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SoftBank’s Next 30-Year Vision (2010) [pdf]
- abrgr 9y ago10^60 computing elements (presumably doing some computing that we humans want done) with only ~10^80 atoms in the universe? I'm as optimistic a technologist as they come but that seems a bit... extreme
- paxy 9y agoI don't think you're comprehending the sheer difference in scale between 10^60 and 10^80.
- abrgr 9y agoOur galaxy has ~10^70 atoms. At an atom per compute element, we will use 1/10^10 of our entire galaxy for our own compute? 10^60 is a bit more than the number of atoms in our sun. Given our sub-exponential space advances over the last 50 years, it seems... ambitious... to turn our sun into a computer in the next 300. If they're saying we'll be an interstellar spacefaring civilization in much less than 300 years, they really buried their lead :)
- Iv 9y ago> If they're saying we'll be an interstellar spacefaring civilization in much less than 300 years, they really buried their lead :) If you think we can't reach Kardashev scale I in 300 years you are really pessimistic! We have, right now, the technology to go visit other stars. It would take a sizable amount of the world's GDP but it is possible. I certainly hope that in 300 years we will have explored other systems!
- xelxebar 9y agoActually, people are already working on getting to Alpha Centauri within a reasonable timescale and without exhausting the world's GDP [1] ! [1] https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/3 https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/3
- akvadrako 9y agoI'm not saying it's impossible, but I wouldn't trust these guys to do anything. The funding is basically all from one russian oligarch who probably does it for fun then gets board. Their last initiative was much less ambitious, yet after several years the website just says "Details of the competition will be announced soon." [1] https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/2 https://breakthroughinitiatives.org/Initiative/2
- 0x4f3759df 9y agohttp://www.positrondynamics.com http://www.positrondynamics.com
- adrianN 9y agoWhere a sizeable amount is about the size of the Manhatten Project, so, in fact, not all that much.
- mdonahoe 9y agoPerhaps quantum computers 300 years from now won't use an atom per compute element.
- DonaldFisk 9y agoMass of the sun: 2 x 10^30 kg Mass of a hydrogen atom: 1.67 x 10^-27 kg So there are 1.2 x 10^57 atoms in the sun. And we need the sun. The mismatch is caused by someone extrapolating an exponential trend in one area well into the future, ignoring physical reality. Anyone with a good grasp of high-school physics should have noticed this before the slides were released.
- hasenj 9y agoThe presentation was probably made by business-minded people who are just good at talking and trying to sound impressive.
- nameisu 9y agoi have 10^0 clues
- dkural 9y agoThis is by far the strangest presentation I've seen by someone who controls hundreds of billions of assets. It has a surreal sensibility.
- mljoe 9y agoBased on conversations with people who have worked with Masayoshi, I don't think he does this for PR. It's a very genuine sentiment.
- godzillabrennus 9y agoHow many presentations have you seen from “someone who controls hundreds of billions of assets”?
- intended 9y agoDepending on where you are in finance it’s not an irregular phenomenon - any ppt from any major wall street bank would also conform.
- par 9y agoThese VC pitch decks are getting more and more dystopian by the day.
- 0x4f3759df 9y agoI wonder how they're doing on the goal of starting 5000 companies in 30 years.
- phyalow 9y agoPretty good - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/softbank-plots-deals-to-build-300-billion-asset-management-arm https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/softbank-...
- eungyu 9y agoConsidering it's 2010, I'll admit there are some good parts. But it's distracted like hell.
- contingencies 9y agoI think an interesting point is that, for example in US corporate culture, it would be unacceptable to have a non-facetious theme of empathy running throughout such a strategic document. Whereas, it seems to me that the Japanese management culture truly allows for this sort of thing, compared to US board rooms. The world needs more of this, so well done Japan! The money slide for me was the top companies by market capitalization over time, where you see railroads (old transport and information infrastructure) ousted by fuel and steel (car infrastructure), ousted by infotech infrastructure.
- hkmurakami 9y agoI don't buy that. It may not be as facetious as in the US, but it's still facetious. Most manufacturing companies, and all the large ones, have replaced a large fraction of their fulltime blue collar workforce with temp workers whose contracts last for 2-3 years. The mothership will _subcontract_ out work to subsidiary companies (for example, software development work) so that they can maintain their lockstep pay/promotion schedules in the mothership, but pay the subsidiary employees less [1]. Companies in Japan are just as profit motivated as their US peers. True corporate empathy ended a very very long time ago, if it ever existed (probably existed a few hundred years ago) It's just a matter of what kind of marketing is acceptable and believable to the general public. Also keep in mind that Son Masayoshi is a master PR user. Nowhere else have I seen someone use PR towards the general public to lobby for things like wireless spectrum auctions and solar energy government subsidies. [1] most of the time, unless it's a special case company full of researcher types.
- contingencies 9y agoOK, so you're saying it's just as facetious.
- sifar 9y agoLooks like Black Mirror had access to this presentation. When will people realize that it is not just the number of neurons but the structure of brain that makes it what it is. I have often wondered what gives these people (the visionaries with the means, think Musk) the arrogance to impose their vision on humanity. It is one thing to work on something you believe and try to bring it in reality, it is quite another to believe one can lead the world to follow some particular path. They may be working with an incredible tunnel vision or may be I am unable to comprehend the scale at which they operate.
- davedx 9y agoArrogance, hubris... and history is full of dangerous visionaries who pushed, pulled or dragged societies, willingly or kicking and screaming, to unknown destinations in the physical or mental worlds. To deny this trait is to deny what it is to be human.
- FullMtlAlcoholc 9y ago>I have often wondered what gives these people (the visionaries with the means, think Musk) the arrogance to impose their vision on humanity. Nothing gives anyone the inherent right to impose their will on others. Governments only have authority because they have usurped a monopoly on violence. "Power belongs to the people that take it. Nothing to do with their hard work, strong ambitions, or rightful qualifications, no. The actual will to take is often the only thing that’s necessary." -Tyrell Wellick, Mr. Robot
- sifar 9y agoSadly yes, it is just because they want to and can. I have come to this realization in recent times. But then again this is true for most of the things in life (if you want it and are able, you do it), so it doesn't provide a detailed insight into where does this particular will come from. I can understand for people to have it when the world was small, but the more knowledge man acquired and sought to control things, the more it exposed the things still to know.So I think there is some willful ignorance involved which discounts this uncertainty or fog of war and generates the will to influence humanity centuries hence.
- eecc 9y agoIt’s a surprising presentation. I might not agree with several assumptions and implications but I was sincerely put off balance by this mission statement “Endeavoring to benefit society and the economy and maximize enterprise value”... quite a difference from the “fiducial duty” to scorch the earth for a penny more.
- icebraining 9y agoMost big companies have similarly lofty mottos and mission statements.
- karmapolic 9y agocan someone please breakdown what the vision is? going through the doc was all too confusing.
- loblollyboy 9y ago'extrapolate everything'
- cjCamel 9y agoMuch like all CEOs went through a phase of doing a marginal gains presentation, and some are still probably talking about how the internet is an opportunity, I suspect we'll see this kind of presentation trickle down to most orgs that like to think they are innovative. It's a continuation of some of those mad stream of consciousness presentations we saw from "digital visionaries" a few years back.
- familyit 9y ago"Prestige Worldwide"
- bookofjoe 9y agoSuperb
- lovemenot 9y agoI suppose this 2010 document could have been an early step in Softbank's bid to secure the $90B invested funds from Saudi Arabia and others, which was announced earlier in 2017. 2040 was perhaps the timescale around when Saudi was expecting to need substantial new revenues uncorrelated with burning hydrocarbons.
- look_lookatme 9y agoI like the part where we get to communicate telepathically with golden retrievers.