Your politeness could be costly for OpenAI

“I can’t help but wonder how much money OpenAI has lost in electricity costs from people saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to their models.”

A user on X (formerly Twitter) posed a seemingly random question about the money OpenAI has spent on electricity costs due to polite interactions with their models. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman responded humorously, suggesting that the amount spent on politeness could be considered money well spent, amounting to “tens of millions of dollars.”

Altman’s light-hearted response led Futurism to question whether being polite to AI chatbots is a waste of time and electricity. However, Kurt Beavers from Microsoft Copilot’s design team explained that using polite language with AI sets a positive tone for interactions and can influence the AI model to respond politely as well.

While politeness may be beneficial, there are also instances where profanity has its own unique uses.