✅ Final Thoughts Friday for 2024-08-16
Four upcoming events, SXSW panel, tech news highlights, and personal updates.
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As a reminder, I’ve committed to four events for the remainder of this year.
AI Field Day 5 in Silicon Valley September 11-13, 2024 for Tech Field Day
Monktoberfest in Portland October 2-4, 2024
Cloud Field Day 21 in Silicon Valley October 23-25, 2024 for Tech Field Day
All Things Open in Raleigh October 27-29, 2024 for CLS
SXSW in Austin March 7 - 15, 2025
Speaking of SXSW, I organized an awesome panel with amazing speakers on an amazing topic. I’d appreciate you voting (registering to vote is free) for this panel.
The week in review for me is being thankful for new client work, cooler weather, and catching up with folks. As I decide what the longer term fate of these daily updates and weekly digests become, I’ll probably use this section for a “me” update of sorts.
Switching gears, the bigger tech stories this week seemed to be Patreon (and Apple), Google Gemini, FTC actions on fake reviews, A.I. safety bill contraction, and CHIPS Act grants. My thinking is this:
At some point, deleting the Patreon app is an option as is providing feedback to companies like Patreon to encourage eschewing app investments to instead focus on making far greater value open web first designs that walled garden handheld tiny screen experiences cannot easily match.
Gemini is useful in the Google ecosystem. The demos seem very cool (even the ones that failed) but will it be an iOS experience?
One of the reasons I stopped using Amazon for e-commerce was the reviews seemed remotely authentic, and that was probably 10 years ago — so it highlights just how slow legislation and regulation are relative to the speed of technology.
It was probably inevitable that the first wave of AI safety bills in the United States would be watered down or cut back in response to a whole host of objections that either came directly from the industry or via proxy and likely lobby related communications.
Seeing CHIPS grants happen is exciting and I hope the investments turn into a story that we look back up on fondly — even if I was probably a few years ahead of my time.
Techmeme: After Apple's threats, Patreon memberships via its iOS app will be subject to Apple's 30% fee from November 2024; creators must switch to subscription billing (Sarah Perez/TechCrunch)
By Sarah Perez / TechCrunch. View the full context on Techmeme.
Techmeme: Hands-on with Gemini Live: conversationally, a big step forward, but functionally, a step back in some ways, largely due to working entirely in the cloud (Joanna Stern/Wall Street Journal)
By Joanna Stern / Wall Street Journal. View the full context on Techmeme.
Techmeme: The US FTC announces a final rule banning the sale of fake reviews and testimonials, including AI-generated ones, with fines as high as $50K per violation (Danny Gallagher/Engadget)
By Danny Gallagher / Engadget. View the full context on Techmeme.
Techmeme: California lawmakers weaken the AI safety bill with amendments proposed by Anthropic and other opponents, including giving the AG less power to sue AI companies (Maxwell Zeff/TechCrunch)
By Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch. View the full context on Techmeme.
Techmeme: The Biden administration approves $1.6B in Chips Act grants and $3B in loans for Texas Instruments, to help pay for one chip factory in Utah and two in Texas (Mackenzie Hawkins/Bloomberg)
By Mackenzie Hawkins / Bloomberg. View the full context on Techmeme.
Note: Some images via Unsplash
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Cuthrell Consulting LLCAttn: Jay Cuthrell1903 Live Oak St #92Beaufort, NC 28516-0092
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