2026-05-14 22:31:46
While I understand the attempt at an AI-first computer, there are a few strange things about the 'Googlebook' starting with the name on down. Of course, that could just be because much of it is TBD at the moment, perhaps related to Google IO kicking off next week. Still...
M.G. Siegler
Inklings is a newsletter featuring links and commentary from M.G. Siegler on timely topics found around the web.
🛍️ Amazon.com Adds Alexa – I never fully understood why Amazon created a separate brand/product for augmenting their core shopping experience with AI. I guess (and guessed) it was to be able to experiment with 'Rufus' while at the same time, the earlier versions of Alexa may not have been up to ruff snuff – especially if you're going to be putting it in front of millions of people instantly. With Alexa+ now ready and rolling (out), it's seemingly time see if Amazon's AI can be used to buy the big boy pants. And presuming it works (Rufus has gotten much better over time in my own usage), this could help Alexa itself, giving Amazon an advantage in the all-important AI commerce – and eventually agentic commerce, space. [Verge]
🎥 AI as a Filmmaking Tool – You can put Peter Jackson in the James Cameron camp with AI. That is, rather than freaking out about it, simply viewing it as yet another tool to leverage (or not) when it comes to making movies. It is interesting how the camps at least somewhat seem to be dividing between filmmakers who favor special effects versus those who favor practical effects... I'm not saying AI is simply the new CGI, but well, Jackson is with: "It's no different from any other special effect." He goes on to note that he's not talking about AI in general, and that he's obviously in favor of IP and identity rights. But again, it's just the common sense: if you can leverage something to better fulfill your vision as a filmmaker, why wouldn't you do that? Because people aren't as involved as they are in say, stop-motion filmmaking? What is the cut off line we're drawing here, and why? To save jobs? Jobs have been going away in Hollywood for years, long before AI came around. There will be new jobs to leverage the new tools, just as is always the case. Also, if and when fully AI-generated movies come, I suspect once the novelty wears off, very few people will want to watch them. And the human-created ones (perhaps augmented by some AI tools) will rise in value. [THR]
📉 Is Microsoft Now Undervalued? – The company has just sunk below $3T in market cap. They're $2.6T behind NVIDIA and Amazon is about to overtake them to push them into the 5th most valuable company in the world spot. About a year ago, I made the case that Google was severely undervalued relative to their parts. The company was at $2T back then – ahem – now they're at $4.8T. Microsoft's story is a bit different since their parts are a bit more downtrodden at the moment (Xbox, LinkedIn, etc). Still, it's hard to argue with their continued results, quite literally. And with that 25%+ stake in OpenAI. If they can actually figure out AI on their own, obviously the stock will bounce back. But Wall Street is clearly also skeptical of that at the moment and the massive CapEx spend. (They're also obviously skeptical of Apple and AI, but with next-to-no-spend, they're near an all-time high at $4.4T.) Are activists going to start circling like they did at the end of the Steve Ballmer era? No one is going to force Nadella out, but might they force some spin-outs? [Information 🔒]
M.G. Siegler
"OpenAI is Coke, Anthropic is Pepsi and Grok is RC Cola. I never really saw people drinking it."
– Ben Pouladian, an engineer and investor, on the notion that growth at Grok, xAI's chatbot, has stalled. While the racy stuff may have worked for a bit, I wonder what percentage of usage is directly tied to X, and even more specifically people asking it to fact-check tweets (something which Meta is on the verge of copying with Threads, as is their way).
While forcing banks currying favor ahead of an IPO to use it is certainly one strategy, that's not really scalable either (nor does that appear to really be working). So what gets Grok back into the race? Anything? Simply throwing money seemed to work at first, then didn't. Maybe tying it directly to Cursor if/when they complete that full deal?
Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:
• Who Is Winning Elon v. OpenAI?
• OpenAI's $7B Man With His Own AI Lab
2026-05-14 02:32:35
First, can we talk about the name? 'Googlebook'.
I really, really don't understand why you unveil a product that is clearly going to be marketed around its AI capabilities with a name that's associated with the historic web search capabilities. Yes, Google is an entire company that obviously now does far more than Search, but most would still associate the word with such functionality – it's the "Kleenex" of that industry! A verb! When I hear 'Googlebook' I don't think, "oh nice, a new AI product." I think, "is it some kind of new Search hardware?" Or worse, I immediately think of Google+ – this sounds like what we used to joke the name of Google's Facebook competitor would be!
Wait, isn't there also another product called Google Books? Yes, yes there is. Google, you have a major SEO problem here. Also, will the universe collapse upon itself if you access Google Books on Googlebooks?
It also, of course, sort of sounds like "Gobbledygook". I'll go ahead and use the definition that Gemini pulls up: "language that is nonsense, overly technical, or confusing." Sounds about right here. I do sort of like the paired 'o' parallels on either side of the name – some mild '007' vibes – but it's sort of a ridiculous mouthful of a name. Yes, 'Google' itself is famously nonsensical and fun, but pairing it with another 'oo' word conveys baby speak a bit too much?
Obviously they must have debated it, but again, given the AI element, I would have gone with 'Geminibook'. It's still a mouthful, and a bit bland. But they could have had some fun and styled it as 'GeminiBook' – evoking Apple's old 'iBook' branding.
Even more fun? 'aiBook'! But that may have actually drawn a lawsuit from Apple. Though I'm not sure how much they could have done there? But since they're partners in AI now, perhaps best not to poke that bear...
'Chromebook Gemini'? Sort of lame, but more straightforward? Follows the 'Chromebook Pixel' since-discontinued branding convention. Then again, the intention is to break away from just being about Chrome – and specifically ChromeOS – here, clearly.
That points to another oddity here. They apparently don't yet have a name for the OS these machines will be running? It's clearly the ChromeOS/Android hybrid that has long been rumored (and slightly leaked) as "AluminumOS", but I guess the branding team was exhausted after coming up with 'Googlebook'. Which is sort of funny because if I think of ChromeOS + Android, I might actually think 'GoogleOS' makes some sense there! It's famously Google's two OSes, combined!
Or how about this: 'gOS'? Again, Apple might be annoyed (though not as much as they would be about AiOS!), but it would allow Google to not only leverage the above but rope in Gemini too!
Maybe there is still hope for one of those. Maybe they're just saving it for the actual IO conference next week? We'll see!
Anyway, with 500-ish words about the branding out of the way, the device itself makes sense at the highest level. This is the AI PC that Microsoft tried to do with 'Copilot+ PCs' (I take back everything bad I said about your branding, Google), but done right. Well, maybe. But hopefully as it's Google, not Microsoft. The latter I thought also had some correct high-level ideas around trying to reconstitute Windows and PCs in general around AI, unfortunately, their execution has been... sub-par. Which is a nice way of saying "shit".
In fact, they've had a few "oh shit" moments with the big attempt to push the 'AI PC' movement. First there were some major security concerns (par for the course for Microsoft). Then there were some major gaming concerns (par for the course for Microsoft). Then there were some major OS bloat concerns (par for the course for Microsoft). Now they're slowly but surely pulling back Copilot from every possible surface (and Surface), having annoyed their users to death.
It just feels like Google can't possibly do worse? And that's not to mention the fact that Gemini, the AI products and models, are actually solid. How they'll productize them into a full laptop experience remains to be seen, but the technological capabilities will be there, clearly.
And one of the main new elements they're touting right now is "Magic Pointer" – basically bestowing AI magic upon the old standard mouse cursor. Others have tried to use the text cursor (or caret) to this end. It's a good idea, but hasn't really caught on. The mouse cursor is arguably more interesting because it's how you digitally point at something. It's risky because there are going to be some real UX concerns in messing with such a standard, only for one type of device/OS. But it's certainly worth trying if you're Google.
It's sort of taking the 'Circle to Search' idea from mobile and porting it over. But it goes further too, as some fun early demos showcase. Performance issues aside (as they're running remotely), it does feel like a natural way to say, manipulate an image. Just point at the an area with your cursor and say "put a bird on it".
And it should help bridge the gap between mobile and desktop as touch becomes more ubiquitous across all devices – even MacBooks at some point soon! This is just a more natural way of doing some things than using a text prompt, obviously.
As for Chromebooks. Google wants to make it clear that they're not going anywhere – touting 60%+ of the US education market – but they also clearly were never able to make them robust enough to challenge MacBooks, or the higher end Windows laptops. Again, they tried with the Pixel model, but ultimately Chromebooks found their place at the lower-end of the market, and environments like schools where most of what you need is in the web browser.
Oh yes, and the MacBook Neo is coming for that market. Hard.
For many other types of users, ChromeOS could just never quite cut it. I tried using a Chromebook Pixel as my main machine once – I lasted about a week. I don't know if the ability to also run Android apps helps with that since those apps are obviously going to be tailored for phones (and I guess some for tablets), but it probably can't hurt? Again, unless it adds more complexity from a UX perspective. Hard to say for sure right now, as the focus is pretty clearly on the hardware here.
And beyond the high-level notion of what the devices are, there are not many more details. This chat with Google VP John Maletis gets at some – notably, that there will apparently be chips from Intel and Qualcomm – so x86 and ARM-based chips? Queue the scary flashbacks to the early days of Microsoft Surface. Are we going to get a 'Googlebook RT'?
And while Dell, Lenovo, HP, ASUS, and Acer are all on board (which Microsoft can't love, obviously), Samsung, Google's key partner on Android itself, is nowhere to be found... Also not being discussed: will Google itself make Googlebooks? The "nothing to share" comments sound a lot like "yes". So yes, there will likely be 'Google Googlebooks' alongside 'Dell Googlebooks' and the like.
With that, we're right back where we started, in branding territory. 'Googlebook' is going to take some getting used to. Then again, it's not really a product for me. Or maybe it is. I'm intrigued by an AI-first laptop, of course. But I was also intrigued by a browser-first laptop back in the day. Ultimately, it just wasn't enough. Will Googlebook be? Way too many TBDs to know right now.
One more thing: I do like the notion of the 'Glowbar' being the unifying design element to showcase what is a Googlebook and what is not. The Chromebook Pixel had something similar, and it was nice. It obviously called back to the old glowing Apple logo that used to be ubiquitous across classrooms until Apple turned off the lights, quite literally. I'm guessing Google is hoping you'll start seeing those 'Glowbars' pop up, announcing themselves in a similar manner. Though it could be cool if they actually did something beyond glow? Perhaps indicating when Gemini is working? Though that takes my mind immediately to Cylons...
2026-05-13 19:03:30
There's something that has long annoyed me about the way Panos Panay answers questions. This dates to his Microsoft days and continues into his Amazon days. He often does this thing where he tries to turn the table on the questioner by acknowledging what they're getting at, trying to seem like he's being direct, but it's really just a form of misdirection. I'd find it decidedly less disingenuous to simply give an "I'm not going to answer that" – you know, the Apple way.
Anyway, this long FT interview seemingly almost lulls Panay into giving an actual answer. Not quite, but he seemingly reveals enough that's interesting. I speak, specifically, about "Transformer", the codename of Amazon's rumored new "phone" project. After Panay dances around the notion of new devices and form-factors that Amazon is thinking about and/or playing around with internally (which, as he notes, sometimes leads to "rumors"), Rafe Rosner-Uddin comes right at him:
What sort of device will you come forward with? Will it be a phone? And will people sacrifice their iPhone for an Amazon phone? Is that a surface area that you even want to play in given how competitive it is? Amazon’s Fire phone wasn’t a success and you tried to bring mobile back at Microsoft with the Surface Duo.
At first, Panay tries to pump the breaks with his verbal roundabouts, but then he sort of stumbles into perhaps revealing something by trying not to directly answer the question:
Here’s what I’d say: it’s just not the goal. I know there’s a lot of rumours out there.
I don’t think the phone form factor is going away anytime soon. I’ve said that publicly. I keep saying it. I always get asked, ‘so the phone’s gone, right?’ Absolutely not. The phone’s not going anywhere. However, I think the phone is going through some transformation, and will continue to do so over the next 10 years, for sure.
I think your black and white question is, are you going after a phone? A lot of people want me to say no, but a lot of people want me to say yes, I get it. Here’s my take: it’s not necessarily [that] we’re going after a phone, no.
There’s no clear path that makes sense. You just said it, there’s so many new form factors that are important that need to be focused on. It’s a tricky question. If I black and white say no, I would say that was accurate. But I also think it’s misleading.
There's a seemingly fairly easy way to read between those many lines: Amazon is not working on a device that looks exactly like the iPhone or the latest smartphones from Samsung or Google, but they are perhaps exploring devices that would essentially fill that role (and hole) in your life.
It's all a bit silly. Is the iPhone really a phone? I mean, technically yes, but that specific functionality is arguably the least interesting aspect of the device. It's really just a computer. For the past 15 years running, the most portable computer. As a result, this has made it the main hub of both our computing lives, but also arguably and increasingly our lives in general. That hub status is what Amazon – and everyone else – would clearly love to capture. Who cares if it's a phone?
As Panay notes, there's really no obvious inroad to disrupt the iPhone at the moment. As it turned out, there also wasn't back when Amazon shipped the Fire Phone or when Facebook went down the phone path as well. Microsoft too under Panay!
As he continues:
One of the most incredible parts of the culture here is the willingness to make a big bet when you need to. And the question is, when do you need to? Well, what’s the right thing for the customer over time? There’s always opportunity, but right now, no.
What I won’t ever do again is [go to the customer and say] here’s another phone. What do you think? There’s no point. We know what customers need right now.
That might suggest that Amazon will come at consumers first with a tangential device – or devices. Things that perhaps work with the current crop of phones. This makes sense and it's seemingly the same gameplan that OpenAI is exploring with their Jony Ive-led device – or devices. Meta as well because again, they don't have a phone, so what choice do they have? But all of these players, assuming they see some level of success with any sort of newfangled AI-first devices – far from a given, obviously – will almost necessarily want to break free from the chains of Apple (or Samsung, Google, etc).
That's undoubtedly why Panay doesn't want to full-on reject the notion. Amazon may indeed come out with something that may not look exactly like the iPhone, but will serve largely the same purpose. Again, a hub for your computing life.
Panay notes a few times in the interview that right now he views the home as such a hub. And that's obviously because that's where Amazon has a foothold thanks to millions of Alexa devices sold over the years. With many (but not all) of those now (finally) being upgraded to Alexa+, this is a potential strength for Amazon, certainly versus Apple, which has a far smaller footprint with the HomePod, and their latest attempts to enter the home have been delayed along with the revamped Siri.1
So can Amazon figure out a way to bridge the home to mobile? Maybe. And as Rosner-Uddin smartly follows up with, perhaps it's Amazon Leo, their newly rebranded but still not operational satellite internet project aimed to compete with Starlink. If Amazon can turn that effort into a true consumer-scale offering, the sky is quite literally the limit. That suddenly flips them from being beholden to Apple to Apple potentially being beholden to them – they already are, in a small way now thanks to Amazon's GlobalStar deal!
Anyway, yeah, sure, Amazon is not building a phone. But they're also not not building a phone. Because it may not be a phone as we've typically thought of a phone. But the phones we now have are long from being thought of typically as phones. They'll probably start with devices that work with existing computing hubs – i.e. the iPhone – but they'll eventually aim to create something that can become that hub itself. Perhaps connected via their own satellite service.
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
1 Just as Amazon had to delay Alexa+ before rebooting the efforts – something Panay talks a bit about, but is also clearly disingenuous about with "I don’t know if it was already really in flight." Come on... ↩
2026-05-12 20:55:31
My god, it's full of quotes. Between the testimony and all the discovery in the Elon Musk vs. OpenAI trial, as you might expect, there are a lot of juicy tidbits. But the direct quotes are truly impressive. So far, my favorite has to be Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, on the witness stand, giving his assessment of the OpenAI board when they decided to remove Sam Altman as CEO (aka "The Blip"): "It was amateur city as far as I’m concerned."
Not amateur hour, mind you.1 That would be just a brief moment in time. This was a whole metropolis of amateurs running amok. Mucking up Microsoft's investment.
To me, it's sort of a perfect encapsulation of the situation and it perhaps speaks to the broader one in Silicon Valley. Because these startups are now valued at billions, or tens of billions, or hundreds of billions – or even potentially trillions – there's an assumption from the outside looking in that these are well-oiled machines of industry being run by professionals that themselves are execution machines.
Yeah, no. That's not how it works. Anyone who has lived and/or worked in that world knows this all too well, but this trial is exposing such sausage to all.
It is, indeed, amateur city.
Not across the board, of course. Certainly the mature companies often do run like well-oiled machines that keep printing profits even if and when hiccups occur. Just look at all of Big Tech for examples of that. Apple flubs AI to start? No matter, the iPhone will just keep selling. Google too? All good, their myriad other businesses will quite literally buy them time. Amazon needs longer to get Alexa+ fully baked? You're going to keep shopping and businesses will keep using AWS. Meta quite literally can't buy a hit any longer? No matter, the ads will just keep being served. Even Microsoft itself keeps switching Copilots trying to find one to steer the AI business. But it doesn't matter to the actual top and bottom line. At least not so far.
But startups are a different beast, of course. They're most often going to be immature from both a company and leadership perspective. That's not necessarily a knock on the individuals – though sometimes it is! – it's just the nature of the business. Again, such imperfections can be masked by the massive valuations placed on the companies by investors. And in the Age of AI, such numbers not only can surpass those of actually mature companies, they oftendwarf them. This again leads to a natural assumption that they're more mature than they actually are.
The truth is that it's hard to grow up in a period of intense growth, as paradoxical as that may sound. Because everything is moving so fast and constantly evolving, it's unrealistic, if not impossible, for a company's roots to take hold. Anything that appears settled can be uprooted at any moment. Experience helps, and perhaps matters most when it comes to a company maturing faster. But clearly OpenAI was growing at such an unprecedented rate that immaturity ruled the day and the company.
That all came to a head in "The Blip". And it clearly wasn't just the OpenAI board, as Nadella is suggesting. As the texting, emails, testimony, and um, journal entries, make clear, everyone was operating on the fly. From Sam Altman to Greg Brockman to Ilya Sutskever to Mira Murati and seemingly everyone else on down – and up, to the board. (And yes, the whole non-profit element probably didn't help matters here!) Honestly, even the exchanges within Microsoft in the early days of their partnership with OpenAI betray a fairly humorous lack of understanding of what they were all dealing with – though yes, with at least a bit more corporate maturity!
And even Elon Musk, an entrepreneur with perhaps more experience than anyone when it comes to starting and running companies, was clearly bowled over by the immaturity of the operation. And yes, that included some of his own immaturity. Perhaps a lot.
In a way, this trial brings to mind my favorite part of Steve Jobs' famous 2005 Stanford commencement speech: "Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you."
Now, "smarter" is perhaps too loaded a term when it comes to AI given both the nature of the technology and the expertise required to build it. But as with all things in life, there are trade-offs.2 Jobs' point was simply that everything out there that you see and read about and perhaps admire is not built by infallible gods, but by people. Individuals full of flaws with hampers full of dirty laundry. And this trial highlights that.
People can be immature. People can be insecure. People can be jealous. People can be deceptive. People can be messy. People can be complicated. And it's people that start and run companies. At least until the AI gets good enough.
So yeah, OpenAI was "amateur city" – as are most startups. The difference is that most startups haven't historically been given billions upon billions of dollars with the assumption that such money would instantly make them more professional. It doesn't work that way. At least not at first. Such things take time, and mistakes, and headaches.3
In that way, it is Microsoft who may have actually misread the situation. And while it's hard to argue with the result of their investment – at least on paper – there are other results of that partnership that they've clearly grown less keen about and have moved to distance themselves from, professionally.
Let's end with another Nadella quote, this one from an internal note to his executive team in 2022 ahead of a fresh $10B investment into OpenAI – their last major one: "I don’t want to be IBM and OpenAI to be Microsoft."
Spoken like a mature company and leader operating in a professional city...
One more thing: the other thought that immediately popped into my head upon reading Nadella's quote was actually a song. Quite naturally, Guns N' Roses' 1987 "Paradise City". Did you know it was written while the band was together on a tour bus back from... the Bay Area? Fun lyrics too:
Rags and riches, or so they say, you gotta
Keep pushing for the fortune and fame
You know it's all a gamble when it's just a game
You treat it like a capital crime
Everybody's doing their time
1 Though yes, my best guess would be that Nadella slightly flubbed the common phrase – to the point where many stories misquoted him assuming he had said that version and not actually "amateur city" which both AI and a web search will tell you is best known as a "seminal lesbian mystery novel by Katherine V. Forrest" published in 1984. I'm going to assume that's not what Nadella was referring to... ↩
2 My own belief remains that "smarts" matters less than determination with startups. Which I know sounds like a "winning thing" to say, but I actually think it often goes quite dark. Those willing to be the most ruthless in business often win. You have to be okay with being ruthless, which many are not... But many are smart. That's not enough. ↩
3 It's honestly sort of surprising that the company not only hasn't come apart during the endless turmoil, but has thrived. Perhaps that just speaks to the opportunity here... ↩
2026-05-11 22:44:41
Wrapping up my trifecta of podcast appearances in the past week...
M.G. Siegler
Inklings is a newsletter featuring links and commentary from M.G. Siegler on timely topics found around the web.
💰 Microsoft's Defensive Early OpenAI Dealings – Leading up to Satya Nadella taking the stand this week at the Elon Musk vs. OpenAI trial, this is a fun read looking back to the time of the initial interactions between Microsoft and OpenAI (which is why they're roped into this trial). Notably, about 18 months before their first massive investment (there was just a cloud credit deal at that point), basically the entire executive team at Microsoft seemed super skeptical of OpenAI's prospects and was far more interested in ensuring they didn't "storm off to Amazon in a huff and shit-talk us and Azure on the way out," as CTO Kevin Scott put it in one email. Nadella kept seeking feedback about a deeper partnership and everyone either seemed to think they could do this all themselves (typical big company talk) or really just seemed worried it would be a boondoggle at best and money pit at worst – but again, noted the PR value of a partnership and at the very least, ensuring Amazon didn't get the same. Not exactly inspiring insight about the future of AI and more just cynical business dealings. To be fair, it was undoubtedly hard to see where AI would go from there, and certainly how fast it would evolve. And yes, the OpenAI deal did end up as a huge money pit – but ultimately one that has given Microsoft billions in returns, at least on paper... [Wired]
🤝 Apple & Intel Have a Deal... For Something – While the two sides reportedly have a "preliminary agreement" for Intel to manufacture some chips – as previously discussed – it's still not clear what those chips are and when they might be ready. Still, that hasn't slowed Intel's continued stock surge, as they're not only well past their all-time highs now, they're also a $630B company now, breaking into the Top 20 most valuable companies in the world, just ahead of ASML and catching up with bitter rival AMD, fast. The report gives a lot of credit to the Trump administration and the President in particular for making this happen with Tim Cook directly – which, of course, has hugely boosted the government's 10% stake in Intel. And NVIDIA's. And SoftBank's. Really, shouldn't Apple have one too? What a wild world we live in. A year ago, approaching a market cap of $100B from the wrong way, everyone was writing off Intel as dead. (Well, not everyone...) [WSJ 🔒]
📚 The Barnes & Noble Comeback – I've been tracking this for a while, mainly because I'm a big fan of James Daunt, both because of the small bookstores in London that bear his name, but also what he's done with Waterstones. Basically, he took a tired chain and made it more like his own stores. And now he has done the same again with B&N. To the point where Elliot is setting up the packaged companies to go public in London. Yes, bookstore chains owned by a hedge fund. It's clearly all Daunt and this piece delves into why: while the store personalization aspect is key, it's the behind-the-scenes logistics that makes the business now sing. Daunt's inventory management reads a lot like Tim Cook's at Apple – and I swear I'm not just saying that as the two look similar and are nearly the same age. By shrinking the stores and the number of books ordered, he's been able to compete with Amazon and get back to growth. By year-end, B&N should have 740 stores – more than they had in 2019, which is pretty incredible. [WSJ 🔒]
🤨 RIP "The Mouth of the South" – While the NYT obit of Ted Turner is a bit more robust at 4k words, it seems fitting to link to the CNN one, which has a smoother story arc. It's a wild one. From taking over his father's struggling billboard business (after he committed suicide) to becoming the largest land owner in the US (at the time of his death last week at age 87, he had fallen to fourth). As he himself noted, CNN was the ultimate crown jewel of his legacy as it completely changed media, ushering in the 24/7 news cycle, but there was so much else too. The Atlanta Braves (and putting them on the map by putting them on his networks around the country for all 162 games), TBS, TNT, TCM, the Cartoon Network, buying MGM, merging with Time Warner (then merging that with AOL – yikes), winning the America's Cup, donating $1B to the UN (which took a long time to pay due in part to the disastrous AOL merger dragging down his net worth), Captain Planet (!), Jane Fonda (which the CNN piece goes deeper on), etc. Highly controversial and problematic at points, but seemingly calmer as he aged. His dealing with debt and hugely risky business moves have echoes in our current times with people like Masa Son and even the Paramount/Warner Bros deal. But yeah, talk about right place/right time when the Gulf War broke out... [CNN]
"I hope that 80-times growth doesn’t continue because that’s just crazy and it’s too hard to handle. I’m hoping for some more normal numbers."
– Dario Amodei, speaking at Anthropic's developer conference about the recent growth they're seeing, and explaining why they needed to write the SpaceX deal (as well as a range of others), fast.
Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:
• Elon Musk's 'Colossus' Strategy
• OpenAI's Next Microsoft Fight
• Berkshire's Cash Pile
2026-05-09 22:04:39
This month's discussion between Alex Kantrowitz and I on his Big Technology Podcast was all about money. I mean, I think it always technically is on some level, but this one was all about CapEx, "The Clause", and Stargate.
Specifically, while overall Big Tech CapEx spend may be on the verge of hitting $1T combined soon, Apple... stays the same at their roughly $10B a quarter. And actually, they might be down a bit this year versus last. They are ramping R&D spend, but so are all their competitors. It's just such a binary bet that they don't need to fully control AI – at least right now.
And it could pay off in a few ways. If this plays out like Apple vs. Google Maps, where Apple had to rip off the band-aid and then try to catch up, as painful as it was for Maps, it seems like they might not be able to do that at all with AI. But if it's more like Google Search, obviously that has worked out extremely well for Apple – to the point where Google is paying them billions to use it. Meanwhile, Microsoft spent billions to try to compete and, well, Bing is not Google!
That's sort of another way of framing the notion that owning the iPhone (the distribution and eventually edge compute platform) may matter more than owning the models. The reality will undoubtedly be more nuanced, but it's an interesting, if insanely risky, bet by Apple when you just look at what their peers are doing.
Further, there is a way to look at this through an even simpler lens. Perhaps Apple realized they were behind but also realized that in order to try to catch up, they'd have to spend billions – likely hundreds of billions – and while xAI and Meta have done that, it hasn't really worked out for them. At least not yet. So maybe Apple, in a moment of corporate self-reflection, simply realized that wasn't a smart play. And perhaps they'll focus on the future of the industry with robots and what not. Again, we'll see!
They are clearly signaling they're about to start ramping spend on something. Might it be more CapEx spend, or might it be M&A? (Sadly, Anthropic may be a bridge too far now, but Disney?!) Could it be going deeper on chips with Johny Srouji, maybe even further down the AI path to eventually compete with NVIDIA in ways? Perhaps only John Ternus now knows...
WWDC in a month should be fun though!
Speaking of fun, "The Clause" is dead, long live some new clauses in an agreement between OpenAI and Microsoft. Is it as simple as the latter realizing that their massive ownership stake in the former will be far more valuable if they're actually able to get their models on all clouds? Perhaps. But that's obviously also somewhat risky for Microsoft given that those other clouds compete with them.
But perhaps those new clauses which give Microsoft first-look rights at OpenAI's newest tech is good enough. Are we entering a world with movie-like windowing for AI – "See it first in Azure, coming soon to AWS"?
At the very least, OpenAI and Microsoft get to avoid more lawsuits – with one another no less - just as the trial in which they're both defendants against Elon Musk kicks off...
Finally, the Stargate situation remains a sort of fascinating encapsulation of the AI data center strategy overall. Certainly for OpenAI, which keeps moving the goal posts ever since they announced it at the White House.
It was a great PR moment to announce something which... basically hasn't happened. At least not as it was laid out. And while OpenAI may be getting gaslight-y about this, clearly the strategy has shifted. Owning and controlling data centers may have sounded good – or even necessary, to combat Google – 18 months ago. But now it just sounds insanely expensive, slow, and risky. Better to offload all of that to partners. At least for now.
Perhaps if and when OpenAI is public, they can revisit. As presumably they'll have more avenues to raise the needed debt, versus relying on SoftBank, Oracle, and NVIDIA (before the latter just tried to quietly get out of doing that). Regardless, CFO Sarah Friar is probably happy not to have all of this on OpenAI's balance sheet right now...
At the same time, you could certainly argue that OpenAI spending like "drunken sailors" on data center deals over the past couple of years has given them a real advantage over Anthropic at the moment. And now we're seeing Anthropic have to take their shots and break out their pocketbook to spend under pressure. Money wins.