Artificial Intelligence | Double Burrito Day

Doubling down on AI

Many years ago, at the Tropicana Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, I once saw a guy in a Tom Brady jersey, double-down on successive (winning) hands of blackjack (at a $5 table). From my vantage point, after 15 minutes he was up at least $12,000 dollars. I told you that story to tell you this one.

I wrote some time ago that AI was too big to fail and that it wouldn’t matter if OpenAI or Anthropic went bankrupt. Both would be absorbed into MSFT, Google, or Amazon quickly for pennies on the dollar. The collateral damage however could be catastrophic because much of the AI buildout is debt-financed. And now, the institutional investors and market makers who manage your 401k or pension have decided to “Tom Brady” their way to the AI promised land. NVIDIA has announced that it now has partnered with Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfrield, Goldman Sachs, and KKR to establish “independent financing platforms designed to mobilize 3rd party capital to support the buildout of AI infrastructure over time.” The announcement signals two important things:

1. The AI bottleneck is no longer GPUs (called it) or Memory (called it) or Networking (called it) or Electricity (called it), no, the number one bottleneck now is financing (did not call it).

2. If indeed OpenAI goes bankrupt (I bet they will), the second-order effects would be so HUGE (see above) that the the world’s largest bank (and lender of last resort) would have to step in and bail everyone out. Sound familiar? Afterwards, life, for the most part will go back to normal, except for the crippling inflation and lack of funding for many home buyers and small businesses. But otherwise, back to normal.

The moral of the story is to choose your friends wisely. If I had a rack of “High Society” sitting in front of me at a casino table, one of my friends would take half the stack and hide it from me. Tom Brady chose his friends poorly.

RIP Trop in Vegas. Good times.

Chat UI – It’s like living in the future

Posted on September 24, 2023 by Leonard Pham

ChatUI : Chatbots :: Transformers : GoBots

If you get the above reference, we can be friends.

ICYMI, Google released an updated version of Bard, which includes extensions (plugins) to Google Workspace, YouTube, Google Hotels & Flights, etc.

In the immortal words of Joe Biden, this is a BFD. It’s not just a big deal for Google; it’s a BFD for the future of interactions with Software and retrieving information. Product Managers, please pay attention.

Traditional information retrieval systems rely on structured data, where users must be precise (sometimes exact) with their search terms, tags, folders, etc. The only way to find the information you’re looking for is to input the predefined pathways to that information – the correct combination of folders, tags, filters, etc. This approach places an enormous burden on users to remember or anticipate the right pathway/inputs, leading to inefficiencies and frustration.

Have you ever endlessly searched for an email? Of course, you have. We all have. What if you could just ask BARD to track down an email for you? In the example below, I’ve asked Bard to locate the most recent receipts that I received.

BARD tracks down my recent receipts in my inbox.

Great, but I’m looking for a specific receipt, so I asked Bard only to show me receipts over $30.

ChatUI fundamentally changes how developers and designers must think about Software and User Interaction. Chat is the ultimate input device. It allows us to bend Software to our will without searching, memorizing formulas, shortcuts, or menu dropdowns. Our personal devices and software services will truly become our second brain. We’ll just chat with the computer and tell it to do what we need it to do. Imagine generating charts and pivot tables as quickly and easily as ordering from Chipotle. Burrito, White Rice, Black Beans, Chicken, Verde Salsa, Sour Cream, and lettuce with a side of guac and chips – in case you’re wondering.

I’m a nerd, but very excited about BARD’s new extensions and what’s to come. My prediction is that this fall, the Google Empire Strikes Back.

P.S. – I don’t want to tell Larry Page and Sergey Brin how to do their jobs, but y’all need a commercial to announce the release of these new features. How about this:

🎵 Upbeat 80s synthesizer music, transitioning into a catchy jingle. 🎵

“Drowning in your digital mail? Lost in your own inbox? Well, the future is HERE, and it’s RADICAL! Introducing… the NEW GMAIL 3000!”

“Lost that super important mail from Aunt Patty about her cat? No worries! With our bodacious SEMANTIC SEARCH, just type in ‘@GMAIL show me emails with images of Aunt Patty’s cat,’ and boom! There it is!”

“And hey, filters schmilters! With our new CHAT UI, just say the word, and GMAIL 3000 is on it. It’s like having a chat with your own futuristic robot!”

[Cut to a group of teenagers giving a thumbs up.]

Teen #1: “No more missing out on party invites for me!”

Teen #2: “GMAIL 3000 is totally tubular!”

Teen #3: “AI WHAT? I just know it’s wicked cool!”

🎤 “So say goodbye to the boring, old email blues and HELLO to the neon-lit, electric future with GMAIL 3000!”

🎵 The upbeat synthesizer jingle fades back in. 🎵

“GMAIL 3000! It’s like living in the future!”