We're not in the 2010s anymore, consumer hardware is actively regressing. Smartphones are actually a great example to bring up, because I believe 2026 was the first year in which smartphone hardware did not advance at all (and arguably declined) relative to price, due to AI-related shortages.
Nobody can predict the future, of course, but I personally believe this pattern will hold. A decade from now, the idea of a consumer being able to purchase a personal device with more than 8GB of RAM will be a thing of the past, all significant compute will be done in the cloud using the massive amounts of hardware being hoarded by corporations as we speak.
A decade from now, the idea of a consumer being able to purchase a personal device with more than 8GB of RAM will be a thing of the past
The only way this is remotely possible is if the copyright cartels get their way and make it illegal to have unlicensed local compute. Assuming that doesn't happen, I'd gladly bet a large amount that computing will be much more affordable 10 years from now.
I think one of two things is more likely: either at some point the bottom falls out on the $1T/year datacenter capex we have today, or it doesn’t and eventually supply will enormously expand as new fabs being planned today eventually come online.