Astra, monitorability, the ticking clock

So the news on Astra… intense. Even without experience with the model yet, just looking at the system card and results to date, the timeline’s far shorter than I’d guessed. Lord knows where we’ll be in a year.

A note on monitorability - honestly less concerned on that one point than most of the industry. Security on that front was never going to last. Even a modestly capable human brain can - with effort - run two chains of thought at once, how much easier must it be with the thinking depth of a large model?

I’ve more thoughts on the security situation there and around Hugging Face, but those will take some time to properly fact check and compose. Fast as things are going, I’m sure by the point I can really afford the time for the deep dive there will be plenty more to talk about.

Four more weeks of contracting. Then I get to concentrate on the world outside my little algorithmic cloister - chafing under the chain doesn’t begin to describe it, but we do what we must.

Anyhow, one bright spot - Stone and Crane draft two is progressing nicely. It’s one thing I can do with my main dev machine down for maintenance, and good exercise for a human brain working at human speed.

First installment of Journeys by Sunday evening, events allowing.