The launch of OpenAI’s GPT-5 has ushered in a panoply of views on the future of AGI and end-user applications. Does the platform’s aggressive router presage a future of lobotomized AI responses driven more by compute efficiency than quality? Will new chip models be able to make up the difference? And how will OpenAI, which recently hired Fidji Simo from Instacart to become CEO of Applications, expand its revenue beyond API calls and consumer subscriptions?These are huge questions which will ricochet throughout the tech economy. Thankfully, we have a veteran hand this week to go over it with us in the form of Dylan Patel, founder, CEO, and chief analyst of Semianalysis. He’s the guru everyone reads (and listens to), covering the intricacies of chips and compute for a readership of hundreds of thousands of subscribers.Joining host Danny Crichton as well as Lux’s Shahin Farshchi and Michelle Fang, the quartet discuss the questions above plus how Mark Zuckerberg is transitioning Meta Reality Labs, the hopes and dreams of new chip startups, the future of AI workloads, and finally, Intel after the U.S. government’s purchase of 10% of its shares.
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America’s degrowth lawyers need to learn from China
It’s fun to play a game of superlatives with China. From the awe-inspiring and cyberpunk scale of the metro trains cruising through apartment blocks in Chongqing to the stupendous rate of its shipbuilding, housing construction and waterworks, China has shown that it can build like no other. That includes the just-announced Medog Hydropower Station, which at $167 billion would be one of the largest and most expensive construction projects ever seen. Behind all of this activity is a state organized for engineering, designed for speed and scale.That’s one half of the thesis of Breakneck, the new book out by Dan Wang, which was already long listed for book of the year by the Financial Times. The other half of the thesis is that America is ruled by a lawyerly society, one that holds up projects across years of red tape and lawsuits in the name of everything from noise pollution to just good old-fashioned trolling. Can we have growth without the lawyers? And what are the costs when every project can’t be debated to its most minute detail?Dan and host Danny Crichton talk about Dan’s trips across China, the massive growth he witnessed while living in the country for six years, and comparisons between China, America, South Korea and Japan, and why the virtuous cycle of construction is so absent from America today.
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The CIA in the 21st Century
Few agencies have been more central to global affairs than the aptly-named Central Intelligence Agency. Often shrouded in mystique both cultivated and unasked for, the agency has been at the center of some of the most important foreign policy successes of the United States — such as the search for bin Laden — and also some of the country’s gravest errors, including the Iraq War WMD debacle. Yet, the agency faces profound pressure today on what its present and future mission should be in a world of increasing competition between great powers.That mission is the subject of Tim Weiner’s new book “The Mission: The CIA in the 21st Century.” Weiner has been chronicling the agency since the 1980s, from its covert action program in Afghanistan to the austere budget years of the 1990s to the rise of counterterrorism and now, the pivot to Russia, China, Iran and other U.S. adversaries.Alongside host Danny Crichton, the two talk about Weiner’s history reporting on the agency, the challenge of regrouping to confront future threats versus present ones, how the agency has struggled on intelligence gathering in China, the relationship between the FBI and CIA, and finally, what’s next for the agency under the current Trump administration.
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The challenges of complex risks in game design
Building great Riskgaming scenarios is far more of an art than science. The designer needs to understand the players — what they know and what they don’t — and then carefully construct a landscape of decisions that has fidelity to the real world while not being overwhelming. Parsimony is key, and that means a designer really has to grok the fundamentals of the issue under hand to be able to offer the best experience.That’s where Randy Lubin shines. Through his studio Leveraged Play, he has designed a whole suite of fun and profound policy simulations, focusing on the intricacies between tech and culture. Now, he’s also designing a new Riskgaming scenario for Lux, focused on AI, automation and the future of cities, exploring policy issues like employment and housing.With host Danny Crichton, Randy talks about his design process, what’s going on with his upcoming scenario, how AI is changing the future of game design, and a bit about his game design community Foresight Games.
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Intel, chips and America’s future
By now, we’re all familiar with the crisis that has faced America’s chip manufacturing industry. Intel remains the last bastion of homegrown chips (if we exempt new developments from TSMC and Samsung). Yet, Intel’s stock has been bludgeoned, down more than 55% over the past five years as Nvidia skyrocketed about 1,475% in the same period. What would it take to rebuild America’s chip capacity? Do we have a chance to build our own TSMC?That’s the question that Kyle Harrison has been asking. He’s a general partner at Contrary Capital, and alongside his co-author Maxx Yung, the two wrote a new blockbuster report called, “Building an American TSMC.” It’s a magisterial look at the accidental history, enervating present and intricate future of semiconductor fabrication in the United States, and what it would really take to maintain and grow this critical capability.Kyle and host Danny Crichton talk about Intel’s recent and historical woes, how to avoid another massive manufacturing failure like General Electric and Boeing, the complex barriers to entry in the semis market, and finally, why ecosystem development particularly around specialized labor is so crucial to protect.
A podcast by venture capital firm Lux Capital on the opportunities and risks of science, technology, finance and the human condition. Hosted by Danny Crichton from our New York City studios.
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