?Tech Readings of the Week #17

Hello there???

Welcome back to the 17th issue of?#TRW, the newsletter that brings you awesome tech updates to make your weekends even more exciting. ??

It appears that the Italian Government has finally taken a bold step to supercharge the local tech industry...

...by proposing the Colosseum as the venue for the "match of the century" between Musk and Zuckerberg! ????

Probably it's not entirely true, but in any case, where can tickets be purchased?

In the meantime, enjoy the readings and have a fantastic weekend! ??

???What's going on in AI:

• AI is killing the old web, and the new web struggles to be born -?generative AI models are changing the economy of the web, making it cheaper to generate lower-quality content. We’re just beginning to see the effects of these changes (The Verge)
• ‘It’s not like science fiction any more’: Nasa aiming to make spaceships talk - researcher Dr Larissa Suzuki tells how Nasa is developing a ChatGPT-style interface (The Guardian)
• An Interview with Marc Andreessen about AI - and how you change the World (Stratechery)
• Biotech begins human trials of drug designed by artificial intelligence - Insilico Medicine says the trial of lung disease therapy is a milestone for generative AI in drug development (Financial Times)(€)
• Humans may be more likely to believe disinformation generated by AI - the way AI models structure text may have something to do with it, according to the study authors (MIT Technology Review)(€)
• Stanford: Most large AI systems don’t meet proposed EU requirements - compliance with Europe’s draft AI Act may prove challenging for creators of large language models (Twch Brew)
• AI and The Burden of Knowledge - a story of superior intelligence and possible obsolescence (The Generalist)
• From IBM to Databricks, It’s been a big week for tech M&A - sometimes, no one is buying. Other times, everyone is spending big (Crunchbase)

???Tech & Science:

• The dawn of spatial?computing - a close look at the breakthroughs in mixed reality tech (Every)
• Lasers enable internet backbone via satellite, may soon eliminate need for deep-sea cables - optical data communications lasers can transmit several tens of terabits per second, despite a huge amount of disruptive air turbulence (Tech Explore)
• Brain implants could be the next computer mouse - what the world’s fastest brain-typist is telling us about the future of computer interfaces (MIT Technology Review)
• Linda Yaccarino’s vision for Twitter 2.0 emerges - staff should be ready for "hand-to-hand combat" as the company preps new ad offerings (ARS Technica)
• Oculus founder explains what Apple got right & wrong on Vision Pro - it's mostly right "for Apple" (RoadToVR)
• Google says it will start blocking Canadian news stories in response to new law - in response to a new law that would compel tech companies to pay publishers for content (NPR)
• New Moon rover gives It the old college try - the United States' first robotic lunar rover was built by Carnegie Mellon students (IEEE Spectrum)
• The one-shot drug that keeps on dosing - What if a single shot lasted for months? (ARS Technica)
• Scientists are gene-editing flies to fight crop damage - the spotted-wing drosophila is a threat to fruit growers across the US and Europe (Wired)(€)

????VCs, startups & money:

• Silicon Valley braces for the worst as funding dries up - painful adjustment looms for start-ups as they burn down cash reserves (Financial Times)(€)
• These are the sectors where hot seed-stage startups are clustering In 2023 - the clustering effect is clear in this year’s vintage of seed-funded startups. A handful of categories accounted for an outsized number of investments. (Crunchbase)
• 1,600 workers set to lose their jobs as Getir prepares to exit Spain - the news comes just a week after Getir announced it was exiting France (Sifted)(€)
• From AI to SVB and everything in between - a quick look back at the first half of 2023 (Crunchbase)

???Reports & Data:

• How tough Is the fundraising environment actually? - it's chilly out there, but private market fundraising hasn't frozen over (Pitchbook)
• YC top companies List by revenue - a startup is designed to grow fast, and the best metric to gauge that growth is revenue. After all, you make what you measure (Y Combinator)
• 2023 US Venture Capital Outlook: H1 Follow-Up - S&P and NASDAQ are in the green, median pre-money valuations for seeds are going steady, and micro investors are buoying the pre-seed market. But a flurry of startups is headed for liquidity limbo (Pitchbook)

???Resources for founders and investors:

• Risky Business: venture scale vs. venture risk - while only an infinitesimal number of venture-backed companies achieve venture scale, 100% of venture-backed companies take on venture risk (Bryce Roberts)
• The VC jobs hierarchy - you can’t work in the startup world without knowing what a VC firm is, but do you know exactly what each person within that firm does? (Sifted)(€)
• Navigating the high cost of AI compute - as a predominant factor driving the industry today is simply the cost of training and inference (a16z)
• OpenAI PPUs: How OpenAI's unique equity compensation works - a look at one of the hottest and most secretive AI companies today (Levels.fyi)
• What LPs want to see from first-time VC fund pitch decks - just like startups VCs need a deck to pitch to LPs — but what do they need to include? (Sifted)(€)

???Meme of the week (actually not a meme):

Great job, you made it to the end! High five???

I hope you enjoyed this week's newsletter and found something that inspired you.

But why keep all the knowledge to yourself? Share it with your friends and colleagues with the button below?????

If you have any suggestions or want me to feature something (such as your startup) in the next issue,?drop me a DM???

See you next week!

Edoardo