Grok-3: New AI Tool Arrives, But Your Strategy Still Matters More

The Cliff Notes

Last week, Grok-3 hit the streets as another AI tool. After conducting some preliminary LLM (large language model) tests, it represents an incremental advance in some areas while retaining many common LLM limitations. Its Thinking Mode effectively addresses certain basic reasoning errors, but core challenges around humor generation, spatial reasoning, and balanced handling of ethical scenarios persist.

Again, there will continue to be more and more new toys and tools released daily, weekly, hourly. The trick is not to get every one of them. Go back to basics, what are you trying to do? Does it address use cases that move the needle for your business? Can you fully maximize the value and extract tangible outcomes that improve the organization? Don’t fall for FOMO (fear of missing out). Be intentional before jumping from tool to tool. Pick ONE and extract the maximum value out of it.

Mistral Saba: Finally, Someone Gets Something Right.

The Cliff Notes

Mistral released a new model called ‘Saba’, which is a first-of-its-kind model trained to provide specialized regional nuance across languages in the Middle East and South Asia. Think about it like this: there’s Arabic, and then there’s the Arabic that people actually speak, slightly (or extremely) differently, in various regions across the world.

The Plot Thickens

This model not only allows like-for-like regional responses but can also translate from one region to another. This is like saying something like a valley girl and translating it for someone in South Boston. Same language, different place. The cultural context is different, the slang is different, hell, even some of the words themselves mean different stuff.

The Ripple Effect

You know we tell it like it is, right? We call the game as we see it, and we don’t get paid for anything we write, or don’t write, in this newsletter. Ready? This is an amazing step in the world of AI. We’ve long called for inclusive, ethical AI training and this is a great first example. For AI to realize even a fraction of its lofty promises, it must work for everyone, everywhere. There’s so much folly in the faux-intellectualism in the trans-humanist views of the AI elite—too much belief that it’ll all just happen and all work out if we achieve machines that are smart enough.

The Cold Hard Truth: this is going to require work, and a LOT of it.

Your Next Move

Pay close attention to this space. We applaud the team at Mistral for this bit of work, and we look forward to joining them as part of a fairer, more ethical AI future.

Our own project, ETHICALENS, aims to take this strain of development one step further, allowing a broader range of cultural contexts to be captured and used to create an inclusive AI future. This isn’t about Silicon Valley; this is about harnessing the tremendous power of AI for you, your organizations, your communities, and for the betterment of life for all.

ETHICALENS revolutionizes product development by bringing diverse perspectives into every stage of creation. Our AI-powered platform analyzes content, marketing, and product features through the authentic lens of different communities, ensuring genuine representation and cultural relevance. By leveraging real-time data from diverse social channels, cultural publications, and community forums, ETHICALENS helps businesses understand and serve their entire audience.

We invite you to be part of this transformative journey. Please join the wait list to secure early access, which will be prioritized for organizations that can benefit most from our platform. For the latest updates and insights, follow us on Bluesky @fusioncollective.bsky.social where we share our development process and vision for an inclusive AI future.

Join us in creating technology that truly reflects and respects the rich diversity of human experience.

Beyond the Goose Chase: AI’s Promise, Peril, and the Path Forward

“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” - James Baldwin

The Cliff Notes

In a world where AI increasingly determines who gets a loan, who receives medical care, and whose resume lands on the hiring manager’s desk, Block’s announcement of Goose isn’t just news - it’s a moment that demands our attention and challenges our consciousness.

In the ever-evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, yet again, a new player has emerged that promises to reshape how we think about AI development and accessibility. Block, under the leadership of visionary Jack Dorsey, has introduced Goose - an open-source AI framework that stands as both a beacon of hope and a mirror reflecting our deepest concerns about the future of technology and humanity.

At a high level, Goose allows a connection between LLMs and real-world (primarily software) actions. So, Goose can act as an Agent that uses the output of LLMs to do other stuff, like writing files, etc. While pretty darn cool, this moment stretches far beyond lines of code and technical specifications. It challenges us to define not just how we build AI, but who we build it for and what world we want it to shape.

The Plot Thickens

The Promise and Paradox of Digital Democracy

Goose represents something profound - a step toward democratizing AI development. Yet, as we celebrate this technological milestone, we must confront an uncomfortable truth: for millions around the world, the promise of AI remains as distant as the infrastructure needed to access it.

Consider these transformative possibilities - and the stark realities that limit them:

Healthcare Revolution: Imagine rural hospitals gaining access to sophisticated diagnostic tools, leveraging AI while maintaining patient privacy through on-premises deployment. But what of clinics operating without reliable electricity? Communities where internet connectivity is a luxury, not a given? The bitter irony is that areas most in need of AI-enhanced healthcare often lack the basic infrastructure to implement it. When a hospital struggles to keep the lights on, how can we expect it to deploy advanced AI systems?

Financial Inclusion: Small community banks could develop AI-powered risk assessment tools that understand local contexts and communities. Yet in regions where basic mobile connectivity is intermittent, where power outages are daily occurrences, these tools remain theoretical. The informal economy traders, the unbanked millions who operate entirely in cash - they remain invisible to AI systems not because their economic activities aren’t valid, but because the digital infrastructure to capture their reality doesn’t exist.

Educational Empowerment: Educational institutions could create personalized learning experiences that adapt to diverse learning styles and cultural backgrounds. But this vision crumbles in communities where schools lack computers, where students share outdated mobile devices, where broadband is nonexistent. The digital divide isn’t just about access to AI - it’s about access to the basic tools needed to participate in the digital age. Moreover, giving a kid an iPad without the support to navigate it is as useless as the number 9 on microwave.

Infrastructure Reality: Before we can talk about AI democratization, we must address fundamental questions:

• How do we bridge the gap when 2.6 billion people still lack internet access?

• What happens when unreliable power grids make cloud computing impossible?

• How can communities benefit from AI when basic digital literacy remains a challenge?

• What about regions where the cost of data makes consistent internet access prohibitive?

Community Empowerment: The promise of tools like Goose must be paired with initiatives that address basic infrastructure needs. True democratization means:

• Investment in reliable power infrastructure

• Affordable and accessible internet connectivity

• Basic digital literacy education

• Support for local technology hubs and training centers

• Solutions that can operate with limited or intermittent connectivity

The digital divide isn’t just about technology - it’s about fundamental human rights in the digital age. Until we address these basic infrastructure gaps, the democratization of AI will remain a privilege of the connected world, not a tool for global empowerment.

We must ask ourselves: How can we ensure that the path to AI democratization includes building the bridges necessary for all communities to cross the digital divide? Without addressing these fundamental gaps, tools like Goose, however revolutionary, risk widening the very inequalities they aim to address.

The Ripple Effect

The Shadow Side: Ethics in the Age of Accessibility

With great power comes great responsibility. Everything from economic opportunity, university admissions, detecting cheating, organ transplants, to insurance applications and everything in between: algorithmic discrimination is impacting people’s lives every day. As someone who has spent years examining the intersection of technology and human progress, I must ask: Are we ready for this level of AI democratization? My immediate answer is NO. And, hell NO for the people in the back.

The open-source nature of Goose, while beautiful in its intention, raises critical concerns. When we lower the barriers to AI development without establishing robust ethical frameworks, we risk amplifying existing societal biases. Incomplete or biased datasets could be used to train AI systems that perpetuate discrimination, all while wearing the mask of technological objectivity.

**The Ethics Gap: A Global Blindspot **

In the constant stream of tech headlines, rare moments emerge that transcend innovation and force us to examine our collective journey. Block’s Goose is one such watershed moment. Let me be direct: while Goose offers impressive technical capabilities, it spotlights a glaring absence in our global AI landscape - the lack of a unified ethical framework that ensures AI serves all of humanity, not just those whose data happens to be included in training sets.

Think about this:

• When an AI system is trained primarily on data from urban areas, what happens to rural communities?

• When facial recognition algorithms are developed using predominantly Western datasets, what about the global majority?

• When medical AI is trained on data from one demographic, who pays the price?

These aren’t hypothetical concerns - they’re playing out right now in real communities, affecting real lives.

The Data Divide: A Modern Crisis

Picture this: A small community bank in rural Kenya wants to use Goose to develop an AI-powered lending system. They have the technical capability now - but where’s their training data coming from? Silicon Valley? Wall Street? How can we expect such systems to fairly evaluate the creditworthiness of farmers whose economic patterns differ fundamentally from Western models?

This is the silent crisis of AI democratization - access to technology without access to representative data perpetuates digital colonialism under the guise of innovation.

Your Next Move

A Bold Vision for Inclusive AI

Imagine if Goose’s release had been accompanied by:

• A Global Data Coalition: A partnership of nations and communities committed to building truly representative datasets

• An Ethical AI Certification: Like Fair Trade for coffee or FSC for timber

• Mandatory Inclusion Metrics: Requirements for documenting and improving dataset diversity

• Community Data Sovereignty: Frameworks for communities to maintain control over their data while contributing to global AI development

We need these structures not tomorrow, but today. Each AI model deployed without them exponentially widens the digital divide.

Looking Forward

As we embrace tools like Goose, we must remember that true progress isn’t measured by technological capability alone, but by how that technology uplifts all of humanity. The framework’s open-source nature and focus on privacy and security provide a foundation, but it’s up to us to build upon it with conscious consideration of ethics and inclusion.

The Path Forward: Your Role in AI’s Future

This isn’t just about technology - it’s about power, representation, and the future of human society. As Maya Angelou said, “When you know better, you do better.” Now we know. The question is: What will we do?

To developers: Document your data sources. Question your assumptions. Seek out diverse datasets.

To businesses: Invest in data collection from underrepresented communities - not as an afterthought, but as a priority because it’s bad business if you don’t. Don’t run away from the words diversity and inclusion. Yes, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DE&I) has been weaponized as an initiative and is currently being systematically dismantled, but the not-so-secret to our success is that diversity is the future of this country and the world. Sticking to math, because it doesn’t have an opinion, diverse markets and women in America are $16.3 trillion of the American $27 trillion GDP—that’s 60% of the US economy. This is the reason why I like math. This is just bad business rejecting the business case of diversity.

If you purely look at the math, do you want more customers or do you want them to go someplace else? Do you want employees who can understand the customer base? Do you want products on the shelf that reflect that?

To policymakers: The time for voluntary guidelines has passed. We need robust frameworks that ensure AI development serves all of humanity.

To everyone reading this: Your voice matters. Demand transparency about the data used to train the AI systems affecting your life.

A Moment of Choice

The release of Goose represents more than a technological milestone - it’s a moment of choice. Will we accept the convenience of building AI systems with whatever data is easily available? Or will we do the harder, more vital work of ensuring our AI systems truly represent and serve all of humanity?

The answer to this question will shape not just our technological future, but the very fabric of human society for generations to come.

Which side of history will you be standing on?

What role will you play in ensuring AI serves all of humanity, not just the privileged few? How can your community’s unique experiences and data contribute to more inclusive AI development? Let’s continue this crucial conversation.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of our ongoing series examining the intersection of AI innovation and human equity. Follow our coverage of global AI ethics and inclusion initiatives and join our weekly round table discussions on building a more equitable AI future.

Taming Quantum Chaos: The Breakthrough That Could Turn Science Fiction into Monday Morning

My heart races with both excitement and trepidation as I share with you, a technological breakthrough that could fundamentally reshape our world. Microsoft’s announcement of Majorana 1, the world’s first quantum chip powered by a groundbreaking Topological Core Architecture, isn’t just another tech headline – it’s a pivotal moment in human history that demands our attention, understanding, and most importantly, our conscious consideration.

The Cliff Notes

The Dawn of a New Era: A Technical Revolution

Before we dive into possibilities, let me break down what makes this breakthrough so revolutionary in a way that speaks to hearts, minds and profits.

Imagine trying to balance thousands of spinning plates on poles – that’s similar to how traditional quantum computers work. Each spinning plate (represents a qubit) is incredibly delicate and can wobble or fall at the slightest disturbance, requiring constant attention and energy to keep spinning. Even a slight change in temperature or a tiny vibration can cause them to crash. This makes building larger quantum computers extremely challenging – it’s like trying to keep more and more plates spinning without letting any fall.

Now, Microsoft’s breakthrough – the Majorana 1 – is like discovering a completely new type of plate that’s naturally more stable – think of it as a self-balancing plate. These special plates (called Majorana particles) don’t exist in nature, but Microsoft has figured out how to create them by combining specific materials in a precise way, similar to how a chef might combine ingredients to create a completely new dish with unheard/unknown ingredients that none of the original ingredients had.

The Topological Core Architecture leverages these Majorana particles to create qubits that are inherently more stable and error-resistant at the hardware level, rather than requiring extensive software-based error correction. This fundamental stability stems from the topological protection of quantum information, making the system more robust against environmental disturbances.

This breakthrough matters because it means we can potentially build much larger and more practical quantum computers – moving from juggling a few dozen delicate plates to managing millions of stable ones. And that’s the scale we need to solve real-world problems that could transform our lives.

The chip’s innovative design uses aluminum nanowires arranged in H-patterns, with each H containing four controllable Majoranas forming a single qubit. This architecture allows for digital control rather than analog fine-tuning, dramatically simplifying the scaling process. Microsoft has already demonstrated eight topological qubits on a chip designed to scale to one million - a feat that would require a facility the size of a football field using conventional approaches.

But what truly shifts the paradigm is the promise of practical scalability. Let me paint you a picture of possibility: Imagine a world where bridges heal themselves, where the scourge of microplastics vanishes from our oceans, where hunger becomes a distant memory through revolutionary agricultural breakthroughs. I keep saying this but - this isn’t science fiction – it’s the potential promise of Microsoft’s new quantum computing technology. By achieving what was once thought impossible – creating and controlling Majorana particles to produce more reliable and scalable qubits – Microsoft has kicked down the door to computing power that could solve problems our most powerful current computers can’t even begin to approach.

Now, you can’t run out and buy one of these things and throw it in your desktop—we’re still a long way away from that. And quantum algorithms and programming frameworks are an entirely different beast. But this was a big enough announcement that I couldn’t ignore not only this development but also the opportunity to remind you all: you need to pay attention.

The Promise and the Business Potential

As I’ve always said, with great power comes great responsibility, and the business implications of this technology are staggering. Let’s look at how this quantum breakthrough translates into tangible business value:

Operational Transformation

The ability to perform TRILLIONS of operations on a million qubits transforms how businesses can approach optimization problems. Supply chain optimization, financial modeling, and resource allocation - problems that currently take weeks or months to solve - could be tackled in hours or minutes. For a global manufacturing company, this could mean reducing inventory costs by 30-40% while improving delivery times by optimizing routing and warehouse operations - in real-time.

R&D Acceleration

The quantum advantage in simulating molecular interactions could cut pharmaceutical R&D cycles from years to months to possibly days. A drug development process that typically costs $2.6 billion and takes 10+ years could potentially be compressed to a fraction of that time and cost. Similar advantages apply to materials science, where quantum-computed simulations could replace years of trial-and-error experimentation.

Financial Services Revolution

Quantum computing’s ability to analyze vast combinations of variables could revolutionize risk assessment, fraud detection, and portfolio optimization. Banks could offer more personalized financial products while better managing risk, potentially unlocking trillions in new economic value.

As for specific transformative applications:

• Environmental Restoration: The ability to break down microplastics and develop non-toxic alternatives could be our planet’s saving grace. Imagine calculated solutions for carbon capture, waste reduction, and ecosystem restoration – all powered with quantum precision.
• Healthcare Revolution: By understanding enzyme behavior at the quantum level, we could unlock new treatments, personalized medicine approaches, and solutions to diseases that have long evaded our understanding. The implications for global health equity are staggering.
• Infrastructure Innovation: Self-healing materials could revolutionize construction, manufacturing, and urban development. Think about bridges that repair themselves, buildings that adapt to environmental stresses, and infrastructure that grows stronger, not weaker, with time.

The Ripple Effect

The Shadow Side: Risks and Responsibilities

This all sounds amazing, technically astounding and mind blowing but we need to pause and reflect on the deeper implications. With every technological leap forward, we must ask ourselves: Who benefits? Who might be left behind? What are the risks we must address?

Security Concerns

The same computing power that could crack environmental challenges could also break current encryption standards, potentially exposing sensitive data and communications. We must proactively develop quantum-safe security protocols to protect our digital infrastructure BEFORE we scale its use.

Bias and Exclusion

This is becoming eerily similar to businesses approach to cloud computing in the beginning, the race to the bottom to swap CapEx for OpEx without thinking through all of the things that need to happen to really derive value and enable business outcomes that move the needle. As we rush toward this quantum future, we must ensure that the datasets and problems we choose to solve represent all of humanity, not just a privileged few. The risk of embedding existing societal biases into quantum-powered solutions is real and must be actively prevented. Without this intentional step, honestly as a Black woman – this is straight up terrifying.

Access and Equity

Will this technology widen the digital divide, or can we ensure its benefits reach all corners of society? The answer lies not in the technology itself, but in our choices and policies around its deployment.

Your Next Move

A Call to Conscious Innovation

What moves me most about this breakthrough is not just its technical achievement, but the opportunity it presents for humanity to do better – to learn from our past and create a more equitable future. Here’s what we must commit to IMMEDIATELY:

1. Ethical Framework Development: We need robust guidelines for all AI use not just for quantum computing applications, ensuring they serve the greater good while protecting individual rights and privacy.

2. Inclusive Development: Diverse voices must be at the table as we develop quantum applications, ensuring solutions address the needs of all communities. The persistent and continued underrepresentation of women and people of color in technical development and decision-making roles within the tech and manufacturing industries is a significant concern. This abject lack of diversity not only perpetuates systemic inequalities but also hinders innovation and inclusivity in product development. Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DE&I) has been weaponized as an initiative and is currently being systematically dismantled, but the not-so-secret to our success is that diversity is the future of this country. Sticking to math, because it doesn’t have an opinion, diverse markets and women in America are $16.3 trillion of the American $27 trillion GDP—that’s 60% of the US economy. This is the reason why I like math. This is just bad business rejecting the business case of diversity. If you purely look at the math, do you want more customers or do you want them to go someplace else? Do you want employees who can understand the customer base? Do you want products on the shelf that reflect that? Business leaders, inclusivity is good business. Do the math and develop with inclusivity in mind (i.e., revenue, revenue, revenue).

3. Environmental Responsibility: As we scale this technology, we must consider its environmental impact and ensure it contributes to, rather than detracts from, our sustainability goals.

Technical Implementation and the Path Forward

For businesses looking to prepare for this quantum future, the roadmap starts now. Microsoft’s integration with Azure Quantum provides a pathway for organizations to begin experimenting with quantum algorithms and hybrid quantum-classical approaches. The platform’s compatibility with existing AI frameworks means companies can start building quantum-ready applications today, ensuring they’re prepared for the scaling advantages of tomorrow.

Key steps for business leaders:

1. Quantum Literacy: Invest in building quantum computing expertise within your organization to understand the pros, cons, and downstream impacts not only across your organization, but your customers and the world.

2. Use Case Identification: Identify and map your most computationally intensive problems that could benefit from quantum advantage

3. Infrastructure Preparation: None of this is going to work if your infrastructure isn’t ready – modernized, secure, resilient and scalable. So, before you go off jumping on the quantum computing band wagon, out of FOMO (fear of missing out), make sure you have a modernized data infrastructure, inclusive of data controls, governance, and security to support quantum-classical hybrid approaches.

We are standing at a crossroads. The power of quantum computing, combined with AI, could either exacerbate existing inequalities or help create the more equitable world we dream of. The choice is ours.

So, let us embrace this technology not just for what it can do, but for what it can mean for humanity when guided by intentionality, wisdom, compassion, and a commitment to the greater good. Let us ensure that as we build this quantum future, we build it for everyone.

Remember, the true measure of any technological advancement isn’t just in its processing power or technical capabilities – it’s in how it serves humanity as a whole. As we step into this quantum age, let us do so with intentionality, humanity at its core, critical minds, and an unwavering commitment to creating a future that uplifts us all.

In the end, the question isn’t whether quantum computing will change our world – it’s whether we’ll be intentional enough to ensure it changes it for the better.

And that is a responsibility we all share.

This is our moment to shape the future. So, let’s do so with wisdom, intention, and an unwavering commitment to the greater good.

The power is in our hands.