Regulating is very hard at the software level but not hard at the hardware level. The US and allies control all major chip manufacturing. Open AI and others have done work showing that regulating compute should be significantly easier to do than other regulations we've done such as nuclear https://www.cser.ac.uk/media/uploads/files/Computing-Power-a...
This paper should be viewed in retrospect with the present day knowledge that Deepseek exists - regulating compute in not as easy or effective as previously thought.
As for the Chinese chip industry, I don't claim to be an expert on it, but it seems the Chinese are quickly coming up with increasingly less inferior alternatives to Western tech.
The thing is, though, that Deepseek's training cluster is comprised of mostly pre-ban chips. That and the performance/intelligence of their flagship models achieved parity with western models between two and eight months old at the time of release. So in a way, they're still behind the Americans and the export controls hamper their ability to change that moving forward.
Perhaps it only takes China a few years to develop domestic hardware clusters rivalling western ones. Though those few years might prove critical in determining who crosses the takeoff threshold of this technology, first.
@malcomgreaves I'm not sure you caught the intended target of @cle's comment. I believe he was talking about your comment being the thing he thought may be intentionally ironic, not PG's essay.
One of the main points in the essay: "The problem with political correctness was not that it focused on marginalized groups, but the shallow, aggressive way in which it did so"
And your comment is a classic example of that behavior.
I try to get around with just an apple watch. The most frustrating part is needing (or worrying I'll need) to take an uber or a lyft (my main modes of transport). They discontinued their watch apps and their api's are very locked down.
I've tried this several times too and still do phone less days quite often thanks to the watch, but my big obstacle has been the lack of Uber/Lyft which I use instead of having a car. They used to have those apps on the watch but unfortunately they don't.
If I could use Uber/Lyft on the watch I would mostly leave my phone on the charger.
Perhaps more importantly than a mental model for thinking about this you might need the right mental state. You're tired and not seeing a path forward. That leads to burnout fast and isn't a great space to make big decisions from.
I'd talk to your co-founder and start by taking some time off. I bet for the past 3 years of grinding on the startup you haven't done a good job with vacations. If you went and fully unplugged for a month (or more) you might be in a place for a better perspective.
You might feel like you can't get away - that you're too essential to some work right now - but in my experience a top role of co-founders is to keep the passion and vision strong. Where you sound like you're at mentally you may be doing more team harm than good and your co-founder may be surprisingly supportive of you taking some time to get rest.
I've attended one of those at the Zen Center! My partner took me to one as a birthday present last year. She ended up being kinda frustrated with the process, but I found it soothing and relaxing, and left happy and contented.
The guy running the workshop had us use epoxy and not urushi powder (not surprising; I'm sure all of us would have ended up with severe skin irritation otherwise). The article mentions concerns about food safety; IIRC we were told that the epoxy we were using in the workshop was not food safe, but that it's easy to acquire food-safe versions of it.
We also didn't do this in anywhere near as many steps, with as many different treatments for different sizes/shapes of damage. Ultimately we fully repaired a piece in a couple hours, not the several months that the article author took to do it right. (And the extra care and use of the proper materials shows; the final repaired alligator mug from the article looks orders of magnitude better than my work.)
I wish I could offer something more useful, but in this case her birthday was fast approaching and I remembered her bringing up Kintsugi in a conversation. I did a search for "kintsugi toronto" and found that teacher's site on the first results page. Back in the day I would have browsed craigslist, but unfortunately it's not as popular here anymore.
The article really focused on doing this in Yellowstone, and all the problems we'd have there. I noticed the second hottest spot on the map is Southern California - which has the benefits of being a desert and close to major population that'd use the power.
