8 ms·

A few things from the Dwarkesh interview with Satya: * He sees data center leases getting cheaper in near future due to everyone building * He’s investing big

• djtango 2y ago
  > Even if there is fast takeoff AGI, he thinks human messiness will slow implementation Five years ago during covid all these clunky legacy businesses couldn't figure out a CSV let alone APIs but suddenly with AGI they are going to become tech masters and know how to automate and processize their entire operations? I found it very amusing that at the turn of the decade "digitalisation" was a buzzword as Amazon was approaching its 25th anniversary. Meanwhile huge orgs like the NHS run on fax and was crippled by excel row limits. Software made a very slow dent in these old important slow moving orgs. AI might speed up the transition but I don't see it happening overnight. Maybe 5 years if we pretend smartphone adoption is indicative of AGI and humanoid robot rollout
  • qwertox 2y ago
    > Meanwhile huge orgs like the NHS run on fax I thought this was a German-only thing?
    • ta1243 2y ago
      Not convinced. In 2018: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/health-and-social-care-secretary-bans-fax-machines-in-nhs https://www.gov.uk/government/news/health-and-social-care-se... > Matt Hancock has banned the NHS from buying fax machines and has ordered a complete phase-out by April 2020. The NHS is quite federated. Hell many parts of it are independent companies. Some trusts have decent modern systems though - I had to go for a test just before christmas - I'd phoned up my GP in the morning got an appointment for half an hour later, he ordered a test, said go to one of these 8 centres, so I went to one about half an hour away (I live a fair way away from a major town). Had the test, by the time I'd had lunch and driven back home I had another call from the GP asking me to come in that evening, the appointment was created by the GP and read seconds later at the hospital, the test was done there and results reported back again at the click of a system at the GP. But that's just my local trust. Go 10 miles west and it's another trust and they have different systems. And I had to go to one of the test centres in the trust, I couldn't go to one in a neighbouring trust as they have different systems and there's no/limited interconnects.
      • NikkiA 2y ago
        It's all pretty much a central system as of this year, your trust will have localised PWAs or Apps, but it all connects via provider IDs and transfer codes to the same NHS backend.
    • ghaff 2y ago
      The healthcare system I largely use in the US was bought up by another larger system. They are now primarily on an electronic system (which for me is welcome) but some of the offices still use faxes as well.
      • dboreham 2y ago
        I had a stint in healthcare software and can confirm the fax thing is real. That said, I had a hunch it's all cloud-hosted fax sending systems delivering to cloud-hosted fax-to-pdf systems. I challenged by colleagues to show me an actual fax machine and never had any takers.
  • qgin 2y ago
    I think you don’t have widespread adoption until AI takes the form of a plug-and-play “remote employee”. You click a button on Microsoft Teams and hire “Bob” who joins your team org, gets an account like any other employee, interacts over email, chat, video calls, joins meetings, can use all your software in whatever state it’s currently in. It has to be a brownfield solution because most of the world is brownfield.
    • dumbaccount123 2y ago
      [dead]
    • lazide 2y ago
      Hah, that isn’t a brownfield solution. These orgs could hire someone who could solve these issues right now (and for the last decade) if they would allow those people to exist in their org. The challenge is precisely that those people (or people with that capability) aren’t allowed to exist.
      • dnissley 2y ago
        "Bob" in this example is just some other random individual contributor, not some master of the universe. E.g. they would have the title "associate procurement specialist @ NHS" and join and interact on zoom calls with other people with that title in order to do that specific job.
        • Earw0rm 2y ago
          Right, but these jobs are inefficient mostly because of checks and balances. So unless you have a bunch of AIs checking one another's work (and I'm not sure I can see that getting signed off) doesn't it just move the problem slightly along the road? There's an argument here something like.. if you can replace each role with an AI, you can replace multiple with a single AI, why not replace the structure with a single person? And the answer is typically that someone has deemed it significant and necessary that decision-making in this scenario be distributed.
  • markus_zhang 2y ago
    In fact most of the industries out there are still slow and inefficient. Some physicians only accept phone calls for making appointments. Many primary schools only take phone calls and an email could go either way just not their way. It's just we programmers who want to automate everything.
    • graemep 2y ago
      Given how bad some of the apps and websites are I am not sure phone calls are any worse! They are also less prone to data breaches and the like.
    • QuadmasterXLII 2y ago
      “ only takes phone calls for appointments” is a huge selling point for a physicians office. People are very tired of apps.
      • bronco21016 2y ago
        I’d far prefer a well done app. It’s so frustrating doing a back and forth of dates when trying to make an appointment.
        • Kamq 2y ago
          Fair, but I'd prefer phone over a poorly done app. And given the state of most apps...
      • markus_zhang 2y ago
        Yeah maybe we programmers should start doing that too. Why do we use Teams, Slack or even emails? We should submit our code to a mainframe and everyone is going to improve their skills too.
        • dboreham 2y ago
          On punched cards.
      • 2y ago
  • mattlondon 2y ago
    But why are these sort of orgs slow and useless? I don't think it is because they have made a conscious decision to do so - I think it is more than they do not have the resources to do anything else. They can't afford to hire in huge teams of engineers and product managers and researchers to modernize their systems. If suddenly the NHS had a team of "free" genuinely phd-level AGI engineers working 24/7 they'd make a bunch of progress on the low-hanging fruit and modernize and fix a whole bunch of stuff pretty rapidly I expect. Of course the devil here is the requirements and integrations (human and otherwise). AGI engineers might be able to churn out fantastic code (some day at least), but we still need to work out the requirements and someone still needs to make decisions on how things are done. Decision making is often the worst/slowest thing in large orgs (especially public sector).
    • djtango 2y ago
      IMO it comes from inertia. People at the top are not digital-native. And they're definitely not AI-native. So you're retrofitting a solution onto a legacy org. No one will have the will to go far enough fast enough. And if they didn't have the resources to engineer all these software migrations who will help them lead all these AI migrations? Are they going to go hands off the wheels? Who is going to debug the inevitable fires in the black box that has now replaced all the humans?
      • ghaff 2y ago
        And many of the users/consumers are not digital-native either. My dad is not going to go to a website to make appointments or otherwise interact with the healthcare system.
    • typewithrhythm 2y ago
      It's not a resource problem; everyone inside the system has no real incentive to do anything innovative; improving something incrementally is more likely to be seen as extra work by your colleagues and be detrimental to the person who implemented it. What's more likely is a significantly better system is introduced somewhere, NHS can't keep up and is rebuilt by an external. (Or more likely it becomes a inferior system of a lesser nation as the UK continues its decline).
  • Delphiza 2y ago
    As a first order of business, a sufficiently advanced AGI would recommend that we stop restructuring and changing to a new ERP every time an acquisition is made or the CFO changes, and to stop allowing everyone to have their own version of the truth in excel. As long as we have complex manual processes that even the people following them can barely remember the reason why they exist, we will never be able to get AI to smooth it over. It is horrendously difficult for real people to figure out what to put in a TPS report. The systems that you refer to need to be engineered out or organisations first. You don't need AI for that, but getting rid of millions of excel files is needed before AI can work.
    • kjellsbells 2y ago
      I dont know that getting rid of those wacky Excel sheets is a prerequisite to having AI work. We already have people like Automation Anywhere watching people hand carve their TPS reports so that they can be recreated mechanistically. Its a short step from feeding the steps to a task runner to feeding them to the AI agent. Paradigm shifts in the technology do not generally occur simultaneously with changes in how we organize the work to be done. It takes a few years before the new paradigm backs into the workflow and changes it. Lift and shift was the path for several years before cloud native became a thing, for example. People used iPhone to call taxi companies, etc. It would be a shame to not take the opportunity to tear down some old processes, but, equally, sometimes Chesterton's fence is there for good reason.
  • llm_trw 2y ago
    Counterpoint: the PC. The minicomputer revolution was meant to replace all the big iron in the basement with computers shared by teams. This lasted a decade until we got computers meant for one person and we've used that format of computation for nearly 50 years now. Everyone is talking about how AI will replace people. It won't. AI without HI is useless. However, HI with AI is much better at handling all the bullshit office work that needs to get done—anyone who doesn't understand this is either an idiot, a troglodyte, or already has an expendable army of minions doing their work. The surge in AI demand won't be top-down but bottom-up. That stupid office birthday wish card being passed around? I can Shakespeare the motherfucker. And that email to the big boss telling him the project is doomed and that he needs a compass to find his own ass? Let's ask R1. >My boss is a moron who can't find his ass without a compass. His latest tech initiative will cost us millions and make the best staff leave. Write a professional letter that covers those points without being harsh. --- Subject: Request for Review of Upcoming [Tech Initiative] Dear [Recipient Name/Team Name], I hope this message finds you well. I wanted to share some thoughts regarding our upcoming [Tech Initiative Name], as I believe open dialogue will ensure its success while aligning with our team’s strengths and long-term goals. While the initiative’s intent to innovate is commendable, I’ve observed several potential challenges that may impact its effectiveness: Financial Impact: Based on preliminary analysis, the projected costs appear to be significantly higher than initially estimated. A detailed cost-benefit review or phased rollout might help mitigate financial risk while allowing us to test feasibility. Team Retention Concerns: Many of our top performers have expressed reservations about the initiative’s current structure, particularly around [specific pain point, e.g., workflow disruption, lack of clarity]. Retaining their expertise will be critical to execution, and their insights could refine the plan to better address on-the-ground needs. To ensure alignment with both our strategic objectives and team capacity, I respectfully suggest: Conducting a collaborative risk assessment with department leads. Piloting the initiative in a controlled environment to gather feedback. Hosting a forum for staff to voice concerns/solutions pre-launch. I’m confident that with adjustments, this project can achieve its goals while preserving morale and resources. Thank you for considering this perspective—I’m eager to support any steps toward a sustainable path forward. Best regards,
    • nrclark 2y ago
  • lmm 2y ago
    > Five years ago during covid all these clunky legacy businesses couldn't figure out a CSV let alone APIs but suddenly with AGI they are going to become tech masters and know how to automate and processize their entire operations? The whole point of an AGI is that you don't need to be a tech master (or even someone of basic competence) to use it, it can just figure it all out.
    • dmix 2y ago
      Random non-technical people dealing with CSVs is probably one of the best usecases for current AI tools too.
    • djtango 2y ago
      Technical people don't write code, they (along with product people) specify things exhaustively. While in theory a super AGI can do everything (therefore deprecating all of humanity) in reality I suspect that given existing patterns in orgs of layers of managers who don't like to wade into the details specifying to the nth degree there will be a need for lots of SMEs except that AI will probably be a leaky abstraction and you'll still need technical people to guide the automation efforts
• heresie-dabord 2y ago
  Is this the transcript of the interview (podcast) with Dwarkesh? https://www.dwarkeshpatel.com/p/satya-nadella https://www.dwarkeshpatel.com/p/satya-nadella Because if so, > He doesn’t necessarily believe in fast takeoff AGI (just yet) the term "fast takeoff AGI" does not appear in the transcript.
  • qgin 2y ago
    Some paraphrasing on my part, but what he does say is at odds with fast takeoff AGI. He describes AI as a tool that gradually changes human work at a speed that humans adapt to over time.
    • heresie-dabord 2y ago
      Given that you invented the term in your paraphrase, what do you mean by "fast takeoff AGI"?
• lolinder 2y ago
  This is a very refreshing take. Our current intellectual milieu is largely incapable of nuance—everything is black or white, on or off, good or evil. Too many people believe that the AI question is as bipolar as every other topic is today: Will AI be godlike or will it be worthless? Will it be a force for absolute good or a force for absolute evil? It's nice to see someone in the inner circles of the hype finally acknowledge that AI, like just about everything else, will almost certainly not exist at the extremes. Neither God nor Satan, neither omnipotent nor worthless: useful but not humanity's final apotheosis.
  • jcgrillo 2y ago
    Whoa there, hold yer horses ;) Let's wait and see until we have something like an answer to "will it be intelligent?" Then we might be ready to start trying to answer "will it be useful?" I agree completely though, it's nice to see a glimmer of sanity. EDIT: My best hope is this bubble bursts catastrophically, and puts the dotcom crash to shame. Then we might get some sensible regulation over the absolute deluge of fraudulent, George Jetson spacecamp bull shit these clowndick companies spew on a daily basis.
• lenerdenator 2y ago
  > human messiness will slow implementation If by "messiness" he means "the general public having massive problems with a technology that makes the human experience both philosophically meaningless and economically worthless", then yeah, I could absolutely see that slowing implementation.
  • shermantanktop 2y ago
    Picking on "philosophically meaningless" a bit... I'm a hobby musician. There are better musicians. I don't stop. I like to cook. There are better cooks. I don't stop. If you are Einstein or Michael Jordan or some other best-of-the-best, enjoyment of life and the finding of worth/meaning can be tied to absolute mastery. For the rest of us, tending to our own gardens is a much better path. Finding "meaning" at work is a tall order and it always has been. As for "economically worthless," yes if you want to get PAID for writing code, that's a different story, and I worry about how that will play out in the scope of individual lifetimes. Long term I think we'll figure it out.
• adverbly 2y ago
  > * He doesn’t necessarily believe in fast takeoff AGI (just yet) This is so based... I would probably have given slow take off a 1% chance of happening 10 years ago, but today I'd put that somewhere like 30%.
• mikesurowiec 2y ago
  I expect data centers will become more expensive precisely because everyone is building at the same time. Supply chain crunch
  • kridsdale1 2y ago
    Temporary. During their operating and depreciating long tail phase the over supply will drive down costs for users. Like fiber cables.
• ein0p 2y ago
  In fact I don't think he believes in the takeoff of AGI at all, he just can't say it plainly. Microsoft Research is one of the top industry labs, and one of its functions (besides PR and creating the aura of "innovation") is exactly this: to separate the horseshit from things that actually have realistic potential.