February 15, 2024
Tech News
In a surprising move, Cisco Systems has announced its plan to cut 5 percent of its global workforce, resulting in over 4,000 job losses. This decision comes as a response to weak demand from customers, particularly in the telecom industry. As a result, Cisco has also lowered its annual revenue forecast, expecting it to be between US$51.5 billion and US$52.5 billion, down from the previously projected US$53.8 billion to US$55 billion. However, the company is not losing hope and is focusing on artificial intelligence and partnerships, such as with Nvidia, to boost growth. In line with its restructuring efforts, Cisco will incur a charge of US$800 million related to severance and other costs.
Meanwhile, Nvidia has achieved a significant milestone by becoming the fourth most valuable company in the world, surpassing both Amazon and Alphabet in terms of market capitalization. With a market cap of $1.83 trillion, Nvidia’s success can be attributed to its dominance in the AI chip market. The company’s H100 chip powers the majority of large language models (LLMs) used today. Furthermore, Nvidia is preparing to release an even more advanced AI chip, the H200, and has invested $30 billion into a unit dedicated to assisting other companies in developing their own custom AI chips.
Shifting gears to the social media realm, Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Threads, has made an intriguing announcement. Meta plans to remove politics from its recommendations across both platforms, signaling a desire to create a more neutral user experience. This decision, however, has opened up an opportunity for Bluesky, a startup led by CEO Jay Graber. Bluesky aims to provide a decentralized social networking service that empowers users to customize their feeds, including the amount of political content they see. This approach stands in contrast to the centralized control seen in platforms like Meta’s.
Lastly, a conflict has arisen between users of Bluesky and Mastodon, two decentralized social networks, regarding the potential bridging of the two platforms. The debate revolves around Bridgy Fed, a project by software developer Ryan Barrett, which seeks to connect the AT Protocol used by Bluesky and the ActivityPub used by Mastodon. This discussion has brought to light differences in culture and philosophy between the two communities. Some Mastodon users have expressed concerns about privacy and consent regarding their posts appearing on Bluesky.
Tech Explained
Artificial Intelligence (AI) – AI refers to the simulation of human intelligence in machines that are programmed to think and learn like humans. It encompasses various technologies, including machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision, to enable computers to perform tasks that typically require human intelligence.
Market Capitalization – Market capitalization, often referred to as market cap, is a measure of a company’s value, calculated by multiplying its current stock price by the total number of outstanding shares. It represents the total market value of a publicly traded company and is used to determine its ranking among other companies.
Decentralized Social Networking – Decentralized social networking refers to the concept of distributing control and ownership of social media platforms among its users rather than a central authority. It aims to provide users with greater autonomy and the ability to customize their online experiences, including the content they see and the algorithms that drive recommendations.
ActivityPub – ActivityPub is a decentralized social networking protocol that allows different platforms to communicate and share content with each other. It enables users to interact across multiple platforms while maintaining control over their data and privacy.
Large Language Models (LLMs) – Large language models are AI models trained on vast amounts of text data to generate human-like text. These models have revolutionized natural language processing tasks, such as language translation, chatbots, and content generation. Nvidia’s H100 chip powers many of these LLMs, making it a crucial component in the AI industry.
