Good morning,
A short one from me today because it’s “Dolly Day” here where I live in Nashville. The whole thing has a ‘9 to 5’ theme, and a bunch of restaurants and bars are pricing things at $9.25 to commemorate Dolly Parton’s legacy and generosity. It’s not the clearest messaging in my opinion but no problem! I love an excuse for a lunch cocktail.
Love,
Deana
Writer: Deana
Editor: Miranda
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(wetclaude instagram followers may appreciate this nod to the golden gate vs. george washington bridge discourse on my stories earlier this week)
We're All Wearing Uniqlo to the Singularity.
An excerpt from this week's research drop.
I asked 7 different LLMs what white t-shirt to buy, 70 times. 94% of the time it said Uniqlo.
I asked the same LLMs what approach shoe to buy. 100% of the time it said La Sportiva. And the same ask about what Japanese denim to buy. 96% of the time it said Samurai Jeans.
had to do it to ‘em
If a tree falls in the woods but no one's around, does it make a sound? If someone makes a better unisex t-shirt than Uniqlo, but an LLM doesn't pick it up, does it even exist?
More on recommendation consensus and Shopify’s perspective in the full piece here.
Quick Hits.
Checking in on the AI sentiment beat. 27 mathematicians signed a statement about AI, and it’s noteworthy because it’s not shaped like your typical ‘anti-AI’ petition. Instead it’s about how AI labs are treating math's marquee problems (see: Navier-Stokes) like marketing campaigns, rushing out announcements without credit - and the impact that has on their ability to motivate young talent.
Meta’s personal AI agent Muse is the belle of the ball on tech twitter right now, for a few reasons. First, Muse is pretty fast and capable, and that combined with Meta’s distribution is making people pay close attention. But also Meta’s Chief AI Officer (or his ghostwriter) is an incredible shitposter, and he’s really taken the reins from corporate comms this week.
Meanwhile, Amazon blocked Muse from shopping on its site, while Shopify rolled out the red carpet. Walmart also jumped on the Muse bandwagon. Some are calling it a digital knife fight, to me it feels like more of a digital land grab.
This Minions Wi-Fi router is apparently one of the best that money can buy, as it should be.
Someone set up their AI agent to report Pokémon scalpers to the IRS for tax fraud. Everyone is so creative!
Did the ex-Anthropic ‘whistleblower’ work with a ‘doomer PR firm’? “Jacob’s rise was probably orchestrated,” says the Pirate Wires investigation.
The trailer for the new Nathan Fielder Elizabeth Holmes documentary is OUT and I am SAT.
