Signal: Google Roars Back 📧
Stocks seem to be whipsawing right now to close the week – up, down, up, down, up. It's like a Contra or Zelda code (more on that below). Regardless, the swirl (thanks, NVIDIA) seemingly has pushed Google ahead of Microsoft to be the third most highly valued company in the world from a market cap perspective. Sort of a wild ascent given that just six months ago I was writing about how undervalued Alphabet seemed as a stock relative to its parts. The company has gained over $1.6T in market value since that post – the stock is up nearly 80%.
The Inner Ring
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
Take One...
🌎 World Models, So Hot Right Now – With Gemini 3 out the door, what is Google DeepMind's Demis Hassibas now spending most of his (research) time on these days? The same thing that Yann LeCun and seemingly many others are... And he thinks we may be closing in on a "ChatGPT moment" for the "World Model" space – if we can get the costs down. Luckily, Google has the "huge advantage" of TPUs – something which is seemingly becoming more clear by the day. And it may become more clear yet if and when the AI Bubble bursts. "It feels like there’s obviously a bubble in the private market. You look at seed rounds with just nothing really being tens of billions of dollars. That seems a little unsustainable. It’s not quite logical to me." That's a bit self-serving, of course. But that doesn't mean it's wrong! [Sources 🔒]
📽️ Netflix's Warner Bros Bid Includes Theatrical Promise – It seems like each week now brings a new sign that Netflix is thawing their stance against theatrical releases for their content (a prediction I made a year ago). To be fair, this one is probably necessary if the company wants any shot of competing for the Warner Bros movie studio (which has agreements already in place for theatrical distribution). Still, it once again signals that Netflix is not as militant on this stance as they have historically projected in public. And this will continue soon with the release of the final season of Stranger Things, which is (smartly) paired with a theatrical experience. And there will be more calls and pressure when the third Knives Out is released, which would obviously be a huge theatrical event because Netflix has helped make it a big franchise. It doesn't have to be all-or-nothing here, Netflix should leverage theaters where it makes sense both for marketing and to make money, imagine that. BTW, those first bids from Paramount, Comcast, and Netflix are now in David Zaslav's hands... [Bloomberg 🔒]
📲 Perplexity's Mobile AI Browser – For all the talk and hype about the "AI Browser Wars", I've been surprised that none of the major players have tried to immediately go after the green field: mobile. I get that it's harder to do – in particular on iOS which remains locked-down when it comes to browser technology, which is undoubtedly part of the reason why Perplexity is starting with Android. Still, as someone now fully sold on using an AI browser, I find it weird/frustrating to use a mobile browser and have no such AI options to do what I regularly do on the desktop now. Instead I have to use a separate app, like an animal. There might even be a real opportunity on iOS as Apple should add AI functionality to Safari in about 15 years. I still regularly use The Browser Company's (clever) Arc mobile app, even though they've abandoned ship on Arc for the more AI-centric Dia. [TechCrunch]
📺 Big Streamers Bet Big On 'Pause Ads' – As much as I generally dislike advertising – certainly, when it's say, crammed into your TV UI, or certainly your refrigerator! – I think I'm actually okay with this. Right now when you pause content, it's just frozen as a static image. Some people obviously pause to try to catch something, but most of the time it's just to do something else. So I'm okay with using this otherwise dead space – especially if the ad is actually relevant to something you just saw on-screen. You can imagine a world in which some consumers may even pause on purpose to see if they can buy something they're seeing. This may sound like the definition of dystopia to any filmmaker, but you could see this being a thing if it worked well enough. Certainly for Amazon TVs! And in general, I'd be more in favor of this type of ad if you got something back in exchange for seeing it, such as a discount on the streaming service. Sort of like the lock screen ads on Kindles. Or even that free TV set that has the ad bar at the bottom. This all sounds like a nightmare to me, but I get it. And I don't think it has to be all bad. [Variety]
💸 Sam Altman's 'Rough Vibes' Memo – Three interesting elements here. First, that Altman felt the need to write this just ahead of Google's release of Gemini 3. Clearly, he knew it was going to be good. And second, that's a problem for OpenAI because if nothing else, it highlights a fear that many investors and watchers have that Google's sheer size and scale – and most importantly, profits – will allow them to ride ChatGPT's first-mover advantage into the ground. This is obviously why OpenAI is trying to move heaven and earth to create their own infrastructure – but do they have enough time before the bubble bursts? That's the million dollar question. Actually, the trillion dollar one. Perhaps several trillion. Finally, the specific notion that Google has in some way overcome the pre-training hurdles that the other LLM makers have run into is interesting... Google itself is playing this up – is it something specific about TPUs (versus NVIDIA's GPUs) or something else in the process? That's also a several trillion dollar question! [Information 🔒]
I Wrote...
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
I Quote...
"You can’t go through 50 states. You have to get one approval. Fifty is a disaster. Because you’ll have one woke state and you’ll have to do all woke. You’ll be back in the woke business. We don’t have woke anymore in this country. It’s virtually illegal. You’ll have a couple of wokesters."
– The President of the United States with some very deep and serious thoughts as to why he might issue an Executive Order to stop states from enacting their own AI laws.
Interestingly enough, this notion is something that at least some of the MAGA base is pushing back against. That's right, AI and Epstein are the issues dividing the party.
I Wrote Even More...
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
Asides...
- As always, a solid overview presentation by Benedict Evans. "AI Eats the World" is well worth the flip-through. [Ben Evans]
- Something else Demis Hassabis may be focused on these days? AlphaAssist a universal assistant powered by DeepMind technology in the vein of Tony Stark's J.A.R.V.I.S. Sounds like a "Siri done right". [Reuters]
- Also: in 2019, before the rise of ChatGPT, OpenAI apparently approached Demis about doing a JV to work towards AGI. He, of course, declined...
- Stargate news! No, not OpenAI's data center project, but the sci-fi franchise from which that project took its name. It's being rebooted... by Amazon, which acquired the rights alongside MGM. Sort of an awkward IP dance there! Though SoftBank apparently owns the trademark? [THR]
- Meta's new 'Hyperscape' technology, the ability to scan a room with a Quest headset to make a VR version of it looks very impressive. [Verge]
- Just a week after their limited test in a few countries, ChatGPT group chats are now live around the world – I suspected this would happen quickly as there's some real sticky (in a good way for OpenAI) potential here... [TechCrunch]
- Framing the 'AI Bubble' as an 'LLM Bubble' seems like a reasonable way to point out the obvious while still signaling that you're bullish on AI overall, so kudos to Hugging Face CEO Clem Delangue for coining it. [Axios]
- The new deal where Microsoft and NVIDIA will invest in Anthropic so Anthropic can spend money with Microsoft and NVIDIA values the startup at $350B. Time to update the OpenAI "Constellations" chart once again... [CNBC]
- Needing to keep up with the AI Joneses (and needing money), xAI getting more funding to secure a $230B valuation it seems. Also technically an OpenAI Constellation! [WSJ đź”’]
- Do I hear $480B for ByteDance? Why not. Also, where the hell is that TikTok sale?! [Bloomberg đź”’]
- In other circular deal news, did Oracle's $300B deal with OpenAI actually backfire? It's seemingly a problem (to Wall Street at least) when neither side actually has the money in the bank to spend on such deals. [FT đź”’]
- Beyond the money, one hold up in the Disney/Google negotiations may have been about letting YouTube TV offer smaller/cheaper/focused packages which is obviously needed as prices rise exponentially. [9to5Google]
- I'm getting worried, Heat 2 is seemingly sounding almost too good to be true – now Christian Bale may be on board too?! [Deadline]
- This is a month old, but I've gotten enough messages about this over the years... Ghost has finally implemented a way to login to sites (such as Spyglass) without needing to use an email link. Instead, they can now send you a one-time code (to your email) to login. [Ghost]
I Spy...
It feels like I've been waiting my whole life for a Legend of Zelda movie. While I loved Mario, my favorite Nintendo game was always Zelda. From the golden NES cartridge on down, it was absolutely magical to me. I even tolerated Zelda II, which was rewarded in the form of A Link to the Past, the Super Nintendo sequel which is still my favorite of the series (undoubtedly for nostalgic reasons). Anyway, just seeing this one shot (and some spy cam footage) is insanely exciting to me. They better not fuck this up, and at least from this, it doesn't look like they will.
