👋 On time for your weekend: a round-up of this week’s remarkable stories at the intersection of technology, business, design, and culture. Three reads and three listens; no fluff, just stuff ⚡
We are drowning in information, while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely —E.O. Wilson
📚 Reading
Rising Tide Rents and Robber Baron Rents:
In the dying stages of the old cycle, the companies on top of the heap turn to extractive techniques, using their market power to try to maintain their now-customary level of profits in the face of macroeconomic factors and competition that ought to be eating them away. They start to collect robber baron rents. That’s exactly what Google, Amazon, and Meta are doing today.
Tim O’Reilly—Radar | 18 minutes
Experiment w/ building an app end to end on LLMs:
It might be that the current problems with generative AI are actually the things that create an innovator's dilemma and give startups an advantage to slip under the incumbents. It seems like the ideal spot right now would an app where 90% "done" is a mostly great experience, but the failings are still somehow not stomach-able by incumbents.
Moxie Marlinspike—X | 2 minutes
Fear and Loathing of A.I.
This is what happens with significant new technologies! They fit existing laws awkwardly, at best, so new laws are needed. I don’t know exactly what those laws will be, or how various supreme courts will eventually rule on fair use and derivative works; but the claim that “generative AI is built on theft” is patently legally ridiculous.
Jon Evans—Gradient Ascendant | 19 minutes
🎧 Listening
We're really in an age where it pays to be an outlaw. I think people always have a soft spot for outlaws like people who break the law. But I think that we're in a time because following the rules for a lot of people feels like it was a sucker's bet that the people who break norms, break rules, get attention and accrue power. Would you rather be Elon or would you rather be Sundar?
Brian Morrissey—People vs Algorithms | 74 minutes
Talking smarter in the moment:
Just strive to get it done, just answer the question. Just give the feedback. Just respond in small talk. You actually free up the cognitive resources to do it really, really well. It is in the freeing ourselves up to just do what needs to be done, to just answer the question, to just connect, we actually free up bandwidth […] maximize mediocrity so you can achieve communication greatness.
Matt Abrahams—Lancefield on the Line | minutes
Major Shifts in Tech & Culture:
Productive work and the nature of productive work is changing so rapidly now that […] the people who can learn new things have unlimited job prospects, and the people who can't learn new things are, you know 🤷🏻♂️ Even if you went to college, I don't think it matters.
Ben Horowitz—a16z | 78 minutes
💎 Timeless
1️⃣ year ago—Against Safetyism
2️⃣ years ago—How Pattie Maes Almost invented Social Media
3️⃣ years ago—Why We Keep Telling the Myth of a Renaissance Golden Age and Bad Middle Ages