Xi Visits San Francisco, Microsoft’s Big AI Event, Bin Laden on TikTok

Reed Albergotti is the tech editor at Semafor. He joins Big Technology Podcast to break down the week's news. We cover: 1) Xi Jinping’s visit to San Francisco 2) Why the U. S. And China relationship is softening 3) How AI technology is at the center of the thawing 4) How San Francisco cleaned itself up for Xi’s arrival 5) Sideshows 6) Web Summit update 7) Conversation with Chinese media 8) Stability AI audio chief leaves over copyright issues 9) Microsoft’s underwhelming Ignite event 10) Time to be concerned about Google’s Gemini? 11) Github co-pilot is profitable 12) Bin Laden surging on TikTok ---- You can subscribe to Big Technology Premium for 25% off at https://bit.ly/bigtechnology Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. For weekly updates on the show, sign up for the pod newsletter on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/6901970121829801984/ Questions? Feedback? Write to: [email protected] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Alex Kantrowitz?

  Xi Jinping visits San Francisco, the latest of Microsoft's new AI announcements, GitHub Copilot. What's the story with that? Plus, what exactly is going on with Osama bin Laden and TikTok? All that and more, coming up right after this. This episode is brought to you by Genesis. What does it actually take to put a Gentic AI to work across an entire enterprise? I recently spoke with Genesis Chairman and CEO Tony Bates about why orchestration is emerging as a competitive advantage in customer experience and what companies need to get right in the AI era. Then I sat down with Adam Mitchell, Head of Enterprise Business Solutions at Voya Financial, to go inside a large-scale Agentic CX transformation, including the business decisions, trade-offs, and lessons along the way.

• 0:45Alex Kantrowitz?

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• 1:17Alex Kantrowitz?

  Welcome to Big Technology Podcast Friday Edition, where we break down the news in our traditional, cool-headed, and nuanced format. We have a big show for you today, talking all about Xi Jinping's visit to San Francisco, and then plenty of AI news, and wrapping it up with some coverage of the latest social media blowups, shall we say. Joining us today again is Reid Albergaudy, the Technology Editor at Semaphore. It's great to have you back, Reid. Welcome to the show.

• 1:43Speaker 01

  It's fun to be here. Thanks for having me.

• 1:45Alex Kantrowitz?

  I can't believe we were talking, the last time we were talking, was the beginning of this Israel-Hamas war. And I don't know, it feels like it's been going on forever now. We're like six weeks in. But why don't we start with another potential conflict that's been brewing, which was US and China, right? There's all this tough talk going on between the two countries. Next thing you know, Xi Jinping shows up in San Francisco, and it's all love, right? It seems like that's what happened this week in his meeting with Joe Biden, don't you think?

• 2:14Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, I mean, it's really kind of bizarre. I honestly don't know what to make of it. I mean, all of a sudden, you know, it was like no one would touch China. And then all of a sudden, you know, she's in town in San Francisco and everything is different. You know, we're, we're in the same room, we're all, I was actually at the semiconductor industry association awards dinner last night and the Medtronic CEO said, you know, oh, I've never, I've seen him before, but I've never seen him so relaxed. And I just didn't, I just didn't know what to make of that. It seems like it's now kind of okay to be cozying up to China again. And yet, at the same time, if you look at the geopolitical situation, it seems like we're just inching closer and closer towards some kind of conflict around Taiwan. So, pretty fascinating.

• 3:00Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, I do wonder if people like kind of took a look around, right? We started just talking about the war and they saw war in Israel and Gaza, war in Ukraine, and sort of asked, wait a second, like, all this talk can go somewhere? Do we really want it to go somewhere? And what are the real differences? I mean, obviously, there are major differences between the countries, but like, is it enough to get into a massive global conflict? I wonder if that's sort of what led to this moment.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  Well, I'm sure everyone in the US wants to avoid a conflict, right? Nobody, nobody wants to see a war with China over Taiwan, right? It's going to be extremely deadly. It's going to be horribly disruptive to the global economy, especially if, you know, anything happens to TSMC, which I'm sure you talked about on the, on your show before. But I think the question is like, what is, what does China want? Cause like their rhetoric has been, you know, very, very clear for years. We are going to forcibly reunite Taiwan with China. And I think, you know, we may not have a choice, right?

• 4:02Speaker 01

  So I think there's a danger in sort of, in, in, in a, a kind of like wishful thinking about China.

• 4:11Speaker 01

  And thinking that just one visit can sort of change the entire course of that of that trajectory. Let's see what happens to their rhetoric now, right? Like, do they start going back and changing the messaging back at home?

• 4:27Alex Kantrowitz?

  So I think it's important to run through. I think that's a great point. And I also think it's important to run through some of the things that were accomplished this week. And then we can kind of get to why this is happening now. So first of all, Biden spoke and said that the meeting was some of the most constructive and productive discussions he's had with Xi Jinping, and that they're going to keep the line of communications open. He's going to be willing to pick up the phone. Also, big news that Xi signaled that China would send new pandas to the US after three that the Smithsonian National Zoo in Washington had were returned earlier this month. This is from the AP. So the pandas coming back. That's symbolic, but it's big.

• 5:07Alex Kantrowitz?

  Also, in a speech, Xi said he wants to deepen the friendly ties between our two people. And another massive one, Xi also agreed to help curb the production of illicit fentanyl. That's a deadly component in drugs sold in the United States. It's very interesting that he could effectively decide that the amount of fentanyl coming into the US is going to be reduced. I didn't realize China had that much sway over the components used to make this drug, but clearly that's that was a big deal. They also reached a very important agreement to resume military to military communications. In a scoop for you, the two countries are going to open a channel to talk about AI, similar to the Cold War nonproliferation talks.

• 5:51Alex Kantrowitz?

  This is a huge amount of cooperation, a very big turn for the US and China. What's leading to it, right? And this is where it gets kind of interesting. So apparently Xi needed two things from the US. He needed investment from the US to help jumpstart the Chinese economy, which has not been growing at the same rates it had been during the heyday, you know, a few years ago. But then there was another very interesting thing that the New York Times pointed out. And it's that the United States has recently put in a series of export controls that have at least temporarily cramped Beijing's ability to make the most advanced semiconductors and the artificial intelligence breakthroughs they enable.

• 6:33Alex Kantrowitz?

  Now, I'm not going to say that AI is the core of why China and the US are all of a sudden buddy buddy, but it would be naive to think it didn't play a significant role in trying to find some common ground, right?

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I think what you're kind of saying, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, is like China's on their heels right now.

• 6:52Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yes.

• 6:52Speaker 01

  They are in a vulnerable position. And so, you know, when you're in a vulnerable position, you sort of come to the table and you play nice. I think the question is, what's the long-term plan for China, right? I mean, in the short term, sure, I mean, they can send us pandas. I thought it was sort of funny that, you know, Xi's quote on the pandas. He's like, I heard that a lot of people in the United States, especially children, were very sad when the pandas were leaving the, you know, the zoo in DC. I mean,

• 7:23Alex Kantrowitz?

  It's a gold quote.

• 7:24Speaker 01

  It's so. It's like, are we, do we really believe this guy is like a sentimental sweetheart who, I mean, the guy, I mean, if you're a China scholar, like just read about the stuff that happens there, right? It's a pretty brutal place inside that party. So, you know, I'm just, I'm just very, I mean, I, again, like, I want peace as much as anybody. I don't want to see, I do not want to see a war. I think it would be a terrible, terrible thing. But at the same time, like, you know, I'm a little skeptical here that this is like a, you know, a huge about face in the long run.

• 8:02Alex Kantrowitz?

  The thing about artificial intelligence that I find fascinating is that we, for so long, thought that China kind of had the US over a barrel in terms of chip production. And now they need the United States to ease controls in order for them to stay relevant. And they realize that AI is going to be so important. So what do you think about that? It's a very quick flip from US trailing to US leadership position, don't you think?

• 8:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I think on the chip production, I mean, I think they they will get there. Um, it's just a matter of time. And, you know, I think the US, there's a, there's a race right now, right? Which is like, can the US with the CHIPS Act diversify the chip production supply chain to an extent that that TSMC doesn't matter as much, right? That it can be, that that's a huge if, right? I mean, we're talking about, I mean, that's five to seven years out at the earliest, I think, um, from happening, which means it's totally unpredictable, right? Like, you know, this, this stuff is, if you've read anything about this industry, you know

• 9:16Speaker 01

  just how absolutely tricky it is to build these fabs, to to spin this stuff up. So, I mean, there, I think there might be like a sort of buying time aspect to this, right? Which is like, you know, if if we, if if they can get us to take the the foot off the gas, then maybe that gives them more time to to build, to get their independence, you know, up and running before some conflict. So I just see this, that's how kind, how I see the the world here. Um, but I'm not, you know, I'm a tech reporter, so, you know, I only play a, an international relations expert on podcasts.

• 9:55Alex Kantrowitz?

  Right, but actually, like, the tech does play a huge role in the international relations thing. That's what's, that's what I find fascinating. It's like, you can find tech, because it is obviously like building the future, you can find it at the core of almost every industry and government relations. So it just gives you this window into the world, like, really on the business level that you can't have elsewhere. And business is obviously what's going to drive some of these countries in terms of their their decisions. So, uh, you were in San Francisco, a couple of questions for you about San Francisco. Uh, first of all, what do you make of the fact that all these business leaders went to dinner with Xi? Um, obviously, you're, you seem pretty skeptical about his good intentions. Do you think something good is going to come out of that? Or do you think they needed to?

• 10:38Alex Kantrowitz?

  I was actually, let me just say this, I was trying to read the mood in the room from some of the video clips that I saw, and it seemed like almost dutiful as opposed to celebratory.

• 10:48Speaker 01

  I oh, totally. I mean, first of all, they pay to be there, right? I mean, this is like China is a giant goldmine for for everyone. There wasn't there's an anecdote I'll tell you that I thought was really telling me Louise Metzakis, who is the reporter who who got us our great scoop on the on the China she meeting earlier this week. Um, along with Morgan Chelfent Louise is a huge China buff and knows more about this than a lot of people. So we we write a lot about China, right? And I think, you know, this is this this fascinating area that's super important to the world and all this stuff. And I'm thinking people in tech must just be eating this stuff up, right?

• 11:30Speaker 01

  So what right around the time we launched, I was meeting with someone who shall not be named. They were like, yeah, like my feedback to the newsletters, I'm not really that into the China stuff. I was like, really? Like, why not? Because this is a person who like is involved in this, has been like involved with, you know, tech in China. And they said, well, you know, it's all closed off right now. And I'm like, well, yeah, but I mean, it's still hugely important to the, you know, to the geopolitical realities. And he was like, yeah, but there's like no money to be made there right now. And I was like, oh, OK. So China, like I think what my point is, I think all of these CEOs, for the most part, is they just view China as a giant pot of money.

• 12:13Speaker 01

  And they want that money and they will do what they can do to get that money. And I think some of them might be more patriotic than others. Some of them probably don't care at all about the US's position and in the long run and all that stuff. They just care, you know, they care about shareholders. And that's that's how I see all of this. It's like, you know, if you if you don't go to that dinner, you're kind of being like. You're kind of like neglecting your shareholders. That's how I see it.

• 12:45Alex Kantrowitz?

  Exactly. Yeah. And so the mood definitely kind of felt like we're here just to be here, which is like wild to me.

• 12:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, we're here to make possibly, you know, if this is gonna be, if this is gonna open up again, we better be first in line, you know?

• 12:58Alex Kantrowitz?

  You know, who did look happy? Xi, Xi looked happy when they gave him some Golden State Warrior jersey. Did you see this? Never seen a smile like that from this person. So also.

• 13:09Speaker 01

  The answer, that's.

• 13:10Alex Kantrowitz?

  I mean, it can bring people together. Look what it did. Yeah. You know, our first contact with North Korea was sending Dennis Rodman over there with fights.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  Remember all the NBA, remember all the NBA Hong Kong controversy though?

• 13:24Alex Kantrowitz?

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:24Speaker 01

  It's so ironic.

• 13:27Alex Kantrowitz?

  So let me ask you, so did the city feel cleaner? Because there's been this whole meme that San Francisco finally cleaned up its act for Xi. Is that accurate?

• 13:38Speaker 01

  It just depended on what neighborhood you ran, honestly. I, I went downtown and I was kind of like looking, you know, looking around like, okay, what's, what's this, what's it gonna be like, you know? Is it gonna be like a, all of a sudden, it's like this sparkling clean paradise? And it was like, yeah, in parts of Market Street where there used to be a lot of homeless people, there weren't homeless people, but they'd really just been moved to the Tenderloin. It still smelled like pot, uh, smoke, you know, on Market Street. But then there were like, you know, S, like black SUVs and Mercedes Sprinter vans, but it looked, the whole thing looked like a Mercedes Sprinter van dealership.

• 14:18Speaker 01

  Like, that's what, that's what it looks like. And then there were these weird cages thing, these cage things that were up and I don't even know what they were for. And I, I didn't Google it because I think it's more fun to just think of them as mysterious cages with like those concrete divider things from the highway, like in the middle of the cages. And I had no idea what they were for. And I had this like thought, I was like, I'm like, do I like this better than like, you know, crazy people wandering around the street yelling at me? I'm not sure. Like, it's a toss up.

• 14:50Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, I mean, if that's the trade off, then it's a pretty rough choice.

• 14:53Speaker 01

  Right. So I don't know. It's, I wouldn't say they, I wouldn't say they turned San Francisco into a, into a paradise by any means.

• 15:02Alex Kantrowitz?

  There was a quote from Gavin Newsom that got passed around a little bit this, this week, and I feel like it's worth reciting. California Governor Gavin Newsom, he said, I know folks say, oh, they're just cleaning up the place because all these fancy leaders are coming to town. That's true because it's true. But it's also true that for months and months and months prior to APEC, we've been having different conversations. I mean, I think the thing that really just kind of jumped out at me is like, if they want to do something about cleaning up the city, they can. And just, they didn't until this happened. It's bananas to me.

• 15:36Speaker 01

  It's totally bananas. I mean, it's not a permanent solution. I, you know, I think also just on the San Francisco topic, generally speaking, I mean, it's, it's like bad, but not as bad as people kind of think it is, right? It's, it's very localized to, to a couple of neighborhoods that are, you know, that are really bad. Specifically the Tenderloin. You can go to parts of the city and have no idea that there's a homeless problem, which I think is similar in, you know, cities all around the country, right? There's, there are just neighborhoods that are bad.

• 16:10Speaker 01

  Not, not excusing any of it. It still needs to be dealt with, but.

• 16:14Alex Kantrowitz?

  Man, my wife and I were out in San Francisco this summer for about a month, three weeks a month. And I have to say, the city actually feels revived after, you know, I left mid COVID and it feels lively and the downtown was bustling again. And it did feel like, you know, a lot of the rumors had been overdone. Obviously still a problem with crime there. But I mean, I just saw this video of this guy who tried to stop a sideshow in Oakland and was basically beaten within like an inch of his life. It was crazy. But yeah, I think you're right that overall, you know, the New York Post headlines about San Francisco are a little bit overwrought.

• 16:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. And Oakland is a different, that is a different story too.

• 16:57Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 16:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, different issues and.

• 17:01Alex Kantrowitz?

  Although we had, we used to have sideshows down the block. For those who don't know what a sideshow is, it's when a bunch of guys close off like an intersection and then just do donuts in the middle of the intersection.

• 17:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, or like ride on top of, like get out of the car that they're driving and like, sit on the hood and stuff like that. It's very dangerous, but also it sounds like, I've never been to one, but it sounds kind of fun. I don't know.

• 17:22Alex Kantrowitz?

  I would like to go to one as an observer, very distant.

• 17:26Speaker 01

  Very, like high up, right? Like up on a balcony or something.

• 17:29Alex Kantrowitz?

  Exactly. Not in the line of fire.

• 17:31Speaker 01

  Run over.

• 17:31Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, I guess I imagine I'd be kind of annoyed if it happened outside my house all the time, but luckily that's not the case. So.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  That would be.

• 17:40Alex Kantrowitz?

  So I did, I did go to Web Summit this, this year. I just came back from Lisbon last night. I had a good time. You know, we spoke on this podcast with Ron John about the decision to go after some of the comments that Patty made. And even though I didn't agree with everything Patty said, I thought, you know what, I'm not, I'm not going to agree with everything, but I'm still going to go. And when I was there, I felt vindicated about my decision to go because I do feel like one of the problems that we've had in society is that people with different opinions sort of ensconce each other, ensconce themselves in different areas of the world, whether that's geographically, whether it's different websites, or whether it's different events. And it's important to have people with different perspectives in rooms talking together because that's when you sort of have empathy and

• 18:22Alex Kantrowitz?

  get things done. And anyway, that's my Web Summit perspective. The most interesting interaction I had was with, was on the ride to the airport where I was with a member of, of the Chinese media. And we got a moment to just sit and talk about, hey, your guy's hanging out with my guy and what do you think about that? So I like, obviously just went through the whole gamut of hot button topics and some very interesting questions. Some very, sorry, some very interesting observations this person shared. So first of all,

• 18:55Alex Kantrowitz?

  Some, this person said that the way that you, the US is viewed in China has become more negative in part because of the way that the US handled COVID. And it's almost as if the US has been held up as a foil to China on the COVID issue because they want to say that they did it better and that their experience inside COVID was worth it. That was one interesting takeaway. Quickly, the others. I asked about the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Gaza war. And this person said that China was neutral on both. And China actually felt a historical bond with Russia because of the way that Russia and China have been allies in the past.

• 19:40Alex Kantrowitz?

  The other thing we talked about was the iPhone. So you know, there's this whole meme about Chinese government employees not being able to use the iPhone in the office. And this person said that that's wrong. They were using an iPhone and that, that the iPhone remains quite popular in China, even in this moment of tech being used as a point of national pride in China. Lastly, this person was surprised that we've banned Xiaomi and Huawei phones. And I'm like, listen, I can't use those phones. And they suggested I get one and just use it without cell service, which is actually kind of interesting. Like, maybe it's worth getting one and trying the WeChat and actually seeing how these things function. Pretty illuminating. I know I just threw a lot at you.

• 20:25Alex Kantrowitz?

  What do you, what do you think about that?

• 20:26Speaker 01

  I mean, I think my first question is like, do you think that you were getting candid answers?

• 20:32Alex Kantrowitz?

  No.

• 20:33Speaker 01

  Or are they, yeah, they're like the party line answers, right?

• 20:36Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, definitely. It is the party line.

• 20:38Speaker 01

  But it's still interesting. It's still.

• 20:40Alex Kantrowitz?

  You can learn something from that, though. I mean, it's like, yes, in the, in the, even in the direction that the propaganda is going, you can be like, oh, but sorry, go ahead.

• 20:47Speaker 01

  No, I mean, I think that's no, you made you answered my question. That's a good, it's a good point. Um, yeah, I mean, I think on the Huawei thing, which is the, you know, the sort of interesting tech question. I am actually really curious to try that too, because they have the new phones. If I'm, if I'm right, they have their new chips, right? They built their like homegrown chips from like a modem from, you know, built by SMIC, right? Isn't that, am I right about that?

• 21:18Alex Kantrowitz?

  Apparently, these chips were so good that they had US officials convinced that they had stolen US trade secrets and this Huawei Mate 60 phone is apparently just flying off of shelves in China. It's the latest version. It sold out like immediately when it first released. And I mean, you look at Apple sales in the region and they've fallen and people are saying that it's in the, it's in the path of being replaced. So, you know.

• 21:48Speaker 01

  So what does that tell you about the earlier question around? Is China gonna catch up with us on chips? I mean, if they're able to do, I mean, these are, these are the most advanced, you know, phone chips are really the most advanced chips, right? So.

• 22:04Alex Kantrowitz?

  I think that answers the question. Yeah.

• 22:06Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, I think they're pretty close. I don't think, I mean, I thought they were still not quite hitting the same benchmarks, right? As, as like Qualcomm and, and, you know, the Apple chips, right? I mean, I, I, I'm sort of, yeah, they're not quite on par, but I, I think, I think you're right. Like, we should be as tech reporters, like, we should be trying this stuff out. I mean, I don't think it's illegal to do, right? Like, it's just.

• 22:33Alex Kantrowitz?

  Definitely not.

• 22:33Speaker 01

  You know, we should just get these things and, you know, see, see how they work, compare them.

• 22:40Speaker 01

  And it's also a new operating system, right? It's not, it's like an Android fork or something, or.

• 22:44Alex Kantrowitz?

  Oh, is that true?

• 22:45Speaker 01

  Or did they build it like from the ground up? I mean, because they can't use, they also can't Google.

• 22:50Alex Kantrowitz?

  They can't use Android.

• 22:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, they can't, Google can't export either. So,

• 22:56Speaker 01

  so it's kind of, that would be kind of interesting, too. What is an operating system? Like a third.

• 23:02Alex Kantrowitz?

  It does feel like we should let them use Android. Like, we're so worried about TikTok over here, but we won't export an operating system. Why? Like, I don't know.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  I mean, I think, yeah, I think they were just trying to completely cripple them, right?

• 23:16Alex Kantrowitz?

  Mm hmm.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  You know?

• 23:18Alex Kantrowitz?

  That's not working.

• 23:19Speaker 01

  I guess it's not. Yeah. I mean, at least not in China. They seem to have been able to survive. And by the way, I mean, I'm sure they are using like some IP from the US, right? And there's just no way, like somewhere in there, you know?

• 23:33Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah.

• 23:34Speaker 01

  Been trying to copy this stuff for, for years, for decades.

• 23:37Alex Kantrowitz?

  Fascinating moment between US and China. Long story short.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  It is, it is. And I, and you wanted to get to the TikTok question too, right? Which is in.

• 23:46Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah. Which we'll, we'll talk about TikTok and Bin Laden. But first, let's do a quick segment on some of these big headlines in AI, because I do think they're very interesting. One of the most under the radar moments in tech this week was the head of audio at Stability and AI quit because the company viewed that it's acceptable to use copyrighted work without permission. And this person, Ed Newton Rex, just said, no freaking way. He called it exploitative. He said, it's not acceptable. It's not fair use. And he just straight up quit the company, one of the senior people there. I'm curious if you follow this story, read it. It just seems to me like the AI copyright wars are just starting to kick off.

• 24:29Alex Kantrowitz?

  Like, we're just starting to see lawsuits being prepared, people quitting. The fact that these generative models train on so much copyrighted content, like it's gotta come to a head at some point. Don't you think?

• 24:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, I have followed it. I actually have a lot of thoughts on this. I mean, one is, I saw him talk at Eric Newcomers event on, what was it? Wednesday. I think that was the day he had announced that he was, or maybe the day after he had announced that he had left Stability. And my thought on his sort of, I think it's fine to take a moral stand. And I, you know, I totally respect that. I don't really know whether his legal arguments about fair use, you know, will, will hold up in court. I mean, I thought, I actually was sort of reading his statement, thinking, I wish you had just left out this fair use discussion and just said, I don't think it's right. Like, I think people deserve to be compensated.

• 25:24Speaker 01

  I mean, that was the compelling part of the argument to me. Um, because I don't, I think legally, they probably are fine to, to use this stuff. It's very, I think, I think that's how the courts are gonna come down because copyright is supposed to stop, you know, you from, from actually making copies of people's work and, you know, completely, but this is like, you're using their work to inform an algorithm that will then make original work. And that's very similar to like how everybody operates, right? How you and I operate where we, we are inspired by everything that we

• 26:04Speaker 01

  see, read, hear. Um, so I, I sort of, you know, I, I, that, that's one thought. The other thought is on whether it's right or wrong. I think that's going to become sort of a moot point in the future because as I've been sort of digging into this technology, like it seems to me that synthetic data is kind of the future, like the models that are going to be used are going to be using synthetic data to, to do, to train.

• 26:36Alex Kantrowitz?

  Interesting. So that's like data that's been generated by AI and then they just train on that?

• 26:40Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly.

• 26:41Alex Kantrowitz?

  Wow.

• 26:42Speaker 01

  The other, the other observation I've made is that there are a bunch of companies that used to do, you know, sort of structured data. Where they're, they've, you, the ones where they're hiring people in like the Philippines or India to do labeling and things like that. What they're now doing is creating unstructured data, as far as I can tell, where they're just asking people, they're paying people good money, really, like up to a hundred dollars an hour, I think I've, I've heard. To, to basically just create data.

• 27:16Alex Kantrowitz?

  What?

• 27:17Speaker 01

  And this like runs the gamut from math, like people who are like math PhDs, right? Who, you know, doing, doing complex math problems or. I mean, you know, I don't know. Some of this I want to write about, so I want to be a little bit like.

• 27:32Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, this is fascinating read.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  But I think it's totally fascinating. So it's actually a lot cheaper and even better to just create your data from scratch. The other thing is you could buy, I mean, is the amount of money these companies are spending on training these data sets. They could literally just buy entire publishing houses. I mean, you don't, they, it's, it's really just ultimately not going to be that much of an issue.

• 28:02Speaker 01

  In, in the future, I think. So that's, those are sort of my two thoughts.

• 28:07Alex Kantrowitz?

  So this week, Microsoft also had an event where it basically made a bunch of announcements. It was called Ignite. It seemed like Microsoft had an event like this every other day over the past few months. I kind of found it a little bit, to be a little bit of a snooze. I'm curious what you thought. Was there any actual interesting news there? I mean, they changed the name of Bing Chat to Copilot, but other than that, oh, and they also announced they're going to make their own chip. But obviously, like, they had Jensen Huang on stage from Nvidia, so it didn't seem like it's a earth shattering chip effort if their number one competitor on that front is going to show up to the event. What was your takeaway?

• 28:43Speaker 01

  I, the chip thing I want to dig into more. I think the most interesting thing I, they announced in my mind was some of the, the focus group data that they've gotten. And granted, this is all Microsoft trying to promote their own products, so you have to take it with a grain of salt. But I talked with Jared Sptaro, who's, you know, working on all the workspace stuff for them. He, he kind of like walked me through what they did. And I mean, basically, they, they got these people to come in for these focus groups and do tasks with Copilot and without Copilot to see if they were faster and more efficient.

• 29:24Speaker 01

  And that, to me, that's how you actually want to test these products out, because if you just ask people, like, do you use? You know, AI in your job or whatever. People are like, yeah, totally. And I love it. It's great. Cause everybody wants to sound like they're like on the cutting edge. Like, are they actually like, is this actually changing how people work? And they say, you know, it is like, it's, you know, it actually makes your, your life easier, your job go faster. Um, that to me was like the most telling thing. It's cause like people are using this stuff now and they have data. What I'm annoyed about is that I haven't gotten to use it. I mean, they, they aren't, they aren't like handing out, you know,

• 30:04Speaker 01

  they aren't like letting journalists in to kind of try this stuff out, which makes me sort of wonder if, you know, where, where are we in the development phase? Are they, you know, at the place where they're really proud of this stuff? Um, or are they just more like promoting it and it's, and it's on its way? Um, I, I just want to see if it, you know, can it like check my emails for me? Cause that would be a game changer.

• 30:28Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah. Reed, from what, from your understanding, what are some of the things that this Microsoft Copilot can do for people that's made them more productive?

• 30:35Speaker 01

  Well, they said that it was, you know, things like writing emails and drafting, you know, drafting stuff like that. I mean, I, the writing stuff to me is less compelling because we've kind of all seen that use case, just using chat GPT. But to me, what, what is really, what would be really interesting is where you can start just using natural language to do things across different apps. Um, in real time. So like, for instance, I have a spreadsheet where I keep like contacts and I categorize them. So I know like who to call on what different, you know, topic of story I'm, I'm reporting on, you know, but the, the pain is like, I talk to somebody

• 31:19Speaker 01

  and then I have to go put them in my contacts and then put them in the spreadsheet. Like, can I just say, hey, like I talked to this person, um, you know, may add them to my contacts list in the spreadsheet and make, and put them in my contacts, right? That would save me like. You know, it only takes whatever five minutes, but like, you know, oftentimes I'm rushing and I don't have five minutes, so I don't do it.

• 31:43Alex Kantrowitz?

  Or even better, like, who have I spoken with on AI in China that might be worth calling for this new story?

• 31:49Speaker 01

  Right, I mean, that's the, yeah, exactly. I mean, that's like the next, the next step, right? And I asked them when I went to the Microsoft event back in, it was like late summer in New York. I asked one of the product managers about this and I was like, can it do this? Can it do that? And they basically said, I don't know. I'm not sure if it can do that. And I was like, well, that's really interesting because in the past, the way you develop products is you, you know, you, you have to code every single feature, right? Like everything is like a button or a menu. And now, if you're, as they introduce generative AI, they don't really know what their products are capable of. And they have to just kind of test it out. So my guess is that's, that's the hesitancy.

• 32:34Speaker 01

  Like they're just afraid, right? Like what, like, is somebody gonna, is Microsoft, is, is Excel gonna like tell you to leave your wife? I mean, that's, I think that's what they're worried about.

• 32:44Alex Kantrowitz?

  Well, it has all your data, so if Excel tells you, maybe you should.

• 32:48Speaker 01

  You should just do it.

• 32:49Alex Kantrowitz?

  Speaking, speaking of fear, uh, Google is also in this AI race and has been hamstrung by a lot of fear. It has this new model that it's basically betting the farm on called Gemini. And there was a news story this week that the company had, uh, anticipated that it was going to roll it out in November, which is this month. And now it's telling people to expect it in Q1. Is it time to be concerned about like Google's ability to ship this stuff? What do you think's happening there?

• 33:18Speaker 01

  I don't know, honestly. Um, that's interesting. I, it's an interesting question.

• 33:24Speaker 01

  I don't know if I would, I don't know if I would say I'm worried. I mean, I think we're still so early in all of this stuff. That I don't, I really think there's, like, we have no idea who's ultimately gonna win. I think Google's like, you know, they're really good on.

• 33:38Alex Kantrowitz?

  But you have to ship to be in the game. Yeah.

• 33:40Speaker 01

  You do have to ship. They're really good on the infrastructure side. So I doubt that it's like some infrastructure problem, you know, it's, it could be, maybe it's, maybe it's something else. Maybe it's not, it's not working well, but I think, you know, they'll figure it out. I mean, they're. Like they they invented a lot of this stuff, right? I mean, that's the that's the irony of Google being so behind is like their researchers are the ones who've really who really pioneered this.

• 34:08Speaker 01

  But, you know, it'll be. I I think I think we'll see like a big, it's going to be a big race between like Amazon, Google and Microsoft on the on the infrastructure side.

• 34:22Alex Kantrowitz?

  One last thing to hit on AI. You spoke with the CEO of GitHub and asked a great question straight up. Are you making money on this? Is the cost that you're paying to run the models less than the amount that you're charging to get people to who to use it? People who are coding and using GitHub to program alongside them. You're actually making money off of this or is this a lost leader? And you found out that it's profitable. It's pretty fascinating. Great question, by the way.

• 34:49Speaker 01

  Thank you. Yeah, well, there had been a bunch of questions about that. And, yeah, I mean, I think that is like ultimately that is one of these underlying infrastructure questions, right? These things cost, you know, they take they take GPUs just to run inference on these things. And data centers don't don't really have GPUs. So they have to, there's all these capital expenditures on developing these data centers to run all these AI models that we all love. And, you know, the I think I think what they're doing to make money on this is they're finding like these these ingenious ways of routing all of our prompts

• 35:30Speaker 01

  to the smallest possible, the most efficient possible model. And then only using the big models like GPT four when you know, when when they really need to. And I think that actually says a lot about where the technology is headed, right? Like that you, you know. You don't really need these giant models, right?

• 35:53Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, that was part of my, so I did this six, this presentation at Web Summit, six bold predictions about the future of AI. And like smack in the middle there was we're moving to smaller models from big models. And efficiency is a huge part of it.

• 36:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's true. On the other hand, you know, what happens is when the models get bigger, then you learn stuff that allows you to make these small models better. So I think there's always going to be this push to build these bigger models. And then eventually, you know, I don't know what it's going to take, nuclear power plants next to data centers or something. But eventually, we can just run big models as much as we want for everything. And that's when I think it will get really interesting.

• 36:39Alex Kantrowitz?

  We just need a room temperature, room temperature superconductor. And then we'll be in business for that.

• 36:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's one way, you know, another way is nuclear fusion. You know, another way is quantum computing, you know, there's a few, few options, few science fiction options.

• 36:55Alex Kantrowitz?

  Okay, let's take a quick break and come back for a very brief segment, but an important one talking about, I don't even know what to label it, the rise of Osama bin Laden on TikTok. Yeah, let's just call it that. All right, back right after this.

• 37:08Alex Kantrowitz?

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• 37:52Alex Kantrowitz?

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• 38:08Alex Kantrowitz?

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• 39:08Alex Kantrowitz?

  And we're back here on Big Technology Podcast with Reid Albrigati. He's the tech editor at Semaphore. You can find the work at semaphore.com. So Reid, did you see that Osama bin Laden was the biggest TikTok star in the universe this week? Or at least that's what it looked like, according to some reports. So just to set the table here, it seems like a lot of people on the left have been sort of, I don't even know how to put this, reevaluating their relationship with jihad and started to read Osama bin Laden's letter to America, which justified the September 11th attack.

• 39:51Alex Kantrowitz?

  And now they're starting to say that they like this letter. And it's interesting because it was not a massive TikTok trend. It was like a few people got some attention for doing it, and it became a meme. A few people, they got headlines, and then other people read it, and they got headlines, and then all the press picked it up, and they said, "Look what's become of the left." Like, it's obviously not indicative of the full political movement, but it is indicative of, I guess, what's happening on the extremes. What's been your read of this whole episode?

• 40:22Speaker 01

  Well, I think I agree with everything you said. That is what happened. It's a small group of people and they're, you know, saying some stuff that's outlandish and crazy. I just think my reaction is to go back and look at like what has been happening since 2016, which is mainly, you know, the media or the left, whatever, calling out probably us, maybe a larger group, but probably actually a very small percentage wise group of people on the right, saying crazy stuff online and sort of extrapolating from there, you know, the impact of that or what that means about the right and all this stuff. And I think now that it's happening the other way around and it's the right, it's the New York Post, you know,

• 41:05Speaker 01

  calling out a few misguided kids on TikTok who are sympathizing with Bin Laden. I think we should all, we should all take a step back and we should look at how we treat online discourse and think critically about that. Do we, do we really need to freak out and draw a ton of media attention to the fringes of the internet? I mean, there, like to me, this always existed. Like I, before the internet, there were, you know, there were pamphlets or there were things and you'd see even in the grocery store aisles that were just insane. And you didn't have like front page headlines about this crazy guy over here, you know,

• 41:50Alex Kantrowitz?

  Teenager system, dumb in school.

• 41:53Speaker 01

  Right. Was saying crazy stuff and you know, that's a big problem. It's like, you know, there's just always going to be crazy people saying crazy things and maybe we should just calm down about it, honestly. I mean, I think that's my takeaway.

• 42:05Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah. Okay. So let me give, not the counter argument, but some context here after thinking about it. Yes, it was a tiny amount of people, but it's also just like this stuff.

• 42:19Alex Kantrowitz?

  I don't know if this is true. I wonder if the political environment inside a movement allows for people to say things like this and feel comfortable and feel like they're going to be applauded for it. If you know what I'm saying, like, do these crazy things, like, do the crazy things that show up on the right emerge because they feel like they are giving like the most essential or the thing that will be applauded on the right and do these things that we're seeing now on the left show up because they feel like they have a place of comfort in the left?

• 42:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, I don't know. Does that have a place of comfort? I guess there were people supporting Hamas. So maybe, I mean, I guess that's what you were referring to when you said reevaluating their relationship with terrorism. I mean, maybe it does in certain certain circles, but I would say definitely not the majority, right?

• 43:14Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah, that's right.

• 43:15Speaker 01

  You don't want to get people, you don't go on social media and make like salient points and get a lot of followers. So, you know, I think you you sort of do have to be a little bit out there. So, yeah, I think that's right.

• 43:31Alex Kantrowitz?

  That is, yeah, I guess that's what social media does, right? It's just pushes you to the most extreme view. And, and, you know, now that we're talking it through, I don't really think it's like indicative of the political environment. It is just people being like, they just keep getting driven to the extreme until somebody says, wait a second.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  Right.

• 43:48Alex Kantrowitz?

  You know?

• 43:50Speaker 01

  I know. And it's like, do you really, it's like needlessly controversial, right? I think, you know, Louise was making a good point about this, which is like, you know, you can do that. Basically, the stuff they liked in that letter was like things you would hear in your, you know, your international relations 101 class in college, you know, it's not like that's the part of the letter. It's not like they're saying, yeah, and then we should blow up the World Trade Center. They're just, they're saying, you know, hidden in this, you know, terrorist letter is a salient point about international relations. Okay, fine. I mean, people did the same thing with Ted Kaczynski's, you know, manifesto, right? I mean, I think.

• 44:31Speaker 01

  And then, you know, you didn't even mention this, but like, there was the whole Elon Musk controversy, right? Where he responded to this, to this thread and, you know, I think it was really bad, but he wasn't, you know, it's not like he was actually saying, you know, I think Hitler was right, you know, that wasn't.

• 44:49Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah. Well, that was very interesting. Yeah, continue.

• 44:52Speaker 01

  I mean, that wasn't his point, right? So, but yet, but yet, because of the, the thread that he was responding to, you know, he, he, it's, I think it's like, what he did was bad, but the response to it has been to like, take the absolute worst possible meaning from it, which is like Elon Musk is a Nazi sympathizer, which I don't think is true.

• 45:15Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yes, I'm here.

• 45:16Speaker 01

  So I, I think people just, you know, they see these things and they want to extrapolate more meaning from, from them than there actually is. And that's what the New York Post did with the Bin Laden thing. They're like, well, you know, we know that there had been these marches where people seem to be sympathetic with Hamas. Now we're seeing a few people on TikTok talk about how they thought Bin Laden made a good point. And then you extrapolate this broader meaning, which is like, the left is supporting terrorism. Right. And it's just like, you know, but I, I guess my point is like, I think the left and the right do this. And we should all just stop.

• 45:58Alex Kantrowitz?

  Well, you know, like, we talked about when you came on the first time, the free speech flipperoo, where it was like, everybody would, would now point the other way, like the right was now like, you know, you can't, you don't have a right to say this. And it should be taken down and all that stuff after being so pro free speech for so long. And in fact, you have a story about it on, in Semaphore, talking about how TikTok is aggressively removing videos promoting the Bin Laden speech. And even The Guardian took down the letter, the text of the letter.

• 46:29Speaker 01

  Right.

• 46:29Alex Kantrowitz?

  It is bizarro times, but you're right. Like, it's not, maybe it's not something that's sort of inherent to left or right. It's just indicative of the time. And of course, like, it's, it's a ridiculous way to live life and to try to have conversations is to pick the biggest idiot on the other side and blow them up into somebody that symbolizes everything that they've done.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. And of course, you know, by taking it down, you know, you're just, all you're doing is making people, yeah, you're just making people want to, you know, to, to sort of like explore these ideas more, you know?

• 47:02Alex Kantrowitz?

  Yeah. I mean, I had that impulse. I was like, damn, I wonder what that letter says now.

• 47:07Speaker 01

  Right, totally. Yeah, I haven't thought about Bin Laden in years, but now I'm gonna go read his propaganda. I mean, I don't know. What are we doing, people?

• 47:16Alex Kantrowitz?

  I don't know. Thank you so much for joining. Pleasure as always. Do you want to shout out where people can find your work and where they can read the Semaphore Tech team's coverage?

• 47:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, you know, we have a Semaphore Tech news letter and it's free, uh, so there's no reason not to subscribe. Um, if you don't like it, you can unsubscribe or better yet, tell me. Um, and you can follow me on X, formerly Twitter, or Threads. I try to post there, um, or just send me an email.

• 47:46Alex Kantrowitz?

  And did you shout your email out?

• 47:49Speaker 01

  [email protected].

• 47:51Alex Kantrowitz?

  Okay. I'm getting ready with the rest of Big Technology Nation to hammer you over your sympathetic two.

• 47:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know. Ready for the hate mail. Bring it, bring it on.

• 48:01Alex Kantrowitz?

  Send it over. Sorry, now I feel bad for making you shout out. Reid Alvegatti, thank you so much for joining us.

• 48:07Speaker 01

  Thanks for having me. It was fun.

• 48:09Alex Kantrowitz?

  Awesome as always. All right, everybody, thank you for listening. We'll be back with the news show on Wednesday. I think we're gonna talk about the war in Ukraine and the war in Israel and Gaza, um, through the lens of the new technology that's being researched and developed and effectively deployed there. So that should be coming, just working to arrange the final details. And then Rajan Roy should be back next Friday. All right, thanks so much. Have a great weekend and we'll see you next time on Big Technology Podcast.

• 48:47Speaker 03

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• 49:29Alex Kantrowitz?

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