What Sam Altman Told OpenAI About the Secret Device He's Making with Jony Ive
wsj.com
wsj.com
- the quality of the output of OpenAI models good enough;
- the target user group broad enough;
- the interest of people in AI-based devices and AI functionality high enough;
- OpenAI’s hardware experience and Joni’s team supply chain experience good enough;
… to guarantee even a tiny sliver of success to the absolute best chatGPT-based product these two will make?
1. I would imagine they believe their models will continue to get better at the rate they have been. Which would make a lot of things possible. e.g. imagine this https://simonwillison.net/2024/Oct/31/cerebras-coder/ with two generations better than what OpenAI has now. (I am talking about the speed, not the coding or interface) I can think of ALOT of things I would use a device for that would do that.
2. intersection of 1.4 billion iPhone users and 800 million ChatGPT users.
3. This is an unknown, like asking what the interest is for AirBnB, Uber or the iPhone. Obvious now but very smart people said their was 0 market. Similar to people thinking an AI device is a Humane Pin
4. remains to be seen, I would say Joni's team has the hardware experience and you can hire the supply chain people.
1. There is a lot of belief in this, and not much science. If anything studies are saying the opposite.
2. Not sure I follow. They want to make a "third core device", so they'd like to add themselves to the digital life you already have. Good luck with that too?
3. Well, true, but not what market research says so far with AI being not at all the sales driver a lot of companies would think it was.
4. Fair enough.
I would also add that for me there is another fundamental phylosophical issue: former visionaries clearly had ideas that defied the status quo, and what people (like me in this case) were quick to dismiss as impossible. That said, their visions always were intended to make the world A BETTER PLACE. Even Steve Jobs, as business oriented as he was, he always wanted to make a dent in the Universe (as selfish and naive as that might be), or make computers that everyone could use. How is Sam Altman aligned to this tenet enough to convince someone like Joni to call him a real visionary, and work with him? This escapes me, because for all I've known and (thoroughly researched), Altman just has the self-aggrandizing and narcissistic traits of Jobs without all the positives that made him Steve Jobs.
I'm somewhat worried that, to an extent, Altman's Kool Aid is so potent it could even turn someone like Ive into a believer.
No one with a brain is going to be willing to allow that kind of chaos into their lives.
How is this not a red flag to anyone? Are we past reality already to this point? Like, how can you claim you're gonna do something so incredibly revolutionary and at the same time fall for the worst trait a VC would spot in a wannabe startupper -- thinking that the incredible originality of your idea is your moat?
ChatGPT is a success story as much as it concerns brand and distribution, and this product could be the same, but Altman is admitting clearly that they have zero moat in this. This could be copied by anyone as long as they hear the idea? Seriously?
Openai is Microsoft, for the better and the worst, and Microsoft is windows computer.
They already kind of implemented chatgpt to billion of consumer with Microsoft recall and all the other ai feature in office, paint and so on.
"The product will be capable of being fully aware of a user's surroundings and life, will be unobtrusive, able to rest in one's pocket or on one's desk"
"Ive and Altman's intent is to help wean users from screens. Altman said that the device isn't a pair of glasses, and that Ive had been skeptical about building something to wear on the body."
> They aren’t going to carry around two devices that need charging.
Remember when we said the same things about laptops? And then cell phones?
Interesting …