Ben Peirce
@bpeirce.me
Building data and advertising products at Roku | Ex EIR at SamsungNext | misc startups | Harvard PhD in robotics
The move to the cloud meant that infra costs started to change daily rather than quarterly. The same will happen to dev costs with the adoption of coding agents.
March 24, 2025 at 4:18 PM
The move to the cloud meant that infra costs started to change daily rather than quarterly. The same will happen to dev costs with the adoption of coding agents.
A corollary to Arthur C. Clarke’s notion that advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic is that technological breakthroughs go through a “magic” phase until users develop mental models (accurate or not) of what’s going on under the hood. LLMs are currently in this phase.
March 22, 2025 at 8:05 PM
A corollary to Arthur C. Clarke’s notion that advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic is that technological breakthroughs go through a “magic” phase until users develop mental models (accurate or not) of what’s going on under the hood. LLMs are currently in this phase.
AI anxiety has two main flavors: What are we going to do? and What am I going to do?
February 7, 2025 at 3:33 PM
AI anxiety has two main flavors: What are we going to do? and What am I going to do?
Last night my 4-year-old asked me to teach him sign language. He didn’t specify ASL, so I taught him “too legit to quit.”
February 4, 2025 at 5:15 PM
Last night my 4-year-old asked me to teach him sign language. He didn’t specify ASL, so I taught him “too legit to quit.”
The amount of coding LLMs can do is impressive, but so is the amount of drudgery developers treated as the norm. There was a lot of low-lying fruit in dev workflows that has been waiting to be automated for years.
February 3, 2025 at 11:00 PM
The amount of coding LLMs can do is impressive, but so is the amount of drudgery developers treated as the norm. There was a lot of low-lying fruit in dev workflows that has been waiting to be automated for years.
When did working out of a Starbucks go from badass to broke-ass?
January 11, 2025 at 1:50 AM
When did working out of a Starbucks go from badass to broke-ass?
Watched Polar Express, aka Uncanny Valley Snowpiercer, with the family yesterday. The animation hasn’t aged well, but at least the story is embellished and tonally unbalanced.
January 1, 2025 at 5:15 PM
Watched Polar Express, aka Uncanny Valley Snowpiercer, with the family yesterday. The animation hasn’t aged well, but at least the story is embellished and tonally unbalanced.
If future generations watch action movies where villains have only robot goons, will they look back on the human cannon fodder of, say, James Bond films as barbaric?
December 31, 2024 at 7:23 PM
If future generations watch action movies where villains have only robot goons, will they look back on the human cannon fodder of, say, James Bond films as barbaric?
Thomas Edison kind of looks like if Kevin Costner and Simon Le Bon had a mid baby.
December 28, 2024 at 7:16 AM
Thomas Edison kind of looks like if Kevin Costner and Simon Le Bon had a mid baby.
Just watched The Christmas Chrinicles with the family, aka Captain Ron with a white beard.
December 25, 2024 at 4:01 AM
Just watched The Christmas Chrinicles with the family, aka Captain Ron with a white beard.
When you call a hamburger with cheese a cheeseburger, you’re committing a category error.
December 16, 2024 at 3:29 AM
When you call a hamburger with cheese a cheeseburger, you’re committing a category error.
Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) is such an antiquated term.
December 12, 2024 at 7:40 AM
Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) is such an antiquated term.
Whitehead said that “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.”
He was talking about math, but the same could be said of software systems, most recently LLMs. Black boxes are a blessing and a curse.
He was talking about math, but the same could be said of software systems, most recently LLMs. Black boxes are a blessing and a curse.
December 10, 2024 at 5:15 PM
Whitehead said that “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.”
He was talking about math, but the same could be said of software systems, most recently LLMs. Black boxes are a blessing and a curse.
He was talking about math, but the same could be said of software systems, most recently LLMs. Black boxes are a blessing and a curse.
The children’s books I read to my kids seem to fall into two broad categories: Those that are a pleasure to reread, and those that become more grating each time. Few lie between these two extremes.
December 9, 2024 at 5:15 PM
The children’s books I read to my kids seem to fall into two broad categories: Those that are a pleasure to reread, and those that become more grating each time. Few lie between these two extremes.
Every advance in artificial intelligence motivates clearer thinking about what we mean by “intelligence.”
December 8, 2024 at 9:27 PM
Every advance in artificial intelligence motivates clearer thinking about what we mean by “intelligence.”
A failure of systems thinking in Idiocracy: Stop watering crops with Brawndo to improve crop yield, which causes Brawndo’s stock to crash, which adds economic crisis to food shortage.
December 8, 2024 at 7:37 AM
A failure of systems thinking in Idiocracy: Stop watering crops with Brawndo to improve crop yield, which causes Brawndo’s stock to crash, which adds economic crisis to food shortage.
“A bad system will beat a good person every time.”
– W. Edwards Deming
– W. Edwards Deming
December 7, 2024 at 1:50 AM
“A bad system will beat a good person every time.”
– W. Edwards Deming
– W. Edwards Deming
In Running Man (1987), the scene where Jesse Ventura's character is digitally inserted into the broadcast to appear as if he defeated Arnold was the least believable when I first watched it. Now, it seems obvious.
December 2, 2024 at 5:15 PM
In Running Man (1987), the scene where Jesse Ventura's character is digitally inserted into the broadcast to appear as if he defeated Arnold was the least believable when I first watched it. Now, it seems obvious.
I hear a lot about using ML and AI in DevOps for pattern recognition and anomaly detection, but very little about the complex dynamics of taking the human out of the loop for operational tasks. Like autoscalers with black box controllers.
December 1, 2024 at 10:31 PM
I hear a lot about using ML and AI in DevOps for pattern recognition and anomaly detection, but very little about the complex dynamics of taking the human out of the loop for operational tasks. Like autoscalers with black box controllers.
One of my favorite exchanges from Joe Versus the Volcano:
November 30, 2024 at 10:00 PM
One of my favorite exchanges from Joe Versus the Volcano:
My daughter asked to see John Wicked yesterday. Sounds like too much gunplay for a 6-year-old.
November 30, 2024 at 1:32 AM
My daughter asked to see John Wicked yesterday. Sounds like too much gunplay for a 6-year-old.