Tech Brew Ride Home - Fri. 10/25 – GPT-5 Coming By December?

Episode Date: October 25, 2024

The Verge says we could get GPT-5 by December, but it might be called Orion. The biggest health care data breach in US history. Turns out Americans can actually produce high yield, quality silicon. Or, at least, Arizonans can. And, of course, the weekend longreads suggestions. Here’s what you missed today in the world of Tech. Sponsors: Acorns.com/ride Links: OpenAI plans to release its next big AI model by December (The Verge) UnitedHealth says data of 100 million stolen in Change Healthcare breach (BleepingComputer) TSMC’s Arizona Chip Production Yields Surpass Taiwan’s in Win for US Push (Bloomberg) Bluesky raises $15M Series A, plans to launch subscriptions (TechCrunch) Weekend Longreads Suggestions: The mystifying, acrimonious battle between Arm and Qualcomm (Financial Times) Who Gets the TikTok in the Divorce? The Messy Fight Over Valuable Social Media Accounts (WSJ) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech meme right home for Friday, October 25th, 2024. I'm Brian McCullough today. The Verge says we could get GPD 5 by December, but it might be called Orion. The biggest healthcare data breach in U.S. history.

Turns out Americans can actually produce high-yield quality silicon, or at least Arizonans can, and of course the weekend long-read suggestions. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. Okay, here we go, or note this for later claim chatter. A source has told the Verge that OpenAI plans to launch its next flagship model codenamed Orion by December, rolling it out in phases starting with the company's trusted partners. Quote, unlike the release of OpenAI's last two models, GPT40 and 01, Orion,

Orion won't initially be released widely through ChatGPT. Instead, OpenAI is planning to grant access first to companies it works closely with in order for them to build their own products and features, according to a source familiar with the plan. Another source tells the verge that engineers inside Microsoft, OpenAI's main partner for deploying AI models are preparing to host Orion on Azure as early as November. While Orion is seen inside OpenAI as the successor to GPT4, it's unclear if the company will call it GPT5 externally. As always, the release plan is subject to change and could slip.

Open AI and Microsoft declined to comment for this story. Orion has been teased by an Open AI executive as potentially up to 100 times more powerful than GPT4. It's separate from the 01 reasoning model OpenAI released in September. The company's goal is to combine its LLMs over time to create an even more capable model that could eventually be called artificial general intelligence or AGI. It was previously reported that OpenAI was using 01 codenamed Strawberry to provide synthetic data to train Orion. In September, OpenAI researchers through a happy hour to celebrate finishing training the new model, a source familiar with the matter tells the verge. That timing lines up with a cryptic post on X by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman,

in which he said he was, quote, excited for the winter constellations to rise soon. If you ask ChatGPT-01 preview, what Altman's post is hiding, it will tell you that he's hinting at the word Orion, which is the winter constellation that's most visible in the night sky from November to February, but it also hallucinates that you can rearrange the letters to spell Orion. quote. Now, it is worth noting that Sam Altman himself replied to this on X by saying, fake news out of control, end quote. United Health says over 100 million people had their data stolen in that February ransomware attack on change health care, which would make this the largest

ever U.S. health care data breach, quoting bleeping computer. In May, United Health CEO Andrew Whitty warned during a congressional hearing that, quote, maybe a third of all Americans health data was exposed in the attack. A month later, Change Healthcare published a data breach notification, warning that the February ransomware attack on Change Healthcare exposed, quote, a substantial quantity of data for a substantial proportion of people in America. Today, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights Data Breach Portal updated the total number of impacted people to 100 million, making it the first time United Health, the parent company of Change Healthcare put an official number on the breach.

On October 22nd, 20204, Change Health Care notified OCR that approximately 100 million individual notices have been sent regarding this breach reads an updated FAQ on the OCR website. Data breach notifications sent by Change Health Care since June state that a massive amount of sensitive information was stolen during the February ransomware attack, including health insurance information such as primary, secondary, or other health plans, policies, insurance companies, member group ID numbers, and Medicare, Medicaid, government, payer ID numbers, health information such as medical record numbers, providers, diagnoses, medicines, test results, images, care, and treatment, billing claims and payment information such as claim

numbers, account numbers, billing codes, payment cards, financial and banking information, payments made and balance due, and or other personal information such as social security numbers, driver's licenses, or state ID numbers, and passport numbers. The information may be different for each individual and not everyone's medical history was exposed. This data breach was caused by a February ransomware attack on United Health subsidiary change health care, which led to widespread outages in the U.S. health care system. The disruption to the company's IT systems prevented doctors and pharmacies from filing claims and prevented pharmacies from accepting discount prescription cards, causing patients to pay full price for medications. The Black Cat Ransomware Gang,

aka Alv, conducted the attack using stolen credentials to breach the company's Citrix's remote access service, which did not have multifactor authentication enabled. During the attack, the threat actors stole six terabytes of data and ultimately encrypted computers on the network, causing the company to shut down IT systems to prevent the spread of the attack. The United Health Group admitted to paying a ransom demand to receive a decryptor and for the threat actors to delete the stolen data. The ransom payment was allegedly $22 million, according to the Black Cat Ratsamware affiliate who conducted the attack, end quote. One of the reasons people were like, you can't just onshore something as complex and sophisticated as chip production back to the U.S.

Was that, aside from not having the fabs and factories in place, we don't have the workforce anymore, the institutional knowledge, the skill set to produce high-quality silicon. Well, maybe that's not true. A source told Bloomberg that TSM's U.S. division president said during a webinar that production yields in Arizona are four percentage points higher than at similar facilities in Taiwan. That might not sound like much, but in silicon production, those fine margins are huge. Quote, the share of chips manufactured at TSM's facility in Phoenix that are usable is about four percentage points higher than comparable facilities in Taiwan. Rick Cassidy, president of TSM's U.S. Division told listeners on a webinar Wednesday, according to a person who participated. The success rate or yield is a critical measure in the

semiconductor industry because it determines whether companies will be able to cover the enormous costs of a chip plant. The accomplishment is a sign of progress for Washington's efforts to revitalize American semiconductor manufacturing. TSM, the main chip manufacturing partner for Nvidia and Apple, is in line to win $6.6 billion in government grants and $5 billion in loans plus 25% tax credits to build three fabrication facilities or fabs in Arizona. The award, like almost all others from the 2022 Chips and Science Act, isn't yet finalized. A TSM spokesperson declined to comment directly on Cassidy's event and referred to remarks from Chief Executive Officer C.C. Way on a call with investors last week. Our first FAB entered engineering wafer production in

April with four nanometer process technology and the result is highly satisfactory, with a very good yield, he said at the time. This is an important operational milestone for TSM and our customers demonstrating TSM's strong manufacturing capability and execution, end quote. The latest yield advancement is notable for TSM because it has historically kept the most advanced and efficient plants in its home island of Taiwan. Its Arizona site got off to a rocky start as the company couldn't find enough skilled staff to install advanced equipment and workers struggled with safety and management issues. TSM reached an accord with construction labor unions late last year. The chipmaker originally planned to have its first Arizona plant start full production

in 2024, but pushed back the target to 2025 over the labor issues. It later delayed the start date for its second fab to 2027 or 2028 from an initial target of 26. That fueled concerns that the company might not be able to make chips in the U.S. as efficiently as in Taiwan. TSM could now be keen to expand its U.S. presence further, depending in part on the possibility of more government backing. Cassidy added, citing early conversations in Washington about a second chips act. There is room for at least six total fabs at the Phoenix Complex, end quote. I guess there was a good reason for going to Arizona after all. That state has at least enough highly skilled workers, apparently. Blue Sky says it now has more than 13 million users, has raised

a $15 million Series A led by blockchain capital, and plans a subscription for features like higher quality video uploads, quoting TechCrunch. Within the last month alone, Blue Sky has added around 3 million new users bringing its total user base to about 13 million. Blue Sky was initially incubated inside Twitter as former CEO Jack Dorsey's vision for what the future of social media should look like, but the social network and developer of the open source AT protocol is no longer affiliated with Dorsey, who left the startups board earlier this year. Still, many of the initial goals for Blue Sky remain consistent. Like Mastodon, Blue Sky's AT protocol is decentralized, meaning that individual people will be able to set up their own social servers and apps,

and people outside of the company, have transparency into how and what is. being developed. With this fundraise, we will continue supporting and growing Blue Sky's community, investing in trust and safety, and supporting the atmosphere developer ecosystem. Blue Sky's blog announcement reads, in addition, we will begin developing a subscription model for features like higher quality video uploads or profile customizations like colors and avatar frames. The Blue Sky team has been quick to tell users that this paid tier will not be like X, where subscribers get exclusive blue checkmarks and algorithmic upranking, making their posts more visible. The way Twitter did subscriptions was basically a blueprint for how Blue Sky shouldn't do them.

Blue Sky developer Paul Frazy posted. Pay-to-win features like getting visibility or having a blue check because you're a subscriber is just wrong and ruins the network for everyone, end quote. The series A round is led by blockchain capital with participation from alumni ventures, True Ventures, 7X, Dark Modes, Amir Shavat, and Kubernetes co-creator Joe Betta, the presence of a crypto-focused firm, Might Alarm Skeptics, especially since CEO Jay Graber used to be a software engineer for a crypto company Zcash, but Blue Sky has proactively assured users that the company is not pivoting to Web 3, end quote.

Time for the weekend long read suggestions. First up, given this week's bombshell news, I wanted to share this deep dive from the Financial Times, looking at the dispute between Arm and Qualcomm, whose relationship soured after Qualcomm became one of the main opponents to Nvidia's attempted Arm acquisition, apparently. quote, investors and the tech world have been mystified and more than a little concerned about why the two appear as far apart as ever. Barring a last-minute settlement, the dispute is heading for the unpredictability of a jury trial in December. The anxiety became more acute this week as Arm turned the legal screws on its rival, hammering both company's stocks. The fight revolves around Qualcomm's quest to supercharge its move beyond the smartphone market with its 2021 acquisition of Nuvia, a chip startup. Nuvia had designed its own cores or the building blocks for processors based on arms technology. Qualcomm gave up making its own cores nearly a decade ago, and instead, like most in the industry, buys cores that are designed by Arm itself. So the Nuvia deal introduced an element of competition to the relationship. Qualcomm

would still rely on Arm's underlying chip architecture, but over time would become less dependent on arms cores. In its legal complaint, Arm has claimed that Qualcomm has no rights to use the Nuvia technology without arms permission, an apparent attempt to force Qualcomm to the bargaining table, extract higher royalties. The twist this week came as Qualcomm unveiled its first well-received smartphone chip based on Nubia's technology, as well as its use of the technology in cars. Arms response a day later was stunning in its severity. It issued official notice that it plans to cancel a key license to Qualcomm in 60 days' time cutting off that company's ability to ship chips based on anything other than Arm design cores. The cancellation would not affect many

current Qualcomm products, but the company has clearly staked its future on Nuvia's technology and its rollout of a new generation of products is already well underway. And if Qualcomm cannot ship chips, many device makers that use its products would grind to a halt. Perversely, perhaps, the stock market's immediate reaction was to punish Arm more than Qualcomm, wiping 9% off its stock price after its license cancellation threat, compared with the 3% drop for its rival. True, Arm depended on Qualcomm for 10% of its revenue last year, meaning its own business could be dented if it follows through with its threat. but for Qualcomm, the immediate risk of losing its so-called architectural license from Arm,

and seeing its technology roadmap blocked, looks far more extreme. The drastic legal threat appeared to stir deeper anxieties that this dispute may not be headed for a smooth resolution and a return to business as usual. Besides the budding competition between the two, the relationships soured after Qualcomm became one of the main opponents to Nvidia's attempted acquisition of Arm, which was eventually blocked by regulators. The legal escalation seemed to Stoke White. concerns, Arm, which receives only tiny royalties for each device that ships with its technology, has been bent on increasing how much it gets paid. The sight of it leveling such a legal weapon

against a key customer is hardly likely to make others feel secure. There has also been uncertainty about how Arms business model will evolve as it looks to become a more important supplier to its customers. Qualcomm's move away from buying Arms Cores, highlights Arms Heavy Reliance on a handful of big customers, end quote. And finally, from the journal, a look at the fight over valuable social media accounts when couples divorce. Apparently, 44% of the 27 million paid content creators in the U.S. say social media is their full-time job. So the idea of who gets the TikTok account is very much like who gets the house or a share of the pension. Quote, once divorce specialists tally up how much money the accounts are raking in, the couple can divide them or one partner can take more and buy the other out.

But there's one elusive factor in a digital assets value, the account's potential to keep making money. Both partners have to make a case for their role in that potential. How many pranks did they think of? How many hours did they spend editing videos? There's typically one person in the relationship who is passionate about social media who's driving the business, says Cameron Ajarri, who runs a talent management group with his wife representing some of TikTok's most followed couples. It's not always clear who that person is by the time divorce rolls around. Social media success often evolves quickly and couples may not be prepared to track finances or labor. Reza and Pugia Khan say everything they've done to amass about 5 million followers on shared channels

has been a team effort. They started posting about their wedding in 2020 and within months Puja was able to quit her office job. Now they estimate social media brings in about half a million dollars a year. Almost all of that goes into a joint bank account. It was a little overwhelming to see their incomes jump so fast, far above what their parents made, said Reza 28 and Pugia They hired a financial advisor earlier this year, but the idea of dividing their empire has never crossed Pooge's mind. This is the first time we're actually thinking about it, she says. If I really went public with a hypothetical split, that could create its own momentum. The way influencers rebuild their brands after breaking up can make or break their careers.

If the person got popular by posting memes or makeup tutorials, they probably won't take much of a financial hit from a divorce. But there could be more damage if a lot of the videos feature family time. One could take it over and they just rebrand, which is risky, said Nina Sheehan Despate, a divorce attorney in Los Angeles who has worked with influencers. When you're looking at the valuation, you would have to consider that, end quote. No weekend bonus episode for you this weekend, but I will leave you with this gem. Did you know the singer Neil Young and the actress Daryl Hannah have been married for years? I certainly did not. Discovering that yesterday led me down a Google rabbit hole that ended up with this quote from,

from Neil Young, ostensibly about why his relationship with Hannah works. There is a swear word coming up in case kids are listening, but if they're of a certain age, they will probably appreciate it even more than you. Quote, love is like a fart. If you have to force it, it's probably shit. Share that with your significant other this weekend. Talk to you on Monday.