The Local Maximum with Max Sklar

Assembly Member Clyde Vanel and I talk about new technology that affect the State of New York and the world!- The rise of Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies- The possibility of blockchain technology being used to maintain state government records like birth, death, and voting registration.- Automation and Jobs- Entrepreneurship; the opportunities in the new economy- 3d printing and the Rubik's Cube Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Twitter's Jack Dorsey is being pressured by a bunch of social media reporters from CNN to silence voices like Alex Jones; and all of the big socials are caving in fast. It's time to unmask the seemingly reasonable justifications for these bans for what they are - censorship.I add to the voices calling for a freer flow of information, and I call for entrepreneurs, engineers, and product designers to come up with a new generation of platforms that will be better than the old.We also talk about millennial and their avocado toast, rip on Long Island, explain the difference between New York City and Long Island, talking about organizational bias as a way of dealing with it, and my answers on a public interview keeping me up at night.This is sure to be the most controversial Local Maximum to date. Check it out! Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Today we dive into the current Bayesian flame wars on Twitter. Do Bayesian priors converge? As Nassim Taleb (@nntaleb) points out, not necessarily until a fat tail or power law distribution. We'll talk about what that means, and the wonders worked by Bayes rule even under some seemingly preposterous priors.Also - the military wants to do machine learning with less data. Is the era of big data over and giving way to the era of the big algorithm? The results of the Twitter Shadow Ban poll, QA bias, the Streisand effect and the Alex Jones banning Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Chris Messina and I go over a recent article of his on the evolution of conversational commerce and bots, and how to steer the industry towards better products. Relationship Design, Augmented Reality, and Natural Language. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

I may be on vacaction, but I still snuck in some time to put together a show! Decided to go solo this week and focus on Twitter's purging of bots and trolls. There is wide agreement that they need to do something to fix their platform, but there is not wide agreement on what exactly the problem is and what should be fixed. Can they focus on the experience and wellbeing of their enduser, or will they fall victim promoting fashionable political trends and end up with censorship? Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Artificially Intelligent Host Christian Hubbs talks to Max about what he's learning in the field of AI through his work. Industries and use cases for AI. When are self driving cars coming? And - what's the end game for humans and machines. We also talk about Christian's interest in reinforcement learning, and how that's being used to have computers play games like go. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Kris Conception talks about Natural Language Processing, Natural Language Understanding, and machine translation. We then go into how we build the taste ontology at Foursquare to supercharge the best city guide in the world, and how it connects concepts through languages and cultures. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

So the overall theme of the show today is applying what we learned last time. Bayesian Probability is good. P-Value hacking - is where we get into trouble. Death to P-hacking!We start by following up on my monologue from last week about Beliefs and Probability. This leads us into an article about the Reverend Thomas Bayes himself, and how his ideas transformed our thinking on probability and belief. And finally, are most of the scientific studies that you hear about wrong? Worry about p-hacking, and think like a Bayesian, and maybe we won't be misled as often; let’s begin to attempt to figure out how to make sense of it all. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

I explore the nature of probability, and my approach to thinking about facts and belief. I talk about problem solving a lot; here I go into the fundamentals and work to justify how I think about it.What problem does probability solve? Should we always think in terms of probability? What's the difference between an artificial language (code, math) and natural language? How many water molecules are in the Atlantic Ocean? Sometimes we have vague questions and make vague statements - should that be ok?This episode is a little different, but I hope this is the beginning of a back-and-forth conversation with the Local Maximum listenership to try to get to the bottom of these deep issues. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Aaron and Max have a stream-of-consciousness discussion where we look at some recent discussions on the tech web: Fred Ehrsam on Blockchain AI Marketplaces, and Chris Messina on the effect of AI agents on the economy. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Daniel Kronovet and Max discuss the world of information theory. We go into how it was invented by Claude Shannon at Bell Labs, the meaning of information and entropy, and the difference between measurement and processing. Catch references to a Jim Carrey movie and the Belmont stakes! Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

An article about MIT research claims that they've built a psychopathic AI. We think the article is a little off base, and try to determine what's actually going on. We cover related examples, of Microsofts Twitter Bot learning from the worst people, and a cool Google Image Program that sees animals everywhere.I also check in with Christian Hubbs, host of Artifically Intelligent, about his podcast. I was interviewed for todays episode, so check that out!I also define a Convolutional Neural Net, but only on the highest of high level! More on that could come in future episodes. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Run Your Mouth Podcaster and Stand-Up Comic Rob Bernstein joins me on the Local Maximum to talk about Comedy, Podcasting, Facebook, AI, Big Data, and of course MS Paint. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Today's concept is underfitting vs. overfitting. Someone who underfits doesn't adapt quickly enough to new data. But if you think that's bad, an overfitter will read TOO MUCH into new data and come up with wild ideas. How do you balance between them and what are some examples?We also talk about Warren Buffet's Recent statements on Bitcoin as Rat Poison Squared, and the response from Union Square Venure's Fred Wilson. How does Bitcoin get it's value? We look at underfitters and overfitters in the crypto space.Finally, the value of the Turing Test. When General AI comes, will it be the fabled machine that can pass as human, or will that idea be sidelined as more profitable uses taken precedent.Also, we learn what an Ornithopter is, and get an update on Yanny-Laurel. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Sarah Spagnolo tells us how we turn data insights into news stories. Does marijuana legalization affect bar-going? What's it like to go on TV? I also have to weight in on #teamyanny and #teamlaurel. Plus an update on the news stories we're tracking on Google and Facebook. How far along is Google's conversational AI demo? Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

A Washington Post OpEd believes that advances in AI will lead to a new centrally-planned economy. Google's Bots call unsuspecting businesses to save you time - but what are the implications? Bill Gates and Warren Buffet go sour on Bitcoin. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

I talk to Mariya Yao about AI and Machine Learning as applied to a variety of business problems and across industries. We cover:- What are some of the misconceptions around AI?- If I have an AI product, how can I talk about it to business leaders? How do I sell it externally? How does it become a business?- Where are various industries on this?- And what are some of the pre-requisites for AI; I’m talking about data collection, and organizational issues. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Aren’t you getting tired of using an internet that’s built to waste YOUR time - I know I am!Product Manager Marissa Chacko and I discuss the promise and perils of these bots and push notifications. We worked on Foursquare's bot Marsbot together, and produced it to help the user first. What are some ways we can focus on building apps that help users, and what are some of the bad habits that have gotten us apps which aren't looking out for our interests? Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Engineer and Podcaster Max Sklar shares his story about building software from his time at Yale to the Foursquare Innovation Lab. He’ll cover:What he has learned about working on vast location databases, building large-scale machine learning algorithms, and designing chatbots and apps that people actually want to use.Different ways to approach career and on working in teamsHis thoughts about where the tech/software industry is going in the next decade and encourage Yalies to follow up on their ideas. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Aaron comes back on the program to discuss the Mark Zuckerberg testimony before congress, particularly the part pertaining to moderation and censorship. In the last episode, I described the current approach that companies like Facebook, Twitter, and Google have towards this problem and why it might be flawed. Today, we see this theory play out in the Facebook CEO's answers.We discuss the case of Diamond and Silk, which I mentioned last week but had no idea would appear in the hearings. Also, Facebook's approach of ensuring that it's tools are used for good, and what this directive means for Facebook's future and how the internet will look in a decade.Also, I finished the 10 episode challenge! This podcast is all grown up now. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Today I answer the question of how I would handle moderation for Facebook and Twitter - and I break down the problems that they're facing and why. Don't hold your breath expecting them to try out my proposal!I also discuss Lindy's Law, which is a helpful rule of thumb in technological and social forecasting. As popularized by @nntaleb, it's another tool in your toolkit for understanding the world. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Today I post-game my discussion with Dennis Crowley. I share his goal of wanting people to execute on their ideas, but what are the common blockers? I talk to Aaron about how it broke his code, and the AI couldn't do it on it's own but only with my help - all because my brain was influenced by the power of suggestion. Plus - answer to a listener question about Marsbot! Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Today I talk to famed Foursquare Founder Dennis Crowley. His approach to being a tech entrepreneur has inspired us all! Just listen.We talk about his approach to trying out new ideas, and also the current landscape for consumer technology and where we may be headed. Finally, we talk about Foursquare's recent foray into bots and beyond. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

The big news right now is around an analytics company that used a dataset from Facebook - gotten by the company under false pretenses - to help the Trump campaign in 2016. Everyone is SHOCKED - but this kind of data mining was glorified and extolled as a social good when it was used for Obama in 2012. The comparison of the coverage is stark.How are we going to get out of this? What exactly is the problem? I think that the vast centralization of data services has led to all sorts of problems, and the answer is well articulated in VC Chris Dixon's article from last month about the coming decentralized services. I summarize his article which adds to my optimism about the future. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

It seems like yesterday when we had to get used to Bitcoin, and now new currencies are cropping up all the time - including the crypto-juggernaut Ethereum. To help us keep up and understand what's going on, I have Ethereum developer Christian Lundkvist from ConsenSys on the show. We talk about why Ethereum is separate from Bitcoin, and what the world-changing applications of these cryptocurrencies might be in the next few years. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

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I have a discussion with Stephanie Yang about how we used machine learning and sentiment analysis to build Foursquare's critically acclaimed venue rating system. Some anecdotes and what we learn along the way. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

In my first interview, I speak to Google engineer Maryam Aly who worked on Foursquare's Internationalization Stack for several years. This includes making sure that the foursquare city guide and swarm apps work all around the world. Sometimes, a simple translation isn't enough - we had to deal with the quirks of each language, and puns and cultural references that don't carry through. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

In the rest of my discussion with Aaron, we discuss the how Bayes rule can apply to news items like the Hawaii ICBM Scare, the murder of DNC Staffer Seth Rich, Medical Diagnosis, Conspiracy Theories, theology, and politics. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe

Max Sklar starts off the Local Maximum podcast. He goes over the purpose of the podcast, and the push for 10 episodes. Aaron Bell interviews Max on Bayesian vs Frequentist Statistics. Mathematical reverends, German Enigma's, and Tampered Dice. Get full access to The Local Maximum at localmaximum.substack.com/subscribe