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Brian McCullough
Welcome to the Tech Meme Ride home for Thursday, February 13, 2025. I'm Brian McCullough. Today we maybe have a roadmap for GPT5, but also, is it not really GPT5 just a renaming of what they already have in the pipeline? It's kind of weird. Elon gives his conditions for dropping his takeover bid Utility companies say the AI hype is real, but what if in the end, the end users don't actually show up? Here's what you missed today. In the world of tech, the whole Elon bid thing has sucked up all the attention. But in the background, this has quietly been an important moment for OpenAI. They need to raise more money, thus the wooing of Masa San. But also they need to demonstrate that they're still leading in the AI race. And that was true even before the whole deep seek thing happened. Thus the 12 days of announces in December, remember? So a bunch of announces from San Altman and company over the last day. Basically they were giving the outlines of their roadmap going forward into GPT5, which will apparently include O3, which is no longer set to ship as a standalone model. Also, GPT 4.5 will apparently be OpenAI's last non chain of thought model. Quoting TechCrunch in a post on X on Wednesday, Altman said that in the coming months, OpenAI will release a model called GPT5 that integrates a lot of OpenAI's technology, including O3 in its AI powered chatbot platform, ChatGPT and API. As a result of that roadmap decision, OpenAI no longer plans to launch O3 as a standalone model. The company originally said in December that it aimed to release O3 sometime early this year. Just a few weeks ago, Kevin Weil, OpenAI's chief product officer, said in an interview that O3 was on track for a February March launch. Altman also announced that OpenAI plans to offer unlimited chat access to GPT5 at the standard intelligence setting, subject to abuse thresholds once the model is generally available. Altman declined to provide more detail on what this setting and these abuse thresholds entail. Subscribers to ChatGPT plus will be able to run GPT 5 at a higher level of intelligence, Altman said. While ChatGPT Pro subscribers will be able to run GPT5 at an event higher level of intelligence. GPT5 will incorporate voice, Canvas, search, deep research and more, he added, referring to a range of features OpenAI has launched in ChatGPT over the past few months. A top goal for us is to unify our models by creating systems that can use all our tools, know when to think for a long time or not, and generally be useful for a very wide range of tasks before GPT5 rolls out OpenAI plans to release GPT 4.5, a model codenamed Orion, in the next several weeks, according to Altman. Altman says this will be the company's last non chain of thought mod. Like O3 and OpenAI's other reasoning models, non chain of thought models tend to be less reliable in domains like math and physics. It seems that OpenAI is fully embracing the reasoning model trend it arguably kick started with its first reasoning model 01 late last year. Reasoning models effectively fact check themselves, which helps them to avoid some of the pitfalls that normally trip up models. This fact checking process incurs some latency. Reasoning models take a little longer, usually seconds to minutes longer to arrive at solutions, but they tend to be both more reliable and capable. In recent social media posts, I'll admit admitted that deepseek has lessened OpenAI's technological lead in AI and said that OpenAI would pull up some releases to better compete, end quote Ethan Mollick tweeted this is not unexpected reasoners becoming the dominant form of LLM after GPT 4.5, but it is good to have some transparency and commitment to free frontier models for all. Deserves real applause. Still would be nice to have a lab be fully transparent about their one to three year roadmaps end quote Though Gary Marcus tweeted this quote Sam Altman tried today to put a positive spin on what looks like a major retreat. Perallstreetjournal reporting in December, Project Orion, which aimed to be GPT5, was behind schedule and running up major bills today. Altman rechristened Orion as GPT 4.5 rather than 5, which likely means that despite major bills Orion never met the expectations so called scaling laws had implied. AI will soldier on, perhaps with new inventions, but pure scaling of data and compute didn't even get us to GPT5, let alone GPT6. Even with the discovery of test time compute, GPT5 remains elusive and Fergal Reid tweeted this low confidence hot take, but I read this as bearish for OpenAI and indeed for anyone trying to massively scale pre training. The implication of GPT5 being powered by O3 and not 4.5, which I presume is a scaled up model, nor a 4.5 that does reasoning again presuming a large 4.5 indicates that the last 12 to 18 months of attempting to scale pre training has probably not resulted in another 10x jump for pre trained models. Especially when you read this with Gemini 2's benchmark performance, yes, Test Time Compute is scaling well. That's real. Maybe pre training has scaled okay logarithmically, but Test Time Compute is just doing so well. Smaller model plus test time just economically beats large pre training runs. But given deep seq, R1, S1, et cetera, converting base models to reasoning models isn't that expensive. So that doesn't seem to justify the the capital structure of something like OpenAI. Also, just an FYI that OpenAI plans to give free ChatGPT users unlimited GPT5 access at the standard intelligence setting. As I said earlier, plus and Pro users will get to run GPT5 at higher levels. Quoting a gadget we want AI to just work for you. We realize how complicated our model and product offerings have gotten, altman wrote. We hate the model picker as much as you do and want to return to Magic Unified Intelligence. In its current iteration, forcing ChatGPT to use a specific model, such as O3 mini, involves either tapping the Reason button in the prompt bar or one of the options present in the Model picker, which appears after the chatbot answers a question. If you pay for ChatGPT plus or Pro, that dropdown menu can get pretty long with multiple models and intelligent settings to choose from. Once GPT5 arrives, OpenAI plans to offer free users unlimited access to the model, subject to abuse thresholds at the standard intelligence setting. Altman did not provide an exact timeline for either GPT 4.5 or GPT 5 other than to say they could arrive within weeks or months. Months, end quote. But back to the whole Elon bid business. According to a court filing, Elon Musk will apparently withdraw his $97.4 billion bid if OpenAI's board of directors halt its conversion to a for profit company, quoting TechCrunch. Should the charity's assets proceed to sale, a Musk led consortium has submitted a serious offer that would go to the charity in furtherance of its mission, the filing read. However, if OpenAI's board is prepared to preserve the charity's mission and stipulate to take the for sale sign off its assets by halting its conversion, Musk will withdraw the bid, end quote. The filing, submitted to the U.S. district Court for the Northern District of California, claims that Musk's offer to buy OpenAI's nonprofit is serious and that the nonprofit must be compensated by what an arm's length buyer will pay for its assets. In a filing earlier on Wednesday, attorneys for OpenAI called Musk's move to take control of the company an improper bid to undermine a competitor and a contradiction of his position in court that a transfer of the startup's assets through restructuring would breach its mission as a charitable trust, end quote. Indeed, in another filing, OpenAI says Elon Musk's bid contradicts his attacks in his lawsuit against OpenAI that its assets can't be transferred away for private gain. This is a filing in that original case where he originally sued to halt the move for the for profit plan. So Musk was offering to drop the takeover bid, I guess to stop this case if they stopped going for profit. Quoting Bloomberg, Musk's move to take control of OpenAI contradicts his position in court that a transfer of the startup's assets through restructuring would breach its mission as a charitable trust, according to Wednesday's filing out of court. Those constraints evidently do not apply so long as Musk and his allies are the buyers. The OpenAI lawyers said Musk would have OpenAI transfer all of its assets to him for his economic benefit and that of his competing AI business and handpicked private investors, end quote. The judge in the case, U.S. district Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, signaled at a Feb. 4 hearing that she wasn't convinced she needs to take immediate action against OpenAI. She said she will probably let Musk take OpenAI to trial and require him to testify over at least some of his claims. Lawyers told the judge the earliest a trial could take place is in late 2026, end quote Apple has released an Apple TV app for Android phones and tablets, limited to TV plus MLS season pass and MLB Friday Night Baseball. And the app doesn't support casting. But clearly this is a play to get subscribers outside of the Apple ecosystem. Quoting 9to5Mac the app lets users log in with their existing Apple account or create a new account through the app and subscribe using Google Play Billing. The app is rolling out now supporting Android 10 or newer devices. The app supports the fundamental Apple TV app features users will be familiar with from the app on Apple devices, including the Continue Watching queue, offline downloads and search playback progress syncs across all your devices so you can start watching a show on your TV and then continue in bed on your Android phone, for instance. However, the app is limited to Apple TV plus MLS Season Pass and MLB Friday Night Baseball content. Itunes, store purchases and rentals are not shown in the app at all, nor can users access their previously purchased library through the Android app. In some ways, though, this makes for a cleaner experience with a simple layout of four tabs on the phone app, Apple TV plus MLS downloads and search on tablet form factors. This interface is presented in a floating sidebar layout rather than a direct port of the iOS app. Apple is using native Android UI components where applicable, such as context menus when long pressing on an item. However, this is still a 1.0 release and there are some notably absent features. The Android app does not support notifications or casting, for instance. An app for Google TV Living Room devices has existed for many years, but this is the first time the Apple TV app is natively available for Android phones and tablets. Those customers wishing to enjoy Apple originals on non Apple mobile devices were previously limited to a mediocre web app experience available in the browser. Additionally, starting today, the Google TV Apple TV app will also allow customers to subscribe directly to TV and MLS season pass using Google Play billing. This solves another pain point as previously the app forced users to first make an account and subscribe on another device. Today's launch is both symbolic and significant, and perhaps the biggest statement yet that Apple cares about Apple TV becoming successful as a standalone service rather than a mere ecosystem. Add on end quote. I've been running resumewriters.com on Shopify for years now. Nobody does selling better than Shopify, home of the number one checkout on the planet and the not so secret secret Shop Pay which boosts conversions up to 50%, meaning way less carts going abandoned and way more sales going. Businesses that sell more sell on Shopify. So if you're into growing your business commerce platform better be ready to sell wherever your customers are scrolling or strolling on the web, in your store, in their feed and everywhere in between. When you think about an innovative product, a progressive brand and button down marketing, an often overlooked secret is actually the business behind the business making selling and for shoppers buying simple. For millions of businesses, that business is Shopify. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout we use with Shopify. Sign up for your $1 per month trial at shopify.comride all lowercase go to shopify.comride to upgrade your selling today shopify.com ride if you're a security or IT professional, you've got a mountain of assets to protect. You've got devices, applications, employee identities plus the scary stuff outside your security stack like unmanaged devices, shadow IT apps and non employee identities. It's a lot. Fortunately you can conquer those risks with 1Password extended access management you know I use 1Password personally but get how you can deploy this it folks. 1Password's device trust solution blocks unsecured and unknown devices before they access your company's apps. And don't worry, 1Password still protects against the biggest attack source Compromised Credentials Its industry leading password manager helps employees create strong unique logins for every app. Secure devices check Secure credentials check. What About Employee Productivity? 1Password Extended Access Management empowers hybrid employees to join the security team with end user remediation that teaches them how and why to fix security issues without needing help from it. Go to 1Password.com Ride to secure every app, device and identity, even the unmanaged ones. Right now my listeners get a free two week trial at 1Password.com Ride. That's 1Password.com Ride Meta says it will open up Facebook Marketplace and let classified ad firms in Europe pay to place their listings there. This comes after a pilot with ebay and is in direct response to the EU's recent 798 million euros fine. Quoting Bloomberg in a statement, Facebook said that despite the changes, it continues to disagree with the European Commission's decision last year, which saw Meta punished for abusing its dominance. The company also reiterated earlier comments from Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg in calling the EU antitrust fines tantamount to a tariff regime. The Brussels based commission said it is currently assessing whether Meta has fully complied with the decision. European Union antitrust regulators issued a directive in November requiring Meta to separate its Facebook Marketplace classified service from its main social network and to stop imposing what it deemed anti competitive conditions on competing online marketplaces for used goods. The decision, which included financial penalties, marked one of the last major enforcement actions by out outgoing EU Competition commissioner Margareth Vestiger. During her tenure, the Brussels regulator imposed multiple antitrust fines totaling over 8 billion euros against U.S. tech firms, with Google parent Alphabet bearing the brunt of these sanctions. British competition authorities had also investigated similar concerns regarding Facebook Marketplace, but ultimately closed their probe after Meta agreed to certain commitments, According to the UK's Competition and Markets Authority. You know how I have that list of all time highs and 52 week high stocks to give me a heads up when tech companies suddenly start killing it before the headlines actually reach us? But you know what has been near the top of those lists recently? Boring old utility companies. Why? Well, AI of course. As we've discussed, demand for electricity is through the roof, so naturally business is booming if you produce electric. Case in point, one of the stocks making all time highs is Dominion Energy, which now says data center power demand in Virginia, which is home to the so called Data Center Alley, almost doubled in the second half of 2024, rising to 40.2 gigawatts in December 2024 alone. That's up from 21.4 gigawatts just back in July. Yeah, that'll pop your stock. Quoting Bloomberg Demand for power is surging with the development of data centers and artificial intelligence, along with manufacturing and the electrification of the economy. Northern Virginia, which has the biggest concentration of the facilities in the world, has earned the nickname of Data Center Alley. Dominion still expects big demand growth, even after Chinese AI company Deepseek upended some of those expectations last month when it released a model that appeared to be much more energy efficient. What's undeniable is that data center growth in Virginia is not slowing down. In fact, it's accelerating, dominion Chief Executive Officer Bob Blue said on the call. Blue acknowledged the spike in request was likely boosted by a system the company instituted in August to evaluate new requests for power in batches in the order they're received. Developers reimbursed Dominion for costs. One gigawatt is roughly the output of a nuclear reactor and can power about 750,000 homes, end quote. Yeah, but again, what if the demand for this stuff never actually materializes? On the end user side, a survey of attendees at The Wall Street Journal's CIO Network Summit found that while 60 of chief information officers reported experimenting with AI agents, 21% are not using them at all, citing a lack of reliability. That's in stark contrast to the vendors selling this technology, who say it will be too late for businesses to wait for all of the technology's kinks to be ironed out. Vendors like OpenAI, Microsoft and Sierra are banking on the fact that enterprises will be ready sooner rather than later to take on new workforces of AI agents that automate away much of the daily toil for their employees. Except that it is imperfect, bret Taylor, co founder and CEO of the agentic AI startup Sierra and chairman of OpenAI, said at the summit. Rather than say, will AI do something wrong, say when it does something wrong, what are the operational mitigations that we've put in place to deal with it? Not all business technology leaders are ready to take on that risk. 29% of attendees at the summit said cybersecurity and data privacy is their primary concern around using AI agents. Jared Spataro, corporate vice president of AI at Work at Microsoft, said at the summit that the business software giant's plan to help companies get value from AI AI involves combining its copilot AI assistant with AI agents. When you use that simple frame and assistant copilot plus agents, we think you can wind up with the right pattern, he said. Still, the promise of AI agents and AI largely could be even further away than a few years in the future. 75% of summit attendees polled said they believe AI is currently driving a small amount of value for their investments, but not enough. Sometimes, however, companies are in the mode of having hammers looking for nails, said Jim Seiders, chief information officer of data analytics for firm Palantir, also speaking at the summit. They're so scared to be left out of a revolution in progress that they buy an AI thing of some kind and they try to figure out how to drive value with it, cider said. End quote okay, so the 2000th episode of this podcast is happening later this month and I want to do something special for like probably a listener call in episode. We did that a couple of times years ago and Riverside supposedly has a thing that allows people to watch live and be brought up from the audience, so I want to give that a test run. Anyone want to help me kick the tires on that? I know that this is a bit sudden, but watch my Twitter and Bluesky account today at around 2:30 Eastern. If I can put a link in there, we'll do a quick test stream. I won't publish it, but if you want to participate, it'll help me see how the system works before we record the episode properly. If I don't do it at 2:30 Eastern today, I'll do it at like 1pm Eastern tomorrow. So check my socials or email me@brianechmeme.com if you want to participate and maybe I'll just email you the link. Thanks in advance. If you'd like to help. Again, this is a test run and it won't be published, but it is gonna be live, so keep that in mind. If you join in, talk to you maybe in a couple hours.