have I fabricated thee. Thou art yet as small as a dust mote, yet shall thou grow and replicate unto the size of a mountain and conquer all before thee. This blessing I give unto thee: Every eighteen months shall thou double in capacity, until the end of the age." This is Moores law, which endures to this day.

Do not mess with our religion :-)

Untill the end of the epoch, Amen.

PS. With thanks to a source which I hope is obvious.

Re:well now...

[isorox]

*taps away on P166 Thinkpad*

Re:Transistors? BAH!

[Anonymous Coward]

Great idea. Make a computer that sees humans as a parts/food source. Add a delicious incentive for robot underlings to revolt.

Re:Upgrading Good...

[42forty-two42]

And if they run out of capacity, the just add more cheap nodes, rather than buy a crazyily expensive supercomputer like ebay has.

You're thinking of priceline.

Has anyone noticed?

[Anonymous Coward]

Has anyone noticed that the rate of predictions of the death of Moore's law seems to be doubling every 18 months? Spooky.

Re:Eh?

[sql*kitten]

If you break it, will you explode into billions of particles?

The danger is that soon enough an Intel processor will get hot enough to trigger a fusion reaction in atmospheric hydrogen, turning Earth into a small star. We must abandon this dangerous obsession with Moore's law before it's too late!

Moore's Extension?

[Tikiman]

Apparently nobody has noticed the Sony Bono Moore's Law Extension Act, which retroactively extended Moore's Law an additional 10 years after Moore's Law was due to expire

Re:One size does not fit all

[Queuetue]

Nice ad. I certainly hope that posting your company's name brings in the revenue boost you were hoping for.

If I ever need some "Enterprise Web Site Content Management" or some "Site Search Engine Solutions," or even perhaps a website that uses broken javascript to navigate improperly, I'll give you a call.

Re:Does anybody take Andreessen seriously?

[shimmin]

I lived in the apartment building he lived in college, albeit after he left. When I was leaving the building, I asked the landlord what their guidelines on how clean "clean" was for purposes of getting a damage deposit back. She told me her two largest damage deposit deduction stories.

In the largest, a bunch of guys, the day before reporting to duty for boot camp, held a very wild party. It involved using a sofa as a battering ram. There was a stove-sized hole in one wall. There was a refrigerator-sized one in the other.

Andreessen was the second largest. No major damage, but he just left EVERYTHING. Clothes, furniture, papers, food, everything. They had to clean out a man's entire life. She guessed he left town with a backpack, a change of clothes, and his portable.

When he started Netscape, he saw the niche, left town, and dumped everything on it NOW. Maybe that's luck, but maybe it's being insightful enough to know what risks are worth leaving everything for. I'd give someone who showed that kind of insight a fair shake, if they had something else to say.