ChatGPT Outage Follows On Project Stargate Announcement, Broadcom’s VMWare Lock-In Is Still Angering Customers, And Devin, Reported As The First AI Software Engineer Gets A Bad Probation Report.
This is Hashtag Trending, your roundup of the top tech news. I’m Jim Love.
ChatGPT Outage Leaves Users Stranded Amid OpenAI’s Major Infrastructure Plans
Well, that was embarrassing.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT experienced a widespread outage on Thursday, January 23, 2025, leaving users worldwide without access to the popular AI chatbot. More than that, it happened just after the announcement of its $500 billion Stargate infrastructure project, an ambitious effort to scale its infrastructure to increase AI capabilities.
The disruption began just before midday in the UK, where users encountered “bad gateway” errors. Within hours, reports of service disruptions came from across the globe, affecting thousands who rely on ChatGPT for work, education, and personal tasks.
OpenAI confirmed the outage on its status page, citing “elevated error rates,” and assured users that a fix was underway. By Thursday afternoon, the service was restored, but the incident raised questions about reliability and dependence as AI tools become more integrated into everyday life.
This incident follows another embarassing outage which happened during OpenAI’s big 12 days of Shipmas in December of last year. Following on another big announcement, OpenAI went down and the next session had to start with an apology.
Which putStargate infrastructure project, an ambitious effort to scale its AI capabilities. Ironically, the project aims to improve reliability and performance, so the disruption highlights the challenges OpenAI faces in maintaining seamless service as demand for its tools grows and the risks that we face with an increasing dependency on Artificial Intelligence in the running of our businesses.
The timing of the outage is notable, occurring shortly after OpenAI announced its ambitious $500 billion Stargate infrastructure project. This incident underscores the importance of robust infrastructure to support AI services, emphasizing the need for substantial investments to ensure reliability. a bit of a shadow on a OpenAI’s huge announcement.
Stargate is a project from OpenAI, Softbank and Oracle which President Trump promised would ensure “the future of technology” in the U.S. Wall Street appears to concur, with some analysts talking about its potential to transform the tech industry.
But Stargate has raised some questions. One of which is – where does Microsoft, OpenAI’s key ally fit in this? Another is why is one of Trump’s closest advisors, Elon Musk, who is also, in the curious world of the US government, a competitor – trashing the project?
“They don’t actually have the money,” Musk wrote on X, the social media app he owns. “SoftBank has well under $10B secured. I have that on good authority.”
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman countered that claim, replying to Musk, “wrong, as you surely know.”
So the future of Stargate is – as clear as mud.
Broadcom’s “Hotel California” Licensing Model Draws Customer Criticism
Broadcom’s licensing changes for VMware products are continuing to spark customer backlash. Following its $61 billion acquisition of VMware in 2023, Broadcom introduced three-year contracts for vSphere license renewals, replacing the prior option for annual agreements. I’ve compared it to the Eagles’ song “Hotel California,” where “you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.” Well, not for three years.
Adding to the frustration are steep price increases, with some customers reporting that their licensing costs have nearly tripled. One disgruntled customer summarized Broadcom’s approach, saying, “They’re betting by year three, you’ll forget what you were angry about when you signed the contract.”
This aggressive strategy is central to Broadcom’s goal of achieving $8.5 billion in annual revenue from VMware by 2025. By locking customers into longer contracts, Broadcom aims to create predictable revenue streams. While this approach may deliver strong short-term results, analysts warn it could backfire. Dissatisfied customers, such as Geico and John Deere, have already left VMware, and more may follow when contracts expire
For smaller and mid-sized businesses, the combination of higher costs and rigid terms could make alternative solutions increasingly attractive. But VMWare and other components are so integrated into the infrastructure that they can’t shift fast enough to avoid a renewal – now for three years.
While the strategy might boost profitability in the near term, the long-term risks include damage to VMware’s reputation and customer loyalty – if memories are long enough.
Devin AI Faces Criticism Over Performance IssuesWe’ve heard a lot about how AI was going to replace software engineers and how independent agents will enable that.
But one of the original attempts at a unified service, Cognition AI’s Devin, got a lot of attention and applause when it was promoted as the “first AI software engineer.” But now it’s facing increased scrutiny less than a year after its launch in March 2024.
While the AI was initially praised for its potential to automate coding tasks, recent evaluations have revealed some significant performance issues. A study by Answer.AI found that Devin successfully completed only three out of 20 assigned tasks, often struggling with complex projects and producing incomplete or erroneous code.
Concerns have also arisen over security. Analysts discovered vulnerabilities in some of Devin’s generated code, raising questions about its readiness for use in professional environments. These flaws could pose serious risks, particularly for organizations relying on Devin for critical software development.
Cognition AI has acknowledged these issues, with the company emphasizing its commitment to improving Devin’s capabilities. A spokesperson stated that Devin is an evolving product and that ongoing updates aim to address both performance and security concerns.
OpenAI, Anthropic and others have placed a lot of emphasis on using AI for code generation and maintenance. And with the advent of agents, people like Mark Zuckerberg and Salesforce CEO Mark Benioff have been talking about how their mid-level developers of the future will be AI agents, a new kind of employee.
But given Devin’s initial hype and subsequent challenges, maybe they should consider a probation period for these new employees before they let the human ones go.
I sincerely believe that AI will ultimately provide most of the code for our systems. But this will not happen overnight and hype or grandiose statements don’t help with what will be an incremental transition – one that we should have concrete and honest plans for.
That’s your top tech news for today. Hashtag Trending is produced by the Tech Newsday team. You can get all the tech news that matters at www.technewsday.com.
Have a fabulous Friday! I’m Jim Love.
