Comment by sfpotter
5 months ago
The problem is the "desire to be relevant in an important technological shift".
There's loads of worthwhile research to do that has nothing to do with LLMs. A lot of it will not or cannot be done in an industrial environment because the time horizon is too long and uncertain. Stands to reason that people who thrive in a "high-pressure cooker" environment are not going to thrive when given a long-term, open-ended goal to pursue in relative solitude that requies "principles and philosophical opinions" that aren't grounded in "actual execution". That's what makes real (i.e. basic) research hard and different as opposed to applied research. Lots of people in industry claiming to be researchers or scientists who are anything but.
"actual execution" in the business world seems to be more and more synonymous with recklessly and incompetently fucking things up. See also: doge.
Shhh you’ll let the cat out of the bag, me and a whole crap ton of people put food on the table doing just that
they see, "actual execution", I see, "failed upwards in a ZIRP economy"
A lot of business basically just steal from their future selves in perpetuity until the interest they’ve accumulated is too great and they implode.
It’s the GM and intel school of business. Constantly choose what makes money now, and avoid advancements and infrastructure. Wait now the competition is 20 years ahead? So you have 20 years worth of infrastructure to pay off, right now? Oh…
Everyone is just faking it until the chicken inevitably comes homes to roost. Then they walk about from the explosion and go to another company and say “see? Look how much share holder value I made! Nevermind that the company got destroyed shortly after I left!”