Ben Lister

(Gift link) - Nice oped from Martin Casado and Katherine Boyle at a16z VC on the blatant bias for Big Tech in D.C. on all things AI. I've never seen such government favoritism for incumbent tech companies in my 40+ year career. It's frankly obscene, self-destructive behavior. It may be some part exploitation of ignorance on the part of Big Techs (you've been duped), it may be some part faulty ideology, but I don't think there is any question it's also political corruption. It's one of the most extreme examples of government capture we've ever seen. To clarify my position -- I don't think it was necessary to even mention open source in this op-ed as it muddies the water with two issues, even if related (I support some open source, though in LLMs it does have security considerations -- all LLMs do). I'm also not against all regulation in AI, but I am fiercely opposed to regulation that favors dominant monopoly incumbents and/or new ventures with multiple billion dollar valuations that don't even have a product. As I repeat often, the super majority of problems and risks that need regulating in AI are caused by LLM firms and their Big Tech partners. That's where the focus should be, and since they are conflicted, the government shouldn't be relying on them for advice like they are, or internal AI advisers who came from them who are on the payroll of non-profits funded by tech billionaires with a myriad of conflicts. It's ugly. Bottom line: While the U.S. has a serious problem with the Big Tech oligopoly and their oligarchs, we are not quite yet an oligarchy, but we're getting very close to meeting that definition. We better fix it before it's too late. ~~~~~ Quote: Although the public-facing argument for AI regulation is to promote safety, we believe the true purpose is to suppress open-source innovation and deter competitive startups. Many emerging technology companies are well-equipped to help solve national-security challenges, but of the 22 members on the board, none represent startups, or what we call “little tech.” Only two are private companies, and the smallest organization on the board hovers around $1 billion in value. The AI companies selected for the board either are among the world’s largest companies or have received significant funding from those companies, and all are public advocates for stronger regulations on AI models.

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Me: "I'll give that public speaking thing a try in 2024." Also me: Getting stuck right into the big games apparently... I'll be talking at BigDataLdn this year. It's a solid mix of hype and anxiety, Hanxiety if you will! But mostly hype. #BigDataLDN #data #dataengineering #dataleadership

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if you know, you know xAI announces 'colossus' 100,000 h100s. sam i am whatev you say i am (alt)man aims to spend billys. so. what's the story morning glory. it could be just me. it could be following the (ai) news stream online, on X. it kinda appears that whenev elon makes a statement. toute suite. there is a reply from OpenAI via bloomberg. is it me. or is this part of the nerd drama. tit for tat. either way on the back of NVIDIA hitting it outta the park with it's valuation. the other 2 indicators (amongst many) appears to be up and to the stratosphere. which creates the resulting fomo. with the rest of the field anticipating that all this good news trickles down to (ai) chatgpt grok llms whatev being implemented and in fact performing as advertised. there is another factor which has to do with the (un)natural implementation. adoption. of these clusters. the energy. the queue. the models. the data. the resulting outcomes advancing varying industries. first the creative in the form of images, music, video. then in areas as in biology, pharma, health. then perhaps in areas which become it's own new marketplace that appears as if from no where. and so it is. we are in a market which is gun ho. ho ho ho. in time for christmas those NVIDIA gpus will be cranking out the training outcomes. there is a lag when this stuff is in training mode. it's weeks and months depending on the mixture of tokens, the model, complexity of other models. and of course the output that matches as if by magic. there is so much going on at the same time we are watching intently for all the great news. a rising billy tide that raises all millys to billys. exciting stuff. as we watch the tit for tat. goes click clack. train. infer. and back again. source: https://lnkd.in/eNuC9dtW source: https://lnkd.in/g9aBN2Qf < . >

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UCL are using no code to generate additional revenue 🎓 Here's how they built a SaaS tool on Bubble👇🏽 UCL are one of the top universities in the world. The Medical School were fed up of their dated Microsoft Access system. Things were moving too slow, and they needed a change. They explored traditional software development but it was too expensive. They came across Bubble and got building. #1 They built a personal tutoring app The idea was to assign students a tutor. Students could see the notes, and the tutor could respond. #2 They built an app to manage student records #3 They build a curriculum map app - which now has 12,000+ users It guides students on their learning and helps them prepare for exams. The tool is so good that other departments and universities started reaching out. So good that UCL have started reselling this as a SaaS tool with customisations... Goodspeed Bubble Taylor Bennie

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It’s finally here. Chapter 2/4 on The Post Web And it’s a beast. A thorough examination of The Stack and it’s implications.

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AI is shaping our future, but who exactly is shaping AI? The reality is stark. ❌ While women make up half of the UK population, only 22% of AI professionals are female. This isn't just about diversity - it's about the future of technology itself. At today's Women in Silicon Roundabout event, I witnessed more than discussion - I saw action. A room full of brilliant minds actively building the future we need to see. Because when we limit who shapes AI, we limit what AI can achieve for humanity. The brilliant Naomi Pearse put it perfectly: ↳ We need to democratise AI knowledge, build truly inclusive learning environments, and ensure every woman who wants to shape the future of tech has the tools to do so. Because the next breakthrough in AI shouldn't depend on gender - it should depend on brilliance. And right now? We're missing out on far too much of it. #ai #womenintech #artificialintelligence #machinelearning #wosr24

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If you're in the UK, Keir Starmer is currently announcing serious implications around AI. It's pretty clear at this point that AI is the future. Any deniability at this point is either sheer willing ignorance or laziness. I'm not saying that to be provocative. It's tough love. Truly, you only need open your eyes to what AI is currently capable of. Here's just 10 points that I picked up on from the AI Action Plan on the UK Government site. And this is the near future: - Expand AI computing capacity, including a new supercomputer by 2030. - Establish AI Growth Zones for streamlined AI infrastructure development. - Form an AI Energy Council to address sustainable energy needs. - Invest in AI talent development through scholarships and visa programs. - Create a UK Sovereign AI Unit to boost private sector collaboration. - Leverage public sector data for AI research and development. - Implement AI tools in public services like healthcare and education. - Provide regulatory support to foster AI-driven innovation. - Develop a competitive copyright regime for AI innovations. - Promote AI safety and ethics through the AI Safety Institute. And many more. If you're thinking of implementing AI/Gen. AI into your business, there are a few things you need to do and implement. Otherwise you'll have this ultra powerful (and expensive) tool but only ever get 10% from it. Although it's 5 steps, these are crucial for success. And for avoiding a potential lawsuit. I'm running a series on this. And yes, it's a good idea to share it around. AI will affect all of us. You will help others by sharing this ♻ #chatgpt #promptengineering #agents #AI

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Development hot take? Don’t name your micro services using cryptic names. Ex. Superman, Batman etc. It’s like 5% cute and 95% annoying as hell. I’m all for creativity and having fun at work, but deliberately making domain knowledge obtuse and making it even harder for new developers to get up to speed is just stupid.

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Two things I didn’t know last week in AI that I do now 1. Thanks to Alan D. Thompson’s memo - ‘When Google Gemini responds, it embeds a secret and invisible 'watermark' in its response by the words it chooses, their order, and the general syntax. This means every time you ask Gemini a question, the response is trackable. For example, if you use it to write a book or an essay, Google (and perhaps law enforcement) can check to prove that it was AI-generated. It is possible that other labs are doing this as well. There are concerns around this, including complex legal issues’ - err not cool Google 🚫 - is this right? Feel free to correct if this isn’t accurate. 2. The People's Liberation Army researchers used an earlier Llama 13B large language model (LLM) from Meta incorporating their own parameters to construct a military-focused AI tool to gather and process intelligence, and offer accurate and reliable information for operational decision-making - ChatBIT. I am not picking on 🇨🇳 - it is more the lack of enforcement more generally with open source models and thinking of Ai risk and governance, technically the license prohibits this use - but supposedly nothing to see here as Mark Zuckerberg’s says we can't stifle innovation - so if they can do that, we all can right…and what’s the point of the licences… Ps. I should add China 🇨🇳 has some excellent LLMs so from a technical perspective the story isn’t that interesting,

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Wrapping up my trip with a visit to Google in Cambridge and some reflections on why FAANG is not my cup of tea: First, it's worth mentioning there's a lot to LIKE about a big tech career - Get paid a LOT of cash, and stock you can sell for more cash - Solve problems at a scale larger than most startups, by orders of magnitude - Work with generally smart, self-motivated people, since the hiring bar is high - Fun office spaces where you can work out of a teacup if you'd like - If you get bored you can move around the org and the world I wouldn't call such an opportunity unenticing. If I had chosen offices with teacups at the start of my career, I'd probably have had a lot of fun, learned a ton, and dig the perks. And there might have been a version of events where I joined successively great teams, found the right managers and projects, and kept having fun for a long time to come, while earning a ton of real money. But there was also a very likely path (which I see a lot of folks go down) where - bureaucratic bullshit fills the day - politics dictates how products are built - the work gets so uninspiring that coasting becomes more attractive - hit some glass ceiling in career growth because of bad management - get sick of working for other people who work for other people who work for other people So it's not OBVIOUS that I'm better off for having gone into early stage startups and now starting my own. But, I'd say I'm content with my path - I choose what I work on and who I work with - I never go into work dreading a conversation with someone difficult or toxic - If I get absolutely bored with what we're working on, we just go pivot - I never have to fight for 'credit' for my work. - When I see bullshit creeping in I can cut it right out - I never have to ask for approval to do something - I'm answerable only the The Market (and my cofounder? 😬) - If I want to go to somewhere different / nice / fun to work I can just go fly somewhere and visit my friends anyway. Would you trade what you're doing for a FAANG job with a fat paycheck? (Or if you already have one and LOVE it, please tell me what I'm missing out on?)

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Had a realisation about Product People and why we are good at both taking and mitigating risks – we don't have a specialism, so we're great at saying "So What"? This allows product people to be experts at "comparing apples and pears", even when there is incomplete data (which is always the case). This sounds obvious (and maybe it already was to others, apologies if so), but it only just dawned on me. Some examples: 1) A peer in payments has come to you, as they are really worried that PSD2 isn't turned on and they think this is a big risk as it's legally mandated – they want you to make it a top priority to fix it. For them it's top priority as they are accountable for payments, but as a product person who is agnostic, you ask "how much is the fine and how many companies have been fined so far"? They are flabbergasted that you aren't taking it more seriously, but they don't realise you are taking it as seriously as every other risk, but you just aren't as close to it as they are. 2) Technology want to borrow engineers from all the product teams to upgrade the ecommerce platform the company uses, as it's out of service soon and is therefore a "burning platform". For them it's a top priority, as they accountable for service reliability, but as a product person who is agnostic, you ask "what happens if we don't do anything"? The answer is "nothing", but over time the risk of something going wrong and being easily fixable increases. 3) The Brand team want to refresh the look of a product that has performed well at MVP stage, to make it more in line with other parts of the portfolio, but this would slow down the build and scale of the product. For them it's a top priority, as they accountable for the companies brand salience, but as a product person who is agnostic, you ask "what happens if we ship the MVP branding and do you have any data to suggest the new brand would improve our metrics"? And I could go on, it's the same with UX design, engineering, marketing, sales and everything else – all have needs, but none are created more important by default. All will be greeted by product people with a polite "So what", as they are balancing the needs of everyone (including the customer).

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A signature moment for UK tech. I wrote an oped today for The Times on how this moment for Wayve can trigger a movement for UK tech. In the same edition Scale AI's Alexandr Wang announces he is setting up a UK HQ and University of Cambridge announce they are doubling down on spin outs. Four main externalities helped the Wayve story this far: - top Cambridge academics, UK skills density in AI - immigration policies attractive to talent - corporates partnering with startups - UK government regulatory arbitrage Rishi Sunak's support for the tech sector can be seen by 2 quotes from him welcoming tech companies today. These conditions should unleash more AI leaders from the UK Policies do matter for entrepreneurs. For founders what has helped and what has hindered ? cc Microsoft NVIDIA SoftBank

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DeepSeek V3 - new open model that is better than Claude Sonnet at the Aider Polyglot coding benchmark and - perhaps most importantly - has 10x cheaper inference costs. The massive price drop means you can experiment with having a Aider build you a feature for $2 instead of $20. $20 is a little too pricey for rapid experimentation in your development workflow. Unsurprisingly, Deep Seek's site is down. Other Model Inference providers like Hyperbolic seem to have also taken Deep Seek V3 down for maintenance https://lnkd.in/gtn8Hb36

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We may be entering a new form of Conway's Law where systems and the team structures that run them evolve to meet the needs of the AI that writes their code. Deploying Cursor/Windsurf across a monolith/mono-repo is more fluid than across multiple separate repos where you have to repeatedly pass across context from one LLM instance to another. Or possibly given the issues with input token volume, we'll develop better context sharing/RAG for LLMs that are still repo specific.

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One of the best blogs I've come across on quantization, with outstanding visualizations. Highly recommend a read for anyone looking to understand LLM quantization in more depth! 📐 - https://lnkd.in/e_WTgq6x At Felafax AI (YC S24), we are building Infra to make full precision multi-GPU fine-tuning easier. #AI #Infra #LLM

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The end of this post is brilliant! Eddie Short paraphrases Satya Nadella here: 'AI will not replace companies and economies, but companies and economies that lead with AI, will replace those that do not!'

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Would you hire an AI over an engineer? I have to admit, initially - I was skeptical. The last thing any software engineer wants is to be made redundant whilst AI can take their jobs 🫣 🧠 Fortunately for tech startup founders, recent AI developments have now leveled the playing field for those in smaller teams. Let me explain. From my prior experience running a development agency, it was common to have 6-10 engineers on a development project for 3+ months to produce award-winning tech products. Now with AI tools such as Claude, Cursor, Github Copilot, tech founders can achieve greatness with a far smaller engineering footprint. Let's take our latest B2B SaaS platform, Perioko. In under 12 weeks - as a solo engineer, I have been able to deliver: - 46 API endpoints - 8+ core features - 79 unit tests - Deep KYC / AML integration - Enterprise-level security - Multi-tenant database support - Full mobile responsiveness - English and Mandarin support Before 2020, I would have needed 3+ devs over 4-5 months to achieve the same result. 🤯 Utterly insane. This was all made possible with the use of AI (primarily used to augment rather than replace common engineering tasks).

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Particle's latest product, Tachyon, went live on Kickstarter yesterday. How's it going??? - Hit our funding threshold in 35 minutes - $100,000 of sales in less than 24 hours Here's what the press is saying: - "Want an SBC that can do it all? Particle's new Tachyon board is aiming to dethrone the Raspberry Pi as the king of tiny computers." - XDA - "A Snapdragon SBC with 5G and an AI accelerator? Sign me up." - Tom's Hardware - "This level of integration is rarely seen in SBCs, and it positions the Tachyon as a potential game-changer." - PC Guide Here's what my family is saying: - "Video is so good!!!! Best one for sure" - Ashley Supalla - "Wow! And it even looks cool" - my mom - "Zach , I didn't understand a single thing you were saying....but I love the video ! Really sounds exciting . Good luck " - my mother-in-law Come check out what we're up to! https://lnkd.in/eY2DWCyK #5G #IoT #AI #SBC

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