Thu. 01/23 – “Humanity’s Last Exam”
Techmeme Ride Home
Brian McCullough
4.7 • 984 Ratings
🗓️ 23 January 2025
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Ok, that whole AI datacenter joint venture thing seems to have gotten messy. A ByteDance board member thinks TikTok might have a way out without selling. Netflix rakes in a bunch of Oscar nominations. And humanity’s final exam has been formulated to see when AI has actually graduated to true intelligence.
Sponsors:
Links:
- OpenAI, SoftBank Each Commit $19 Billion to Stargate Data Center Venture (The Information)
- OpenAI’s Stargate Deal Heralds Shift Away From Microsoft (WSJ)
- TikTok’s parent company is in active discussions about a deal, board member says (CNN)
- Co-founder of French Crypto Startup Freed After Kidnapping (Bloomberg)
- Subaru Security Flaws Exposed Its System for Tracking Millions of Cars (Wired)
- Oscar Nomination Scorecard: Netflix Leads Among Studios With 16, A24 Close Behind With 14 (Variety)
- When A.I. Passes This Test, Look Out (NyTimes)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Tech Meme Ride Home for Thursday, January 23rd, 2025. I'm Brian McCullough today. Okay, |
| 0:10.7 | that whole AI data center joint venture thing seems to have gotten messy. A bite dance board |
| 0:16.2 | member thinks TikTok might have a way out without selling. Netflix rakes in a bunch of Oscar nominations, |
| 0:21.8 | and Humanity's final exam has been formulated to see when AI has actually graduated to true |
| 0:28.5 | intelligence. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech. So as I described yesterday, |
| 0:35.7 | there were some doubts raised in some corners about that whole Stargate joint venture announcement, but that has blown up into a whole ball of speculation. |
| 0:44.4 | Some say this was just a vaporware-like announcement to generate headlines and goodwill with the new administration. |
| 0:50.8 | Sam Altman and Elon Musk got into it on socials after Musk tweeted that Softbank didn't have the money secured, as he said. |
| 0:58.4 | Altman replied, wrong as you surely know. Want to come visit the first site already underway? |
| 1:04.3 | This is great for the country. I realize what is great for the country isn't always what's optimal for your companies, but in your new role, I hope you'll |
| 1:11.0 | mostly put emoji American flag first, end quote. The information says that Sam Altman told some |
| 1:17.3 | colleagues that Open AI and SoftBank will each commit $19 billion to Stargate, and Open AI would |
| 1:22.4 | effectively hold a 40% interest in the joint venture. Quote, Altman's comments on Tuesday suggest the company will have to raise $19 billion through |
| 1:31.0 | equity or debt, and company leaders previously told colleagues they were prepared to raise |
| 1:35.4 | debt for data center projects. |
| 1:37.3 | The company projected to generate about $4 billion in revenue last year while still |
| 1:41.1 | burning considerable sums of cash due to high computing costs. |
| 1:44.4 | OpenAI raised $6.6 billion in equity funding last fall at a $157 billion valuation, and has raised |
| 1:50.3 | a total of about $20 billion, mostly from Microsoft, which has rights to Open AI's intellectual |
| 1:54.9 | property, but is largely unaffiliated with Stargate. The scale of the Data Center venture |
| 1:59.4 | is unprecedented. On Wednesday, Altman |
| 2:01.9 | likened Stargate to a venture fund with OpenAI and SoftBank as two of the general partners. |
... |
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