TL;DR: a one liner source file tells the compiler to set main as a 4GB array; in the process the compiler might run out of memory.
In this particular case, the article clearly says:
> The array will contain 4294967295 integers, each with the size of four bytes, taking up 17179869180 bytes in total.
Later, the article again stresses again that you have to multiply by four:
> having the size of 10000 integers, that is, 40000 bytes
It's really hard to imagine how somebody who actually did read the article could have missed that.
Anyhow, this was more of a short blog post than a full article. It was a 2 minute read (not exactly a novel). And the thought experiments at the end are interesting, and illuminate some important points about how the language operates. Definitely worth the read.