5 ms·

FWIW I take his writings with a hefty pinch of salt these days. It seems incredibly concentrated on OpenAI to the detriment of anything else. This was only ce

FWIW I take his writings with a hefty pinch of salt these days. It seems incredibly concentrated on OpenAI to the detriment of anything else. This was only cemented when he ended up appearing on some OpenAI marketing video. This is fine. He is his own person and can write about whatever he wants and work with whoever he wants, but the days when I'd eagerly read his blog to get a finger of the pulse of all of the main developments in the main labs/models has passed, as he seems to only really cover OpenAI these days, and major events from non-OpenAI labs/models don't seem to even get a mention even if they're huge (e.g. nano banana). That's fine. It's his blog. He can do what he wants. But to me personally he feels like an OpenAI mouthpiece now. But that's just my opinion.

firesteelrain 1y ago
Never read his blog and I like the writing. > he feels like an OpenAI mouthpiece now That seems a little harsh. But, I felt the same about older blogs I used to read such as CodingHorror. They just aren’t for me anymore after diverging into other topics. I really liked this article and the coining of the term “Research Goblin”. That is how I use it too sometimes. Which is also how I used to use Google.
simonw 1y ago
"It seems incredibly concentrated on OpenAI to the detriment of anything else." My most recent posts: - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/7/ai-mode/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/7/ai-mode/ - Google/Gemini - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/research-goblin/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/research-goblin/ - OpenAI/GPT-5 - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/kimi-k2-instruct-0905/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/kimi-k2-instruct-0905/ - Moonshot/Kimi/Groq - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/anthropic-settlement/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/anthropic-settlement/ - Anthropic (legal settlement) - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/4/embedding-gemma/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/4/embedding-gemma/ - Google/Gemma So far in 2025: 106 posts tagged OpenAI, 78 tagged Claude, 58 tagged Gemini, 55 tagged ai-in-china (which includes DeepSeek and Qwen and suchlike.) I think I'm balancing the vendors pretty well, personally. I'm particularly proud of my coverage of significant model releases - this tag has 140 posts now! https://simonwillison.net/tags/llm-release/ https://simonwillison.net/tags/llm-release/ OpenAI did get a lot of attention from me over the last six weeks thanks to the combination of gpt-oss and GPT-5. I do regret not having written about Nano Banana yet, I've been trying to find a good angle on it that hasn't already been covered to death.
- Squarex 1y ago
  I used to read and love your blog, but recently I've noticed a bias towards OpenAI since you were involved with the ChatGPT-5 prerelease.
  - simonw 1y ago
    As soon as another lab release an exciting new model (Anthropic and Gemini have both been quiet since GPT-5, with the exception of nano banana which I do intend to cover) I'll write about what they're up to.
- sangeeth96 1y ago
  > I think I'm balancing the vendors pretty well, personally. You are. Pretty much my main source these days to get a filtered down, generalist/pragmatic view on use of LLMs in software dev. I'm stumped as to what the person above you is talking about. OT: maybe I missed this but is the Substack new and any reason (besides visibility) you're launching newsletters there vs. on your wonderful site? :)
  - simonw 1y ago
    The Substack is literally the exact same content as my blog, just manually copied and pasted into an email once a week or so for people who prefer an email subscription. I wrote about how it works here: https://simonwillison.net/2023/Apr/4/substack-observable/ https://simonwillison.net/2023/Apr/4/substack-observable/
- BoredPositron 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - simonw 1y ago
    I'm one person with a blog, and I have other things to do. Sometimes I feel that there's pressure for me to be a full blown newspaper covering everything that happens in a multi-billion dollar industry.
jryle70 1y ago
His content seem pretty fair and balanced. https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=simonw https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=simonw Or take a look at his website: https://simonwillison.net/ https://simonwillison.net/ At least you admit it's your opinion. Maybe that's your bias showing?

firesteelrain 1y ago

Never read his blog and I like the writing. > he feels like an OpenAI mouthpiece now That seems a little harsh. But, I felt the same about older blogs I used to read such as CodingHorror. They just aren’t for me anymore after diverging into other topics. I really liked this article and the coining of the term “Research Goblin”. That is how I use it too sometimes. Which is also how I used to use Google.

simonw 1y ago

"It seems incredibly concentrated on OpenAI to the detriment of anything else." My most recent posts: - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/7/ai-mode/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/7/ai-mode/ - Google/Gemini - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/research-goblin/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/research-goblin/ - OpenAI/GPT-5 - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/kimi-k2-instruct-0905/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/kimi-k2-instruct-0905/ - Moonshot/Kimi/Groq - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/anthropic-settlement/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/6/anthropic-settlement/ - Anthropic (legal settlement) - https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/4/embedding-gemma/ https://simonwillison.net/2025/Sep/4/embedding-gemma/ - Google/Gemma So far in 2025: 106 posts tagged OpenAI, 78 tagged Claude, 58 tagged Gemini, 55 tagged ai-in-china (which includes DeepSeek and Qwen and suchlike.) I think I'm balancing the vendors pretty well, personally. I'm particularly proud of my coverage of significant model releases - this tag has 140 posts now! https://simonwillison.net/tags/llm-release/ https://simonwillison.net/tags/llm-release/ OpenAI did get a lot of attention from me over the last six weeks thanks to the combination of gpt-oss and GPT-5. I do regret not having written about Nano Banana yet, I've been trying to find a good angle on it that hasn't already been covered to death.

Squarex 1y ago
I used to read and love your blog, but recently I've noticed a bias towards OpenAI since you were involved with the ChatGPT-5 prerelease.
- simonw 1y ago
  As soon as another lab release an exciting new model (Anthropic and Gemini have both been quiet since GPT-5, with the exception of nano banana which I do intend to cover) I'll write about what they're up to.
sangeeth96 1y ago
> I think I'm balancing the vendors pretty well, personally. You are. Pretty much my main source these days to get a filtered down, generalist/pragmatic view on use of LLMs in software dev. I'm stumped as to what the person above you is talking about. OT: maybe I missed this but is the Substack new and any reason (besides visibility) you're launching newsletters there vs. on your wonderful site? :)
- simonw 1y ago
  The Substack is literally the exact same content as my blog, just manually copied and pasted into an email once a week or so for people who prefer an email subscription. I wrote about how it works here: https://simonwillison.net/2023/Apr/4/substack-observable/ https://simonwillison.net/2023/Apr/4/substack-observable/
BoredPositron 1y ago
[flagged]
- simonw 1y ago
  I'm one person with a blog, and I have other things to do. Sometimes I feel that there's pressure for me to be a full blown newspaper covering everything that happens in a multi-billion dollar industry.

jryle70 1y ago

His content seem pretty fair and balanced. https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=simonw https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=simonw Or take a look at his website: https://simonwillison.net/ https://simonwillison.net/ At least you admit it's your opinion. Maybe that's your bias showing?