The Modern CLI Renaissance (14 minute read)
The rate at which new CLI tools are being written has picked up over the past few years after seeing relatively little activity between 1995 and 2015. This article discusses the trend where people are rewriting and rethinking staples of the command line interface, why the trend may be happening, and why the trend is a good thing. New tools have the opportunity to learn from their predecessors and build upon them. While the new tools may not be perfect, they are a result of software becoming more polished and adapted to new use cases.
Google co-founder Sergei Brin is back at Google and working on AI.
Klarna's aggressive cost-cutting measures and focus on AI are part of a broader trend where companies across various sectors are implementing AI-driven solutions to enhance efficiency and reduce costs.
Android apps are blocking sideloading and forcing Google Play versions instead (3 minute read)
A new feature in Google's Play Integrity API allows apps to push 'remediation' dialogs during sideloading that can't be worked around.
OpenAI is reportedly moving away from its complicated non-profit structure next year (2 minute read)
Sam Altman told OpenAI staff members during their weekly staff meeting that the company will be transitioning to a more traditional for-profit corporate structure next year. OpenAI will remain focused on building AI that benefits everyone. Altman did not specify exactly what the company's corporate structure will look like, but a spokesperson says that non-profit is core to OpenAI's mission and will continue to exist. The company started as a non-profit organization that relied on money from donors, but donations alone were not enough for the cost of computation power and talent required to push its core research forward.
Amazon tells employees to return to office five days a week (11 minute read)
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has instructed corporate staffers to spend five days a week in the office starting on January 2. The decision is a significant shift from Amazon's earlier return-to-work stance, which required corporate workers to be in the office at least three days a week. Amazon also plans to simplify its corporate structure by having fewer managers, with each S-team organization expected to increase its ratio of individual contributors to managers by at least 15% by the end of the first quarter of 2025. A copy of the full memo from Jassy is available in the article.
TikTok argued against its U.S. ban in court today. Here's what happened (9 minute read)
On Monday, a panel of three judges from the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit heard TikTok's arguments against a law that will force the company to find a non-Chinese buyer or be banned nationwide. It was unclear which way the court was leaning, but the judges appeared dubious of TikTok's plea that its right to free expression surpasses national security concerns. However, the judges did point out that shutting down the app could violate the rights of US TikTok users and TikTok's US operations. TikTok's strategy of trying to overturn the law by attacking Congress' legislative authority is unusual - it appears that it may be asking the court to send the law back to Congress to be amended.
Some reflection on what today's reasoning launch really means (3 minute read)
OpenAI's o1 represents a new paradigm - people shouldn't expect the same pace, schedule, or dynamics of the pre-training era or for their GPT prompts to 'just work'.
Ban warnings fly as users dare to probe the “thoughts” of OpenAI's latest model (5 minute read)
OpenAI has been sending out warning emails and threats of bans to users trying to probe how its latest AI model works.
Salesforce's New AI Strategy Acknowledges That AI Will Take Jobs (4 minute read)
Salesforce says that its AI tools can handle tasks without human supervision. The company plans to charge $2 per conversion held by its new generative AI agents. Salesforce is insulating itself from customer job cuts by pricing its new AI features based on outcomes rather than the number of employees using it. Its new AI agents will allow companies to increase their workforce capacity during busy periods without having to hire additional full-time employees or gig workers.