Venkatesh Rao

1 month ago | contraptions.venkateshrao.com | Venkatesh Rao

The Contraptions Book club March pick is Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition by Frances Yates. Chat thread here. We will discuss this the week of March 24th. I’ll be co-hosting an online salon Silicon Archipelago: A Salon On Open Distributed Southeast Asian Tech Futureson Friday, March 14 (Southeast Asia time).

Nov 25, 2024 | snorkel.ai | Matthew Casey |Matt Casey |Venkatesh Rao

Large Language Models (LLMs) are redefining what’s possible across industries. They represent a significant leap forward in transforming enterprise processes and enhancing customer interactions. However, LLM evaluation poses complex challenges for enterprises who wish to deploy them. LLMs behave differently from traditional models, meaning data scientists must assess them differently. Traditional record-by-record assessments used in machine learning don’t apply.

Oct 11, 2024 | ribbonfarm.com | Venkatesh Rao

After several years of keeping it going in semi-retired, keep-the-lights-on (KTLO) mode, I’ve decided to officially fully retire this blog. The ribbonfarm.com domain and all links will remain active, but there will be no new content after November 13th, 2024, which happens to be my 50th birthday. There will be one final roundup post before then, and perhaps a shortish epitaph post. And the main page will switch to a static landing page. But after that date, this will effectively be a museum site.

Aug 2, 2024 | studio.ribbonfarm.com | Venkatesh Rao

Found this excellent 2017 paper, Bullshit as a Problem of Social Epistemology by Joshua C. Wakeham, via Sarah Perry, and just read and discussed it in the Yak Collective governance study group this morning. The paper builds on the Harry Frankfurt “indifference to truth and falsity” model (from a 1987 paper and a 2005 popular crossover book — the idea went viral on the internet along the way).

Jul 14, 2024 | ribbonfarm.com | Venkatesh Rao

I like to make a distinction between imagination and creativity that you may or may not agree with. Imagination is the ability to see known possibilities as being reachable from a situation. Creativity is the ability to manufacture new possibilities out of a situation. The two form a continuous spectrum of regimes in simple cases, but are disconnected in complex cases. I’ve been playing with Legos in open-play mode lately to try and develop better intuitions about both.