Hollywood Has to Learn to Love AI. You Too, Mr. Beast
October 31, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
Russia’s leadership is good at talking, stalling, and doing what it wants. Is OpenAI copying this tactic? ”OpenAI Cracks Down on Sora 2 Deepfakes after Pressure from Bryan Cranston, SAG-AFTRA” reports:
OpenAI announced on Monday [October 20, 2025] in a joint statement that it will be working with Bryan Cranston, SAG-AFTRA, and other actor unions to protect against deepfakes on its artificial intelligence video creation app Sora.
Talking, stalling or “negotiating,” and then doing what it wants may be within the scope of this sentence.
The write up adds via a quote from OpenAI leadership:
“OpenAI is deeply committed to protecting performers from the misappropriation of their voice and likeness,” Altman said in a statement. “We were an early supporter of the NO FAKES Act when it was introduced last year, and will always stand behind the rights of performers.”
This sounds good. I am not sure it will impress teens as much as Mr. Altman’s posture on erotic chats, but the statement sounds good. If I knew Russian, it would be interesting to translate the statement. Then one could compare the statement with some of those emitted by the Kremlin.
Producing a big budget commercial film or a Mr. Beast-type video will look very different in 18 to 24 months. Thanks, Venice.ai. Good enough.
Several observations:
- Mr. Altman has to generate cash or the appearance of cash. At some point investors will become pushy. Pushy investors can be problematic.
- OpenAI’s approach to model behavior does not give me confidence that the company can figure out how to engineer guard rails and then enforce them. Young men and women fiddling with OpenAI can be quite ingenious.
- The BBC ran a news program with the news reader as a deep fake. What does this suggest about a Hollywood producer facing financial pressure working out a deal with an AI entrepreneur facing even greater financial pressure? I think it means that humanoids are expendable first a little bit and then for the entire digital production. Gamification will be too delicious.
Net net: I think I know how this interaction will play out. Sam Altman, the big name stars, and the AI outfits know. The lawyers know. Who doesn’t know? Frankly everyone knows how digital disintermediation works. Just ask a recent college grad with a degree in art history.
Stephen E Arnold, October 31, 2025
FAIR Squared Data Management Promises to Find Missing Data
October 31, 2025
It’s very true that information is lost or hidden away in archives never to see the light of day. That’s why it’s important to preserve the information and even use AI to make it available. Science Daily reports on new information management tool that claims to have a solution: “90% Of Science Is Lost. This New AI Just Found It.” FAIR² Data Management is designed by Frontiers and is:
“…described as the world’s first comprehensive, AI-powered research data service. It is designed to make data both reusable and properly credited by combining all essential steps — curation, compliance checks, AI-ready formatting, peer review, an interactive portal, certification, and permanent hosting — into one seamless process. The goal is to ensure that today’s research investments translate into faster advances in health, sustainability, and technology.”
The data management system is built on a robust AI algorithm. Researchers feed their their data into FAIR² and four integrated outputs are returned: a certificate, an interactive data portal with AI chat and visualizations, peer-reviewed and citable data article, and a certified data package. All of these components work “[t]ogether,…to…ensure that every dataset is preserved, validated, citable, and reusable, helping accelerate discovery while giving researchers proper recognition.”
This is a great idea and how AI should ideally be used to ensure that information is credible. If only all AI algorithms employed a data management algorithm like this to prevent AI slop, drivel, and garbage from clogging up the Internet and our brains.
Whitney Grace, October 31, 2025
Will AMD Deal Make OpenAI Less Deal Crazed? Not a Chance
October 31, 2025
Why does this deal sound a bit like moving money from dad’s coin jar to mom’s spare change box? AP News reports, “OpenAI and Chipmaker AMD Sign Chip Supply Partnership for AI Infrastructure.” We learn AMD will supply OpenAI with hardware so cutting edge it won’t even hit the market until next year. The agreement will also allow OpenAI to buy up about 10% of AMD’s common stock. The day the partnership was announced, AMD’s shares went up almost 24%, while rival chipmaker Nvidia’s went down 1%. The write-up observes:
“The deal is a boost for Santa Clara, Calif.-based AMD, which has been left behind by rival Nvidia. But it also hints at OpenAI’s desire to diversify its supply chain away from Nvidia’s dominance. The AI boom has fueled demand for Nvidia’s graphics processing chips, sending its shares soaring and making it the world’s most valuable company. Last month, OpenAI and Nvidia announced a $100 billion partnership that will add at least 10 gigawatts of data center computing power. OpenAI and its partners have already installed hundreds of Nvidia’s GB200, a tall computing rack that contains dozens of specialized AI chips within it, at the flagship Stargate data center campus under construction in Abilene, Texas. Barclays analysts said in a note to investors Monday that OpenAI’s AMD deal is less about taking share away from Nvidia than it is a sign of how much computing is needed to meet AI demand.”
No doubt. We are sure OpenAI will buy up all the high-powered graphics chips it can get. But after it and other AI firms acquire their chips, will there be any left for regular consumers? If so, expect their costs to remain sky high. Just one more resource AI firms are devouring with little to no regard for the impact on others.
Cynthia Murrell, October 31, 2025
AI Will Kill, and People Will Grow Accustomed to That … Smile
October 30, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I spotted a story in SFGate, which I think was or is part of a dead tree newspaper. What struck me was the photograph (allegedly not a deep fake) of two people looking not just happy. I sensed a bit of self satisfaction and confidence. Regardless, both people gracing “Society Will Accept a Death Caused by a Robotaxi, Waymo Co-CEO Says.” Death, as far back as I can recall as an 81-year-old dinobaby, has never made me happy, but I just accepted the way life works. Part of me says that my vibrating waves will continue. I think Blaise Pascal suggested that one should believe in God because what’s the downside. Go, Blaise, a guy who did not get to experience an an accident involving a self-driving smart vehicle.
A traffic jam in a major metro area. The cause? A self-driving smart vehicle struck a school bus. But everyone is accustomed to this type of trivial problem. Thanks, MidJourney. Good enough like some high-tech outfits’ smart software.
But Waymo is a Google confection dating from 2010 if my memory is on the money. Google is a reasonably big company. It brokers, sells, and creates a market for its online advertising business. The cash spun from that revolving door is used to fund great ideas and moon shots. Messrs. Brin, Page, and assorted wizards had some time to kill as they sat in their automobiles creeping up and down Highway 101. The idea of a self-driving car that would allow a very intelligent, multi-tasking driver to do something productive than become a semi-sentient meat blob sparked an idea. We can rig a car to creep along Highway 101. Cool. That insight spawned what is now known as Waymo.
An estimable Google Waymo expert found himself involved in litigation related to Google’s intellectual property. I had ignored Waymo until the Anthony Levandowski founded a company, sold it to Uber, and then ended up in a legal matter that last from 2017 to 2019. Publicity, I have heard, whether positive or negative, is good. I knew about Waymo: A Google project, intellectual property, and litigation. Way to go, Waymo.
For me, Waymo appears in some social media posts (allegedly actual factual) when Waymo vehicles get trapped in a dead end in Cow Town. Sometimes the Waymos don’t get out of the way of traffic barriers and sit purring and beeping. I have heard that some residents of San Francisco have [a] kicked, [b] sprayed graffiti on Waymos, and/or [c] put traffic cones in certain roads to befuddle the smart Google software-powered vehicles. From a distance, these look a bit like something from a Mad Max motion picture.
My personal view is that I would never stand in front of a rolling Waymo. I know that [a] Google search results are not particularly useful, [b] Google’s AI outputs crazy information like glue cheese on pizza, and [c] Waymo’s have been involved in traffic incidents which cause me to stay away from Waymos.
The cited article says that the Googler said in response to a question about a Waymo hypothetical killing of a person:
“I think that society will,” Mawakana answered, slowly, before positioning the question as an industry wide issue. “I think the challenge for us is making sure that society has a high enough bar on safety that companies are held to.” She said that companies should be transparent about their records by publishing data about how many crashes they’re involved in, and she pointed to the “hub” of safety information on Waymo’s website. Self-driving cars will dramatically reduce crashes, Mawakana said, but not by 100%: “We have to be in this open and honest dialogue about the fact that we know it’s not perfection.” [Emphasis added by Beyond Search]
My reactions to this allegedly true and accurate statement from a Googler are:
- I am not confident that Google can be “transparent.” Google, according to one US court is a monopoly. Google has been fined by the European Union for saying one thing and doing another. The only reason I know about these court decisions is because legal processes released information. Google did not provide the information as part of its commitment to transparency.
- Waymos create problems because the Google smart software cannot handle the demands of driving in the real world. The software is good enough, but not good enough to figure out dead ends, actions by human drivers, and potentially dangerous situations. I am aware of fender benders and collisions with fixed objects that have surfaced in Waymo’s 15 year history.
- Self driving cars specifically Waymo will injure or kill people. But Waymo cars are safe. So some level of killing humans is okay with Google, regulators, and the society in general. What about the family of the person who is killed by good enough Google software? The answer: The lawyers will blame something other than Google. Then fight in court because Google has oodles of cash from its estimable online advertising business.
The cited article quotes the Waymo Googler as saying:
“If you are not being transparent, then it is my view that you are not doing what is necessary in order to actually earn the right to make the roads safer,” Mawakana said. [Emphasis added by Beyond Search]
Of course, I believe everything Google says. Why not believe that Waymos will make self driving vehicle caused deaths acceptable? Why not believe Google is transparent? Why not believe that Google will make roads safer? Why not?
But I like the idea that people will accept an AI vehicle killing people. Stuff happens, right?
Stephen E Arnold, October 30, 2025
Old Social Media Outfits May Be Vulnerable: Wrong Product, Wrong Time
October 30, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read “Social Media Became Television. Gen Z Changed the Channel.” I liked the title. I liked the way data were used to support the assertion about young people. I don’t think the conclusion is accurate.
Let’s look at what the write up asserts.
First, I noted this statement:
Turns out, infinite video from people you don’t know has a name we already invented in 1950: Television.
I think this means that digital services are the “vast wasteland” that Newton Minnow identified this environment. I was 17 years old and a freshman in college. My parents acquired a TV set in 1956 when I was 12 years old. I vaguely remember that it sucked. My father watched the news. My mother did not pay any attention as far as I can recall. Not surprisingly I was not TV oriented, and I am not today.
The write up says:
For twenty years, tech companies optimized every platform toward the same end state. Student directories became feeds. Messaging apps became feeds. AI art tools became feeds. Podcasts moved to video. Newsletters added video. Everything flowed toward the same product: endless short videos recommended by machines.
I agree. But that is a consequence of shifting to digital media. Fast, easy, crispy information becomes “important.”
The write up says via a quote from an entity known as Jon Burn-Murdoch:
It has gone largely unnoticed that time spent on social media peaked in 2022 and has since gone into steady decline
That’s okay. I don’t know if the statement is true or false. This chart is presented to support the assertion:
The problem is that the downturn in the 16 to 24 graph looks like a dip but a dip from a high level of consumption. And what about the 11 to 15 year olds, what I call GenAI? Not on the radar.
This quote supports the assertion that content consumption has shifted from friends to anonymous sources:
Today, only a fraction of time spent on Meta’s services—7% on Instagram, 17% on Facebook—involves consuming content from online “friends” (“friend sharing”). A majority of time spent on both apps is watching videos, increasingly short-form videos that are “unconnected”—i.e., not from a friend or followed account—and recommended by AI-powered algorithms Meta developed as a direct competitive response to TikTok’s rise, which stalled Meta’s growth.
Okay, Meta has growth problems. I would add that Telegram has growth problems. The antics of the Googlers make clear that the firm has growth problems. I would argue that Microsoft has growth problems. Each of these outfits has run out of prospects. Lower birth rates, cost, and the fear-centric environment may have something to do with online behaviors.
My view is that social media and short videos are not going away. New services are going to emerge. Meta-era outfits are just experiencing what happened to the US steel industry when newer technology became available in lower-cost countries. The US auto industry is in a vulnerable position because of China’s manufacturing, labor cost, and regulatory environment.
The flow of digital information is not stopping. Those who lose the ability to think will find ways to pretend to be learning, having fun, and contributing to society. My concern is that what these young people think and actually do are likely to be more surprising than the magnetism of platforms a decade old, crafted for users who have moved on.
The buzzy services will be anchored in AI and probably feature mental health, personalized “chats,” and synthetic relationships. Yep, a version of a text chat or radio.
Stephen E Arnold, October x, 2025
Is It Unfair to Blame AI for Layoffs? Sure
October 30, 2025
When AI exploded onto the scene, we were promised the tech would help workers, not replace them. Then that story began to shift, with companies revealing they do plan to slash expenses by substituting software for humans. But some are skeptical of this narrative, and for good reason. Techspot asks, “Is AI Really Behind Layoffs, or Just a Convenient Excuse for Companies?” Reporter Rob Thubron writes:
“Several large organizations, including Accenture, Salesforce, Klarna, Microsoft, and Duolingo, have said they are reducing staff numbers as AI helps streamline operations, reduce costs, and increase efficiency. But Fabian Stephany, Assistant Professor of AI & Work at the Oxford Internet Institute, told CNBC that companies are ‘scapegoating’ the technology.”
Stephany notes many companies are still trying to expel the extra humans they hired during the pandemic. Apparently, return-to-office mandates have not driven out as many workers as hoped. The write-up continues:
“Blaming AI for layoffs also has its advantages. Multibillion- and trillion-dollar companies can not only push the narrative that the changes must be made in order to stay competitive, but doing so also makes them appear more cutting-edge, tech-savvy, and efficient in the eyes of potential investors. Interestingly, a study by the Yale Budget Lab a few weeks ago showed there is little evidence that AI has displaced workers more severely than earlier innovations such as computers or the internet. Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs Research has estimated that AI could ultimately displace 6 to 7 percent of the US workforce, though it concluded the effect would likely be temporary.”
The write-up includes a graph Anthropic made in 2023 that compares gaps between actual and expected AI usage by occupation. A few fields overshot the expectation– most notably in computer and mathematical jobs. Most, though, fell short. So are workers really losing their jobs to AI? Or is that just a high-tech scapegoat?
Cynthia Murrell, October 30, 2025
Creative Types: Sweating AI Bullets
October 30, 2025
Artists and authors are in a tizzy (and rightly so) because AI is stealing their content. AI algorithms potentially will also put them out of jobs, but the latest data from Nieman Labs explains that people are using chatbots for information seeking over content: “People Are Using ChatGPT Twice As Much As They Were Last Year. They’re Still Just As Skeptical Of AI In News.”
Usage has doubled of AI chatbots in 2024 compared to the previous years. It’s being used for tasks formerly reserved for search engines and news outlets. There is still ambivalence about the information it provides.
Here are stats about information consumption trends:
“For publishers worried about declining referral traffic, our findings paint a worrying picture, in line with other recent findings in industry and academic research. Among those who say they have seen AI answers for their searches, only a third say they “always or often” click through to the source links, while 28% say they “rarely or never” do. This suggests a significant portion of user journeys may now end on the search results page.
Contrary to some vocal criticisms of these summaries, a good chunk of population do seem to find them trustworthy. In the U.S., 49% of those who have seen them express trust in them, although it is worth pointing out that this trust is often conditional.”
When it comes to trust habits, people believe AI on low-stakes, “first pass” information or the answer is “good enough,” because AI is trained on large amounts of data. When the stakes are higher, people will do further research. There is a “comfort gap” between AI news and human oversight. Very few people implicitly trust AI. People still prefer humans curating and writing the news over a machine. They also don’t mind AI being used for assisting tasks such as editing or translation, but a human touch is still needed o the final product.
Humans are still needed as is old-fashioned information getting. The process remains the same, the tools have just changed.
Whitney Grace, October 30, 2025
The Good Old Days of Mainframes? Is Vibe the Answer?
October 29, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I like mainframe stories. I read a very good one titled “That Time I Trashed The Company Mainframe, And The Lesson I Learned.” The incident took place decades ago. The main idea is that a young programmer wrote an innocuous program, stuffed it in a mainframe, and generated instant chaos. The lesson for the young programmer was to check and double check one’s code. Easy to say.
There were several gems in the write up. I want to highlight these.
The future is in the hands of smart software. Thanks, Venice AI. Good enough.
First, there is a reference to the programming required for the F-16. Keep in mind that these aircraft are still operational today. The aircraft entered service in the early 1980s. Yep, mainframe code. What does that tell you about fixing up software for some F-16s? Some special knowledge is going to be required. This information is not routinely presented in university computer science courses. My mainframe wizard is darned old and not too peppy. Just whip out your iPhone and bang out some Rust. You can get the F-16 up to speed in no time.
Second, a number of product names appear in the essay. These include:
- Fortran, yep just like JavaScript
- Zilog 8000, a definite fave in electrical engineering courses today
- Job Control Language, easy peasy.
What’s interesting is that I believe that many major systems today are still in daily use.
Third, the write up captures the approach that made those who worked in data centers so darned popular. Emily Post’s mom approved of this behavior:
In 1982, we had no email (executives did, but no one else); therefore, we all had a phone as our primary communication device. When I picked up the phone, all I heard was a lot of swear words and yelling. The IBM mainframe operator was screaming at me for submitting a job that caused his operator console to overflow with errors. He was acting as if I had trashed the entire mainframe and made his life a living hell.
Would some of the young data snowflakes melt with this professional exchange. Gee, of course not. Just head to a Googley relaxation pod and chill. You hope.
I wish to quote form the wrap up of the cited article:
That is the lesson I learned here: reading source code is essential, and I could actually understand a codebase I had never seen before. Confidence-building things like this really helped me move forward in becoming a more professional programmer.
Just keep in mind that smart software is going to do this type of job in the future. There will be absolutely no problems. I am confident that experienced humans will fail their automated hiring tests administered by a tailored large language model. A perfect world with perfect software is arriving.
Stephen E Arnold, October 29, 2025
A Big Waste of Time: Talking about Time to Young People
October 29, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I will be 81 in a matter of days. In 1963, I had a professor at the third rate institution I attended who required that the class read Sir Francis Bacon’s essay “Of Time.” Snappy stuff. I was 18 years old, and there was one thing I did not think about. I don’t recall worrying about time. I structured my life around what classes I had to attend, what assignments I had to do, when I worked at the root beer stand, and when I had to show up at some family function like a holiday. Time was anchored in immediacy. There was no past except the day before. There was no future except checking tasks off my mental checklist or the notecards for which I became famous. Yes, I still write down things to do on notecards.
An older person provides some advice to a young person about using time and taking risks. The young person listens and responds in an appropriate way for 2025 college graduates. Thanks, Venice.ai. Good enough.
That sporty guy Francis wrote:
“Men fear time, but time fears the pyramids.”
I know that this thought did not resonate for me in 1963, and to be frank, I am not sure it resonates with me. The pyramids exist but data about when they were constructed strikes me as fuzzy. I thought about this mismatch between youth, time, and the lack of knowledge about pyramid construction or similar matters when I read “Don’t Waste Your 20s Not Taking Big Risks: You Have It So Easy, and So Little Time.”
The time talk doesn’t work for young people. Time is measured in weird and idiosyncratic ways. The “amount” of time is experiential, contextual, and personal. The write up says:
You don’t appreciate how little time you have to easily go after it and how much harder it’s going to be later.
I am sorry. This does not compute.
The write up continues:
Each year you delay is costing you 10% of the easiest period in your life to take a big risk. So if you are in college or you’re in your 20s and you think that you might want to start a business, completely change your career, move to a new city, do something radical like that, you should do that as soon as humanly possible. Ignore the scared voice in your head. The downside is basically non-existent.
I view this statement as generally bad advice. An informed decision is important. The key word is “informed.” The meaning of “informed” depends on the individual. We are dealing with moving targets. An “informed” decision to a drug addict means one thing. Time to this individual is defined by narcotic need. An “informed” decision for a person who wants to do well in college means doing the work, trying to be organized, and obtaining information to achieve desired outcomes.
“Ignore” is important when one deals with life. “Ignore” is not important in the context of time. I am not sure what time is. I have zero interest in trying to defend Sir Francis’ pyramid time nor do I pay attention to the floundering physicists who argue about what time is.
For a young person today, life is like the world of any young person at any point in history. Telling that young person to not waste time is pointless. In fact, it is a waste of time.
The cited essay wants young people to do stuff, probably backpack in some remote country or start an AI company. The environment today is that the experiential, contextual, and personal cues for “time” come from inputs unique to this point in history. Nevertheless, young people make what they can of their life in the digital fish bowl.
Several observations:
- Decisions occur even if the person involved does not go through the weird notecard drill I did and do. The reality is “stuff happens” and then young people adapt in a way defined by their experiential, contextual, and personal space
- Young people hear “time” and define it as a young person. That means most have no clue what time means in a philosophical or technical context. Give them an essay to read. Have them write 500 words. Forget it. That worked for me and it probably works for many young people if they can actually read Bacon’s essay without AI support.
- At any point in a human’s life, time is not viewed as part of a big picture. Those words about “using time wisely” tell me more about the person speaking them than valid inputs for another individual. Thanks, but I don’t think about time unless it is anchored in some way.
Net net: As the general environment in the US and the technical business sector seems less warm and fuzzy, making informed decisions works better than watching roses die. Risk must be assessed. If it is not, interesting things happen to people. But time as a big idea or a resource to be use in a way that fits into some grand life plan is something oddly positioned in a TikTok-type of amped up Hollywood movie world. Making the best decision based on the information one has is a more useful way to mark off life intervals in my opinion. If your inputs come from Twitter, well, that may work for you. For me, not a chance.
Stephen E Arnold, October 29, 2025
Think It and the It May Not Happen. Right, OpenAI?
October 29, 2025
The collaboration that was meant to revolutionize how humans interact with technology has hit some snags. Coming up with another iPhone-level idea is tough, it seems. Ars Technica reports, “OpenAI, Jony Ive Struggle with Technical Details on Secretive New AI Gadget.” While he was at Apple, Ive designed some of that company’s most iconic products. When OpenAI bought his startup for $6.5 billion in May, Altman and Ive promised a radical new AI assistant that would eclipse Amazon’s Alexa and Google Assistant: a palm-sized, screenless device that would incorporate real-world context and adapt to each user’s needs.
In order to achieve this grand vision, OpenAI hired at least a dozen Apple device experts on top of the 20-some former Apple employees at Ive’s startup. We are told it also poached some workers from Meta’s Quest headset and smart glasses projects. However, that pool of considerable talent has not ensured smooth sailing. We learn:
“Despite having hardware developed by Ive and his team—whose alluring designs of the iMac, iPod, and iPhone helped turn Apple into one of the most valuable companies in the world—obstacles remain in the device’s software and the infrastructure needed to power it. These include deciding on the assistant’s ‘personality,’ privacy issues, and budgeting for the computing power needed to run OpenAI’s models on a mass consumer device.”
Ah yes, computing power. The reason data centers are springing up like thirsty weeds across the land. While Amazon and Google have plenty of compute to power their assistants, we learn, OpenAI has some catching up to do. As for those privacy issues, the write-up does not elaborate. We would be curious to know those details.
Then there is the issue of the virtual aide’s personality. The write-up tells us:
“Two people familiar with the project said that settling on the device’s ‘voice’ and its mannerisms were a challenge. One issue is ensuring the device only chimes in when useful, preventing it from talking too much or not knowing when to finish the conversation—an ongoing issue with ChatGPT. ‘The concept is that you should have a friend who’s a computer who isn’t your weird AI girlfriend… like [Apple’s digital voice assistant] Siri but better,’ said one person who was briefed on the plans. OpenAI was looking for ‘ways for it to be accessible but not intrusive.’ ‘Model personality is a hard thing to balance,’ said another person close to the project. ‘It can’t be too sycophantic, not too direct, helpful, but doesn’t keep talking in a feedback loop.’”
Yes, one would not want to annoy the end user with cyclic conversations. Or a “weird AI girlfriend.” (By the way, have we given up hope on default male or gender-neutral AI voices? Just wondering.) The article notes a couple devices that sound similar to Altman and Ive’s vision have not fared well. Humane, a firm funded in part by Altman personally, has ditched its AI pin. Meanwhile, the Friend AI necklace has been widely reviled. Will the Apple vets (eventually) succeed where others have failed? But in OpenAI Land the “Sky” is the limit. He, just buy stuff. That sometimes is easier.
Cynthia Murrell, October 29, 2025
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