Saturday 25th May, 2024 - Simulation Theory and Virtual Worlds (Issue #165)
Virtual worlds, simulation theory, open source developer funding tools, compute as currency, bitcoin mining AI training hybrid facilities, AI pessimism, freedom, Etherium ETF and music website webdev
Another season 2 instalment…
Sorry this issue is a bit late, world was proper war pathing all day today, unreal amount of blocking of basically everything in every dimension. C’est la vie sometimes.
This is one of those weeks that was so crazy it felt like the newsletter would be a bit haphazard. But having just done the selection and written all the show descriptions, I’m struck with how much actual cool awesomeness there has been. It’s like some sort of gastro buffet of wonderful brain food. Really amazing shows from around the tech sphere and beyond this week. I bet you will all find something to get into.
The big theme this week is all about the far out-there topics of simulation theory, virtual worlds and how they are intersecting with our societies. But there’s a bunch of stuff about interesting web development, open source, freedom tech, AI futurism and the modern monetary system. It’s a phenomenally varied edition this week.
I did a bit of coding on my static site generator, though since I’ve run out of build minutes this month, no way to test it yet. It’s another cool feature that will hopefully speed up build times significantly. I’m calling it ‘incremental progressive rendering’, and it’s a mode you can enable where the generator only renders the output file if the target doesn’t exist or has a last modified date older than the source template. The idea being that if you have a content cache, something you can easily add in for example Github actions, then you’ll only render out new content added compared to the last time you built the site. If it works, I’m expecting my website with 19000 output files will only have to render a handful of files on each run, which hopefully should result in very fast build times.
I will probably run into some unexpected things, but I think it’s likely possible, and will help with the running out of build minutes thing that keeps happening. Of course getting the feature working will itself use up a lot of build minutes, but there’s not much I can do about that. The plan is to first get the interleaved everything page fixed, debugged and working, then move on to the build system optimisations.
I wrote several blog posts this week, but since I’ve run out of build minutes I’m not able to publish to the website. Still I’ll list the titles here to wet your appetite, perhaps some of you will swing by again at the end of the month when they all get published:
Energy drinks
Kevin Rose on metabolism and first tier bio-markers
Documenting code while blogging
Bitcoin is great for learning about money
I've got AI fatigue
AI futurism still interesting
Who pays for the high frequency blockchains?
Twitter app offline actually pretty good
Development strategy ideas
The one I’m most happy about was the development strategy ideas. Writing this post has really helped me put all my development work into focus with a clear direction. That’s something I desperately needed given all the recent turbulence / never ending nightmares in my actual life at the minute. Hey if my plans are in any way aligned with things in your life then get in touch.
That’s enough about me and my stuff, things could be better, but I’m just going to keep putting one foot on front of the other regardless how utterly hopeless it seems at times.
I hope you all find the strength you need for whatever projects you are all working on :)
Podcasts
Autonomous Worlds | Lattice’s Justin Gilbert (Bankless Podcast) - I’m not really into gaming, but this turned out to be a very interesting episode. It’s all about using blockchains as a backend for games. There are some very strange, unexpected things you can do with games and blockchains. The infrastructure sort of becomes part of the game. It gave me a very different way to think about blockchains. I think also that in a world with pervasive AI tech, some of the ideas explored by the autonomous worlds folks could be interesting avenues to explore. Kind of out there, but worth a listen even if you aren’t a gamer. https://www.bankless.com/premium-the-evolution-of-autonomous-worlds-lattices-justin-glibert
Building the Patreon For Developers Ep#591 (Changelog Interviews Podcast) - Great interview with a developer that has been on an interesting journey. Patreon focussed on developers, with close integrations into Github, is definitely an interesting angle on a somewhat old idea. Lots of good stories on the business side as well as some in depth technical aspects too. This episode caused me to reflect on my developer journey and my strategy going forward. I even wrote a blog post about it, which I’ll publish next week when my monthly build minutes reset. Great listen. https://changelog.com/podcast/591
Rizwan Virk Ep#2151 (Joe Rogan Experience Podcast) - This episode was fucking great. Some really far out there stuff including the simulation hypothesis, video games, VR, rendering, computer optimisations, consciousnesses virtual universes, multiverses, science, quantum mechanics and computing, astrophysics, exponential growth, pan-religion comparisons, mystical traditions, shamonic traditions, past lives, metaphors, similarities, memories, simulation re-runs, UAPs and entities and lots more. Really good compliment to the Autonomous World’s Bankless episode. Just writing this description is making me want to listen to it again. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9qb2Vyb2dhbmV4cC5saWJzeW4uY29tL3Jzcw/episode/ZjFjZTBjOTQtMTMyYy0xMWVmLTk5YmYtZTNmNzg5MWFiYjIx?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahcKEwi4387czqiGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQAQ
Bitcoin & AI Power Scarcity with Daniel Roberts (What Bitcoin Did Podcast) - Great interview with a bloke that runs a very successful bitcoin mining facility in Australia. It gets quite technical on the business side of things, but it’s a really important aspect of bitcoin that we don’t hear much about. It’s the place we’re the rubber meets the road, the dynamics of the lowest layers of the bitcoin stack, and how they interact with the real world, how such projects are financially possible, and how miners are diversifying their compute offering by making their facilities into a bitcoin - AI training hybrid. https://www.whatbitcoindid.com/podcast/bitcoin-ai-power-scarcity
Strum Machine with Luke Abbott Ep#616 (Shop Talk Show Podcast) - The guys talk to a bloke who had built a website focussed on improving people’s music abilities. There’s some very interesting tech that uses the web audio API to create synthetic music that you can play along to in a way that makes it feel like you are part of an ensemble of musicians. Both Chris and Dave are guitar players so this was a fun listen, with both web development and music intersecting in interesting ways. https://shoptalkshow.com/616
Exploring Polkadot’s Potential with Gavin Woods (Raoul Pal: The Journey Man Podcast) - Gavin Wood had been in crypto since the early days, he has some good stories, and is working on interesting tech. What stood out to me in this episode was his very broad view of the space, and especially their discussion about 2/3 way through about AI. Gavin’s got some pretty enlightening ways of looking at the AI space which is clearly influence by the many lessons learnt building out bitcoin and crypto tech. It’s a little dystopian in places, but he raises good points, and is ultimately a realist optimist, which I think is a very developer way to think about these things. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vcmVhbHZpc2lvbmNyeXB0b3BvZGNhc3Q/episode/NzgyNzU5ZWEtMTZiNS0xMWVmLWI0ZTYtYmJhYzM0ZGM1MzY5?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahgKEwiIw_jCz6iGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQtgE
So what is Sam Altman’s ‘universal basic compute’ anyway? (Politico Tech Podcast) - Sam had been thinking about the long term implications of the AI tech he’s been building with OpenAI for a long time now. Even the incorporation documents of the company have some very strange parts that mention that if artificial general intelligence (AGI) becomes a reality, then the very nature of money might change, and it very well could be an extremely rocky road for our societies. He makes the case that perhaps we should start thinking about ways to ensure we don’t regress into authoritarian regimes with extreme inequality. Perhaps compute itself will become a new currency, and maybe we need to ensure that we all have access to it. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zaW1wbGVjYXN0LmNvbS95MnJxWWJwNA/episode/MWE3Yzg2OGItODQ4ZS00ZDY5LWFhMzktMWY4ZTM5ZjllZWEz?sa=X&ved=0CAYQkfYCahgKEwiIw_jCz6iGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQvgY
Freedom Money: Der Gigi - Europe (Citadel Dispatch Podcast) - Great discussion with Gigi about freedom and what it means, about the differences we see across the world, freedom of speech, privacy, the panopticon, freedom to protest, state surveillance, bitcoin tech and education. Lots of food for thought about the world we live in. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9zZXJ2ZS5wb2Rob21lLmZtL3Jzcy9jOTBlNjA5YS1kZjFlLTU5NmEtYmQ1ZS01N2JjYzhhYWQ2Y2M/episode/M2JhOTEzZDctYmYwMS00ZjY1LWE3ZjctOWZiZTg5OGM0YzI4?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahgKEwiIw_jCz6iGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQrAs
Trump Should Have Used BTCPay Ep#306 (Rabbit Hole Recap Podcast) - I’ve been listening to RHR now for several weeks. They do a fantastic job of going through the main current topics being discussed in the world of bitcoin. Each topic is based on articles that are all listed in the show notes. I thought this episode was particularly interesting one, great selection of topics, lots of interesting angles discussed, gets a bit technical in places but not too much. Worth having on your weekly listening schedule. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy85MWI4ZmJjOC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw/episode/ZDQ2ZjlmNWItNDQ0NC00YzFhLWI3NTItYzg4Zjg3ODI1ZmIx?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahgKEwiIw_jCz6iGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQ5Aw
Monetary Base Update Q1 2024 with Matthew Mažinskis Ep#506 (TFTC Podcast) - This one is proper money system nerd stuff, but I always find it super interesting. Matthew always does an excellent job of going through the data to see what major dynamics have been happening with the money system. I also like his US expat view from eastern Europe. I frequently learn interesting things about the Baltic region where he lives. https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3RhbGVzZnJvbXRoZWNyeXB0LmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz/episode/N2JlZmYyNTAtMGQ5YS00N2JkLTg4YjMtZTdjZmEzY2FjNTQ5?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahgKEwiIw_jCz6iGAxUAAAAAHQAAAAAQqQ8
ETH ETF Officially Approved! | James Seyffart (Bankless Podcast) - Last minute addition, this was released yesterday evening right after the approval. It’s very big news for the crypto industries, and clarifies that Etherium is a commodity rather than a security. https://www.bankless.com/eth-etf-officially-approved-james-seyffart
That’s all from me…
Best reguards,
Mark
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