I am realy excited for the Findings on these missions. Altough I am still missing an Enceladus mission because enceladus is among the most fascinating ocean worlds.
The only reason OpenAI and Anthropic are making a loss is due to training new models to keep up with competition - not because the industry is flawed in terms of business model.
The point is that the model is already immensely profitable. There is no fundamental reason why AI isn't profitable. It already is.
Insane competition does not last forever. When chip manufacturing first started, there were dozens of companies that had fabs that made compute chips. Nowadays, only TSMC is viable. Samsung and Intel survived because of geopolitics.
The last 50 years is a wild take considering thats the time in with the computers became a bigger thing, mobile phones, smart phones. CRISPR, mRNA Vaccincs, HIV Antivirals, HPV Vaccines, We friggin confirmed the Higgs Boson and Gravity Waves. Found thousands of other worlds outside the solar system. Lithium Ion Batteries, the modern solar panel making solar power the cheapest energy source in most of the world. Blue LEDs making RGB LEDs a thing. Reusable Orbital Rockets.
Conglomerates may not be as nimble and agile as single-focus companies, but they are uniquely more resilient to economic shock events, and branches being "unprofitable" for a time can be supported by others.
Unfortunately, MBA beancounter/neoliberal extremism aka "throw out everything not the core business" has become the norm... and so, with Covid, Ukraine and Trump's tariff and Iran wars, we got a ton of "single focus" companies that are struggling hard, and with everything deemed "not the core business" including internal IT, cleaning etc. sourced out, many a corporation has become internally enshittified.
Conglomerates aren't a strictly optimal form of organization. They are more resilient, but they are also massively bureaucratic and can lose their focus. They may also be able to exert a disproportionate amount of leverage on vendors and suppliers.
I'm not saying infinitely asset-light companies are strictly superior either.
I'm saying there's no silver bullet or free lunch here.
If you look at it from one layer above, capital markets that enable the continuous recycling of corporate structures into smaller or larger as needed are more resilient than those in which company structures are ossified.
Of course not every deal is for the better. But no M&A isn't good either. Speaking as a former Wall St M&A banker.
Honestly still one of the main reasons why I am actualy considering switching to iPhone. Atleast with Apple I know what to expect. And as a bonus I get amazing vertical integration and probably the best aftermarket there is.
Exactly this if I would not track it in my Calendar I would forget the birthday of my grandparents who I love dearly. It just cannot compute in the web of information that is in my brain. I need a crutch for it.
I feel seen. Yes. It’s the same fundamental reason to-do apps exist. “Do you really need an app to remember to pay the rent on the first of the month?” “Demonstrably yes.”
And there are events less personably important to me that matter to others, like “tell your son happy anniversary!” I barely know their kid, but it makes the person hearing it happy that someone thought of a nice happening in their life. Now their day is slightly brighter. Darned if I’d ever remember that without something to nudge me.
reply