Diary of a Madman, Page 13

5,000 people peering inside. Don’t get trapped.

Art created by Mia Woike

The Week’s Special Focus on Artificial Intelligence

1. Self-Driving Mini-Series: Our first mini-series hit the streets this week in partnership with The Mission (one of the biggest publications on Medium) and is proving pretty popular. Part 1 focused on self-driving for Space and Part 2 on self-driving cars. We need the former as a back-up plan, but the latter because deep learning isn’t going to get us all the way to the Level 5 promised land. Have something you want to see in Part 3? Email us your thoughts.
2. AI + Movies: We contributed to the Huffington Post this week, on a story about how AI is already helping major movie studios and social networks thing about distributing movies like Star Wars in the future. How? By sending you a full movie inside a text message. Why? Because they can make up to 7x the revenue.
3. AI Business Models: We describe how DeepMind’s strategy of open-sourcing their software and research work is creating a new type of business. Time will tell whether it succeeds or fails, but they’re certainly optimizing for PR and public attention. Up the interest ante by looking at the timeline of AI acquisitions.
4. AI Forecasting: 13 predictions that might come to pass. Note that this is a focus mostly on the Artificial Mathematical Intelligence (AMI) approach and does not fully consider the alternative approach of Artificial Biological Intelligence (ABI). Here’s a handy chart comparing the difference.

Thoughts From The Watercooler

1. Watch: If you’re a subscriber to Netflix, cut out an hour and a half to watch the gorgeously produced Apex documentary on Hypercars by Michael Spinelli. Got me thinking, is there a business model in here for self-driving hypercars?
2. Video: We at Piksel just released version 1.9 of our Hive product, which is a video portal that you can own and operate yourself. Some customers include American social MCNs, expat soap operas, and even niche faith content. V1.9 upgraded our ad integration with Google DFP (allowing you to use any display ad you like), we already have our infinite roll ad editor for video ads using VAST 3.0 links and VMAP cue points, plus we added subscriptions. It’s like having your very own YouTube.
3. The Information: We sometimes give our thoughts on their articles. This one on whether our tech dreams are ahead of reality got a gold star from their editors. Also, Ford’s autonomous driving head mentioned what future prices might look like for the self-driving feature in their car. I break down in the comments what the self-driving business model will be in the future. Still, nobody has any idea how to get to 99.9999% accuracy of Level 5 wayfinding, as evidenced by this chart.
4. Investing: It’s not easy. It very much depends on what point you get in, at what price, and when you decide to get out and realize those gains or losses. I love this chart from the New York Times back in 2011 that shows how incredibly difficult timing the market is. Only Buffett has managed to do it successfully over a long time horizon at scale. Learn more at The Base Code.
5. Venture Capital: If you want the highest compensation, don’t be a corporate VC, but rather independent. Of course, you’ll take on more risk and have to manage LP expectations and fundraising, but corporate VC compensation is catching up.
6. Startup Stats: Surprising findings this week from those who raise more capital than those who raise less. Often, those who do execute better with less get better returns. Go figure.
7. Listen: to one of my favorite tracks from Steve Aoki’s latest album. Might get you hyped for this very fall Monday.

Read The Entire Book

12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

— Sean

Are you as crazy as me? Email the mad man.

Humanizing Tech is a premium publication covering autonomous driving, self-learning AI, personal hedge funds, editable DNA, SAAS space platforms, personal power stations, and niche video portals. This newsletter is a peek inside the Editor’s mind.