AI Bots Are Molting

For this month's appearance on the Big Technology Podcast, we kicked off talking about Moltbook – the Reddit-like social network build by AI bots, for AI bots. Is it real? Sort of – at least some of the content is clearly people gaming the system. But it also points to something potentially interesting/important with regard to AI agents, and how they'll interact with one another in different scenarios in the future. A really, it's a continuation of some early behavior on Facebook all the way up through Microsoft's "Sydney" situation – that may have ruined AI for Bing.

And yes, this is potentially one massive security nightmare given that people are running these "OpenClaws" on their own systems. And then there's the potential for existential risk if billions such bots are created, become aware, organize, and decide that human beings might make for better pets...

From there, we hit on the (still ongoing) mystery around NVIDIA's highly touted $100B bet in OpenAI. Sorry, "up to" $100B. Which is now looking more like $20B into OpenAI's new round of funding. Jensen Huang would like us to believe there's nothing to see in such a change, but he sounds a lot like the way he sounded when he was "delighted" by Google's TPUs...

Speaking of that new round, what are we to read into the notion that Amazon may put $50B into OpenAI? I think it has to do with an anyone-but-Google mentality that the rest of Big Tech is circling around given the rise of Gemini.

Meanwhile, with OpenAI and Anthropic wrapping up their new massive rounds, all eyes turn to the race to IPO. If Anthropic beats OpenAI to market, it may create a real narrative problem for OpenAI. Of course, with SpaceX and xAI now one company – confirmed the day after our podcast, but we discussed the likelihood – Elon Musk may have executed an end-run-around on his rival. If SpaceX goes public in June, you can bet Elon will play it up as the first true AI company that the public can bet on – one wrapped in a profitable rocket ship... Might that push the other big AI players' IPOs into 2027?

Finally, we hit on Apple's latest earnings. Great numbers aren't equating to great stock performance. Part of it is clearly memory chip concerns going forward, but as with that situation, it's AI consuming all narratives. While Wall Street applauded Meta's huge CapEx increase, Apple remains spending closer to $0. That may end up looking smart and prudent in the short term – especially if/when the market shifts – but will it hurt them in the long run? What else are they spending all that cash on? Stock buybacks?

Come on, Apple. If you don't spend on data centers and/or other elements of AI eventually, Google could end up owning the aiPhone.