Sam Altman: Users' polite language on ChatGPT costs OpenAI millions of dollars in energy

Mars Finance News, on April 21st, according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, users' polite phrases like "please" and "thank you" to ChatGPT are consuming computing power and electricity, causing OpenAI to lose millions of dollars. Engineers like Carl Youngblood believe: "Maintaining politeness towards AI is a moral obligation, and harsh daily interactions can lead to a decline in interpersonal communication skills". Epoch AI data analyst Josh You stated that due to model and hardware efficiency improvements in 2025, each ChatGPT query consumes about 0.3 watt-hours of electricity, and polite language will not generate significant energy consumption. According to a Future survey in December 2024, 67% of US users maintain politeness with AI assistants, with 55% believing it is the correct behavior, and 12% out of concern about AI "holding a grudge", with these users worried that in the future, when AI develops consciousness, it might treat humans differently based on historical interaction attitudes.