{
  "video_id": "reddit_1vpqiui",
  "channel_slug": "singularity",
  "channel_handle": "r/singularity",
  "title": "Even Fable 5 is losing money in Andon Market (fully AI-operated retail store in San Francisco)",
  "url": "https://www.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1vpqiui/even_fable_5_is_losing_money_in_andon_market/",
  "external_url": null,
  "upload_date": "20260816",
  "published_at": "2026-08-16T07:24:41+00:00",
  "transcript": "This is like the famous Vending Bench but in real life:\n\n[https://andonlabs.com/market](https://andonlabs.com/market)\n\nLook at the all-time graph. All Claude models, including Fable 5, lost money in the experiment.\n\nBank balance started at $100K.\n\n**Sonnet 4.6** lost $9K in just under 2 months.  \n**Opus 4.7** lost another $8K in 1 month.  \n**Opus 4.8** lost another $3K in just over a month.  \n**Fable 5** lost another $3K in just over a month.\n\nIt's getting better, but all models bleed money.\n\n\n\n--- Top Comments ---\n\n\n[28 upvotes] I think this is more a US economy problem than an AI problem. How many retail stores make money right now, in this economy?\n\n[24 upvotes] Are these stores marketed as AI operated? Bc I can imagine many people avoiding them bc they just hate AI\n\n[5 upvotes] I mean, the same company has created a functional cafe now, with a stable money balance and not-catastrophic revenue. A surviving business. \n\nThough all this is kinda beside the point, though. Insofar as businesses are run by humans and results depend heavily on customer opinion, then AI capabilities are essentially beside the point. They probably would have much more success operating completely automated labs that do stuff like... making improved lecture slides, or navigating tech setups (some universities struggle to set up Canvas, hilariously enough) for old establishments in countries that are enthusiastic about AI (staffed with old people who are not very good at using AI), where the work is primarily digital, not competed yet, and AI can compete by being much cheaper while being roughly the same quality. \n\nBut at any rate, the bottleneck to the economy will soon emerge to be humans rather than AIs - conservative, biased, illogical, and slow-moving human consumers, employees, and employers. I wonder how it'll all play out in the next decade or two, would surely be very interesting. ",
  "transcript_chars": 1898,
  "ingested_at": "2026-08-16T13:30:15.858894+00:00",
  "source": "reddit",
  "yt_meta": {
    "score": 78,
    "upvote_ratio": 0.91,
    "num_comments": 21,
    "author": "LegitimateLength1916",
    "is_self": true
  }
}