Tony Li

Our latest jobs update 👇

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Want to tease something my team has been working on over at Buffer! The attached image isn't a mockup, but a screenshot of a live prototype of RSS feeds directly in Buffer! It's only available internally and still pretty rough at this point, but we'll have it available for user testing soon. With this enhancement, we hope to help Buffer users easily find new and engaging content to share with their audiences. What do you think? Will RSS feeds in Buffer help you create more content?

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Amazon's sub-sub-sub categories are getting out of control. There's a category just for SciFi and Fantasy Art? Apparently I'm their top new release, with my mermaid book :). On the downside, MOST of the other new releases in this area are massive amounts of AI-generated books featuring big-breasted fantasy porn and scifi porn. The books are flooding their system. Here's the link to my book, which is about the history and types of mermaids. It's not a how-to-draw book. https://lnkd.in/g8a8EAJh #mermay #mermaid

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Releasing quantized Llama models. Faster, lower memory footprint, designed to run on small devices. Details here: https://lnkd.in/gdmjfByi

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As the year winds down, I’ve been reflecting on the ideas that left the deepest impression on me, and two books stand out as absolute highlights of 2024: 📖 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱𝘀 𝗜 𝗦𝗲𝗲 by Fei-Fei Li — https://a.co/d/7XqP5J8 📖 𝗔 𝗕𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗳 𝗛𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗜𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 by Max Bennett — https://a.co/d/8UleBZ7 Both are deeply thought-provoking works that I can’t recommend enough! Together, they explore the similarities, differences, and fascinating interplay between biological and artificial intelligence that has reshaped how I think about the future of both. Here are a few similarities that stood out: 🔹 Uniform Neural Structure The brain’s neocortex is built from identical neurons arranged into repeating microcircuits, yet it handles everything from face recognition to poetry. DNNs borrowed this idea: uniform layers of nodes that specialize through training. Another proof that simplicity scales! 🔹 Reinforcement Learning with Curiosity Evolution gifted humans with curiosity, inspiring us to explore the world, take risks, and learn from our experiences. Early ML algorithms lacked this drive, sticking to safe paths with predictable rewards. But in 2017, DeepMind changed that with AlphaZero by explicitly modeling exploration and creating an AI that defeated the world champion of Go! 🔹 Imitation Learning: Understanding the Why Primates revolutionized learning by imitating intent instead of blindly copying actions. Similarly, early autonomous driving systems mimicked human actions based on sensory data and often failed. Andrew Ng’s team solved this in 2003 by training AI to infer the intended trajectories of the experts, advancing robotics and autonomous driving. And here are key differences: 🔹 Backpropagation vs Hebbian Learning AI relies on backpropagation, popularized by Geoffrey Hinton in the 1980s, while the brain uses Hebbian learning, often summarized as “neurons that fire together wire together”. 🔹 Catastrophic Forgetting AI suffers from catastrophic forgetting, losing old knowledge when learning new tasks, which requires freezing models after training. In contrast, human brains replay and integrate memories through the hippocampus, enabling continuous learning without overwriting prior knowledge. 🔹 Simulation and Imagination The brain excels at creating mental models of the world and imagining future possibilities. This “simulation engine” interprets sensory information by assuming it originates from a 3D world that unfolds over time. 🤔 Interestingly, both authors allude to Spatial Intelligence as the next AI frontier. And recently, Fei-Fei Li founded World Labs, a company building Large World Models to perceive, generate, and interact with the 3D world — how cool is that! What an exciting time we live in! I’m eager to see what 2025 will bring. What ideas or books shaped your thinking this year? I’d love to hear your recommendations! 🎄 Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a fantastic New Year! 🙌

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Not mentioned in this post, but you could also not ask for a better manager and advocate than Emily!

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Sharing insights on ever growing gaming industries both on rev and users base. How can we actually get these massive group of gamers to merge into Web3 ecosystem effectively. GAMES WORLD ASSET is the way. Let gamers have a chance to be a stakeholder in big IP games owning the rights.

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Language models enable your phone to better understand the world and look out for you. Great to start wider testing of Scam Call Detection on Pixel using AIcore and Gemini Nano https://lnkd.in/emAKSPz5

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Spooky post ahead! 👻 For the Seattle Indies Halloween party, I dressed up as one of the scariest things: the Evil CEO laying people off. (Ignore my awful handwriting!) On a serious note, many of my friends have shared that they no longer feel secure in their jobs again after these harsh years of layoffs. Being laid off, or "surviving" a layoff while friends around you are removed, can be traumatic. Even if I don't have employees yet at Timeless Toucan I've been thinking about this issue. What can we do as studio directors to support people, preserve their mental health, and prevent them from constantly looking for other opportunities out of fear of layoffs? Is reassurance enough? Should we offer generous severance packages? Do we just accept that this is how people will feel? Ultimately, leading by example and avoiding layoffs in our studios, transparently communicating the studio's finances and runway length to ensure people are not caught off guard is probably the only way to repair this damage long term. I'm curious about your perspectives on this, as employees and studio owners - what would you like to do or see done?

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🍜Anybody up for some ramen? I am excited to share that I am back in the garage, building again (it’s actually a house in the Berkeley Hills). We are taking the wraps off of Supercog AI, a new startup focused on solving Application Integration using LLM powered agents. My co-founder in this new venture is a great friend of mine (and a former co-founder partner), Alex Osborne. Alex and I have worked around the application integration space for a long time, and we are unrealistically excited about applying the GenAI stack to this problem. Not many people relish the task to get some bits to move from system A to system B. But it’s a critical job to be done, and that’s led to a lot of brittle scripts, a myriad of inflexible “no code” tools, and a lot of hand crafted SQL. But the power of the Large Language Model, trained on a huge corpus of information, offers a remarkable tool to solve this problem. The LLM you use today already knows the APIs of hundreds of popular systems. It knows the SQL dialects of every major database. It understands the semantics and data schemas of many popular SaaS systems. It understands much of the specific domain in which your business operates. I like to call the AI revolution “the last platform shift”. That may turn out to be hyperbole, but I definitely believe we are in the very early stages of seeing what this new stack can enable. I know we are hardly the first folks to claim that “amazing stuff is coming!”. But this is why Alex and I have decided to focus on a real and hard problem. If we can prove that LLMs can power a new way to solve this problem, it will be the first successful *new* approach in 15 years.. We will have much more to share about this new platform soon. In the meantime, if you’re interested in getting a peek - or even better if you have application or data integration tasks that you would like some help with - please reach out because we want to help. #genai #startups #backinthegarage

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Calling Investors: Invest in the original Xbox “Duke” controller… I am working with a new gaming peripherals company set to take the world by storm and they are looking for investors to join the team. Founded by Duke Schnepf, son of gaming visionary, and Xbox founder, Brett Schnepf, backed by multiple founding fathers of the Xbox, this company is pushing the boundaries of the gaming peripherals sector. Their journey began with Brett Schnepf, a luminary whose contributions to gaming history are etched in stone. As a founding member of the Xbox console team, Brett's design prowess shaped modern gaming, with iconic creations like the Sidewinder PC controller and the legendary Duke controller. Today, Duke Schnepf carries forth his father's legacy. Upside and a half! In late 2024, a major streaming platform will release a series chronicling the founding of a pioneering gaming console (can you guess which one) and the launch of Duke's ground-breaking products, offering an intimate look at the visionary minds behind this revolution. Looking for investments of $10K, $20K, $50K, $100K, $250, $500K, and $1M. Higher investments with equity shares are available for discussion. We foresee full returns and profits delivered within 1 year. If you're interested in being part of this exciting journey, please get in touch to set up a call ASAP. #Gaming #InvestmentOpportunity #Innovation #GamingPeripherals #TechInvestments #gamedev #investors #angelinvestors #gameinvestor #PEinvestment #AngelInvestment

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𝗙𝗟𝗢𝗪 𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗢𝗥𝗬 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗜𝗧𝗦 𝗥𝗢𝗟𝗘 𝗜𝗡 𝗠𝗢𝗕𝗜𝗟𝗘 𝗚𝗔𝗠𝗘𝗦 𝗠𝗢𝗡𝗘𝗧𝗜𝗭𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗢𝗡 Mihaly Robert Csikszentmihalyi coined the term 𝘍𝘭𝘰𝘸 from which the Flow Theory was postulated. The Flow Theory is widely used in user experiences, especially video games. Mihaly’s conclusion from his research highlights its applicability for mobile games: “𝘈 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘩 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘴𝘰 𝘪𝘯𝘷𝘰𝘭𝘷𝘦𝘥 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘦𝘭𝘴𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘮𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳; 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘴𝘰 𝘦𝘯𝘫𝘰𝘺𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘶𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘰 𝘪𝘵 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘢𝘵 𝘨𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵 𝘤𝘰𝘴𝘵, 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘩𝘦𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘥𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘵.” In his book, 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘎𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘋𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘨𝘯, Jesse Schell applied Flow Theory in videogame design. According to Schell, players who are too anxious or bored leave the game. He suggested that players should oscillate between these two states without going to extremes. Designing this oscillation is challenging and comes ripe with opportunities. Rewarded Videos (RVs) generate more revenue than other AD types. Players need a reason to engage with RVs. Simply dotting them all over doesn't work. This is where the Flow Theory shines as RVs would make sense on both highs and lows of the Flow. Find ways to introduce RVs to enhance the core game's flow. Plan features with RV foresight. Assume the player's role and find perceived value in your systems, how RVs can enhance the experience, and how to present these RVs without breaking the flow. In a sticky situation, encourage players to interact without feeling forced. How you present these RVs to the player will also influence players’ willingness to watch the RV. Simple UI buttons are enough to communicate RVs but having them as your game world turns them into a natural extension of your game. What would feel rewarding and emergent rather than scripted or forced? Iterate solutions as a player and measure their impact. An investor offering currency, a builder offering completion, a healer reviving characters, etc. doesn't break the game's immersion and gets the RV viewed for a favor in return. The icing on the cake is that as players engage more with your game, they are more likely to engage repeatedly with RVs and appreciate their value more. In conclusion: 1. Apply the basic principles of the Flow Theory. Having a solid core with supporting systems creates desirable RV opportunities  2. Immerse yourself as the player and experience the highs and lows of your flow 4. Instinctively identify RV opportunities and presentations with feature development 4. Introduce RVs as a natural extension of your game 5. Increase your players’ willingness to engage with RVs out of excitement rather than disappointment 6. Always strengthen your core game otherwise players won’t stick around long enough to tap those sweet revenue-generating RVs! 

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Want a preview of what I'm going to be talking about in my keynote for RubyConf? You can catch a glimpse of it here!

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Bay Area/Norcal Gaming Studio and Publisher Friends - Join me and the CleverTap Gaming Team 9/24/24 in SF for our Product x LiveOps Symposium - (Happy Hour Edition) co-hosted with our friends at AWS for Games. I'll be hosting a Fireside chat with our long-time client and friend, Francisco Guerrero, Director of CRM and LiveOps at Together Labs where we discuss the convergence of LiveOps and CRM, covering insights such as: - Francisco’s journey over a 20+ year career in MarTech, and the macro-trends, themes, and repeating patterns he’s seen along the way. - A discussion of how the siloes have come down between CRM and Product Teams and how gaming and other app publishers can optimize around this new reality. - An in-depth analysis of the right time and situation to buy vs build LiveOps tooling. You don't want to miss this. Join us for great cocktails, food, and the level of quality content the market knows to expect from CleverTap Gaming! Space is limited, so apply to attend here: https://lnkd.in/gUkmNSdy LET'S GO GAMING!! 🚀🚀🚀

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