2025 is the year of Consumer AI
For the last ~4 months, since the beginning of Q4 2024, it has felt as if one is spoilt for choice among AI developer tools. You only have to seek a capability, and there isn’t just one product offering it, but many, doing so at competitive prices now.
When the makers have extraordinary tools, ideas are tested, built, discarded and improved much, much faster.
The other recent development is just how good voice agents have become. Try having a conversation with the VAPI agent here, or clone your voice with PlayHT. They’re almost human-like in tone, voice modulation, emotion.
Most people find it difficult to write what they want, but they can usually say what they want, however imperfectly.
When we can talk to the AIs, and they can do what is needed, a rebirth of app stores is coming. And I think it’s here.
New technologies the US govt wants to fund
In 2022, the U.S. Department of Defense established the Office of Strategic Capital (OSC) to identify and help scale supply chain technologies critical for national security. In 2023, the US Congress formally authorized OSC to perform 3 core duties:
Carbonomics - the Economics of reaching Net Zero
That is the title of a recent research publication by the CFA Institute & Goldman Sachs International, published in November 2024. (Here’s the full PDF - recommended reading)