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Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

nytimes.com

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Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#281

Post by Loughla »

sensanaty wrote: post #201
kubb wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember the Metaverse delusion? People forgot about that as if Zuck wasn't walking around telling us we'd hang out with friends in virtual spaces, and do activities with goggles on. I really have got to think about that every time people act like these overvalued companies with unlimited funds know what they're doing.

I mean have you seen the interview he did with Theo Von? The guy is a straight up Alien in the way he talks and acts, all those memes about him being a lizard aren't exactly far off.

He was isolated from the real world starting at around age, what, 22?

I'm all for calling out his random flailing in this space for what it is, but it always strikes me as strange when people are surprised that he's weird and robotic. I'm betting he never learned how to actually interact with other professional humans.

He's lived in a golden tower surrounded by people who agree with him or want something from him since he was 21 or 22. Imagine what you would be like if you didn't have any struggles from such an early age. Imagine what your personality would be like if you didn't have substantive, non-transactional, human interactions since the age of 22.

I kind of feel bad for the guy. His wealth and fame have ensured that he would never be normal, or anything approaching normal. Think about it - how does he even know if he has a bad idea? Do you think there are a ton of people around him that want to call out whatever dumbass idea he has? I doubt it. B-b-b-illions of dollars tends to flavor conversations, I would imagine.

That being said, I don't feel that bad, because he can literally change the world and chooses not to.

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#282

Post by gitfan86 »

laborcontract wrote: post #82

Until now I've actually been a believer in the amount of money that Zuck has poured into metaverse investments. I'm not a believer of the metaverse per se, but a believer that innovation takes unafraid capex. The last thing you want to be is scared money like microsoft who chose to scuttle the hololense project over the thought of spending a couple extra billion dollars on it. But this deal really has left me with my…

Sam Altman is a huge risk to META. He has similar morals to Zuck and a much better technical team. If OpenAI turns on the slop generator, they could hit Facebook and Instagram hard. Wang is probably smart enough to help navigate that risk.

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#283

Post by Loughla »

diggan wrote: post #261
Illniyar wrote: post #39

Matt Levine suggested that this was an aquihire. And the weird setup where they only buy non voting shares is to not trigger any regulatory review

> the weird setup where they only buy non voting shares is to not trigger any regulatory review Do regulators actually fall for these sort of things in the US? One would expect companies to be judged based on following the spirit of the law, rather than nitpicking and allowing wide holes like this.

>One would expect companies to be judged based on following the spirit of the law, rather than nitpicking and allowing wide holes like this.

The letter of the law is what people follow. The spirit, or intent, of the law is what they argue about in court cases.

If the regulation says 49% and a company follows it, who's to say they're exploiting a loophole? They're literally following the law. Until there is a court case and precedent is set.

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#284

Post by owebmaster »

Peroni wrote: post #69
Illniyar wrote: post #39

Matt Levine suggested that this was an aquihire. And the weird setup where they only buy non voting shares is to not trigger any regulatory review

$14.3 Billion seems excessive for it to be a pure aquihire play. There's undoubtedly some IP acquisition (or at least exclusive access to certain IP) involved.

Their fantasy money from ScaleAI’s inflated valuation will easily balance this out on the books.

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#286

Post by [deleted] »

ml-anon wrote: post #87
deviation wrote: post #81

Reminds me of "Don't dig for the gold, sell the shovels". Could also be read: > Meta spends 10% of last year's revenue to acquire 49% of a top AI data company and poach their leadership, to ensure they are a key player in what could be a ~5-trillion dollar industry by 2033. Meta has a history of this. Acquiring Oculus (and leaning in on VR), Ray-Ban partnership (and leaning in on AR)... etc. These all just seem like…

What top AI company? Certainly not Scale, right? You realise that frontier labs don't really use Scale anymore exactly because they can't be trusted not to sell their secret-sauce human data collection protocols. No-one in the industry takes this guy seriously.

[deleted]

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#288

Post by diggan »

Loughla wrote: post #283
diggan wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the weird setup where they only buy non voting shares is to not trigger any regulatory review Do regulators actually fall for these sort of things in the US? One would expect companies to be judged based on following the spirit of the law, rather than nitpicking and allowing wide holes like this.

>One would expect companies to be judged based on following the spirit of the law, rather than nitpicking and allowing wide holes like this. The letter of the law is what people follow. The spirit, or intent, of the law is what they argue about in court cases. If the regulation says 49% and a company follows it, who's to say they're exploiting a loophole? They're literally following the law. Until there is a court ca…

> who's to say they're exploiting a loophole?

I guess "intent" is what matters really. If the intent is to avoid regulatory review and you could prove that intent, then they're trying to exploit it. That in itself should probably trigger a review regardless. If they've arrived at 49% for some other reason(s) than just to avoid regulatory review, then fair enough.

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#289

Post by dkdcio »

laborcontract wrote: post #82

Until now I've actually been a believer in the amount of money that Zuck has poured into metaverse investments. I'm not a believer of the metaverse per se, but a believer that innovation takes unafraid capex. The last thing you want to be is scared money like microsoft who chose to scuttle the hololense project over the thought of spending a couple extra billion dollars on it. But this deal really has left me with my…

> said enough in public for me to think, "huh?"

I love this phrasing

Re: Meta invests $14.3B in Scale AI to kick-start superintelligence lab

#290

Post by jordanb »

parsimo2010 wrote: post #275
jordanb wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it was a waste of money and that FB could have just beaten their competition instead of buying them. Correction, people were saying that FB couldn't beat their competition and had to buy them.

If people were saying that there was no way to beat them, then Instagram and WhatsApp weren't bad acquisitions.

Facebook couldn't beat them on merit because it's not very good at what it does. It does, however, have money because it was good at one thing one time, and therefore it could solve its inability to execute with M&A.
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