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Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

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Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#541

Post by keeganpoppen »

xnx wrote: post #486
mehulashah wrote: post #277

Most of the folks on this topic are focused on Meta and Yann’s departure. But, I’m seeing something different. This is the weirdest technology market that I’ve seen. Researchers are getting rewarded with VC money to try what remains a science experiment. That used to be a bad word and now that gets rewarded with billions of dollars in valuation.

> This is the weirdest technology market that I’ve seen. The phenomenon you're seeing is well described here: "The Perfect AI Startup" ( https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/newsletters/2025-09-29/the... ) “It was the most absurd pitch meeting,” one investor who met with Murati said. “She was like, ‘So we’re doing an AI company with the best AI people, but we can’t answer any questions.’” Despite that vagueness, Murati…

matt levine never misses

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#542

Post by IncreasePosts »

daveguy wrote: post #482
coldpie wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So he's not using his own money, and he has enough personal wealth that there is no impact to him if the company fails. It's just another rich guy enjoying his toys. Good on him, I hope he has fun, but the responsibility for failure will be held by his employees, not him.

LeCun's net worth is estimated between 5-10 million. Just for payroll of 10 AI researchers at 300k/yr would cost over $3 million per year. And his wealth probably isn't fully liquid. Given payroll + compute he would be bankrupt in a year. Of course he's not using just his own money. However, I expect he will be a major investor. Most founders prefer to maintain some control.

He's been leading a large, important organization at Meta for 13 years. The stock has 10x'd in that time. He's almost certainly worth way more than that. Those random google sites that talk about net worth have no real idea what they're guessing at and are more akin to clickbait

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#543

Post by HarHarVeryFunny »

xnx wrote: post #486
mehulashah wrote: post #277

Most of the folks on this topic are focused on Meta and Yann’s departure. But, I’m seeing something different. This is the weirdest technology market that I’ve seen. Researchers are getting rewarded with VC money to try what remains a science experiment. That used to be a bad word and now that gets rewarded with billions of dollars in valuation.

> This is the weirdest technology market that I’ve seen. The phenomenon you're seeing is well described here: "The Perfect AI Startup" ( https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/newsletters/2025-09-29/the... ) “It was the most absurd pitch meeting,” one investor who met with Murati said. “She was like, ‘So we’re doing an AI company with the best AI people, but we can’t answer any questions.’” Despite that vagueness, Murati…

I wonder how the investors feel now seeing what the initial product is?!

Maybe investing in all well-connected AI startups is safer than trying to pick the winners and losers?

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#544

Post by KalMann »

DaSHacka wrote: post #20
lolive wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That guy has survived the AI winter. He can wait 10 years for yet another breakthrough. [but the market can’t] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_winter

We're at most in an "AI Autumn" right now. The real Winter is yet to come.

This seems like a strange comment to make since the above comment in no way suggests that we are currently in an AI winter.

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#545

Post by williamDafoe »

mrbonner wrote: post #373
mehulashah wrote: post #277

Most of the folks on this topic are focused on Meta and Yann’s departure. But, I’m seeing something different. This is the weirdest technology market that I’ve seen. Researchers are getting rewarded with VC money to try what remains a science experiment. That used to be a bad word and now that gets rewarded with billions of dollars in valuation.

I can’t help but wonder: if we had poured the same amount of money into fusion energy research and development, how far might we have come in just three short years?

The minimum cost of capital just to run fusion experiments is probably $100m. And the power bills are probably almost as high as the ones from OpenAI, which is to say, they are the highest power bills in the history of mankind ...

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#546

Post by KalMann »

jb1991 wrote: post #521
snapcaster wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you some kind of timeless being? it's a meaningful fraction of a human life

In the context of technology, not the context of one life.

I think his point is it means a lot in the context of investors seeking to make returns on their investments.

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#547

Post by infamouscow »

maleldil wrote: post #523
igravious wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also agree with LeCun that LLMs in their current form - are a dead end. Well then you and he are clearly dead wrong.

How do you know that for sure? How can you be absolutely certain that LLMs are what will lead to AGI?

I’ve yet to meet a single person who claims AGI will happen without recycling the same broken reasoning the peak-oil retards were peddling a decade ago.

Talking to these people is exhausting, so I cut straight to the chase: name the exact, unavoidable conditions that would prove AGI won’t happen.

Shockingly, nobody has an answer. They’ve never even considered it.

That’s because their whole belief is unfalsifiable.

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#548

Post by tarsinge »

natch wrote: post #97
sebmellen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain this “world model” concept to me? How do you actually interface with a model like this?

He is one of these people who think that humans have a direct experience of reality not mediated by as Alan Kay put it three pounds of oatmeal. So he thinks a language model can not be a world model. Despite our own contact with reality being mediated through a myriad of filters and fun house mirror distortions. Our vision transposes left and right and delivers images to our nerves upside down, for gawd’s sake. He im…

And LLMs are trained on the humans trying to describe all of this through text. The point is not if humans have a true experience of reality, it’s that human writings are a poor descriptor of reality anyway, and so LLMs cannot be a stepping stone.

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#549

Post by williamDafoe »

aatd86 wrote: post #265
ryukoposting wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Bell Labs we look back on was only the result of government intervention in the telecom monopoly. The 1956 consent decree forced Bell to license thousands of its patents, royalty free, to anyone who wanted to use them. Any patent not listed in the consent decree was to be licensed at "reasonable and nondiscriminatory rates." The US government basically forced AT&T to use revenue from its monopoly to do fundamenta…

Used to be a Google X. Not sure at what scale it was. But if any state/central bank was clever they would subsidize this. That's a better trickle down strategy. Until we get to agi and all new discoveries are autonomously led by AI that is :p

Google X is a complete failure. Maybe they had fei-fei on staff for a short while but most of her work was done elsewhere.

Re: Yann LeCun to depart Meta and launch AI startup focused on 'world models'

#550

Post by HarHarVeryFunny »

potatoproduct wrote: post #525
commandar wrote: post #517

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anthropic, frankly, needs to in ways the other big names don't. It gets lost on people in techcentric fields because Claude's at the forefront of things we care about, but Anthropic is basically unknown among the wider populace. Last I'd looked a few months ago, Anthropic's brand awareness was in the middle single digits; OpenAI/ChatGPT was somewhere around 80% for comparison. MS/Copilot and Gemini were somewhere bet…

Anthropic feels like a one trick pony as most users dont need or want anthropic products. However, I speak with a small subset of our most experienced engineers and they all love Claude Sonnet 4.5. Who knows if this lead will last.

Anthropic are mostly selling, and having most success, with business customers (incl. selling API access for Claude Code).

This is the reason they haven't bothered to provide an image generator yet - because Chat users are not their focus.

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