Here were a few of our favorites from Stratechery Plus this week.
- Microsoft and OpenAI are Growing Apart. It wasn’t that long ago that the partnership between OpenAI and Microsoft was nothing short of the biggest story in tech. Since then, there has been board drama, passive aggressive comments about models as commodities, and this week, even more passive aggressive comments (aggressive aggressive?) about AI hypemen and which CEO is willing to put $80 billion behind said hype. If you’re trying to understand how all this went awry, Ben’s update on Tuesday is a great place to start. It ran before Satya Nadella’s comments this week, and in addition to retracing the evidence of increasingly strained relations, Ben explains that Microsoft and OpenAI now have misaligned goals and expectations. We discussed all this further on Sharp Tech this week, with the key takeaway being that ultimately, even as the tensions appear to be getting personal, the directions both companies have chosen are rational. — Andrew Sharp
- A Conversation about the State of AI. Ben’s AI interview series with Daniel Gross and Nat Friedman began about seven weeks before ChatGPT launched. They’ve talked six times since then, and each conversation is information dense, fascinating, and occasionally overwhelming as the pace of AI progress continues to barrel ahead on an exponential curve. This week’s conversation covered the announcement of Stargate, the arrival of DeepSeek, robotics, censorship in models, and lots more. I’m biased, but between exploring the underlying tech, the productizing of said tech, and the social implications of all of this, these are some of the best conversations about AI you’ll find anywhere in the world. — AS
- Stratechery Welcomes Asianometry. I discovered Jon Yu and Asianometry through my time at Stratechery, and I’ve enjoyed his deep dives into everything from ASML to Intel History to AT&T’s 20th century monopoly. His work is the best kind of internet content: it will make you smarter without feeling like homework, and answer questions about the world you didn’t realize you had. HIs YouTube channel, Asianometry, is now available to Stratechery subscribers as a podcast, with full transcripts. if you haven’t explored his work, there’s a massive back catalog to start working through over here. As a bonus: I loved hearing more about Jon’s backstory and workflow. As an intro to Asianometry and what Jon does, I recommend starting with Ben’s interview on Monday. — AS
Stratechery Articles and Updates
- Stargate, The End of Microsoft and OpenAI — OpenAI’s Stargate announcement and revised deal with Microsoft mark the end of the relevant portion of their partnership.
- DeepSeek-R1, DeepSeek Implications — DeepSeek, a Chinese company, has a reasoning model similar to o1, except that it is actually open.
Dithering with Ben Thompson and Daring Fireball’s John Gruber
Sharp China with Andrew Sharp and Sinocism’s Bill Bishop
- TikTok and Musk and Xiaohongshu; Xi’s Speech To Top Leaders; New PLA Capabilities for Taiwan; Proposed AI Controls and Continued Hacking Concerns
- Bonus Episode: A TikTok Verdict and Lots of Questions on Substack Live
Greatest of All Talk with Andrew Sharp and WaPo’s Ben Golliver
- A Midseason Awards Banquet: MVP Picks, The Wemby Era, Amen Goes Electric, Cade’s Revival, and Lots More
- The Clippers and the Take of the Year, The Warriors Continue Careening to Nowhere, Do Trade Rumors Still Matter?
Sharp Tech with Andrew Sharp and Ben Thompson
- A Long Weekend for TikTok, Preparing for Trump and an Era of Upheaval, LeBron James as an iPhone
- The End of OpenAI and Microsoft, Risks and Rationale of the Stargate Project, DeepSeek-R1 and Bitter Lessons for the Future