Human creativity and AI are often characterized as being at odds with each other. But as the capabilities of AI grow, so too grow the possibilities for empowering humans in creative endeavors.

This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano speaks with Etsy CEO Josh Silverman about the integration and impact of AI technologies in enhancing the consumer and seller experiences. He shares insights into his journey of scaling technology companies and the evolution of internet technologies, starting with founding Evite. Michael asks Josh how Etsy uses generative AI to keep human connection in commerce and empowering sellers and consumers. Josh shares the challenges and opportunities presented by AI in creative marketplaces, Etsy’s engineering culture, and the future of AI in enhancing online shopping experiences.

Josh Silverman previously served as President of Consumer Products and Services at American Express, CEO of Skype, and CEO of shopping.com, and he held various executive roles at eBay. Josh also co-founded Evite, Inc. where he also served as the company's CEO. He is currently on the board of directors of Shake Shack.

Episode Chapters
(00:00) Introduction
(01:24) Josh Silverman’s Career Spanning The Evolution of Technology: from Internet to AI
(06:16) Etsy’s Mission and AI Integration
(08:36) Enhancing Etsy’s Search and Discovery with AI
(15:27) Empowering Creative Entrepreneurs & SMBs with AI
(16:10) Balancing AI Innovation with Etsy’s Human-Centric Mission
(20:51) Etsy's Engineering Culture and Democratizing Machine Learning
(25:26) Audience Q&A: Creativity, AI Challenges, and Consumer Expectations
(32:57) Closing remarks

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The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see ⁠lsvp.com/legal⁠.

This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Lisha Li, Founder and CEO of Rosebud AI. Rosebud AI allows users to generate video with a few simple prompts by leveraging AI for every aspect of game design. Lisha shares her diverse background from academia to venture capital and acting, leading up to the inception of Rosebud. Michael and Lisha talk about lessons learned when developing consumer AI products and the different iterations of Rosebud AI and its evolution including stock photos and the viral app TokkingHeads.

Lisha is the Founder and CEO of Rosebud AI. She is a former principal at Amplify Partners. Lisha completed her PhD at UC Berkeley focusing on deep learning and probability applied to the problem of clustering in graphs. While at Berkeley she also did statistical consulting, advising on methods and analysis for experimentation and interpretation, and interned as a data scientist at Pinterest and Stitch Fix. She earned her Master of Science in Mathematics at the University of Toronto, with Highest Distinction advised by Prof. Balazs Szegedy in the area of Graph Limits.

Episode Chapters

(00:00) Introduction to Lisha Li and Rosebud AI

(00:47) Lisha Li’s Career: Academia, Acting, VC, and AI

(07:54) The Genesis of Rosebud AI: Creating a Creative Consumer AI Product

(12:14) Navigating Game Development with AI

(17:43) Democratizing Game Creation with Rosebud

(31:20) Building Rosebud's AI-Powered Platform

(35:56) Looking Ahead: The Future of AI in Gaming

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• Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: generativenow.co

• Email: generativenow@lsvp.com

The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see lsvp.com/legal.

One could argue that the model for the news business is broken. So can AI help fix it? This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Sara Beykpour, CEO and Co-founder of Particle. Particle is an AI-driven news platform designed to help people learn exactly what they want to know about what's going on in the world in the most efficient way possible. Michael and Sara talk about the central product role she played for groundbreaking products like Twitter, Vine, Secret, and Periscope, as well as why she started Particle and how AI could help make new business models work for publishers.

Sara has been on the forefront of creating novel media platforms throughout her entire career. She has built and launched three apps that set the stage for today’s multimedia social landscape online: Vine, Secret, and Periscope. She previously worked as Twitter’s Senior Director of Product Management, leading Twitter Blue, Twitter Video, and conversations.

Episode Chapters

(00:00) Introduction to Sara Beykpour

(00:58) Sara's Journey Through Silicon Valley's Startups

(02:43) The Early Days at Twitter and the Birth of Vine

(06:42) Vine's Impact, Decline, and Shutdown

(12:21) From Vine to Secret (Anonymous Social Media)

(14:45) The Periscope Era: Live Streaming's Rise

(21:47) Exploring the Evolution of Social Media and News Consumption

(22:26) The Impact of Twitter on News and Journalism

(27:57) Challenges and Innovations in News Consumption

(32:14) The Rise of Generative AI and Its Effects on News Publishing

(33:26) Leveraging AI in Particle for a New News Experience

(46:15) Exploring New Business Models for Journalism with AI

(49:28) Opportunities With Particle

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• Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: generativenow.co

• Email: generativenow@lsvp.com

The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see lsvp.com/legal.

Cerebras recently announced the launch of The Wafer Scale Engine Three. This is the largest and fastest chip in the history of chips.

This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Andrew Feldman. Andrew is the CEO and cofounder of Cerebras, the hardware company that builds AI supercomputers known for its Wafer Scale Technology. The Wafer Scale Engine Three is about the size of a dinner plate and promises compute design for AI. Andrew and Michael talk about what it takes to have the conviction to make big bets and push the limits of hardware innovation.

Prior to Cerebras, Andrew co-founded and was CEO of SeaMicro, a pioneer of energy-efficient, high-bandwidth microservers. SeaMicro was acquired by AMD in 2012 for $357M. Before SeaMicro, Andrew was the Vice President of Product Management, Marketing and BD at Force10 Networks which was later sold to Dell Computing for $800M. Prior to Force10 Networks, Andrew was the Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Development at RiverStone Networks from the company’s inception through IPO in 2001.

Episode Chapters
(00:00) Welcome to Generative: A Deep Dive into AI Supercomputing
(00:26) The Wafer Scale Engine 3
(00:56) Andrew Feldman's Journey: From Startup to AI Supercomputing Pioneer
(04:53) The Foresight in AI Chip Development: Outpacing the Giants
(07:32) The Wafer Scale Engine 3: A Technological Leap in AI Compute
(17:12) The Future of AI Compute: Expanding Horizons and Synthetic Data
(23:18) Challenges in Chip Design
(23:51) Innovations in Cooling and Powering Chips
(25:02) Overcoming Precedent Challenges
(26:40) The Revolutionary Impact of Wafer Scale Engine 3
(29:08) Diverse Customer Applications
(34:05) Future Directions in Chip Technology and AI Applications
(39:11) Closing Thoughts

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When the world of AI feels so dramatically new, it’s hard to look anywhere except toward the future. But previous examples of technological innovation can teach us a lot about building public trust and collaboration.

This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Verity Harding, one of TIME magazine’s most influential people in AI. Her debut book is AI Needs You: How We Can Change AI's Future and Save Our Own. She points to moments like the Space Race, the development of IVF, and the internet as inspiration for today’s potential regulatory framework for AI.

Verity is the Director of the AI and Geopolitics Project at the Bennett Institute of Public Policy at Cambridge. She also runs the tech consultancy Formation Advisory. She previously directed policy for Google DeepMind and worked for Deputy Prime Minister the Rt Hon Sir Nick Clegg.

Episode Chapters
(00:00) Introduction to Verity Harding

(01:36) Verity Harding's Transition from Politics to Google DeepMind

(08:28) AI Needs You: Unpacking the Book's Message

(11:43) Building Public Trust and Engagement in a Polarized Environment

(20:34) Advice for Builders Who Don’t Want to Decelerate

(24:11) Who are the Stakeholders of AI Governance?

(36:06) AI and the Future: Optimism, Challenges, and the Path Forward

(41:18) Closing Thoughts and Where to Find the Book

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What if AI could understand what we, humans, are feeling? This week on Generative Now, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Alan Cowen, CEO & Chief Scientist of Hume AI. Hume creates empathic AI that learns our preferences from our vocal and facial expressions. Their goal is to maximize our happiness and quality of life. Hume is now announcing their API for EVI, Hume’s Empathic Voice Interface.

The conversation covers Cowen's journey from being a researcher to founding Hume AI, the importance of emotional intelligence in AI for quality human interaction, and the potential to transform user experiences across various apps and devices. Plus, we ask how empathic AI could impact the road to AGI.

Episode Chapters
(00:00) Introduction to Alan Cowen & Hume Demo

(01:38) The Genesis of Hume AI: From Research to Startup

(04:01) Affective Computing and Its Impact

(10:55) Hume AI: Bridging Human Emotions and Technology

(15:37) The Future of AI: Beyond Text to Empathic Interactions

(20:37) Introducing EVI: Empathic Voice Interface

(21:46) Real-World Applications of Empathic AI

(31:19) The Potential Role of Empathic AI in Achieving AGI

(36:53) Trust and Privacy

(40:02) Opportunities with Hume AI

(41:18) Closing Thoughts

Stay in touch:

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• Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: generativenow.co

• Email: generativenow@lsvp.com

The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see lsvp.com/legal.

AI news moves fast. But reporters covering AI move faster. This week on the podcast, Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to journalist Alex Heath about predictions for independent model companies, the conversation around training data, and how journalists are adapting to AI disruptions. Alex Heath is the Deputy Editor of The Verge and the author of Command Line, a weekly newsletter about the tech industry’s inside conversation.

Episode Chapters

(00:00) Introduction to Alex Heath

(1:20) Inside the AI News Cycle

(6:41) Covering OpenAI and Meta Rebrand Breaking News

(10:14) Top of Mind Trends: Databricks, Perplexity, Meta

(13:35) Google’s AI Strategy and Gemini Fallout

(20:25) Second Order Effects of Microsoft’s Inflection Deal

(24:02) Journalism Adapting to AI & Future of Industry

(32:08) What’s Beyond SEO?

(36:19) The Value of Content in Training

(38:10) Elon Musk’s X and Grok

(41:11) Closing Thoughts

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• Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: generativenow.co

• Email: generativenow@lsvp.com

The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see lsvp.com/legal.

Imagination becomes a reality when building the design tools of the future. This week on Generative Now, we’re talking with someone who has been tinkering with AI and design for about ten years. Lightspeed Partner and host Michael Mignano talks to Jordan Singer, Product Designer at Figma, about how Figma acquired his startup Diagram, what it’s like building AI tools at Figma, and how the role of designers is evolving.

Episode Chapters

(00:00) Introduction to Jordan Singer

(01:19) Jordan Singer's Journey from Coder to Designer

(09:27) Creating the Experiment that Became a Startup

(14:10) Leaving Square to be CEO & Founder of Diagram

(22:09) Figma's Acquisition of Diagram

(30:24) Designers as Creative Directors in the AI Era

(37:14) Other Areas of Interest in AI

(40:41) Closing Thoughts

Stay in touch:

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• LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/lightspeed-venture-partners/⁠

• Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/lightspeedventurepartners/⁠

• Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: ⁠generativenow.co⁠

• Email: generativenow@lsvp.com

The content here does not constitute tax, legal, business or investment advice or an offer to provide such advice, should not be construed as advocating the purchase or sale of any security or investment or a recommendation of any company, and is not an offer, or solicitation of an offer, for the purchase or sale of any security or investment product. For more details please see ⁠lsvp.com/legal⁠.