screen capture of a presentation agenda with a photo of a painting of a mountain
Published 23 March 2025
e506 with Andy and Michael M – stories and discussion on the attention economy, focus, pirated data used in training LLMs, snarky software and much more.
Andy and Michael M get things rolling with an intriguing article dealing with focus and attention. Part of their reaction was that there are so many competing sources for attention. And that the pressure to respond with speed to these competing sources compounds the challenge. The conversation reminded Michael of a memo that Steve Jobs wrote to his team at NeXT 39 years ago imploring them to have time of uninterrupted individual work. Check that out in the show notes below. Michael and Andy give a couple examples of what they suggest to bring balance and creativity back to the fore.
Continuing on to the advances made with large language models, Andy and Michael take up the discussion on the data needed to train the LLMs. The Atlantic article on the use of pirated books to train AI also includes LibGen, their search tool The Atlantic created for their analysis of the Library Genesis data set. This subject has cropped up in earlier episodes – such as the discussion on the Sarah Silverman example. Next, the team turns to an AI coding assistant named Cursor. After a developer had spent an hour of vibe coding with Cursor, the AI reportedly gave feedback to the developer that he should complete the work himself to ensure he understands the logic and can maintain the code. Computer applications with snark are nothing new – take Carrot Weather or the Talking Moose for example. Cursor’s reply echos practically every geometry teacher who insists that going through the mathematical proof is crucial to understanding why A^2 + B^2 = C^2 is true. Not necessarily a bad idea, yet surprisingly comes from an AI assistant.
After a surprising article about speed runner successes on aging and accelerating Super Nintendo hardware, Andy and Michael reflect on games embedded inside of other games from a How to Geek article. This appeals greatly to Andy’s love of game preservation, and strikes Michael’s fancy for how art echos through the years, sharing a prior incarnation of this topic with paintings having paintings in them.
Then, a story about the LEGO x Pokémon teaser. The team wraps up this episode with a couple of stories about the challenges indy software developers face.
What suggestions and techniques do you have for recapturing your time and attention? Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @gamesatwork_biz@mastodon.social (our home for now) and let us know!
These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot. All rights reserved. That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.
The weekly conversation hosted by Michael Rowe, Michael Martine, and Andy Piper, Games At Work dot Biz, explores the intersection where our digital play and professional lives collide. This isn't just a review show; it's a deep dive into the technology that powers our hobbies, the business behind the leisure, and the cultural news shaping both worlds. Each episode feels like pulling up a chair with three friends who are as passionate about the craft of game development and the evolution of hardware as they are about the pure joy of finding a great new title. You'll hear specific discussions on everything from the latest graphics card impacting performance to the narrative design of an indie darling, all filtered through the lens of professionals who live in the tech space. The Games At Work dot Biz podcast operates on the belief that the games we play and the tools we use are inextricably linked, offering listeners a consistently thoughtful and engaging analysis that goes far beyond a simple score. Tune in for a regular dose of insightful commentary where the serious business of technology meets the serious fun of games.
Author: Michael Rowe, Michael Martine, Andy Piper
Language: en-us
Episodes: 50
Photo by benjamin lehman on Unsplash Published 21 July 2025 e521 with Andy, Michael and Michael – stories about expressive robots (Shoggoth Mini, Apple ELEGNT, SpiRob & facehugger), newly reengineered Commodore & Sinclai…
original photo, by Michael Martine, Sandwich MA June 2025. Animated by Google Veo3 July 2025 Published 14 July 2025 e520 with Michael, Andy and Michael – stories about AI advertising, still photo animation, anime agents,…
Photo by Mike Stimpson on Unsplash Published 30 June 2025 e519 with Michael, Andy and Michael – stories about AI conversations with pets and people, LLM data retention, AI slop, Clippy-esque prompts, AI workloads in spac…
Photo by Boris Langvand on Unsplash Published 23 June 2025 e518 with Andy, Michael, and Michael – stories about Atari adjacent AI, a new Emotiv experience, Midjourney video magic, Bondi blue, visionOS persona improvement…
Photo by Hasnain Sikora on Unsplash Published 9 June 2025 e517 with Michael, Michael and Andy – stories about Atarino microcomputing, AI through movie and television metaphor, AR running, screens and zombies, Skyrim Gran…
Photo by insung yoon on Unsplash Published 2 June 2025 e516 with Michael and Michael – AI prompts, browsers, model collapse & automation along with a teeny tiny pico Mac nano, and a whole lot more. While Andy is away, Mi…
Photo by Mihály Köles on Unsplash Published 26 May 2025 e515 with Andy, Michael and Michael – the Fortnite Darth Vader NPC, IO, both from Google and Open AI, AI hardware, an intriguing Vision Pro use case, infrared conta…
Photo by WTFast on Unsplash Published 19 May 2025 e514 with Michael R and Andy – generative ads & LEGO, Aston Martin x Apple CarPlay Ultra, new Vision Pro UX, an Internet Roadtrip, Leroy Jenkins and so much more. While M…
Photo by Hande B. on Unsplash Published 12 May 2025 e513 with Michael and Michael – Clippy + LLMs, social AI, first person video, Duck, Pong & other games, and so much more. While Andy is away, Michael and Michael start…
Cartoon versions of Andy and Michael M, generated by ChatGPT Published 5 May 2025 e512 with Andy and Michael – E Ink monitors, Agent run companies & towns, winning arguments with AI assistants, pixellating reality and mu…
