Tech Brew Ride Home - Tue. 03/14 – Meta Has Now Cut 1/4th Of Its Workforce

Episode Date: March 14, 2023

Those expected layoffs have come to Meta. AI tools come to Google Workspace and an API for Google’s PaLM language model. Seems like things have generally worked out with this Silicon Valley Bank aftermath. Microsoft laid off its AI risk team. Layoffs at Y Combinator. And a look at the standard that’s trying to keep over the air broadcast television relevant. Sponsors: Notion.com/ride Links: Meta to cut another 10,000 jobs and cancel ‘low priority projects’ (TechCrunch) Google announces AI features in Gmail, Docs, and more to rival Microsoft (The Verge) Google opens up its AI language model PaLM to challenge OpenAI and GPT-3 (The Verge) FDIC Planning Another Silicon Valley Bank Auction (WSJ) Venture capitalists weigh Silicon Valley Bank salvage operation (FT) Microsoft just laid off one of its responsible AI teams (Platformer) Y Combinator to End Late-Stage Startup Fund, Lays Off Staff (The Information) The future of TV is up in the air (The Verge) 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 TechMeme right home for Tuesday, March 14th, 2023. I'm Brian McCullough today. Those extra expected layoffs have come to meta. AI tools come to Google Workspace and an API for Google's Palm Language model. Seems like things have generally worked out with the Silicon Valley Bank aftermath.

Microsoft laid off its AI Risk Team, layoffs at White Combinator as well, and a look at the standard that's trying to keep over-the-air broadcast television relevant. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. Those additional layoffs from META have arrived in a morning post Mark Zuckerberg said meta plans to cut another 10,000 jobs and withdraw around 5,000 open rolls it is not yet filled and cancel some more projects. This comes just four months after cutting 11,000 jobs, quoting TechCrunch. Combined, this means that META has effectively laid off or plans to lay off roughly one quarter of its workforce since the tail end of last year. Facebook's parent firm said it expects the latest restructuring efforts to start in April and the process

to impact business groups in May. Zuckerberg said that the company will also cancel lower priority projects, adding that it, quote, underestimated the indirect costs associated with these initiatives. This will be tough and there's no way around that, Zuckerberg wrote in a memo to staff that was subsequently published to the public. It will mean saying goodbye to talented and passionate colleagues who have been part of our success. They've dedicated themselves to our mission, and I'm personally grateful for all their efforts, end quote. Zuckerberg added that after the restructuring efforts are complete, the company will lift its hiring freeze across its various groups, end quote.

Google has announced AI-powered features are coming to docs, Gmail sheets, slides, and other workspace apps, helping users generate texts, summarize topics, and create images using generative AI, quoting the verge. The features include new ways to generate, summarize, and brainstorm texts with AI in Google Doc. similar to how many people use OpenAI chat GPT. Also, the option to generate full emails in Gmail based on users' brief bullet points, and the ability to produce AI imagery, audio, and video to illustrate presentations in slides, similar to features in both Microsoft Designer, powered by OpenAIs Dali and Canva, powered by stable diffusion.

Only the first of these, AI writing tools and docs in Gmail, will be made available to a group of U.S.-based trusted testers this month. This is also how Google announced availability for chat GPT rival Bard. Google says these and other features will then be made available to the public later in the year, but didn't specify when. Of all the new features, the AI writing and brainstorming tools in docs and Gmail seem the most potentially useful. In a sample demo, a user is shown the prompt, Help Me Write, and then enters a request. Jobposts for a regional sales rep. The AI system then completes the job spec for them in seconds, letting them edit and refine the text, end quote.

Not only that, devs listen to this. Google has launched an API for its Palm language model, as well as a new app called MakerSuite, to help developers train Palm. Quoting the Verge. Palm is a large language model or LLM similar to the GPT series created by OpenAI or met as Lama family of models. Google first announced Palm in April 2022. Like other LLMs, Palm is a flexible system that can potentially carry out all sorts of text generation and editing tasks. You could train Palm to be a conversational chatbot like chat GPT, for example, or you could use it for tasks like summarizing text or even writing code. It's similar to features Google also announced today for its workspace apps like Google Docs and Gmail. In order to make it easier for developers to train Palm to carry out specific tasks, Google is launching a new app alongside the Palm API called MakerSuite. With MakerSuite,

you'll be able to iterate on prompts, augment your dataset with synthetic data, and easily tuned custom models, said the company in a press release. Google says this sort of fine-tuning, which is necessary to create a consumer-friendly AI system, can even be done in a browser with the computationally intensive work of training and deployment handled by Google Cloud. In addition to launching the Palm API, Google is also expanding support for generative AI in its vertex AI platform, which is designed to help businesses train and deploy machine learning models. It says Vertex will have access to more models built by Google Research and its AI subsidiary Deep Mind, and will also be able to tap into open source and third-party systems in the future.

And finally, Google is also launching a new platform called Generative AI App Builder. The company says this platform, quote, allows developers to quickly ship new experiences, including bots, chat interfaces, custom search engines, digital assistance, and more. developers have API access to Google's foundation models and can use out-of-the-box templates to jumpstart the creation of Gen Apps in just hours or minutes, end quote. Well, it seems like we have a calm after the storm now. I can confirm that all of the startups I'm personally aware of who suffered the weekend of worry because their money was in Silicon Valley Bank. They all seem to be able to access their funds right now. One of the questions about what happened to resolve all of this is that the feds stepped into, backstop deposits without any white night being named to buy up Silicon Valley Bank's assets. And so it's interesting that sources are telling the Wall Street Journal that the FDIC is planning

another Silicon Valley Bank auction after failing to find a suitor back on March 12th. At least one offer had been made, which was rejected. Quote, by declaring the firm systemic, regulators have more flexibility to cover all depositors at the failed bank, including those with deposits above a typical $250,000 insurance cap. The move also gives regulators the ability to offer would-be buyers deal sweeteners, such as loss-sharing agreements, according to former regulators. While none of the largest U.S. banks bid on Silicon Valley Bank during a failed auction on Sunday, at least one offer was made by another institution, but it was declined by the FDIC officials told lawmakers on Monday. The timetable for the second auction was unclear, end quote.

Since I'm a personal customer of Silicon Valley Bank, I got an email in my inbox overnight from SVB's new CEO Tim Mayopoulos, saying, Silicon Valley Bank, N.A. The new FDIC-run Bridge Bank with deposits protected by the FDIC is, quote, open and conducting business as usual, end quote. And also it seems like some folks want to see if they can resurrect Silicon Valley Bank entirely. This is from the Financial Times, quote, since late last week, a group of more than a dozen VC firms have been in talks about how to enable Silicon Valley Bank to continue lending to, investing in, and advising companies and executives in the sector. Firms involved in the talks include General Catalyst, Andresen Horowitz, and Kostla Ventures,

the people said. One of the proposals being discussed is forming a consortium with private investment firm Apollo Global Management that could bid for portions of SVB. They added. The efforts to salvage something from the wreckage of SVB, which was shut down by regulators last week, underscores the importance of the institution to venture capitalists. It also marks a striking turnaround for venture funds that were accused last week of fueling the run on the bank, after some, including Peter Teal's Founders Fund, advised their portfolio companies to move deposits to other lenders amid concerns about SVB's financial health. Founders Fund is not a member of the consortium in talks to acquire some of the bank's assets, said one person with direct knowledge of the talks. Before

pressing ahead with any bid, the group is asking regulators for more information on the state of the bank. According to one of the people, the VC firms would likely require outside capital, as well as expertise in the technical aspects of running financial institutions that they lack. One person said any bid would be structured via a consortium to avoid any of the individual businesses falling under banking regulatory rules, end quote. This is certainly interesting. Sources are telling Platformer that Microsoft laid off one of its AI teams that was tasked with assessing the risks associated with integrating AI tech into its products.

This came as part of that recent round of layoff. that affected 10,000 folks at Microsoft, but the timing is eyebrow-raising since, as we've seen, they and everybody else have gone full-bore into integrating AI into so many of their products. The move leaves Microsoft without a dedicated team to ensure its AI principles are closely tied to product design at a time when the company is leading the charge to make AI tools available to the mainstream, current and former employees said. Microsoft still maintains an active office of responsible AI, which is tasked with creating rules and principles to govern the company's AI initiatives. The company says its overall investment

in responsibility work is increasing despite the recent layoffs. Quote, Microsoft is committed to developing AI products and experiences safely and responsibly, and does so by investing in people processes and partnerships that prioritize this, the company said in a statement. Over the past six years, we have increased the number of people across our product teams and within the Office of Responsible AI, who, along with all of us at Microsoft, are accountable for ensuring we put our AI principles into practice. We appreciate the trailblazing work the ethics and society team did to help us on our ongoing responsible AI journey, end quote. But employees said the ethics and society team played a critical role in ensuring that the company's responsible AI principles are actually reflected in the

design of the products that ship. People would look at the principles coming out of the office of responsible AI and say, I don't know how this applies, one former employee says. Our job was to show them and to create rules in areas where there were none, end quote. layoffs have come even for Y Combinator. Y Combinator says it will not raise another continuity fund, which backed late-stage startups, and the two partners who led the fund planned to leave the company, quoting the information, and 17 YC employees lost their jobs as a result of the decision. A spokesperson told the information after the story was published.

The Mountain View, California-based company employed 105 people before the cuts. Late-stage investing turned out to be so different from early. early stage that we found it to be a distraction from our core mission. So we're going to decrease the amount of late-stage investing we do. Y Combinators, Gary Tan said in a statement to the information, why Combinator's decision to end its growth practice could be a sign of the increasing difficulty that lays ahead for venture-backed startups. Most VC firms have already pulled back significantly from writing larger checks. Why Combinator launched its first late-stage or continuity fund in 2015. At the time, then-Y Combinator President Sam Altman said the vehicle,

would allow it to buy larger follow-on stakes in the most promising graduates from its accelerator, which invests small sums and hundreds of startups in exchange for a 7% stake. A spokesperson for Y Combinator declined to share how much capital had been raised to date for YC funds and how much had been invested in portfolio companies. In 2017, Axios reported that YC was targeting $1 billion for its second continuity fund. Before that, it raised $700 million for its debut continuity fund. The decision follows a year of changes at YC, in August, YC slashed the size of its accelerator batch by about half compared to its winter 2022 program, which had 414 companies, the information reported. Then in January, Tan, who was a partner

at YC from 2010 to 2015, rejoined YC as president and CEO, end quote. Finally today, I learned about ATSC 3.0, a TV broadcast standard, still not available in many major markets since its 2017 launch, but which is something traditional broadcasters are hoping will give them a lifeline to relevancy. Quoting the Verge. Antenna television is back. In recent years, millions of cord cutters have rediscovered antennas as a way to watch broadcast networks like ABC, NBC, and Fox all for free. And now broadcasters are eager to get the rest of us hooked as well. They've been marching ahead with the deployment of ATSC 3.0, a next-generation broadcast format that supports 4K, HDR, Dolby Atmos, Audio, and even interactive apps over the air, no cable or streaming subscription

required. A little over a year ago, one of the country's biggest broadcasters made an unexpected acquisition to help bolster the transition. The EW Scripps Company, which operates dozens of ABC, NBC and Fox stations, as well as a handful of nationwide broadcast networks, quietly bought Nuvio, a Canadian startup best known for its Tableau DVR devices for cord cutters. The acquisition, which hasn't been previously reported, is part of Scripps' multivorpe's billion-dollar bet on acquiring stations, networks, and spectrum for an ATSC 3.0-powered antenna TV future. But the transition to ATSC 3.0 has been anything but smooth. Five years after its launch, the format is still not available in many major markets. Support from TV makers has been limited,

and some of the promised features likely won't be available for years to come. Meanwhile, free-streaming TV channels are growing by leaps and bounds and are quickly becoming a viable alternative to both cable and antenna TV. As it stands, the future of broadcast TV is looking remarkably fuzzy. ATSC3 is to broadcast television what 5G was to mobile a few years ago, a mixture of buzzwords and real innovation, something that's definitely coming, but no one really quite knows yet what its true impact will be. And on paper, there's a lot to like about it. The standard allows broadcasters to transmit TV signals with up to 4K HDR and better audio. ATSC3 also includes data transmission features for better program guides, interactive apps, and eventually

advertising services. The first test of ATSC3 began a decade ago. The FCC gave the full go-ahead for the new standard in 2017, and local broadcasters have gradually been adding ATSC feeds ever since. In early 2023, broadcasters were utilizing ATSC3 in around 50 local markets, including Los Angeles, Portland, and Washington, D.C. By the end of the year, 75% of U.S. households will have access to ATSC3, according to Perl TV, a broadcaster group that's promoting the standard under the NextGen TV moniker. Consumer adoption is another story, however. Most people aren't currently able to watch over-the-air broadcast in ATSC, even if they live in a market where it has been rolling out. While any existing antenna can receive ATSC 3.0 signals,

the same isn't true for TVs. ATSC3 is not backwards compatible with ATSC-1, the current broadcast standard, and most existing TVs can only receive ATSC-1 signals. Manufacturers like Samsung and LG began equipping some of their higher-end TV sets with ATSC-3.0 Tuners in recent years, and Sony is even building a tuner for the new format into every new TV sold in the United States. However, adding ATSC-3 compatibility raises the component cost of a TV, which is why many makers of budget-price TV sets have so far been shunning the new format. The current Vizio TVs on the market do not include ATSC3, tuners, a Vizio spokesperson told us after CES in January. TCL, known for its low-price Roku TVs, also remains on the sidelines.

We will not incorporate ATSC3 in the first half of 2023, as consumer demand for the functionality is still low, a spokesperson told us. There are other reasons consumer adoption is lagging. Many viewers who happen to have a compatible TV and live in a market where ATSC3 is available, quickly find that the broadcasts aren't all they're cracked up to be. ATSC3 may in theory support 4K HDR, but at this point, 4K broadcasts are virtually non-existent in the United States. One reason for this is that the FCC decided against a hard transition to ATSC3 that would have left everyone without a compatible device in the dark. We have to both offer our current services, ATSC1, while also offering the 3.0 signal, explained Alex Siciliano, a spokesperson for the National Association of Broadcast.

The FCC currently mandates that stations transitioning to ATSC3, keep their legacy signals up and running for at least five years, but it could extend that timeline. But while some have been busy pouring billions into broadcast networks and infrastructure, another way to watch linear television has emerged free ad-supported streaming channels. Turn on any smart TV these days, and you'll find programming guides with hundreds of TV channels featuring familiar names like AMC, NBC, and Fox with no need to pay for cable or hook up an antenna. These free, linear channels have been a big hit with audiences and advertisers. Samsung alone claims to stream more than 3 billion hours of free linear programming to its smart TVs per year, and advertisers are expected to spend more than $4 billion on domestic linear streaming services this year, add revenue that directly benefits TV makers, unlike those costly ATSC 3.0 tuners. Today, many media companies still use these so-called fast channels as a way to make some extra money with older shows. AMC, for instance, doesn't stream its cable channel to smart T-Tuners. viewers, in part because it has exclusive deals with cable TV services. Instead, it has dedicated

fast channels for back-to-back The Walking Dead and Portlandia reruns, end quote. People have been yelling at me on Twitter about me saying nothing for you today. Talk to you tomorrow, every day. So I guess it's back to the song lyrics. The plan keeps coming up again, and the plan means nothing stays the same. But the plan won't accomplish anything if it's not implemented. Talk to you tomorrow.