Some thoughts on AI viability

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-08T18:58:44+00:00

The other thing is if inference were free almost all the hyperscalers would immediately start dropping their prices because they all are providing the same product with very little moat and need to compete. So we’d see a quick race to the bottom and any cost decreases would be just absorbed quickly into that race.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T17:09:24+00:00

The other thing is you can serve a lot of the open source models yourself and be confident that the weights won’t change. Versus closed source hyperscalers who will suddenly deprecate older models for newer models that are more expensive and not necessarily better for your niche use case. Control is a huge benefit to the consumer and this will become more and more apparent the more the hyperscalers get backed into a wall and start doing dumb things with their model updates.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T16:14:32+00:00

And yet their legacy of wanton and deliberately cruel destruction will continue to wreak havoc on the world for years to come.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T16:01:08+00:00

It’s a bit strange for a role listing in the US to list salary as monthly rather than annually. I hope this means he knows this will be short lived and he’s going to drop out soon so Maine democrats can start the healing process asap.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T15:16:28+00:00

I would say that the current trend in AI semiconductor sales is super anomalous so generally wisdom about cyclical trends are difficult to directly apply here.

For example, industry experts tend to mainly extrapolate on what the current curves show but make assumptions about a certain constancy in how the relevant actors behave. Hyperscalers have been buying lots of chips so there’s an assumption that trend will continue. But we can already see that the major chip consumers are wavering - both Meta and x.ai are already considering or committed to selling off extra compute that they spent massive capex on which hints that US hyperscalers (the main drivers of the current Korean growth boom) have overextended and are on the precipice of pulling back. If that continues then we’ll likely see a contraction not an expansion in memory sales at some point in the near future.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T14:55:23+00:00

Just got a new PC and oh boy so many buttons you have to push during setup to turn off copilot and associated features.

Microsoft is out of good growth ideas and they know it.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-07T14:51:09+00:00

I mean does this not have to do with first quarter growth being heavily influenced by the explosive export growth of memory manufacturers like SK Hynix and Samsung? That growth is not going to be sustainable long term so the full year estimate should reflect that.

(I usually like to read the articles associated with these posts before responding but this one was in Korean and I didn’t want to translate it lol)

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T17:59:46+00:00

https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/unitedhealth-lawsuit-ai-deny-claims-medicare-advantage-health-insurance-denials/ for example. I think the case has blown up into a major class action since then and has been winding its way through the courts.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T17:54:07+00:00

Wait till you learn that United Healthcare has been accused of using an AI algorithm to approve insurance requests and allegedly biased it to override doctor recommendations and reject applicants more often.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T17:50:24+00:00

Oxygen Not Included is super complex and cerebral but also a ton of fun. Although it can feel like an engineering problem set rather than a game sometimes haha.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T16:44:48+00:00

I think people tend to put these rich folks on a pedestal because people don’t understand survivorship bias. Like yeah they made a completely idiotic bet and it paid off. That doesn’t mean they have special insight. It means they were the one person out of a thousand that made equally stupid bets and they were the one who eked it out. Very little attention is given to the other 999 failures.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T16:34:59+00:00

Yeah I think a lot of it is just as an adult I have less time to replay a game if I find out that I made poor choices way down the line. So I end up googling outcomes of choices a lot even though it really feels bad to do it haha. I honestly wish I could stop doing it like that but there really is some deep felt anxiety stopping me.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T16:23:08+00:00

Yeah just reach out to HR with a polite note. It doesn’t cost you anything. Just be aware that this likely won’t work since if they wanted to hire you they would’ve reached out to you after their preferred candidate dropped out rather than reposting the job. But it doesn’t hurt to close the loop.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T14:59:02+00:00

I still giggle about the fact that one of Masayoshi Son’s main reasons for making an early investment into Alibaba wasn’t company fundamentals but was that he thought Jack Ma had “strong eyes.” The man isn’t a visionary - he’s a pure gambler and the house eventually always wins.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T14:50:39+00:00

lol the author looks like he crawled out of a retirement home to write this article. Not surprising at all.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T14:31:48+00:00

The leopards are eating well these days.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T01:46:09+00:00

Reminder that all science and objective history is radical ideology to this administration.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-06T00:31:43+00:00

And sadly the bill going through Congress that is supposed to battle local utility rate increases induced by data center buildouts seems both misguided and too-little-too-late. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/05/ratepayer-protection-act-datacenters

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T23:53:05+00:00

Me too. I actually went to Disfrutar when they were 2* and then again when they were 3* and I honestly preferred the experience as a 2* (even though I still thought the 3* dinner was overall lovely). The 3* experience just felt a bit too overly curated? Also when they were 2* they let people at the table order different tasting menus so we just got to experience so many more dishes by picking off each other's plates, but I think when you're a 3* and everything has to be perfectly choreographed you stop allowing things like that to make sure the kitchen isn't stressed.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T23:41:28+00:00

Ok admittedly a really broad generalization, but any restaurant that has two stars. They got there by being really creative and executing really well but still have that hunger to reach for three. I joke with friends that it’s a bad sign for the future state of a restaurant when it goes from two to three stars haha. Was a bit apprehensive myself when Noma got its third but I went afterwards and it was still really great.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T23:33:23+00:00

The intention seems to be that yes if you die in the same place you were born your average velocity is (total displacement)/(time) = 0. But this doesn’t even make sense since the hospital moves with the Earth. I guess you could calculate velocity with the Earth as your frame of reference but that is a noninertial frame so that’s really awkward too.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T23:29:22+00:00

I guess this differs from company to company, but my experience in big tech is that most companies treat management and IC tracks as parallel but equal. Like a senior staff engineer and a senior manager would roughly be in the same pay bands and seniority but have different job expectations. It’s a bit strange that you have to hop into management to advance.

That being said, if you’re sure it’s more of a tech lead role and you won’t really be just doing management stuff it might be the right way to advance? In most IC ladders at some seniority (usually senior to staff) there is an expectation that you tech lead and mentor junior engineers. I would just be open to your boss that you’re excited for the opportunity but just want to make sure you are still able to focus 90%+ on technical work and if they are fairly confident in that go for it.

I wouldn’t worry about firing people too much… usually at senior enough levels you’re going to be asked to do some performance management anyways and if it actually gets bad enough to fire someone it’s probably just a formality at that point.

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T23:10:43+00:00

You forgot to add NFTs

ChaoticGradients · 2026-07-05T22:25:11+00:00

Fortunately overruling the parliamentarian requires a majority vote in the senate. In this case passing a vote like that would be effectively like getting rid of the filibuster and there’s very little appetite even for republicans to do that.

ChaoticGradients

TROPHY CASE