Danny In The Valley artwork

Danny In The Valley

417 episodes - English - Latest episode: 21 days ago - ★★★★★ - 165 ratings

After more than a decade in London, Danny Fortson returns to Silicon Valley to meet the techies trying to change the world - and make loads of money while doing it.

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Episodes

Orchid's Noor Siddiqui: "Super-babies"

April 05, 2024 02:00 - 56 minutes - 103 MB

The Sunday Times correspondent brings on Noor Siddiquui, founder of Orchid, to talk about screening embryos (5:00), starting the company (9:30), hiring people as a first time founder (13:00), targeting ageing at the very beginning (15:00), how it works (18:20), why she thinks this is the future of conception (22:00), the need for regulation (31:00), the potential to exacerbate societal problems (38:00), why longevity enthusiasts invested (40:30), and the potential conservative backlash (49:40...

Replika’s Eugenia Kuyda: “Your AI soulmate”

March 29, 2024 08:55 - 43 minutes - 80.4 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Eugenia Kyuda, founder of Replika, to talk about AI friends (4:00), growing up in Russia (6:45), her dad’s experience at Chernobyl (9:00), applying to Y Combinator (12:30), her first idea that didn’t work (16:30), losing her best friend (17:30), launching Replika (20:00), building a bot with pre-written answers (23:40), the key to good conversation (24:30), the bot before the ChatGPT moment (27:15), the changing AI landscape (29:20)...

Perplexity.ai’s Dmitry Shevelenko: “The battle for the front page of the Internet”

March 22, 2024 03:00 - 43 minutes - 78.9 MB

The Sunday Times; tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Dmitry Shevelenko of Perplexity.ai, to talk about finding the company though the Uber mafia (5:00), taking on Google (6:30), the founders' start as AI researchers (8:45), why he joined (11:35), what he did before this (17:00), closing his startup (20:15), hypergrowth lessons (24:40), the business model (28:00), the Gemini disaster (32:35), and doing it differently (36:00). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informati...

Eion's Ana Pavlovic Hans: “Rocks that clean up the planet”

March 15, 2024 09:27 - 44 minutes - 80.6 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Ana Pavlovic Hans to talk about using rocks to cut carbon (3:00), coming up with the best “recipe” (8:00), the measurement breakthrough (11:00), bringing the cost down (20:00), making rock weathering “sexy’ (25:45), being raised in mining country in America and Australia (27:00), the partnership with Stripe (37:40), raising $12 million (41:30), and critter stories from Australia (42:40). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for...

Andreessen Horowitz's Chris Dixon: "Back to the future of the Internet"

March 08, 2024 16:12 - 50 minutes - 92.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Chris Dixon, general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, to talk about writing a book on blockchain and crypto (4:00), why it’s still early (9:30), NFT’s (14:30), the computer versus the casino (18:30), boom and bust (23:00), his vision for a blockchain-based web (27:15), the rise of a new social media model (32:30), overcoming inertia (39:20), bitcoin v everything else (42:10), central bank digital currencies (44:00),  and the ethereum...

Pachama's Diego Saez Gil: "Building software to save nature"

March 01, 2024 03:00 - 38 minutes - 70.6 MB

The Sunday Times; tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Diego Saez GIl, founder of Pachama, to talk about carbon reduction (4:00), hist first startups (6:10), Pachama’s start (12:00), building tools to catalyse climate projects (16:00), how it works (19:10), net zero pledges (22:00), when his house burned down (24:50), the carbon market (27:40), raising $90 million (32:00), and his worst day (36:00). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Expensify's David Barrett: "Venture capital is a scam”

February 23, 2024 05:50 - 44 minutes - 81.8 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent brings on David Barrett, founder of Expensify, to talk about creating a “remote-first” company (3:15), the lounge (6:45), the return-to-office movement (14:15), going public and then getting its shares smashed (17:15), why venture capital is a scam (23:30), why he likes public market investors (30:25), keeping people happy when shares lose 95% of their value (33:35), and the artificial intelligence boom (35:25). PLUS: The link to our previous episode wi...

Climactic's Raj Kapoor: "We need 1,000 climate tech unicorns"

February 16, 2024 03:00 - 50 minutes - 91.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Raj Kapoor, co-founder of Climactic, to talk about growing up in Pennsylvania (3:10), his early days in Silicon Valley (8:00), making himself president of the Internet (club) (10:30), his first startup (16:30), Cleantech 1.0 (22:00), joining Lyft (25:00), self-driving cars (28:30), raising a first fund at Climactic (32:15), using software to cut emissions (37:00), and remaking the electric grid (45:00). Hosted on Acast. See acas...

The Hacking Games' Fergus Hay: "Most hackers are kids"

February 09, 2024 03:12 - 47 minutes - 86.7 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Fergus Hay, founder of The Hacking Games, to talk about why he started the company (5:00), the difference between the real and online worlds (9:30), why everyone gets caught (15:15), his plan for a documentary and television series (21:00), the Hollywood angle (25:45), making hacking sexy (30:30), the cybersecurity industry’s stance on hackers (35:05), how much of cybercrime is invisible (40:45), and reaching young people (44:10). ...

Investing in Us’ Dmitri Mehlhorn: “Tech and America’s $30bn election year”

February 02, 2024 03:00 - 48 minutes - 88.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Dmitri Mehlhorn to talk about Investing in Us (4:45), what it invests in (7:30), funneling cash into election groups (13:20), why America’s election will be decided by the finest of margins (16:50), how artificial intelligence fits with democracy (21:15), the dangers (26:05), Silicon Valley’s attitude to politics (32:50), what works when it comes to changing people’s minds (37:30), why age might not be Joe Biden’s biggest problem (4...

Longevity enthusiast Bryan Johnson

January 26, 2024 19:20 - 1 hour - 119 MB

A throwback conversation with Bryan Johnson, a billionaire techie turned longevity enthusiast who goes to extreme measures to "reverse" his age. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Khan Academy’s Sal Khan: “Building an AI tutor for every student”

January 19, 2024 11:12 - 45 minutes - 83.4 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Sal Khan, founder of Khan Academy, to talk about how he started tutoring family members (4:30), doing startups in the dotcom boom (5:50), starting to do videos in 2006 (10:15), building a business from his closet (14:15), linking up with openAI (16:30), building an AI tutor (19:40), dealing with hallucinations (22:30), moving from text to voice and video (25:55), the Covid effect (30:30), an education co-pilot (33:45), the relations...

Metaphysic’s Martin Adams: “Copyrighting humans”

January 12, 2024 18:24 - 46 minutes - 85.6 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Martin Adams of Metaphysic to talk about using artificial intelligence in entertainment (3:20), the Tom Cruise moment (5:50), how the technology is accelerating (9:20), what it means for Hollywood (13:10), scaling humans (17:35), how much data is needed (22:40), copyrighting people (25:20), the election (30:10), his early days running raves in London (34:35), growing up in Essex (37:40), going to Harvard law (38:45), and the first A...

Common Sense's Jim Steyer: "I'm more worried than ever for our democracy"

December 22, 2023 03:00 - 36 minutes - 67.3 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Jim Steyer, founder of Common Sense Media, the leading online advocacy group, to talk about 2024 as a pivotal year for democracy (4:20), whether Facebook is ready (8:30), Tiktok (10:10), AI-powered misinformation (12:30), why he’s more worried than ever for democracy (17:10), why he thinks regulation will come, but not from Washington (21:30), X under Musk (27:40), the low-hanging fruit (32:00), and the best and worst case for 2024 ...

Babson’s David Stein: “Succeeding where Theranos failed”

December 15, 2023 12:01 - 41 minutes - 75.8 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on David Stein, chief executive of Babson Diagnostics, to talk about the importance of blood testing (4:49), why Babson is not Theranos (6:47), trying to compete with that idea (9:26), why they succeeded where Theranos failed (14:34), using a tiny amount of blood (18:23), fighting against the Theranos effect (24:37), being owned by a company they aim to disrupt (26:28), liquid biopsies (28:02), the new age of biological data (32:23), r...

Apeiron’s Christian Angermayer: “AI, psychedelics and living for hundreds of years”

December 08, 2023 21:54 - 1 hour - 127 MB

The Sunday Times' tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Christian Angermayer, founder of Apeiron Investments, to talk about psychedelics in Oregon (4:15), the spiritual experience of a “trip” (11:30), progressing toward the first FDA approval (15:30), how this will be introduced into the market (21:10), why having a qualified guide/therapist is critical (25:30), gaining societal acceptance (30:20), why he funded the longevity XPrize (34:20), the new approach to ageing (41:00), why we are...

Founders Fund’s Keith Rabois: “The joy of missing out”

December 01, 2023 06:56 - 40 minutes - 74.3 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Keith Rabois of Founders Fund to talk about leaving San Francisco for Miami (4:00), why San Francisco is a “black hole” (7:00), why remote work is broken (11:00), staying on the AI sidelines (16:30), running Openstore (18:40), the Paypal story (26:50), hiring well (30:00), shrinking their fund (33:50), and why big venture capital funds won’t make money (38:20). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Stories of our times- Five days of chaos at ChatGPT HQ: The Sam Altman saga

November 24, 2023 03:00 - 33 minutes - 555 MB

A special episode for your from our daily podcast from The Times: Last week, Sam Altman the CEO of OpenAI - the makers of ChatGPT - was sacked by his board. After a dramatic few days, he is back at the company along with a new board. But is it really business as usual at OpenAI?    Guest: Danny Fortson, West Coast Correspondent, The Sunday Times.  Host: Manveen Rana.   Listen to the Stories of Our Times podcast - https://www.thetimes.co.uk/podcasts/stories-of-our-times  Hosted on Acas...

MosaicML's Naveen Rao: "Bio-inspired AI"

November 17, 2023 04:56 - 45 minutes - 82.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Naveen Rao, founder of MosaicML, to talk about the efficiency of the human brain (3:30), slashing the cost to train AI models (8:00), how this is like the evolution of the car (11:40), selling to Databricks (14:30), how the AI market will evolve (17:00), the fallacy of AI doomerism (21:00), growing up in eastern Kentucky (22:30), plunging into the dotcom boom (24:50), why he studied neuroscience (27:10), selling his previous startu...

Rewind AI’s Dan Siroker on honesty through AI eavesdropping

November 10, 2023 03:00 - 49 minutes - 91.5 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Dan Siroker, founder of Rewind AI, to talk about why he started the company (4:40), recording everything you do, see and read (7:10), living life on a “hot mic" (10:20), the pendant (12:45), bringing Black Mirror to life (17:00), AI as cognitive butler (23:45), growing up surrounded by tech in Palo Alto (28:00), working on the Obama campaign (29:00), making mistakes at other companies (34:00), his view of Sam Altman (37:35), how he ...

One doctor's experience inside Babylon Health

November 03, 2023 04:03 - 36 minutes - 66.7 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Hugh Harvey, managing director of consultancy Hardian Health, to talk about his time at Babylon Health (4:30), his first look at the company’s “artificial intelligence” (7:00), why it’s hard to build a medical chatbot (11:30), the siloed nature of the company (14:30), its regulatory loophole (16:20), Ali Parsa’s obsession with creating an “AlphaGo moment" (21:10), the gong (24:15), how the company became more brazen with its market...

AI Chats with Vinod Khosla and Tyler Cowen

October 27, 2023 16:02 - 1 hour - 124 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on two guests to talk about artificial intelligence. The first is Vinod Khosla, the legendary tech investor and founder of Khosla Ventures, to talk about how the rise of AI compares to previous breakthroughs (4:00), how it is like the Manhattan Project (8:00), why universal basic income may be necessary (16:20), and the culture war aspect of AI (20:25). Then, Tyler Cowen, the George Mason University economist, blogger and author, comes...

Sima.ai's Krishna Rangasayee: “Plumbers of the AI age”

October 20, 2023 06:45 - 44 minutes - 80.7 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Krishna Rangasayee, founder and CEO of Sima.ai, to talk about why we need to remake the tech infrastructure for the AI age (5:10), what the “edge” is (8:30), why he started the company (11:00), the problem with the cloud (15:00), developing a new architecture (19:00), growing up in India (20:45), coming to Mississippi (25:20), starting the company at age 50 (30:00), why being the boss has been so challenging (34:40), the future (37...

Age1’s Alex Colville: “Inventing the anti-ageing pill”

October 13, 2023 08:46 - 42 minutes - 78.6 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Alex Colville, co-founder of Age1, to talk about funding longevity science (3:15), studying the biology of ageing (5:10), the snake oil problem (11:05),  the rise of “geroscience” (15:15), healthspan (23:05), the ageing hypothesis (26:55), the potential of metformin (30:05), working on an anti-ageing treatment (34:15), and how long he thinks we’ll live (38:45). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Climate Overshoot Commission’s Pascal Lamy: “Solar geoengineering should be explored”

October 06, 2023 07:28 - 46 minutes - 85.4 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Pascal Lamy, chairman of the Climate Overshoot Commission to talk about climate migration (7:30), the huge cost of adaptation (12:40), solar geoengineering (14:40), the attraction of a sticking plaster solution (21:25), termination shock (26:40), carbon takeback obligations (32:30), pollution removal (37:00), and how Britain fights into this fight (41:10) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Worldcoin's Alex Blania: "Proof of personhood in an age of AI fakery”

September 29, 2023 10:00 - 48 minutes - 88 MB

The Sunday Times' tech correspondent Danny Fortson rings on Alex Blania, chief executive of Worldcoin developer Tools for Humanity, to talk about launching its iris-scanning orb around the world (5:00), testifying in Nairobi (9:40), signing people up (12:45), what problems it is trying to solve (16:10), proof of personhood in the age of fakery (19:20), the role of cryptocurrency (22:30), not offering crypto in America (26:10), the guiding philosophy (28:20), universal basic income (30:30), gr...

Pangea Biomed’s Ranit Aharonov: “Cancer-hunting AI”

September 22, 2023 02:00 - 38 minutes - 71 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Ranit Aharonov to talk about this moment for artificial intelligence (3:15), studying the brain (6:30), Project Debater (8:30), neural networks (11:30), language’s AlphaGo moment (14:50), the big idea at Pangea (19:20), getting it into the hands of doctors and drug communities (23:25), the role of AI in this tool (26:15), the regulatory limits (32:15), and why she didn't debate the AI she created (37:25). Hosted on Acast. See aca...

Walter Isaacson: “The light and darks strands of Elon Musk”

September 17, 2023 05:21 - 45 minutes - 51.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Walter Isaacson, the biographer of Elon Musk, to talk about his new book (3:10), Musks’ “heartlessness” (6:15), his maniacal sense of mission (10:50), his approach to pro-creation and children (18:00), his fear of loneliness (21:55), and why he can’t smell the flowers (25:00), the reaction to the book (28:35), why Isaacson doesn’t make judgments (30:10), “demon mode’ (34:30), the Twitter deal (38:45), and his political tack right (4...

Air Company’s Gregory Constantine: “Turning CO2 into vodka”

September 08, 2023 08:00 - 33 minutes - 61.8 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Gregory Constantine, co-founder of Air Company, to talk about turning CO2 into fuel, booze and perfume (2:30), why they chose to do consumer products first (5:05), growing up in Australia (6:20), landing in New York (9:15), starting the company (12:00), its first product in 2019 (15:15), raising the first round of venture capital (20:40), shooting for fuel (21:40), their years couch-surfing (25:50), scaling up the technology (28:10)...

Pinecone's Edo Liberty: "AI is infrastructure"

September 01, 2023 02:00 - 43 minutes - 79.5 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Edo Liberty, founder of Pinecone, to talk about the state of artificial intelligence (4:00) the ‘hallucination’ problem (7:10), giving AI’s memory (10:30), starting out in Israel and in academia (17:15), starting pinecone in 2019 (20:30), raising money (24:05), creating a “handshake” between LLM’s and specialised knowledge (26:30), the AI bubble (30:20), and why he chose the name pinecone (39:50). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/p...

Just Climate's Shaun Kingsbury: "We've never built a rainforest"

August 04, 2023 02:00 - 44 minutes - 82.3 MB

The Sunday times' tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Shaun Kingsbury to talk about the Green Investment Bank (3:40), whether he is optimistic (9:15), taking on harder-to-clean industries at Just Climate (13:30), teaming up with Al Gore (16:30), why he is not focussed on climate change adaptation (24:00), trying to create the Tesla of green finance (29:30), what he wants to crack (32:00), why carbon removal is hard (35:30), and the importance of the IRA (39:30).  Hosted on Acast. S...

Deep Sky's Fred Lalonde: "We need to bury every ton of CO2 emitted since the Industrial Revolution"

July 28, 2023 02:00 - 1 hour - 135 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Frederic Lalonde, founder of Deep Sky, to talk about why it is already too late to address climate change (3:10), terraforming earth (14:00), the terrifying math of exponential systems (19:45), the breakdown in insurance models (23:05), what Deep Sky is doing (27:00), starting companies before Deep Sky (33:35), draught and famine (37:50), the waking up of capital markets to the climate crisis (42:00), sea level rise (47:00), why he ...

IRL415’s Philip Rosedale: “Heading toward software’s Hiroshima moment”

July 21, 2023 02:00 - 35 minutes - 64.8 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Philip Rosedale, founder of Second Life and IRL415, to talk about the Apple’s Vision Pro augmented reality goggles (3:30), digital eyes (6:40), the weight challenge (7:50), on whether there is a key breakthrough that will lead to adoption (11:50), how artificial intelligence and goggles come together, or not (16:10), starting a community lab (19:20), AI girlfriends and matchmakers (22:00), on whether software development is heading ...

AstroForge's Matt Gialich: "We can eradicate mining on earth”

July 14, 2023 02:00 - 38 minutes - 70.1 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Matt Gialich, founder of AstroForge, to talk about what he did before attempting asteroid mining (3:40), working at Virgin Orbit (6:00), what he learned at Bird, the struggling scooter company (8:05), jumping to asteroid mining (10:30), the problem with platinum (13:40), targeting metal-rich asteroids (15:40), the first launch (20:45), the space revolution (21:40), raising money (24:20), trying to do a submarine startup before aster...

SciFi Foods' Joshua March: "Most 'clean meat' startups won't be successful"

July 07, 2023 17:58 - 29 minutes - 54.2 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent brings on Joshua March, co-founder and chief executive of SciFi Foods, to talk about the first approvals for lab-grown meat in America (4:45), building their pilot plant (6:45), using Crispr to engineer cells (7:50), the industry's dominant technology approach (12:30), why most of the 150 cultivated meat startups will fail (16:10), why clean meat will ultimately supplant slaughterhouses and industrial agriculture (17:50), the Biden administration’s support...

Lumo's Devon Wright: "Helping farmers save water"

June 30, 2023 09:45 - 45 minutes - 84 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Devon Wright to talk about moving from a boat to the country (4:00), starting agricultural and water tech startup Lumo (7:15), inventing a smart valve (11:40), quitting his old job (15:50), his previous companies (17:50), being in a band (20:30), coming to Silicon Valley (25:20), how farmers view drought and extreme weather (28:00), making water systems more efficient (36:40), pitching investors (40:00), and his worst day (41:30). ...

Trevor Neilson: “I helped start Extinction Rebellion. Here is why they are getting it wrong”

June 25, 2023 04:00 - 1 hour - 141 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent brings on Trevor Neilson, founder of startup Wastefuel and the Climate Emergency Fund, to talk about how he helped launch and finance Extinction Rebellion (XR) (4:50), how the Malibu wildfires inspired him to act (8:20), meeting Roger Hallam, founder of XR and Just Stop Oil (16:00), bankrolling protestors (18:00), why he thinks the movement has gone off the rails (22:50), whether he is worried about what his former colleagues will think (32:00), how XR has...

Securiti’s Rehan Jalil: “Where there’s chaos, there’s opportunity”

June 16, 2023 02:00 - 32 minutes - 44.8 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Rehan Jalil, founder of Securiti, to talk about trying to grab control of data (3:00), the generative AI boom (7:35), growing up in Karachi, Pakistan (10:05), getting one of 200 slots in a top engineering school (14:35), going to America (18:15), the dotcom boom (18:45), his first two companies (21:00), taking advantage of market chaos (25:15), and what he learned from three startups (27:40) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy ...

UC Berkeley’s Hany Farid: “With AI, we’re making the same mistakes that we did with social media”

June 09, 2023 02:00 - 38 minutes - 53.6 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent brings on Hany Farid, of UC Berkeley’s School of Information, to talk about the new age of AI (artificial intelligence) misinformation (4:00), the proliferation of new tools (6:40), AI doomerism (9:50), regulation (13:10), history repeating itself (15:40), the AI election (18:20), simple ways to regulate AI (22:45), why imposing rules is easier than the industry would have us believe (28:50), the challenge presented by the open-source approach (30:30), and...

Sightful's Tamir Berliner and Tomer Kahan: "The world's first augmented reality laptop"

June 02, 2023 01:00 - 35 minutes - 64.4 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Tamir Berliner and Tomer Kahan, founders of Sightful, to talk about inventing the world’s first “augmented reality” laptop (4:30), the end of the screen (8:10), what they learned from Magic Leap (10:30), making technology disappear (12:00), raising money (18:30), the advantages of starting the company in Israel (21:45), Apple’s big announcement (25:00), getting past the “Glasshole” problem (26:15), their backgrounds (29:00), and sel...

Outreach’s Manny Medina: “Most founders give up too soon”

May 26, 2023 07:19 - 34 minutes - 63.1 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Manny Medina, chief executive of Outreach, to talk about how artificial intelligence is invading the sales business (2:30), why it will enhance humans (6:10), growing up farming shrimp in Ecuador (7:45), communism (9:30), coming to America (11:45), his original startup idea, and abandoning it (14:50), why his capitalist life does not conflict with his communist upbringing  (18:50), what is happening in the economy (21:30), moving fr...

Runway’s Cristobal Valenzuela: “Pushing AI-generated film past the ’mom threshold’”

May 19, 2023 12:06 - 39 minutes - 72.9 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Cristobal Valenzuela, founder of Runway, to talk about using AI to edit and create videos (3:00), starting out at art school (6:50), quitting his job and starting the company in 2018 (8:30), his art career (9:30), rushing to raise money before his visa ran out (14:10), the critical breakthroughs (16:45), what “diffusion” is (18:30), the future of film (21:00), zero-cost content (28:30), coming to America from Chile (33:00), and the ...

Stability.ai's Emad Mostaque: "We're all going to die - but not from AI"

May 12, 2023 08:58 - 59 minutes - 109 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Stability.ai's founder Emad Mostaque, to talk about whether artificial intelligence (AI) is going to kill us all (3:30), why AI is the most important invention since the internal combustion engine (8:00), the next leap (12:40), the explosion of large language models and chatbots (17:00), why he is being sued (21:40), how AI can improve humans (25:30), how it will serve as the new platform (31:00), how he plans to make money (33:30),...

Loyal's Celine Halioua: "The first life extension drug for dogs"

May 05, 2023 02:00 - 56 minutes - 103 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Loyal founder Celine Halioua, to talk about extending the life of dogs (3:00), pushing to get first product on market in 2025 (6:10), the regulatory path (10:40), growing up in Texas (15:40), how health anxiety seeded her passion for longevity science (21:00), leaving Oxford after being sexually harassed (25:10), coming to San Francisco to work with Laura Deming on longevity (28:50), choosing to work on dogs (31:30), raising money (...

Andreessen Horowitz's Vijay Pande: "AI doctors"

April 28, 2023 02:00 - 51 minutes - 93.5 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Vijay Pande, head of Andreessen Horowitz’s $1.5bn bio fund, to talk about how artificial intelligence is impacting healthcare (3:30), tools that “understand” biology (8:50), trying to eliminate cancer (12:50), trying to get techie founders to get into healthcare (14:25), America’s plunging life expectancy (18:00), the (potential) end of radiology (21:10), AI’s “hallucination" problem in healthcare (25:55), the future of therapy (29...

SuperFocus.ai's Stephen Hsu: “AI study buddies”

April 21, 2023 02:00 - 50 minutes - 93.1 MB

The Sunday Times' tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Stephen Hsu, founder of SuperFocus.ai, to talk about genetic testing of children (5:15), his new startup SuperFocus (9:15), the hallucination problem for artificial intelligence (11:40), how the Ai revolution could go very badly (17:55), creating an army of AI workers (24:00), how companies are reacting (27:30), starting a company amid the Cambrian explosion of AI companies (32:35), creating AI study buddies (37:00), the “who owns t...

Precision Neuroscience's Ben Rapoport: "Write an email with your thoughts"

April 14, 2023 02:00 - 48 minutes - 89 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Ben Rapoport to talk about his plan it implant his first brain-computer interface in a human this year (5:00), his background in neurosurgery and electrical engineering (10:30), why BCI’s are ready now (13:30), Precision’s approach (16:45), preventing the device being rejected by the body (23:15), what this device will allow (24:45), restoring sense of touch to paralyzed people (32:55), exoskeletons (32:45), his time at Elon Musk’s ...

Fixie.ai's Matt Welsh: "The 12-cent engineer"

April 07, 2023 02:00 - 55 minutes - 63.5 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Matt Welsh, founder of Fixie.ai, to talk about how artificial intelligence will replace human programmers (3:25), its growing capabilities (8:20), the power of natural language prompts (13:20), running the numbers (16:15), historical precedents (21:30), on whether there is a development “brick wall” coming (25:00), why this AI moment has arrived (27:50), whether OpenAI will have a defensible business model (32:30), Fixie’s plan (35:...

Interlude: Back next week

March 31, 2023 02:00 - 1 minute - 2.75 MB

Danny in the Valley will back next week. Jury duty forced me to cancel all meetings and pods this week! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rippling’s Parker Conrad: “We raised $500m in one day to survive the SVB collapse”

March 24, 2023 03:00 - 50 minutes - 93.2 MB

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent brings on Parker Conrad, founder and chief executive of Rippling, to talk about getting caught in the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (3:30), receiving a call at 5:30 am (8:30), how wide the SVB blast radius was (11:00), moving $130m to JP Morgan in three hours (13:45), raising $500m in a day (17:00), why some people still didn’t get paid (23:40), the growing vulnerabilities of regional banks (30:20), the importance of SVB to tech (32:30), Conrad's experie...

Guests

Ben Thompson
1 Episode
Patrick Collison
1 Episode