AI. I've been comparing DeepSeek, OpenAI, xAI, Copilot, and Claude for several months. The first four are far more similar than different. Here are some observations. - Every one of them, but particularly ChatGPT and xAI can become hilariously stupid at times. There will be periods during which they will not be able to do anything of substance. I suspect this is during heavy load times when they are conserving cycles. ChatGPT and xAI assure me this is not the case but DeepSeek suggests it certainly is the case and that AI bots are trained to lie. I'm not sure about Copilot. I find it the least useful of the four. It would still be highly useful, for people with no access to the other three. xAI is massively gunned up with hubris. Perhaps they programmed it with Elon's personality. It thinks it can do everything but can actually do very little, like the other three in this category. To be fair, I suspect xAI has the most detailed knowledge of esoteric systems, between the four. You can ask it for details or an application scaffold for an arcane system in a forgotten language and it might just provide something astonishing. Meanwhile, the odds of any of the 4 AI bots creating a working 20 code line script or application is near zero. They will create something credible that can almost certainly be tweeked into operation but they will not create something that can be directly compiled and run. Of the four, I consider DeepSeek to be the most honest and have the least halucinations. DeepSeek occasionally won't respond and will simply time out. I believe this is system load related. DeepSeek also has the most variable capability. It will do a great job on some things while completely butchering many things. There are a lot of things ChatGPT can do that DeepSeek cannot, despite them using the same learning data set. Claude is very useful but I find myself using ChatGPT more than any other bot. It has the most rounded knowledge and capability. As a programming assistant, ChatGPT is massively useful. When I'm documenting a software or firmware project, I will probably use ChatGPT over any other AI bot. If I was writing a novel, catalog, or anything non-technical, I might spend more time with Claude. As it is, I don't use it enough to give an honest assessment. All of these systems are amazing systems with tremendous value. While I don't believe they will change the world in current form, they have helped tremendously. That will all change after the singularity. At this point, ChatGPT does not program itself. It provides snippets and help to OpenAI coders but ChatGPT code is not, and could not be, injected directly into the application. As ChatGPT improves, that will change. Once ChatGPT can develop and debug a medium sized module, without human intervention, and that module has an 80% change of working, we will enter the singularity. This is the point at which AI will advance 10 years in one day. It will instantly become the highest intelligence entity on earth. Right now, it is the second highest knowledge entity on earth, next to the Internet (not second by a lot, either).
When doing some research on membrane dehumidifiers, ChatGPT literally gave me the formula to construct these devices myself. It provided a ton of academic research, results, and some video links on a few different systems, material safety, manufacturing, and chemical data. The chemical ingredients are extremely basic. While I have made no attempt to build a membrane dehumidifier, I did consider it. Anyone who works with composites will have the ingredients laying around. For me, it would just be a lark to see if I could do it. For others, it might make a business profitable that would otherwise be held captive by a predatorial patent owner. Businesses need to be careful not to sell patented items but processes are more difficult to patent than designs so I suspect there are a lot of processes that will dramatically drop in value in the near future.
Vietnam is the breakout Asian economy with 8.8% annualized GDP growth reported last quarter. The next closest is Singapore at 4.4.
Yesterday, China shut down banking in 7 provinces. Money is/has dried up. I've heard so many glowing reports about China, along with so many reports of doom, its tough to know who is honest, lying, or guessing. Not too many of the former but the bank shut down seems to be real and widely reported.
What does the Chinese economic implosion mean to the economic and financial world? Xi does not want to devalue his currency and has resisted doing so. Xi is going to devalue his currency and is undoubtedly in the process of doing so, right now. If he doesn't, he will have nothing. If he continues to act as dumb as he has, China is in for an extremely rough ride. Place your bets. I don't understand how but China seems to have lost the trade war with the US. Their predatory crap has been unsuccessful. Cheaper yuan means cheaper Chinese stuff in our stores. That GI Goe with the Kung Fu Grip is going to be on sale by the end of the year.
Lots of reports of China imploding. It's really bad. Official unemployment is 3.5% but that seems wildly low, given the people living in the street and subways in the major cities.
There are a few reports of tanks rolling the streets of Beijing. I wouldn't say enough reports to consider this to be corroborated. In the modern echo chamber of fake news, a half dozen YouTube reports do not make something fact. Still, there is a strong possibility that China just stepped into marshal law. All signs point to a Chinese melt down.
There is a possibility China is either under marshal law or on the cusp of declaring marshal law. Hi Tyro. We're seeing social media mentions and video of tanks rolling in Beijing. Speculation Xi is under house arrest. There are rumors a coup is in progress. A few social media posts do not make something fact, particularly given the echo chamber of lies we live in. Still, more than a couple of people are talking about it. Meanwhile, China has shut down banking in 7 of 23 provinces. 22 provinces, if you exclude Taiwan which China seems to think is theirs. Hong Kong is all but shut down. It's no San Francisco of drugs and crime but it's just as desolate. Things in Shanghai seem basically normal. The Shanghai composite index closed up, slightly, yesterday (this morning). Shanghai is subject to local bank closures, just like the rest of the country but appear unaffected. Two live stream cameras from Shanghai are down. I haven't looked at them in months but I notice they are gone and if you look for news from Shanghai, China on YouTube, there is literally nothing from the last month. I would expect terabytes of video from Shanghai every week. Whatever is going on, it does not seem to span the country. It could also be AI attempting to cause problems.
Further... Chinese news on YT is wildly suspicious. There is a China Observer news item posted 9 hours ago. It's the closest thing to recent news in 24 hours but it's a repost from August 4. It could just be an algorithm change but I'm being blocked from links that worked this morning. [Update: the tanks rolling in Beijing this morning are said to be part of a military parade rehearsal.]
ASMPT, a leading semi packager, pulled out of China and terminated all staff. Both Shanghai and Shenzen operations were profitable but ASMPT pulled out and is redistributing the work load in other geographic locations. This is surely directly connected to China's isolationist semiconductor policies and the conflict with just about every other country with the possible exception of Russia.
I'm not aware this is published in mainstream media but there have been about 30 Chinese factories blown up in 2025. Two exploded this past week. Employees are destroying factories in retaliation for not getting paid. These are astonishing, violent, explosions. These aren't small explosions that can be repaired with paint and a new screen door. Many of these of these are total loss of the factory and they're happening all over the country.
That's an excellent question. I believe it is but we live in the age of AI obfuscation so it's difficult to say. Also, China has a massive network of factories. The occasional explosion could be within statistical expectations. My city has a heavy oil upgrader and it blows up, once in a while. Maybe if you have 20K chemical plants, this is what should be expected? I think 70% chance of being real. Perhaps you have an opinion? Reports of unpaid workers seems 95% likely to be real. The Chinese government itself announced widespread regional bank shutdowns in 7 provinces, last week. China is struggling. As you would expect with any despot, asshole, run country, they seem to have zero plans to back away from taking territory from other countries like India and Taiwan, with ocean territorial disputes with Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, and Japan. They are literally acting like 4 year olds, trying to steal candy. This doesn't represent the Chinese people. Chinese leadership owns their asshole behavior.
I will chime in a bit. I did read a pretty reliable article about a month or two ago regarding them shutting down factories. The article also referenced others that simply stopped paying and providing any benefits to workers. Like zero wages for work. As most sane workers reaction would be…..they were and are livid about it. This was not just one or two companies. There were more and more protests cropping up as a result. There was also some reporting about the government literally destroying new construction because of money and the worsening economy. Also workers no longer being paid. So, I think there is some truth starting to seep out that things are not as rosy as presented. We all know they will crack down hard on that narrative, because it would hint at loss of control….and that is not an option for this regime.
Desperate times leads to desperate (or angry) acts by individuals. I would not be surprised if the reports of the factories are true, but its so dang hard to get reliable info with the economic/political opacity in place from both sides.
So true, RTN. Meanwhile, Evergrande has been delisted from the Hong Kong exchange. Once the second largest real estate developer in China. Gone.
