Brian Gracely, Aaron Delp, and Brandon Whichard discuss the top stories in Cloud and AI from September 2024.

SHOW: 861

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #861 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK - http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

NEW TO CLOUD? CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCAST - "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW NOTES:

• Link to September 2024 news and articles

SEGMENTS COVERED IN THE SHOW:

• Good Old Fashioned Cloud News
• The AI Innovation Continues 
• Trend 1 - AI Regulation is having mixed results (multiple products not released in EU now, California’s AI Act gets a veto)
• Trend 2 - OpenAI is making and burning through money at historic levels, only 3 of the original 13 are left. Anyone wanting AI for good has moved on 
• Trend 3 - Google finally releasing some AI tools and chips with potential (NotebookLM, AlphaChip). Also, Aaron no longer uses Google to search, feels last generation now and maybe these new tools are a way back for them?

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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Do we put too much emphasis on the leaders of the tech industry and not enough on the millions that support it? 

SHOW: 860

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #860 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET 

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK: http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

CHECK OUT OUR NEW PODCAST: "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW SPONSOR:

• Access Gartner cloud research come to life with the “The Future of Cloud in 2028: From Technology to Business Necessity,” webinar.
• Secure your seat for Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference 2024 with our early bird savings of $400 off standard rates now.  

SHOW NOTES:

• Western North Carolina Red Cross (DONATIONS)
• Eastern Tennessee Red Cross (DONATIONS)
• OpenAI to remove non-profit control and give Sam Altman equity
• LinkedIn Profile Roaster
• Brian’s “roasted” LinkedIn profile

THE BIG NAMES GET A LOT OF ATTENTION

• We talk a lot about how much CEOs make
• We talk a lot about the CEOs creating/executing strategy (good or bad)
• We talk a lot about “rockstars” (see: Workday “rockstars” commercials)

BUT DO THE REST OF US ACTUALLY DO ANYTHING OF ANY VALUE?

• Do the rest of us live the Ricky Bobby life, “if you’re not first, you’re last!”
• Should we feel bad when we advocate for ourselves, since that’s how the merit/raise system works? 
• Should we be embarrassed 

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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Rick Song (@rickcsong, CEO @Persona_IDV) talks about the evolution of identity verification and threat detection.

SHOW: 859

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SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #859 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK: http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

NEW TO CLOUD? CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCAST: "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW NOTES:

• Persona webpage
• Tech Crunch Article on Persona

Topic 1 - Welcome to the show. Give everyone a little bit about your background with a quick introduction please.

Topic 2 - You cut your teeth at Square prior to Persona, what lessons did you learn there, and how did your experience there impact what you are doing at Persona?

Topic 3 - We are, of course, seeing an uptick in personal fraud in both our personal and professional lives through identity theft and personal information leaking into the world. If someone has all the proper information, how do you identify this as a false identity?

Topic 4 - How has AI impacted all of this? I would think with the power of GenAI tools, this industry has accelerated dramatically?

Topic 5 - Do we have another arms race on our hands to identify and protect both our personal and professional lives from fraud?

Topic 6 - Is Persona a 3rd party API similar in architecture to Stripe? If I’m an architect in an organization today and I want to get started, how would I do that?

Topic 7 - If there was one thing you wanted people to understand about this, what would it be?

Topic 8 - You have access to a lot of personal data, how is this data handled and secured?

FEEDBACK?

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This past week, Amazon announced a new RTO policy that required 5 days a week in the office. What types of impacts could this have on tech workers and the tech industry? 

SHOW: 858

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #858 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET 

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK:  http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

CHECK OUT OUR NEW PODCAST:  "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW SPONSOR:

• Access Gartner cloud research come to life with the “The Future of Cloud in 2028: From Technology to Business Necessity,” webinar.
• Secure your seat for Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference 2024 with our early bird savings of $400 off standard rates now.  

SHOW NOTES:

• Amazon announces new Manager/Employee Ratio and RTO policy for 2025

IT’S BEEN 4.5 YEARS SINCE PEOPLE WERE IN THE OFFICE - FULL TIME

• People have adapted their life to working from home
• People have adapted their families to working from home
• Daily commutes seem like a poor use of resources

IT’S BEEN 4.5 YEARS SINCE PEOPLE WERE IN THE OFFICE - FULL TIME

• Being around co-workers does tend to increase collaboration and idea sharing
• RTO is more difficult on certain employee (especially care-giving women)
• RTO is an effective way to reduce headcount without defined “layoffs”
• RTO may feel more impactful to mobility-able tech workers

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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Jay Madheswaran (Founder & CEO @ Eve) talks about bringing AI to the legal vertical and the intersection of AI/ML of increased efficiency for legal firms.

SHOW: 857

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #857 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK - http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

NEW TO CLOUD? CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCAST - "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW NOTES:

• Eve Homepage

Topic 1 - Welcome to the show. Before we jump into the legal industry and AI, let’s talk a little bit about your background. Give everyone a brief introduction.

Topic 2 - What made you focus on the legal industry? When I think of forward leaning industries that quickly adopt new technologies, I don’t think of legal. What are the most common use cases?

Topic 3 - Tell us a little bit about the tech behind the scenes. Do you use foundational models and then fine-tune them? Do you have your own custom models? What are your thoughts on the current state and future of models for specific industries or verticals?

Topic 4 - Legal is a highly regulated space; how do your customers (law firms) think about data security and compliance? Tell everyone a bit about how all of this works.

Topic 5 - Do your clients use RAG for custom information that needs to be brought into the models? How does all of that work for customer data?

Topic 6 - When I think about legal, I think about two big areas. We covered compliance and the financial side of this, but what about the billing and financial side? How is ROI on legal AI calculated? Where and how does a legal AI help? Is this measured in hours saved, which translates into dollars saved?

Topic 7 - Let’s close by discussing the people aspect. We keep hearing AI is going to take everyone’s jobs away. What are your thoughts on how this supplements vs. replace staff?

FEEDBACK?

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Back from some recent travel, we look at why it’s important to listen to people from around the world to understand the differences between how global regions adopt technology. 

SHOW: 856

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #856 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO:  https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET 

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK:  http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

CHECK OUT OUR NEW PODCAST:  "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW SPONSOR:

• Access Gartner cloud research come to life with the “The Future of Cloud in 2028: From Technology to Business Necessity,” webinar.
• Secure your seat for Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference 2024 with our early bird savings of $400 off standard rates now.  

SHOW NOTES:

LARGER FACTORS PLAY A SIGNIFICANT ROLE IN TECHNOLOGY OUTSIDE THE US

• Diffusion of information
• Currency exchange
• Government laws, embargoes, tariffs
• Language and timezone differences
• Local culture, norms, expectations

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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• TikTok: @cloudcastpod

Brian Gracely (@bgracely)and Brandon Whichard (@bwhichard) discuss the top stories in Cloud and AI from August 2024.

SHOW: 855

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #855 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK - http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

NEW TO CLOUD? CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCAST - "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW NOTES:

• Link to August 2024 news and articles
• Subscribe to Cote's newsletter. 

SEGMENTS COVERED IN THE SHOW:

• Good Old Fashioned Cloud News
• The AI Innovation Continues 
• Trend 1 - What will be the ripple effects of Intel’s struggles?
• Trend 2 - Is this a bump or a bubble for NVIDIA?
• Trend 3 - Why do companies have such a hard time with a 2nd act?
• Trend 4 - Why you should always take the big job if it’s offered to you.  

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
• Instagram: @cloudcastpod
• TikTok: @cloudcastpod

The future of search advertising, the future of chips, the future of open source, AI monetization and government regulation of tech are all uncertain. What does that mean for the future?

SHOW: 854

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #854 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET 

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK: http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

CHECK OUT OUR NEW PODCAST:  "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW SPONSOR:

• Access Gartner cloud research come to life with the “The Future of Cloud in 2028: From Technology to Business Necessity,” webinar.
• Secure your seat for Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference 2024 with our early bird savings of $400 off standard rates now.  

SHOW NOTES:

ARE CORE PILLARS OF THE TECH INDUSTRY UNCERTAIN FOR THE FUTURE?

• Google and antitrust
• Intel and chips
• Open source and licensing
• AI and monetization
• Governments and regulation

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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Paul Delory (@pacdelory, Research VP @Gartner_Inc for Technical Professionals) shares insights about cloud computing, cloud costs, VMware, Platform engineering and IaC.

SHOW: 853

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK - http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

NEW TO CLOUD? CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCAST: "CLOUDCAST BASICS" 

SHOW NOTES:

• On The CUBE discussing VMware in April: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wIClYI6bDQ
• Software Development Times discussion Platform Engineering: https://sdtimes.com/softwaredev/analyst-view-whats-new-whats-now-and-whats-next-in-platform-engineering/

Topic 1 - Welcome to the show. Before we jump into a broad set of topics today, give us a little bit about your background and what you focus on today.

Topic 2 - The hyperscalers have grown quite large over the last decade, but as we came out of COVID, many of their customers were concerned about the cost of cloud. Are we seeing a new rationalization coming around cloud costs and accountability of costs? 

Topic 3 - We’ve all read the headlines regarding changes to VMware by Broadcom. Alternatives to VMware would be big decisions for many companies. As a neutral independent, how are you framing your thinking about the VMware ecosystem and the decisions being made about the future of virtualization? 

Topic 4 - Over the last decade, we’ve seen so many new technologies. To get value from them, they require more cross-functional collaboration. These days we tend to call that Platform Engineering. How well do you see the evolution of people and processes being adopted, and how much more needs to happen?

Topic 5 - Behind the scenes of every transition over the past decade (Cloud, AI, Cloud-native) is the adoption of automation. This seems like a no-brainer, but actual adoption is lumpy across companies. What are some of the hard parts of automation that aren’t discussed enough? 

FEEDBACK?

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With so much rapid change happening around AI models, is there a framework for when to build models, train models, fine-tune models, use RAG or something else? Let’s explore…

SHOW: 852

SHOW TRANSCRIPT: The Cloudcast #852 Transcript

SHOW VIDEO: https://youtube.com/@TheCloudcastNET 

CLOUD NEWS OF THE WEEK:  http://bit.ly/cloudcast-cnotw

CHECK OUT OUR NEW PODCAST:  "CLOUDCAST BASICS"

SHOW SPONSOR:

• Access Gartner cloud research come to life with the “The Future of Cloud in 2028: From Technology to Business Necessity,” webinar.
• Secure your seat for Gartner IT Infrastructure, Operations & Cloud Strategies Conference 2024 with our early bird savings of $400 off standard rates now.  
• Upgrade to the next generation of the cloud.  Oracle Cloud Infrastructure

SHOW NOTES:

• What is Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG)?
• Fine-Tuning vs. RAG
• Predictive AI vs. Generative AI
• Andrew Ng (always worth a watch IMO) https://youtu.be/sal78ACtGTc?si=dCoKXb5o4KB2XSer
• Harrison Chase (LangChain) https://youtu.be/pBBe1pk8hf4?si=lAit69_pDeRKcBGq
• https://blog.langchain.dev/what-is-a-cognitive-architecture/
• https://thenewstack.io/lets-get-agentic-langchain-and-llamaindex-talk-ai-agents/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-IYzyi86yY
• https://blog.langchain.dev/what-is-an-agent/
• https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/autogen/
• https://www.crewai.com/ 

HOW SHOULD WE DECIDE WHICH AI MODEL TO USE FOR OUR APPLICATION?

• Build, buy, use open source, augment with your own data - so many decisions
• How often do you update models with new data? 

HOW DO WE BRING OUR COMPANY DATA / KNOWLEDGE TO OUR AI MODELS?

• Large Static Models - Predictive AI
• LLMs + Slow-Changing Data - Align the Model
• LLMs + Fast-Changing Data - RAG
• LLMs + Agent-Learned Data - Agentic AI

FEEDBACK?

• Email: show at the cloudcast dot net
• Twitter: @cloudcastpod
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• TikTok: @cloudcastpod