Podcasts

China has been a tough market to crack for U.S. internet companies. One of the key reasons is China has its own crop of hugely successful and highly innovative companies. Andreessen Horowitz’s Chris Dixon, Connie Chan and Benedict Evans highlight the key players in China, and what non-Chinese companies can learn from them. Where Chinese companies and money are headed next.

a16z Podcast: China and Tech

On today’s show and thanks to one of our loyal listeners, I was able to finally meet up with Elizabeth Rossiello. Elizabeth is an American living and working in Kenya. She has worked as a microfinance analyst and investment associate since 2009. She is an expert in East African financial product development and she is the CEO and Co-Founder of BitPesa. BitPesa is the next logical step after mpesa and if you have no idea what I’m talking about, then stay tuned because this is a great interview.


CREDITS:

Links for the charities:
Tunapanda Institute
Contact: Jay Larson Jay@tunapanda.org

R.O.C.K
Contact Jason Lee  JLee1782@gmail.com

Heshima Kenya
Contact Tracey Hagman tracey@heshima.org

To get in touch with BitPesa:  info@bitpesa.co

Ode To Satoshi

Ode to Satoshi lyrics & melody by John Barrett
Copyright 2014 RJM Publishing - BMI Nashville. 

Lead Vocal, Harmony Vocals, Harmonica, Snare Drum: John Barrett
Harmony vocals: John Barrett, Connie Sinclair and Lij Shaw
Guitar: Jonathan Brown
Mandolin: Ben Miller
Bass Guitar: Michael Rinne

Initial tracks recorded by Mark Thornton of Sidekick Sound Studios, Madison, TN.  All other tracks Recorded, Mixed and Mastered at The Toy Box Studio, Nashville, Tennessee
Engineer: Lij Shaw. Assistant to engineer: Don “The Don” Bates
Produced by John Barrett & Elijah “Lij” Shaw
 
Special thanks to Alex Munoz Guijarro for his excellent pedal steel playing on many of our shows.

Interviews for this episode were edited and produced by John Barrett at The Tree House Studio - East Nashville, Tennessee.

Theme song “Gravy” by the band, Eleanor Roosevelt with Lij on fiddle.

Special thanks to Alex Munõz Guijarro for his excellent pedal steel playing on many of our shows.

Interviews for this episode were recorded and edited by John Barrett at The Tree House Studio - East Nashville, Tennessee. All shows are produced by John Barrett with the moral support of his trusty sidekick Maxwell Rascalnikov CoyoTe Rex, aka Max.

Theme song “Gravy” by the band, Eleanor Roosevelt with Elijah “Lij” Shaw on fiddle.

And a big thank you for moral support from my good friends at The Tennessee Bitcoin Alliance:
TennesseeBitcoin.org
 
Questions or Comments?

Bitcoins and Gravy Hotline: (615) 208-5198
Listeners . . . listen up! Call this number and say something funny, sing a song, read a poem or just rant! Or if you’d rather you can ask me a question, leave a comment, make a suggestion or record a complaint! If I like what you say I’ll put it on the next show!

Email me to say Howdy!: howdy@bitcoinsandgravy.com

Visit theWebsite: BitcoinsAndGravy.com

Bitcoins and Gravy Tipping Addresses:

Bitcoin: 1ByqQXLTm9JZGSwnfqCCakaifBt3grQkXS
Litecoin: LgqYgxLTBPgr8C1JGLLJVLK4ZN1fveprAp

And if you don’t feel like contacting me, just kick back, relax and enjoy the show. 
I hope you enjoy listening to my guests as much as I enjoy talking with them!


Bitcoins and Gravy Episode #46 BitPesa for Remittances and Spending!

There are a couple of seemingly contradictory memes rolling around the deep learning field. One is that you need a truly epic amount of data to do interesting work. The other is that in many subject areas there is a ton of data but it's not just laying around for data scientists to snarf up.

On this week's Structure Show podcast, Enlitic Founder and CEO Jeremy Howard and Senior Data Scientist Ahna Girshick address those topics and more.

Girshick, who is our first guest who's worked with Philip Glass and Björk on creating music visualizations, said while there may be scads of MRIs, CAT scans, x-rays created -- they're typically used for their primary purpose -- to diagnose your bum knee, and are then squirreled away in some PACS system never to see the light of day again.

All of that data is useful for machine learning algorithms, or would be, if it were accessible, she said.

Girshick and  Howard agreed that while deep learning -- the process of a computer teaching itself how to solve a problem -- gets better with more data, there's no reason to hold off working with it for data become available.

"While more data can be better I think this is stopping people from trying to use big data inappropriately," Howard said. He cited a recent Kaggle competition on facial key point recognition that's  using 7,000 images and "the top algorithms are nearly perfectly accurate."

The reason companies like Baidu and Google say you need mountains of data is because they have mountains of data available, he said.  "I don't think people should be put off trying to use deep learing just because they don't have a lot of data."

Enlitic is using deep learning to provide medical diagnoses faster and help provide better medical and outcomes for millions of underserved people.

It's a fascinating discussion so please check it out -- Girshick will speak more on what Enlitic is doing at Structure Data next month.

And, if you want to hear what's going on with Pivotal's big data portfolio, Derrick Harris has the latest. Oh and Microsoft makes a bold play for startups by ponying up $500K in Azure cloud credits starting with the Y Combinator Winter 2015 class. That ups the ante pretty significantly compared to what Amazon Web Services, Google and IBM offer. Your move boys.

No, you don't need a ton of data to do deep learning

A social media mistake for the record books, and a quiet saint of Wikipedia. 

Reply All from Gimlet Media

#14 The Art of Making and Fixing Mistakes

Many of the most successful companies have their foundations in university labs -- from data science to the web browser itself. Yet the process of moving from research project to successful startup isn't always straightforward. With the goal of smoothing this process and continuing to bridge entrepreneurs across academia and industry, we began the a16z Professor-in-Residence program just last year. And this year's newly anointed Andreessen Horowitz Distinguished Visiting Professor of Computer Science is Dan Boneh, Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University as well as Co-director of the Stanford Computer Security Lab.

In this episode of the a16z Podcast, we sit down with Boneh to chat about applied vs. theoretical math and computer science; what's missing and what's next with "usable" security (including various authentication approaches); and current and future trends in cryptography, bitcoin, and more. Boneh also shares his thoughts on MOOCs (massive open online courses) as the "21st century version of the textbook". Oh, and on when quantum computing will finally happen... and why we should (and shouldn't!) freak out about it. Yet.

---

The views expressed here are those of the individual AH Capital Management, L.L.C. (“a16z”) personnel quoted and are not the views of a16z or its affiliates. Certain information contained in here has been obtained from third-party sources, including from portfolio companies of funds managed by a16z. While taken from sources believed to be reliable, a16z has not independently verified such information and makes no representations about the enduring accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation.
 
This content is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. References to any securities or digital assets are for illustrative purposes only, and do not constitute an investment recommendation or offer to provide investment advisory services. Furthermore, this content is not directed at nor intended for use by any investors or prospective investors, and may not under any circumstances be relied upon when making a decision to invest in any fund managed by a16z. (An offering to invest in an a16z fund will be made only by the private placement memorandum, subscription agreement, and other relevant documentation of any such fund and should be read in their entirety.) Any investments or portfolio companies mentioned, referred to, or described are not representative of all investments in vehicles managed by a16z, and there can be no assurance that the investments will be profitable or that other investments made in the future will have similar characteristics or results. A list of investments made by funds managed by Andreessen Horowitz (excluding investments and certain publicly traded cryptocurrencies/ digital assets for which the issuer has not provided permission for a16z to disclose publicly) is available at https://a16z.com/investments/.

Charts and graphs provided within are for informational purposes solely and should not be relied upon when making any investment decision. Past performance is not indicative of future results. The content speaks only as of the date indicated. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, prospects, and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others. Please see https://a16z.com/disclosures for additional important information.

a16z Podcast: Crypto, Security, CS, Quantum Computing, and More with Our New Professor-in-Residence

Tom Blomfield becomes the second of GoCardless' original cofounding team to join Ben for a podcast in the last couple of weeks. Tom is building Mondo, a bank that is challenging the high street incumbents. In this episode, Tom talks about the challenges of applying for a banking licence,  
shares some tips for first time entrepreneurs, and explains why opening banking APIS are - at the moment - rubbish. 

0030 It's Mondo's first birthday next month! Feel free to send them a cake in the post. 

0130 So far, the reaction to Mondo has been overwhelmingly positive. Why do you think this is? It used to be difficult to get people excited about banking! 

0230 Tom explains why most high street current accounts are rubbish, and why Mondo is better. 

0340 According to Tom, your current account should be a 'home screen app'; and users should feel as comfortable using it as they do on Google, Facebook or Twitter.

0415 How does Mondo attract consumers? 

0612 Tom compares to cost of customer acquisition between high street banks and Mondo... 

0700 Last year it was reported that Mondo were applying for a banking licence - when are you due to get your hands on one?

0825 Why are Mondo applying for a banking licence? Lots of so-called 'challenger banks' aren't actually banks... why is Mondo going through all of this effort?

1000 What is a 'bank in a box'?

1050 Tom tells the story of how and why he got involved with Hiroki and Matt at GoCardless

1350 Experience is very important, and Tom now has three businesses under his belt. In light of his previous successes, Tom shares some tips for first time founders... 

1630 Why do Mondo run hackathons? And should more banks run hacks?

1800 Tom explains that most banking APIs lead to dummy data... he also explains why this is rubbish, and why Mondo's API provides access to real data. 

2300 How can I get a Mondo card?





Podcasts

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