P.S. You Should Know... | Issue #413
Future is here
my story 🚀
🤖 Self-driving Waymos have been omnipresent in our area for a while now. It’s still novel enough that the kids like to shout whenever we see one. This week I finally had the chance to ride in one! It was a short trip from my house to downtown Austin with a friend. It was great! And by the end, it was boring. Eight years ago I made a bet with someone that their newborn daughter wouldn’t need to learn to drive. I have another eight years to go, and I’m feeling pretty good about my odds!
🎉 Congratulations to Nameless portfolio company INFI USA on completing their Series A financing. If you know of any restaurants or stores who would benefit from self-service kiosks, this is the easiest one on the market to set up!
fun facts 🙌
The workers are still home. “Kastle’s weekly back-to-work barometer – which tracks how many people enter an office building for which Kastle provides the electronic access system – has barely ticked up since the start of 2023. Its weekly barometer measures office occupancy as a percentage of what it had been before Covid.” ~ learn more
Who’s afraid of driverless cars? “The majority of Americans, in survey after survey, just don’t feel good about the things.” And yet, they’re here! ~ learn more
Check out these projects from the Stanford hackathon. “BrailleBot - 🎖️Best Hardware Prize Converting a 3d printer and junk material from Stanford supply closet into a $15 braille printer” ~ learn more
The tree of old world languages. A very cool visual! ~ learn more
oh, chicago 🏆
Former Illinois House speaker found guilty. “Michael Madigan was the last man standing long after other political bosses of his era lost their clout, hung it up or went to prison. … But on Wednesday morning, the former Illinois House speaker — the longest-serving legislative leader in American history — was convicted by a federal jury of bribery, conspiracy and wire fraud, capping a four-month trial.” You may be wondering if this is the end of corrupt Illinois politics. I’m not. ~ learn more
oh, austin 🤠
Edge City Austin. This is coming up soon, March 2 - 7th. I’ll be out of town, but maybe you will want to attend? “A weeklong unconference focused on frontier tech for human flourishing, featuring lightning talks, collaborative workshops, a hackathon, and daily workouts.” ~ learn more
tech, startups, internet ⚡
Microsoft's Satya Nadella always impresses. Ever since I saw him at an Economic Club of Chicago dinner a few years ago, I’ve been a fan. This week he was on a podcast to promote the company’s quantum computing breakthrough. It’s a wonderful interview. He also shared the most reasoned take on AGI that I’ve heard yet, which is to ignore all the noise and focus on getting the world’s economic growth rate up to 10%. ~ learn more
Pulling back the curtain on the magic of Y Combinator. “But what does the data say about the impact of YC and the success of their bets? We tried to demystify the giant by reviewing the 4,939 YC companies so that startup founders, investors, and others can see what’s really going on—and maybe learn from the successes or trends.” ~ learn more
DeepMind robots playing 1v1 soccer. Click for video! “Training Robotis OP3, the researchers found they were able to learn movement skills like walking, kicking, and being able to recover from a fall. According to the report, the robots were also able to develop an understanding of the rules of soccer, like anticipating where the ball is going or when to block shots from an opponent.” ~ learn more
better doing 🎯
How an investor uses Deep Research. “1. First, I used O1 Pro to build me a prompt for Deep Research to do Deep Research on Deep Research prompting….” ~ learn more
The only problem is that it’s all made up. Recommended reading for AI users, including the Deep Research guy above. “Despite claiming to have looked at every paper published in the Annals in this 75-year period, poking around the pages it looked at suggests it only looked at ~5-6 papers.” ~ learn more
under the microscope 🔬
First time hearing about 4D printing. “Welcome to 4D printing, a frontier in material and manufacturing science that has been rapidly expanding over the past decade. While 3D printing has captured global attention for its ability to create objects layer by layer, 4D printing adds the element of time.” The application is sofas that self-assemble when you heat them up. ~ learn more
A genome-wide atlas of cell morphology reveals gene functions. “The new technique lets scientists study the effects of perturbing over 20,000 genes on hundreds of image-based cellular features. Generating data with the method is more than 10 times less expensive than comparable high-dimensional approaches such as high-throughput single-cell RNA sequencing and can be adapted to study a wide variety of cell types. In Nature Methods, the researchers applied PERISCOPE to execute three whole-genome CRISPR screens to create an open-source atlas of cell morphology.” ~ learn more
thoughts of food 🍔
Cool restaurants are on OpenTable now. Remember the September 2024 news that they were working to win them back? GrubStreet says it’s working! ~ learn more
Sea-farmed salmon problems. “I knew there were problems with salmon reared in captivity at sea, but after witnessing the damage inflicted by life in an ocean pen, I will be voting with my shopping trolley, says Graham Lawton” ~ learn more
teaching the kids 👩🏫
Schools should pursue excellence. “This tension between Equity and Excellence has long defined education, but the dominant frame in education schools has set excellence aside altogether. The time has come for a fundamental reorientation. One-size-fits-all has failed: not once, not twice, but for three generations. Progress in education cannot mean pushing all kids into the same mold and neglecting those who break it. To reignite the flame of progress in schools, we must embrace the pursuit of excellence.” ~ learn more
big ideas 📚
Why Japan succeeds despite stagnation. “But despite severe economic stagnation, Japan is still a desirable place to live and work. The major costs of living, like housing, energy, and transportation are not particularly expensive compared to other highly-developed countries. Infrastructure in Japan is clean, functional, and regularly expanded. There is very little crime or disorder, and almost zero open drug use or homelessness. Compared to a peer country like Britain, whose economic stagnation over the past 30 years has been less severe, Japan seems to enjoy a higher quality of life.” ~ learn more
on the blockchain ⛓
Siqi Chen explains the craziness of his crypto experience. What started as a fundraiser for medical research ended up with a whole lot of that and more, thanks to weird crypto stuff. ~ learn more