Drew Breunig
@dbreunig.bsky.social
Anybody know what's going on in Arkansas?
January 1, 2026 at 12:25 AM
Anybody know what's going on in Arkansas?
The final 2025 issue of my newsletter just went out.
This was my first year maintaining one; it seemed to go pretty well! buttondown.com/dbreunig/arc...
This was my first year maintaining one; it seemed to go pretty well! buttondown.com/dbreunig/arc...
December Wrap Up
Hi all, In 2024, we said scaling laws will solve everything. All we needed was more data, more processors, and everything would be fine. That wasn’t quite...
buttondown.com
December 30, 2025 at 10:40 PM
The final 2025 issue of my newsletter just went out.
This was my first year maintaining one; it seemed to go pretty well! buttondown.com/dbreunig/arc...
This was my first year maintaining one; it seemed to go pretty well! buttondown.com/dbreunig/arc...
The most useful book I read this year was "The Railway Journey," by Wolfgang Schivelbush, which explores how the arrival of the railroad shaped culture.
It helped me contextualize the impact of AI better than anything else. Strongly recommended. amzn.to/4jlb5sS
It helped me contextualize the impact of AI better than anything else. Strongly recommended. amzn.to/4jlb5sS
Railway Journey: The Industrialization of Time and Space in the Nineteenth Century
The impact of constant technological change upon our perception of the world is so pervasive as to have become a commonplace of modern society. But this was not always the case; as Wolfgang Schivelbus...
amzn.to
December 30, 2025 at 5:53 PM
The most useful book I read this year was "The Railway Journey," by Wolfgang Schivelbush, which explores how the arrival of the railroad shaped culture.
It helped me contextualize the impact of AI better than anything else. Strongly recommended. amzn.to/4jlb5sS
It helped me contextualize the impact of AI better than anything else. Strongly recommended. amzn.to/4jlb5sS
Looking back on 2025: jagged intelligence becomes a fault line.
It's been an incredible year for AI, shaped by the success of synthetic data and coding applications. The challenge is to now building trust through reliability. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/29/2...
It's been an incredible year for AI, shaped by the success of synthetic data and coding applications. The challenge is to now building trust through reliability. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/29/2...
2025 in Review: Jagged Intelligence Becomes a Fault Line
Looking back on 2025, the incredible pace of AI is stunning. But fast growth brings disconnects.
www.dbreunig.com
December 30, 2025 at 12:43 AM
Looking back on 2025: jagged intelligence becomes a fault line.
It's been an incredible year for AI, shaped by the success of synthetic data and coding applications. The challenge is to now building trust through reliability. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/29/2...
It's been an incredible year for AI, shaped by the success of synthetic data and coding applications. The challenge is to now building trust through reliability. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/29/2...
Every month or so, I wonder why no politician picked up and ran with this story. www.newsweek.com/kroger-execu...
Kroger executive admits company gouged prices above inflation
Kroger's senior director for pricing Andy Groff said the grocery giant had raised prices for eggs and milk beyond inflation levels.
www.newsweek.com
December 28, 2025 at 9:10 PM
Every month or so, I wonder why no politician picked up and ran with this story. www.newsweek.com/kroger-execu...
Why I write (and you should too!) www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/27/w...
Why I Write (And You Should Too!)
Publicly writing is one of the most valuable things you can do. It improves your thinking, ability to communicate, and connects you to interesting people.
www.dbreunig.com
December 27, 2025 at 7:13 PM
Why I write (and you should too!) www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/27/w...
Can someone at @popsci.com let us know how much traffic they get sent thanks to Apple continually linking to this article in Weather?
December 25, 2025 at 4:02 AM
Can someone at @popsci.com let us know how much traffic they get sent thanks to Apple continually linking to this article in Weather?
One big applied AI story in 2025 is the rise of inference endpoints that call models equipped with web search, access to files, and code execution. The share of “naked” model calls dropped. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/19/h...
How Model Use Has Changed in 2025
We aren’t just asking for text completion or chat, a good chunk of us are now hitting a single endpoint that can execute code, use a computer, manipulate files, and search the web.
www.dbreunig.com
December 20, 2025 at 5:13 PM
One big applied AI story in 2025 is the rise of inference endpoints that call models equipped with web search, access to files, and code execution. The share of “naked” model calls dropped. www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/19/h...
Jose was 20 years ahead of his time. (This feels like something @ernie.tedium.co would have written about) www.latimes.com/archives/la-...
December 18, 2025 at 12:42 AM
Jose was 20 years ahead of his time. (This feels like something @ernie.tedium.co would have written about) www.latimes.com/archives/la-...
Reposted by Drew Breunig
They fine-tuned an LLM specifically only by feeding it out-of-date bird names, and it started talking like it lived in the 19th century
December 13, 2025 at 7:36 PM
They fine-tuned an LLM specifically only by feeding it out-of-date bird names, and it started talking like it lived in the 19th century
One of the best blogging mechanisms ever was selecting text from a webpage and clicking the Tumblr bookmarklet.
December 9, 2025 at 1:00 AM
One of the best blogging mechanisms ever was selecting text from a webpage and clicking the Tumblr bookmarklet.
Reports about AI usage ended up telling a consistent story: www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/06/t...
Enterprise Agents Have a Reliability Problem
Every enterprise AI report tells the same story once you look past the headlines: chatbot adoption is booming, internal pilots are failing. Reliability is the barrier holding agents back.
www.dbreunig.com
December 7, 2025 at 4:31 AM
Reports about AI usage ended up telling a consistent story: www.dbreunig.com/2025/12/06/t...
This week’s Money Stuff podcast ends suspiciously abruptly, with an edit cutting off a heavy
@matt-levine.bsky.social
sigh while discussing Goldman paying $2B for Innovator Capital.
@matt-levine.bsky.social
sigh while discussing Goldman paying $2B for Innovator Capital.
December 6, 2025 at 4:53 PM
This week’s Money Stuff podcast ends suspiciously abruptly, with an edit cutting off a heavy
@matt-levine.bsky.social
sigh while discussing Goldman paying $2B for Innovator Capital.
@matt-levine.bsky.social
sigh while discussing Goldman paying $2B for Innovator Capital.
Regarding the Claude “Soul Document”: I wonder if training models on documents like these influences our perception of these models as sentient.
In many ways, LLMs are playback machines, which we talk to as human. It reminds me of facilitated communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facilit...
In many ways, LLMs are playback machines, which we talk to as human. It reminds me of facilitated communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facilit...
Facilitated communication - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
December 3, 2025 at 4:39 AM
Regarding the Claude “Soul Document”: I wonder if training models on documents like these influences our perception of these models as sentient.
In many ways, LLMs are playback machines, which we talk to as human. It reminds me of facilitated communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facilit...
In many ways, LLMs are playback machines, which we talk to as human. It reminds me of facilitated communication. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facilit...
It's worth reading both Nuzzi's & Lizza's recent writing, not because of its subjects, but because it effectively conveys the invisible, essential work of great editors.
As someone who is _not_ a professional writer, but writes in public a lot, it is incredibly validating to see these ROUGH drafts.
As someone who is _not_ a professional writer, but writes in public a lot, it is incredibly validating to see these ROUGH drafts.
November 26, 2025 at 10:45 PM
It's worth reading both Nuzzi's & Lizza's recent writing, not because of its subjects, but because it effectively conveys the invisible, essential work of great editors.
As someone who is _not_ a professional writer, but writes in public a lot, it is incredibly validating to see these ROUGH drafts.
As someone who is _not_ a professional writer, but writes in public a lot, it is incredibly validating to see these ROUGH drafts.
Here's a fun OSM task you can do: add the location of Flock cameras. One mapper in our neighborhood has been on a roll: www.openstreetmap.org/node/1333152...
November 25, 2025 at 7:47 PM
Here's a fun OSM task you can do: add the location of Flock cameras. One mapper in our neighborhood has been on a roll: www.openstreetmap.org/node/1333152...
I gave a talk about Overture's GERS (an open, free, maintained ID system for geo data) at CARTO's Spatial Data Science Conference.
It's so much easier to demonstrate the benefits of GERS now that there's a community growing up around it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8YZ...
It's so much easier to demonstrate the benefits of GERS now that there's a community growing up around it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8YZ...
Reducing the Data Onboarding Tax with GERS | Drew Breunig | Overture Maps
YouTube video by CARTO
www.youtube.com
November 9, 2025 at 6:20 PM
I gave a talk about Overture's GERS (an open, free, maintained ID system for geo data) at CARTO's Spatial Data Science Conference.
It's so much easier to demonstrate the benefits of GERS now that there's a community growing up around it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8YZ...
It's so much easier to demonstrate the benefits of GERS now that there's a community growing up around it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8YZ...
Fantastic example of using Overture Maps' GERS identifier, from Carto and @mike.teczno.com carto.com/blog/gersify...
GERSifying Overture Places: A Seamless Path to Richer Insights
Discover how the GERSification of Overture Maps Foundation data can help you connect open and premium data to speed up analysis and smarter spatial decisions.
carto.com
October 16, 2025 at 4:36 PM
Fantastic example of using Overture Maps' GERS identifier, from Carto and @mike.teczno.com carto.com/blog/gersify...
This probably the wrong person to let your video generator run wild with, and perhaps the likeness best equipped to take legal action. www.theguardian.com/film/2015/ma...
October 7, 2025 at 12:14 AM
This probably the wrong person to let your video generator run wild with, and perhaps the likeness best equipped to take legal action. www.theguardian.com/film/2015/ma...
Reposted by Drew Breunig
% of US men under 30 who say legal sports betting is a *bad thing* for society
22% in 2022
47% in 2025
No other demographic group has seen a bigger increase.
22% in 2022
47% in 2025
No other demographic group has seen a bigger increase.
Americans increasingly see legal sports betting as a bad thing for society and sports
Today, 43% of U.S. adults say the fact that sports betting is now legal in much of the country is a bad thing for society, up from 34% in 2022.
www.pewresearch.org
October 2, 2025 at 4:19 PM
% of US men under 30 who say legal sports betting is a *bad thing* for society
22% in 2022
47% in 2025
No other demographic group has seen a bigger increase.
22% in 2022
47% in 2025
No other demographic group has seen a bigger increase.
@bransonreese.bsky.social A friend of mine is a high school teacher and he recently sent me this text: "Just got shamed by a student for saying 'the Deftones' instead of 'Deftones'. I will never recover."
October 1, 2025 at 3:30 PM
@bransonreese.bsky.social A friend of mine is a high school teacher and he recently sent me this text: "Just got shamed by a student for saying 'the Deftones' instead of 'Deftones'. I will never recover."
Reposted by Drew Breunig
Mark your calendars!
In this #podcast, @jed.co and @dbreunig.bsky.social will use Drew's blog post – "Why LLM advancements have slowed: The low-hanging fruit has been eaten – as a starting point for their conversation. Read the post here:
www.dbreunig.com/2024/12/05/w...
In this #podcast, @jed.co and @dbreunig.bsky.social will use Drew's blog post – "Why LLM advancements have slowed: The low-hanging fruit has been eaten – as a starting point for their conversation. Read the post here:
www.dbreunig.com/2024/12/05/w...
September 22, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Mark your calendars!
In this #podcast, @jed.co and @dbreunig.bsky.social will use Drew's blog post – "Why LLM advancements have slowed: The low-hanging fruit has been eaten – as a starting point for their conversation. Read the post here:
www.dbreunig.com/2024/12/05/w...
In this #podcast, @jed.co and @dbreunig.bsky.social will use Drew's blog post – "Why LLM advancements have slowed: The low-hanging fruit has been eaten – as a starting point for their conversation. Read the post here:
www.dbreunig.com/2024/12/05/w...