Rami's Readings #106 - PollyFuzz, GPT-4.1, Synology & Lossless Audio
The latest on AI, LLMs, PollyFuzz, GPT-4.1, Cohere's Embed 4, Matmul, Synology, American Resorts, Lossless Audio, Vinyl Records, and more.
Welcome to Rami’s Readings #106 - a weekly digest of interesting articles, papers, videos, and X threads from my various sources across the Internet. Expect a list of reads covering AI, technology, business, culture, fashion, travel, and more. Learn about what I do at ramisayar.com/about.
👋🏼 Welcome New Subscribers
Hello! A hearty thank you for subscribing to Rami's Readings! There are quite a few new subscribers this week, thanks to a recommendation from The AI Ethics Brief. I am thrilled to have you on board! In this newsletter, I curate the best papers, tweets, and articles I have read during the week focusing on LLMs, AI, economics, business, and technology news. You can learn more about me on my website.
📈 Top Recent Editions According to Substack
🤖 AI Reads
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MaartenGr / PolyFuzz: Fuzzy String Matching, Grouping, and Evaluation
Notes: This past week, I was working on a project for an MIT class that required heavy data preprocessing. This library helped me process >500K entity names into a canonical set using Sentence Transformers in under 30 seconds. Thanks RTX 4090!
How To Write A Fast Matrix Multiplication From Scratch With Tensor Cores
Notes: Incredibly detailed article on how to write your own native fast matrix multiplication.
Byte Latent Transformer: Patches Scale Better Than Tokens
Notes: This paper was released a while back, but Meta released the model on HuggingFace this past week in 7B and 1B sizes.
Cohere Released Embed 4: Multimodal Search For Business
Notes: A new state-of-the-art embedding model from Cohere. 🇨🇦
OpenAI Introduced GPT-4.1 in the API
Notes: OpenAI launched an update to the GPT4 family and a new model, nano, for low-latency applications. Nano is interesting, but I am little worried that it will be added to random products that shouldn’t have an embedded LLM just because it’s low-latency.
💼 Business Reads
Synology Is Tightening Restrictions on Third-Party NAS Hard Drives
Notes: I’ve been a long-time owner of a Synology NAS, but this latest announcement is deeply disappointing. The hardware has been lacking for many years: no native 10 Gigabit ethernet in many models, removal of codecs, outdated processors, etc. Locking out third-party hard drives only further inflates the total cost of ownership. Synology seems to be banking on their excellent software (DSM) to retain users, but that advantage won’t last forever if the hardware continues to fall short and the platform becomes increasingly closed.
The Grand American Resort Is Making a Comeback—Just In Time
Notes: I was fortunate enough to stay at the Hotel del Coronado for a company offsite pre-COVID. The location was stunning, and while the property could’ve used a bit of love, it felt like stepping into another era. It’s great to see renewed investment in historic hotels like this across the U.S. I can’t help but wonder if shows like The White Lotus have played a role in sparking that interest. I am starting Season 3 this week, no spoilers please!
Used Solar Panels Sold on Facebook and eBay Have Cult Following
Notes: I’ve never considered buying used solar panels before, but this might just become my new summer hobby. I would love to be able to charge my bike for cheap.
🔀 Other Reads
Lossless Audio and Ultra‑Low Latency Audio Come to AirPods Max
Notes: It’s impressive that Apple is releasing a firmware update for a product that’s several years old—especially one that enables a significant upgrade like lossless audio. I recently got back into lossless audio myself, thanks to a tiny inline USB-C DAC I backed on Kickstarter. It’s a fantastic, tiny device that works on iOS, Mac, and Windows. After switching to the DAC and a pair of IEMs, I completed a couple blind tests online to see if I can detect 128kbps v.s. 320kbps v.s. uncompressed audio. I was pleasantly surprised by how accurately I could tell the difference between 320kpbs and 128kpbs using the DAC. I forgot how much better it sounds, having gotten used to the Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones which don’t support the aptX Adaptive codec on iPhone (Yes… I know the Samsung phones have had it for years). Now, I’m even more excited to digitize my vinyl collection from overseas.
Enjoy the reads! Signing off from Redmond, WA.