[Weekend Edition] Field Notes

Notable Numbers

• YouMail found that October averaged 158.4 million robocalls per day and 1,833 per second. That was an increase from September’s 149.4 million calls per day and 1,729 per second. (Link)
• AI is the hot new thing. AI companies (or the ones that call themselves AI companies) have raised $18.9 billion in Q3 2024, or about 28 percent of all venture funding, as per Crunchbase data. OpenAI alone raised $6.6 billion. (Link)
• “Bluesky now has over 20 million people! We’ve been adding over a million users per day for the last few days.” (Link) 
• 21% of Americans (37% of under-30s) regularly get news from news influencers. Most operate independently (77%) of traditional news organizations. Yup, we saw that during this election cycle. (Link)

Worth Reading 

• The internet is a series of tubes, and all your data travels over it. A wonderful long read about the internet, cables, and infrastructure. (Nautilus)
• What is Art in the Age of AI? And what is the role of the artist in the age of AI? A great long essay by photographer Joel Tjintjelaar.
• My former colleague Laura Owen, editor at Nieman Lab, is eschewing social media and has come up with a new way to deal with post-social reality for consuming news and information. This is very good. (Neiman Lab)
• With phones, we humans are almost always leaving behind digital crumbs. A great reconstruction of how selfies led to the discovery and conviction of a killer. (The Telegraph)

The Last Word

Enrique Allen, a partner at Designer Fund, passed away. Enrique became a friend when he and Ben started The Designer Fund. The news hits hard. RIP Enrique. Taken too soon. Ben’s note on Enrique’s passing is moving and heartfelt.

November 20, 2024. San Francisco.