Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco • Hacker News Board

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#41

Post by visarga » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:23 PM UTC

gumballindie wrote: post #13

ramesh31 wrote: post #5

I think the one thing we can all agree on is that we're actually excited about something in tech again. Like for real, not in the "oh thats interesting now how can we make money" kind of way. It's been a long time, well over a decade since that's happened. The energy of SF in the late 2000s with the mobile boom was electric. Would be wonderful to experience that again.

Yeah but this time the tech is based on stealing people's intellectual property. Hopefully this theft ends soon.

Technically it is only taking gradients from the training text, not the text itself. And those gradients are all added up so the contribution of any one of them is diluted to almost nothing.

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#42

Post by bettercallsalad » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:24 PM UTC

I am always spooked by these types of headlines concerning AI. On one hand, LLM and AI is supposed to replace many Dev jobs and be productivity multiplier. On the other hand, I still don’t see any widespread adoption of LLMs in tooling and overall dev infrastructure at my work. As someone working at a mid size tech company, is there anything I can do? Are these meetups helpful to learn what tools and technologies are out there to adopt?

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#43

Post by nwoli » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:25 PM UTC

Unfortunately this boom is way different than the previously innovation driven tech booms. There’s no competitive advantage in writing openai wrappers. Any wealthy city can be a hub for it.

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#44

Post by ethanbond » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:26 PM UTC

spacemadness wrote: post #36

smith7018 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, the same Crypto grifters have fully transitioned into AI thought leaders. We're going to have the same get-rich-quick schemes except this time it'll be VC money going to an extremely novel idea built on top of an OpenAI API instead of virtual real estate or hideous JPEGs of apes.

Walking by crypto meetups attended by people that mostly looked like buttoned up bankers sure was… something.

Let’s not try to write off all the ridiculous crypto bullshit as “buttoned up bankers.”

There was (and is) plenty of bona fide Silicon Valley nerds in on the cult/con.

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#45

Post by ethanbond » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:29 PM UTC

dingnuts wrote: post #17

ramesh31 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You didn't feel it two years ago when crypto and Web3 were going to fundamentally change everything? That was the charlatan crap that took over in the last 10 years. Once upon a time, people actually cared about tech for it's own sake, and spent time geeking out and having meetups for the fun of it. Not everything was a "networking opportunity" to grift into a 6 figure PM role. I'd say 2014ish was about the time th…

>to grift into a 6 figure PM role "six figures" in SF is practically poverty, and thanks to inflation it's hardly even "making it" in flyover country nowadays. wow, some grift, lol. in a world where an average cashier makes $40k/yr, $100k isn't going to be the milestone it once was

An average full-time cashier in Columbus, Ohio (a substantial city) earns ~$27k/year and close to zero benefits, according to Indeed.

The economy being harder on people making $100k doesn’t somehow mean everyone else is earning way more — their COL is rising way faster than wages too.

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#46

Post by asveikau » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:30 PM UTC

Solvency wrote: post #15

datadrivenangel wrote: post #7

https://archive.ph/SPkAx Summary: Meetups, especially AI meetups, are back in SF. Love to see it, but we're also seeing the same thing happen here in DC with the meetups I run, so it's not especially newsworthy?

Cool, so there are AI meetups, which are finite sessions inside random cafes and businesses. But what about literally everything outside those meetups, like the horrifying human experience involved in the commute/walk/bike to and from said meetups?

You act like the meetups are happening in the Tenderloin.

I don't care to attend an AI meetup, but I just googled "sf ai meetup" as a thought experiment. First result is 3rd and mission. A very tame block. I could get on the N Judah and wind up near there and not face any of this "horrifying human experience". I do that same trip with my children since they were babies. It's no big deal. I would question the sanity of anyone who is concerned about that trip.

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#47

Post by wilg » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:30 PM UTC

gumballindie wrote: post #13

ramesh31 wrote: post #5

I think the one thing we can all agree on is that we're actually excited about something in tech again. Like for real, not in the "oh thats interesting now how can we make money" kind of way. It's been a long time, well over a decade since that's happened. The energy of SF in the late 2000s with the mobile boom was electric. Would be wonderful to experience that again.

Yeah but this time the tech is based on stealing people's intellectual property. Hopefully this theft ends soon.

What if what you can build based on humanity's collective "intellectual property" is worth the discomfort of not "owning" the work you release into the world?

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#48

Post by lazide » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:32 PM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #31

ben_jones wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A horrifying human experience is living in a war zone. It’s not having to move to a different bart car or endure a pan handler requesting money.

It's genuinely horrifying to realize that you both consider yourself a good person and yet recoil in disgust at people in great need. What is more painful than having your self-conception as an altruistic, moral person thoroughly undermined?

Empathy without boundaries is self destruction

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#49

Post by schrodingerscow » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:33 PM UTC

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #2

It's 1999 all over again. Escuse me, I have some tulip bulbs/crypto for sale.

This is seriously the laziest type of analysis there is. It’s like a freshman who memorizes the formulas for a test and attempts to pattern match existing concepts rather than understanding fundamentals. In this case you’re pattern matching the most unimportant features of the existing trend. If you don’t understand the difference between AI and crypto I don’t know what to tell you

Re: Growing AI presence is re-energizing parts of San Francisco

#50

Post by Hel5inki » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 8:33 PM UTC

Is there value in moving there for an individual who’s an employed swe, but trying to break into AI? I’d love to work for some of these startups but it seems difficult to get past the resume screen these days, and I don’t think I have that weak of a resume. If moving there would make a big impact I’d consider it, but I’m not sure where exactly in SF, and how to connect to the community while maintaining my current job remotely