The government is still shutdown, but nobody seems to notice except Chuck Schumer, and apparently cursing is just de rigueur now. The S&P 500 is still up. Gold all time high. Bitcoin all time high. Carlyle steps into labor statistics with the government shutdown. So why are things ripping?
Maybe it’s OpenAI. Or Nvidia. Kinda weird that stocks went way up up and the labor force went way down for the first time ever right when ChatGPT got released, right? Probably nothing.
Speaking of OpenAI, they now own 10% of AMD.. somehow? Matt Levine describes it well. And some insider made a ton of money on calls. OpenAI had a Dev Day too, and 1,000 startups screamed. There’s an Apps SDK, an Agents SDK, and Sora. And maybe it’s not just startups screaming, but every software company that exists. Maybe that’s why they’re all attaching themselves to Sam & co. Where will search happen in 5 years? ChatGPT. Buy new house goods? ChatGPT. Pay for bespoke, handcrafted yarn sweaters? ChatGPT. Write your own app? ChatGPT. Find a flight and hotel? ChatGPT. You get the idea.
And what’s Anthropic doing? They’re capturing hearts and minds with hats. No seriously, I want one of those hats. I’d stand in line for it. Sonnet 4.5 is amazing. They’re the anti-slop company now. But it also feels like they’re positioned as the elite alternative to the behemoth. But both companies are two sides of the same coin. And the best engineers aren’t writing code anymore.
Now is all this a bubble? Maybe, but it’s all still capex from earnings. Datacenter growth keeps coming. Electricity prices are going up. And there’s plenty of liquidity. Also read the new State of AI report, it’s a lot.
What else? Israel and Hamas have a ceasefire. The White House blesses the peacemakers. Except ICE agents, who shoot pepper balls randomly. And democrats. And also let’s give Ukraine some Tomahawks.
The Church of Nigeria breaks from the Anglican Church over the new Archbishop of Canterbury. Katie Porter bombs an interview and they dig up plenty of old stuff too, and how is she actually running for Governor? China locks down the global rare earth metal market which could make things sticky very fast. A man tries to blow up the Red Mass for the Supreme Court.
Figure previews the latest robot. Tesla releases FSD v14.1. Old monkeys get a shot and get younger. Pope Leo releases his first Apostolic Exhortation, carried on from Francis, Dilexi te.
And most important of all, my daughter plays two new Taylor Swift songs.. and they’re kinda good?
On to the reading!
Timely
Donald Trump’s Worst Idea - Tyler Cowen on skewing the market with nationalized buy signals, and how Trump might usher socialism in the side door.
The Techno-Optimist’s Guide to Futureproofing Your Children - Will kids need careers? Colleges? Is Alpha School and AI tutors a sign of the future? Or a dead-end? I remain, skeptical, but agency is still important.
Hamlet Is The Gen-Z Story We Need - Hamlet, it turns out, is one of the middle children of history too, with no purpose or place.
Some Thoughts on the Sutton Interview - Dwarkesh comes back with a refined view of what “more compute” really means in the Bitter Lesson and how continual learning might work one day.
Timeless
Machines of Loving Grace - A completely brilliant and optimistic piece from the head of Anthropic on the enormous potential of AI. Required reading.
Language Without Mind - Stochastic parrots AI may be, but they are still startling. Will then make us forget our own inner lives and quests; our souls?
Failure Is a Great Tutor—Don’t Fire Him - Monday night, my son caught a long throw from his friend for a game-winning flag football touchdown with 5 seconds left. I wasn’t proud of him for the play, but for the perseverance to join the team, to learn, to work so his teammates can trust him, to drop passes and get up and try again, and to practice when he’s tired.
The Myth of the Sommelier - The Judgement of Paris, the influence of Robert Parker, and the “veneer of credibility” around expertise and wine tasting.
Books
The Pendulum: A Granddaughter’s Search for Her Family’s Forbidden Nazi Past by Julie Lindahl - Julie Lindahl gives us a magically intimate retelling of the research she did into her family’s Nazi past. She grew up in Brazil — where her family had fled in 1960 — with strange holes and disconnections about her family’s past. There are many memoirs from the perspective of Jewish descendants, but few that I’ve seen from Nazi descendants. From her relationship with her loving but Nazi-sympathetic grandmother to the encounters with old men who still remember her cruel and fanatical SS grandfather, this book holds nothing back and is absolutely beautiful.
Tweets
Some good ones, so you don’t need to scroll!
The world is amazing. Cheers!