Field Notes · 12 Jun 2026
Best explained
Anthropic's vague 'potential serious harm' standard in its data retention policy creates ambiguity for legitimate professional use cases, such as lawyers handling government surveillance litigation, making compliance unpredictable.
By the numbers
Nvidia is testing Intel equipment for producing its next-generation Fineman chip set, with production targeted for 2028.
New today — Evidence added
Affirm's profitable growth without late fees or revolving interest refutes the banking industry assumption that such fees are necessary for lending profitability.
Max LevchinNew today — Sharp calls
Sarah Paine describes sanctions as economic chemotherapy, arguing even leaky ones suppress growth enough to explain the North/South Korea divergence.
Sarah PaineClaude Fable low effort tier will switch to API pricing on June 22nd and will no longer be included in the Max account.
Greg IsenbergNew today — Useful context
SpaceX's S-1 filing frames energy as the core bottleneck of AI.
Tomasz TunguzNew today — Watchlist
The Ukraine Reconstruction Investment Fund (EURF) expects to make three to four more investments in 2026.
Conor ColemanAn AI-run retail store opened in San Francisco on Friday, April 10, 2026.
Sergiy NesterenkoRebecca Hinds plans to track a new metric called 'bot sitting percentage' longitudinally to understand how roles evolve with AI.
Rebecca HindsTool watch
Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are exploring compute futures as a financial instrument to hedge data center exposure, signaling Wall Street entry into AI infrastructure markets.
Worth quoting
“The recovery is not coming if you're not getting AI budget. It ain't coming.”Jason Lemkin
“40 to 41% of employees saying they ship AI work that they couldn't explain if asked. This is bot f***.”Rebecca Hinds
“Trump is like sell you know he's our top salesperson for a defense ETF in Europe.”Jan Van Eck
“Took 30 days. That would've taken years before.”Bobby Healy
“The equity-funded bubble of 2000 is very different than the cash flow funded bubble of today.”Denise Chisholm
“You're spending a trillion dollars a year and the revenue on AI talk about maybe 70 80 billion.”Rajiv Jain