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Nov 14, 2018

Listen to

@TechBuzzChina

podcast 🎙to get the latest on what’s buzzing in 🇨🇳 China #Tech, unique insights, perspectives, takeaways that don’t always make it into English language coverage. So you can be smarter about China Tech! iTunes: itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/tec

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Is this real???😂😂😂

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ChatGPT

@ChatGPTGoneWild

Feb 3

ChatGPT gone wild indeed:

Is there a way to auto mute all politicians and natsec tweeters? Except for smart takes on tech as it relates to those two keywords? Maybe not one step but multiple steps? Serious answers only, for real.

Feb 4

I used to book nearly all my trips on Airbnb (bc cheaper, more flexible locations, more fun) but now it’s often more expensive than hotels & crappier w worse checkin & cancellation risk (that’s the worst). Just booked a Westin in San Diego that was cheaper than nearby Airbnbs.

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Feb 3

Operators don't always make better investors: unsuccessful founders turned VC actually perform worse than career VCs, although both are quite a bit worse than successful founders turned VC 🙀 medium.com/venture-capita

Ep. 31: Alibaba and The Little Red Book (Xiaohongshu): Powering Ecommerce with Content — Tech Buzz...

Xiaohongshu aka RED is 200mm MAU and 69mm creators now. Which other apps have this kind of scale and ratio besides the big ones? For those who don’t know it is a lifestyle & product content sharing app & we did a podcast on it a very long time ago

techbuzzchina.com

Transcript ( Y: Ying-Ying Lu; R: Rui Ma; E: Elijah Whaley) [ 00:00 ] R: This has been a pretty slow news week for China tech. Y: We sifted through a lot of headlines, but only one really stood out,...

christophermschroeder.substack.com

I mean, is there really a single proven method of innovation for every technology and stage of business? Read the full post here (there's also some geopolitical stuff too):

The Sober Potential and Rising in Southeast Asia

A report from my first trip to #southeastasia since Covid. Sober and disciplined, a new era of potential is rising.

I don't know if "tall poppy syndrome" really explains what's been happening but I know that most people I know interpret it that way on an emotional level. As for China being committed to innovation, that's a given. It's just that everyone has diff ideas on how to go about it.

Some thoughts: I don't know if it's THAT rosy in China tech (let's just say opinions in my circle are divided). I think it mostly depends on if you're ready for the new meta which is no longer just simple mobile internet. As for AI, that's a global thing, & very exciting yes.

"on occasions certain business leaders rise above the rest invites scrutiny from the government and they will knock it down if they feel the broader population or workers are disadvantaged. “But never confuse this as a failure of commitment to innovate and compete.”"

“You Americans criticize copycats ... They were never copycats, but very innovative enterprises to meet consumer needs on our terms at scale. This is an effective play book you will see in sectors where there are big problems AI can solve.”

“There is no time in history I’d rather be investing in tech startups in China. It's no longer about the next delivery app but massive challenges in health and related sectors that AI is about to unleash across the country and beyond.”

Some interesting China bits from

@cmschroed

post on recent trip to SE Asia. "China remains a model for many in SE Asia entrepreneurs, representing business models & approaches often more relevant to the region than SV &, up until recently, an economic performance to be coveted.

Actually the funniest part is that I didn't even think of the word "ghosted" until I was explaining to another friend what had happened. I guess I've just been lucky in that it's honestly never happened to me not even when I was dating. Guess it was bound to one day 😑

Sucks but been talking to someone I've known for 10 yrs on & off for a few months abt working together on something. They said their former boss wanted to join up & take a significant role. I said OK then I def wanna talk to him, see if idea still works. Then I got ghosted, wtf?

Mobile native, cloud native … now it’s gonna be AI native

Big News 🚨 Microsoft just launched Teams premium powered by ChatGPT at just $7/month 🤯 With ChatGPT, Teams users can generate automatic meeting notes, AI-recommended tasks, personalized meeting templates, and a lot more!!

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NYT oped. Douyin is subject to Chinese censorship laws but to call it a limited version of TikTok is hilarious. Featureset, social impact, revenue, usage, etc TikTok pales in comparison to Douyin. It’s so limited there w 600mm+ DAU! Or is the point that the censorship is good?!

Whew boy Silicon Valley is old news. Welcome to ‘Cerebral Valley’ and the tech bro morphing into the AI bro

finance.yahoo.com

Silicon Valley is old news. Welcome to ‘Cerebral Valley’ and the tech bro morphing into the AI bro

San Francisco's Hayes Valley gets a new nickname.

Hah friend shared this in a group chat … how to get an AI unicorn … find some OpenAI founders w a product any product! Tada 🎉

Who gets to be a tech entrepreneur in China?

I guess I knew it was bad but I didn't know how bad. It was just a finance position, next thing you know, no Chinese American executive assistants or janitors or parking lot attendants in the general vicinity of where defensetech startups are.

Not that it should surprise anyone, but a Chinese American friend just told me that they had (2020ish) interviewed with a defensetech startup for a finance position and was rudely grilled about their ethnicity & questioned re: allegiance to the US

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Below from

covers a book that complains (?) abt how recent tech entrepreneurship opportunities haven’t benefited all classes equally. Rural, elderly, less educated etc. ??? Where does it? Certainly not here in the Bay or any places I know of. U?

technologyreview.com

A new book, The Labor of Reinvention, explores the increasingly blurry line between employment and entrepreneurship in the country’s digital economy.

Feb 1

He was pretty traumatized. He went to school in the US including a few years in Philly in some not great neighborhoods and thought this was another level. Especially the words used, sound like parroting media sound bites, coming from someone who clearly doesn’t understand Chinese

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A visitor from China told me just now that yesterday, in the downtown Redwood City SBUX, when he was having a convo in Chinese w 2 other women, someone came up to him and yelled “Go back to your country! You are sabotaging our national security!” This is so scary & messed up.

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FWIW, the “I stopped coming to SV” comment was said to me by in past years by Indian entrepreneurs too. And maybe this guy is biased, he’s been working on AI for two decades, but I heard many others say similar. Ohh yay thanks ChatGPT for making us cool again 😆

But now, after GPT-3 (COVID prevented visits until now, but GPT-3 was the marker), my respect for SV has returned. No one in China could have done this. SV is again the birthplace of true innovation. I’m so excited about this new era. It feels like mobile internet in 2010.”

Had dinner w a Chinese AI unicorn founder today. He said: “SV was so irrelevant for many of us Chinese tech founders from 2015-2020. We used to come every year like clockwork but in 2017 I remember everyone stopped. It was just too boring. There was nothing new for us to learn.

114x multiple for SaaS in 2021 🤔 for reference I was looking at early stage saas companies in other geos that could barely raise at 10x in 1H 2022 (before valns really tanked)

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Gavin Baker

@GavinSBaker

6) Also still can't get over 114x ARR being the average multiple for SAAS rounds in 2021. Venture in 2021 was a "Loser's Game" in the Charles Ellis sense where the way to win was by not losing. infogram.com/saas-multiples

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A friend said one of the reasons they think SF is back is bc there are lots of young talent, the ones who feel like covid has robbed them of career & personal growth, so like 25ish yr olds, who’ve all flocked to the city to work w / meet each other & have incredible energy.

It does seem like there is never enough parking anywhere these days

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Malls are hot again, the hottest since 2007 A reminder to anyone that thinks they can predict anything

Do we think that Congress will actually know how TikTok works by the time of this March hearing with the CEO?

Yes?
4%
No way
70.2%
Whatever it’ll be good TV
25.9%

429 votesFinal results

Jan 30

Not that I think it will do much in the way of birth rates or anything, just that the orientation of female lives towards marriage as the sole outcome to strive for is finally loosening. Positive.

Glad to see Szechuan province abolishing birth fine and making it easier for unmarried couples / singles to get their children full social benefits. I’ve been seeing a lot more unwed mother content on Chinese social media this days, it’s become much more socially acceptable.

But why will this help when it’s been the large number of paid & often irrelevant results that makes it difficult to use

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Peter Elstrom

@pelstrom

Jan 30

Scoop: Baidu is planning to launch its own version of ChatGPT for the China market, where OpenAI's service is banned. The internet giant will debut its application in March, initially embedding it into its main search services. More here from @pingroma bloomberg.com/news/articles/

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Jan 30

Why do people like reading articles that put their subjects on a pedestal so much. It’s PR disguised as “writing.” Sorry just bitter bc I hate that type of stuff and I could never find an audience like the folks always claiming they found the next most amazing person / biz 🤮

For semiconductor export control takes I pretty much only read Paul (and a very few others):

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Paul Triolo

@pstAsiatech

The most important aspect of the 7 October export control package released by the US Commerce Department is arguably its unilateral nature, and the struggle to get other key players onboard, primarily the Netherlands and Japan, continues. A thread.

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One founder (who raised a huge seed in 2022) said to me last week “VCs are really only doing one thing, trying to pick out the “homecoming queen.” It’s buzz & popularity based, so startups must generate FOMO” 🐑 Two AI Startups Without Revenue Look to Raise at Unicorn Valuations

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Eric Newcomer

@EricNewcomer

Character.AI is in talks to raise $250 million. Adept raising from General Catalyst and Spark. Investors weigh investments in Anthropic and Stability AI. newcomer.co/p/two-ai-start

Haha learned that a friend is buds w director of the Wandering Earth movies. When I asked if he invested in them he said no, he has invested in the guy’s first movie & it wasn’t good so he passed on the blockbuster phenoms that followed. There’s a startup lesson here somewhere 😂