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This Week in Startups

SO MANY THINGS need to go right just so you can watch a TikTok! | E2215

This Week in Startups

Jason Calacanis

Technology

4.41.3K Ratings

🗓️ 26 November 2025

⏱️ 76 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Register here to join Founder University Japan’s kickoff! 👉🏻 https://luma.com/cm0x90mkToday’s show: On TWiST, Alex is chatting with Neubird CEO Gou Rao about the intricate complexity of IT Ops, and the vast amount of layers and components that have to be delivered very quickly to your phone in order to stream a simple video clip.Neubird has developed Hawkeye, an AI “engineer” that uses “context engineering” to isolate and troubleshoot problems, while still keeping costs down. Loading up a video to show your friends may SOUND straightforward, but it’s actually, as Alex notes, a miracle anything on the internet works at all.PLUS we’ve got Subject AI CEO Michael Vilardo stopping by to tell us how the app uses gamification to keep kids learning and engaged. NOTE TO FOUNDERS: Mike got invited on the show because he sends email updates to his “dream investors,” including Jason. It’s a solid best practice!Finally, we’re flashing back to a remarkably prescient 2019 interview with then-Scale AI chief Alexandr Wang, who tells us why he thinks the AI Doomsday scenarios — AND the elaborate AGI promises — are both way overblown.Timestamps:(3:19) Neubird asks: What if we took AI tools and applied them to IT ops?(5:17) Why does IT ops seem to get so much more complicated over time?(6:14) Gou walks us through all the various components that need to be delivered when you post a simple TikTok video(8:41) Why agentic systems (like Hawkeye) are the ideal tool for monitoring metrics, logs, traces and alerts(10:05) CLA - Get started with CLA's CPAs, consultants, and wealth advisors now at https://claconnect.com/tech(11:17) How is IT Ops different from Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)?(12:36) Is Hawkeye an AI Agent or an “Engineer”? How we decide what to call our “co-pilot.”(16:07) How “context engineering” helps Hawkeye isolate problems, and keeps inference costs down(17:27) Is Hawkeye plug and play? Or does it need to be trained on a specific system?(18:59) How Neubird measures Hawkeye’s overall effectiveness(19:59) Perspective AI: Real insights, straight from your customers, and your first two months are on us. Just go to http://getperspective.ai/twist(21:47) Hawkeye can diagnose and make recommendations, or go in and fix the problem itself, if you like!(24:27) What Gou thinks about the pace of AI innovation: Has it slowed? Are we in a lull?(25:41) LLMs already have a lot of knowledge, but how do we enhance their EQ?(28:58) TIP FOR FOUNDERS: Send updates to your “dream” investors! That’s how Mike got on the show!(30:20) Uber AI Solutions - Your trusted partner to get AI to work in the real world. Book a demo with them TODAY at https://Uber.com/twist⁠(31:21) The importance of branding… Why Mike pivoted to Subject.ai(33:43) How Subject helps bring teachers and students together for more 1-on-1 interaction(35:48) Mike walks us through how Subject works, and how gamification keeps kids engaged(39:56) Is anything lost when an AI grades a student’s test, rather than a human?(42:09) Subject can serve as a “teacher of record” in classrooms(46:28) Why Mike and Subject AI are back in the office(47:40) TWIST FLASHBACK with Alexandr Wang of Scale AI from November 2019(53:10) Alexandr explains AI to Jason (back when it was still called “Machine Learning”)(1:01:08) How AI will help people focus on “higher-value work”(1:04:48) Why Alexandr thinks apocalyptic AI scenarios are unrealistic(1:13:28) Are the big promises around AGI overblown?*Thank you to our partners:(10:05) CLA - Get started with CLA's CPAs, consultants, and wealth advisors now at https://claconnect.com/tech(19:59) Perspective AI: Real insights, straight from your customers, and your first two months are on us. Just go to http://getperspective.ai/twist(30:20) Uber AI Solutions - Your trusted partner to get AI to work in the real world. Book a demo with them TODAY at https://Uber.com/twist

Transcript

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0:00.0

You know, what engineers do is troubleshoot, fix problems.

0:03.5

They create problems, and then they fix the problems they created.

0:06.5

There's a lot of interest now in how to use AI, especially Gen AI,

0:10.8

and how that can ease the burden of IT operations.

0:14.9

The moment you get on a phone and you're looking at a TikTok video,

0:17.9

I mean the number of layers that are involved to deliver that, notwithstanding

0:22.0

the physical infrastructure to deliver the audio and video content, but the infrastructure

0:26.1

software and physical infrastructure that it takes to store the media, it's a very complex

0:31.3

environment. And people want more of this faster. Just for fun, can you walk me through

0:35.6

some of the software that goes into making a TikTok

0:38.6

appear on my phone, for example? The videos have to be stored somewhere. So there's some quality

0:42.1

control. So there's software associated with that. And then when the video gets edited and

0:46.8

uploaded and stored, you want to make sure that there's no data loss, no integrity compromise

0:52.5

on the video. And then the distribution aspect of it,

0:55.6

and there's edge caching. You don't want somebody looking at the video to hit the back end server

1:00.6

each time. And so there's what's called content distribution networks involved. This week in

1:04.7

startups is brought to you by Uber. Bad data equals bad AI. Your AI is only as good as the data it learns from. Uber. That's right. Uber AI

1:16.4

Solutions now works with enterprises around the world to source, label, evaluate, and scale real world high

1:23.6

quality data for every industry everywhere so that you can focus on building the next big

1:29.5

thing. High-quality data equals smarter and faster AI. Uber.com slash twist. Perspective AI. Surveys,

1:39.2

they never capture what customers are really thinking. That's why we use perspective AI, real insights

1:46.1

straight from your customers. And the first two months are on us. Just go to getperspective.

...

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