Tyler Cowen: “An AI maniac is someone who is obsessed with working with the latest AI models. They try out new models as soon as they can, they spend hours and hours trying to master them, and they use them to regulate both their workflows and their personal lives. I know one person who has his AI agent text him if he is not drinking enough water, for which he’s placed cameras around his house. One online anecdote tells of a man who canceled a date to spend more time playing around with Claude Fable 5 after Anthropic (where I am a member of the economic advisory board) extended the model’s availability for a few days. Many AI maniacs are using AI tools to start companies of smaller size, and thus of smaller expense, than ever before. For those companies, the humans must set in motion and then monitor a large number of AI tools and agents. Those individuals then stand to reap outsize profits as their companies grow and succeed. Stripe, the payments company, recently issued customer data showing that the number of single-person companies earning $10 million or more has doubled in the past two years. There is no firm estimate how much of that improvement is due to AI, but it stands to reason that AI is a main driver of the trend…”
NYTimes: “Workers often focus solely on their retirement savings balance. But figuring out how you want to spend the rest of your life could be job No. 1.”
WSJ: “To record or not to record? That is no longer a question for people in tech. The answer is a resounding yes. A Zoom call isn’t complete without an artificial-intelligence note taker. Phones are out at meetings, capturing every word. During impromptu conversations with co-workers, someone might turn on the Granola transcription app, which can turn the interactions into one-page summaries or a list of action items. Even at bars and on dates, people are using AI-infused listening apps to analyze conversations later on. Gone are the days of any interaction being private by default. Asking for permission is out, even though in some situations, that could mean violating the law. It isn’t creepy if it’s in the name of productivity, say the people doing the recording.”
Jeff Sommer: “I have no doubt that artificial intelligence is an important technology. Great fortunes are already being made. But I’m also certain that there will be many losers, as there were in two other episodes of mammoth infrastructure investments in budding technologies: the railroads in the 19th century and the various early internet companies of the dot-com era. Well-run, diversified and deep-pocketed companies have a better chance of survival in epochs like these than those that take on inordinate risk with their capital investments. Even so, the future champions may not be any of the early giants. A great winnowing is coming, and prudent investors will accept that they cannot know in advance who the winners and losers will be.”
