Sources with Alex Heath
00:09:38 · S3, S4, S5, Ellis Hamburger
[00:09:38] S3: This episode is brought to you [00:09:40] S4: by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at accenture.com slash Spotify. [00:10:09] S5: This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome, that's new. They can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50 page restoration block or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini in Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online make sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses, setup required, compatibility, and availability varies 18 plus. [00:10:39] S1: Well, back here in The States, we've had some interesting news, some of which I've read on your newsletter. Feel like the one that was most interesting to me was the one that I knew the least about, which was Thinking Machines seemingly quasi imploding before it even launches. Can you tell me some more of that?
00:10:58 · Alex Heath
[00:10:58] S2: Yeah. This is Mira Murati. So she was the CCO of OpenAI. She was the CO for, like, two days, when Sam Altman was fired a couple years ago. She started this new NeoLab, is doing, you know, foundational research in AI and has been kind of just kind of puttering around. I mean, they released something, but it was an academic thing. And they've hired really good engineers. They've raised a ton of money. I think the largest seed round in tech history, like, billion dollars. And, basically, there was this implosion where two of the cofounders left, around six employees have left out of, like, a team of 40 to 50. And when AI researchers are, you know, trading like NBA athletes, like, I guess that matters a lot more than it used to. So people were super interested in this. And I think it's because a lot of people also look at companies like this that are pre product, pre revenue, but are like a talent play in AI and, like, what are you actually gonna do? And if your company is your talent and your talent leaves, what is left? Right? And so, I don't know, man. I think it just says, like, how fragile all this is and there's so few people at the frontier and, like, you know, they all boomeranged back to OpenAI. The people who left, they all came from OpenAI. They just went back. And now this really buzzy AI lab is, like, thrown into into disarray. So, I don't really know what happens next but, I do... I I don't think there's gonna be as many, foundational kind of frontier AI labs that are doing well, in the future. I just think there's gonna be consolidation. It's it's too expensive and there's too much attention on it and, drama, you know. There was like drama about like, there was a relationship that wasn't disclosed or something and I'm like, hello?
00:12:46 · Ellis Hamburger, Alex Heath
[00:12:46] S1: Always is. [00:12:47] S2: Come... But come on, like, every AI researcher in San Francisco was in, like, a polycule. Like, this... Like, arguing that that's the reason you would let go of someone. I mean, I remember, like, one of the OpenAI cofounders, like, got married in the office. Like, this is just I I don't know. There's just a lot of, drama and, like, dirt being slung around in the press on what happened. And I I I think it's just, there's just so much money at stake. [00:13:13] S1: Are you talking about yourself? Dirt being slung around in the press? [00:13:17] S2: I don't think I contributed any of the, salacious details, I will say. I said people were leaving, which is true. But then some others reported like, oh, it was about a relationship or there was misconduct, but wouldn't say what the misconduct was. Very clearly coming from, you know, The Thinking Machines camp. I don't know. When you've been doing this as long as I have, you can very clearly see where narratives are coming from. And Murati's camp was very, like, I think vehemently trying to, push back on the fact that her company was imploding by, like, saying, like, oh, there was a relationship that happened months ago and we're just now, like, doing something about. And it's like, okay, like news at eleven, like people in AI labs are in relationships with each other. I don't know. Just didn't seem that big of a deal to me. [00:14:05] S1: Yeah. It's interesting given that they haven't really talked about much about what they're building yet. Right? I mean, I
00:14:05 · Ellis Hamburger, Alex Heath, Tony Zhao
[00:14:05] S1: Yeah. It's interesting given that they haven't really talked about much about what they're building yet. Right? I mean, I [00:14:11] S2: feel like this is one of I don't think they [00:14:12] S0: know what they're building. [00:14:13] S1: Right. And this is like one of the refreshing things I feel like about having Tony on the pod who we're gonna cut to in a minute here, is that... I mean, he's like humble about it. And as you'll hear, you know, I've like known him for a couple years, but like I first Working with met Yeah. And when I first started working with him, he was being super humble about having this, apparently this goaded research paper that a lot of people were ripping off and that they really were on the frontier. And he isn't super loud and proud about it, but it's like, wow, someone actually with academic background and a technical innovation here. And now a couple years later, they have an impressive product and brand that just kind of feels like the full story. And that's at a moment where it feels like a lot of companies either have some very fuzzy technical idea or they don't have a technical innovation at all. And it's just a pure, you know, vertical play or an audience play or some type of rapper play. And, yeah, it seems unusual these days.
00:15:15 · Alex Heath
[00:15:15] S2: Yeah. For sure. His approach is super unusual. I would argue he doesn't really have a product yet. I mean, it sounds like his product is the gloves that we talk about that people get paid to use to train the data. I'm still very skeptical of, like, these household robots, being in homes very soon. I don't know. I've just been talking to a lot of robotics founders here in Davos recently, and I just... I think there's a lot of hard problems here. But I do think he's approaching it in a super original way, and the branding is sick. The Glove idea is very unique. He's obviously an OG in the field. And Sunday, I think, is considered in Silicon Valley to be, you know, one of the key companies in robotics that everyone's looking to. So definitely a great guest and cool that you worked on that and helped him kinda position all that back in the day. I don't know. It's it's cool to see it finally come out. Right?
00:16:04 · Ellis Hamburger, Alex Heath, S3
[00:16:04] S1: I mean, honestly, I like at some point a year, year and a half later, I don't even know what I contributed. Sometimes sometimes these company... Mean, I work with so many startups at a time in various capacities that sometimes they launch and I'm like, did I write that? And I actually act... I actually have to search my Notion for the tagline sometimes. And I'm like, sometimes it's there, sometimes it's not. Yeah. As Tony said, even just kind of the helper versus Terminator dichotomy. If if it was even just that, I can I can be proud of that? I mean, that's what I try to do. Obviously I can't sell it per se, but that's what I'm proud of is trying to guide people toward a more positive, less cynical vision. And to the extent that people feel that it helped them, awesome. But no, I did not I did not come up with the name. Back then, we didn't actually talk about it on the podcast, but back then they were called LemmyBot, like, let me do that for you, which is pretty cute and catchy in its own way. I think Sunday is just kinda badass because, I mean, it's just one of those names that's, like, super simple and evocative and all the chores happen on Sunday. And so it's just a little too perfect. But Let Me Bot Let Me Bot was cute as well. [00:17:18] S2: Let Me Bot's cute. Yeah. I mean, it's like access. Right? Like simple, evocative, and you listen to pods doing the chores on Sunday. [00:17:25] S1: I hope so. Shall we cut to the conversation with Tony? [00:17:29] S2: Yeah. Let's do it. [00:17:35] S3: This episode is brought to