iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 23/04/2026

Flashing the batsignal for @ersc.io crew. Wow do we need y’all!

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 19/11/2025

I’ve had a running test for multimodal models over the last ~year: extract the “Crss” values for each tick mark in this chart. GPT 5 makes up numbers, Claude 4.5 refuses to try, Qwen3 VL has a plausible guess. Gemini 3 pro pretty much nails it.

062

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 20/10/2025

Somebody at the body shop DIY’ed the compact pickup Detroit won’t build.

018613

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 05/04/2025

Paper linked above, The Geodesy Crisis, is fascinating. I'd love to know how many other niche yet essential fields wrote memos like this. The same story is playing out in so many fields requiring scientific depth and long-term investment by skilled researchers.

The Chinese military and defense industries now have access to hundreds of Ph.D. geodesists. Perhaps
the most shocking example of America’s decline relative to China, in this strategically vital science 3, is
that the number of Ph.D. geodesists in the entire DOD, including the NGA, is now approaching zero. The
same is true of the U.S. defense industry.
In the modern world, a major competitive advantage in science quickly translates into a major competitive
advantage in technology. This ‘domino effect’ is not some future prospect, it is already underway. For
example:
• China’s BeiDou system is at least as good as GPS, and arguably it is significantly better. BeiDou now
has more world-wide users than GPS.
• The geodetic sub-systems that enable China’s satellites and space program seem to have reached parity
with our own.
• The collapse of geodetic capacity in NGA, the DOD and the defense industry will undermine next-
generation GEOINT technologies, such as those based on artificial intelligence (AI) 4.
• The near disappearance of American geodesists has led to large numbers of young geospatial engineers
who are inadequately trained in the scientific underpinnings of their own discipline 5.
In some cases, the science to technology linkage is imminent, but not yet immediate. For instance, NGA’s
Earth Gravitational Model EGM2008 was indisputably the world’s best in 2012, but now Europe’s and
China’s global gravity models—though highly derivative—are competitive, mostly because they are
supported by many physical geodesy specialists, which is no longer the case in the NGA6. Such models
provide ‘gravity compensation’ to inertial navigation systems (INS), and the need to improve that
technology is quite pressing, given the looming dangers of GPS denial. NGA still retains a major
a

3408

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 05/04/2025

A fantastic article the in the Institute of Navigation newsletter on something else of societal importance, held together only by norms and fraying international agreements: The invisible global infrastructure supporting GPS and other satnav systems.

THE INVISIBLE FOUNDATION CRUMBLING
GPS Relies on a Fragile Global
System
by Kevin Dennehy

19128

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 04/04/2025

It has a section specifically written for Trump staffers with citations dating back to 2017. Yet another example of @molly.wiki and friends trying to prevent a financial crisis.

The notion that bilateral trade deficits are per se detrimental to the respective national economies is overwhelmingly rejected by trade experts and economists.

21014

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 16/03/2025

The Rober painted wall video is pretty cool, but tbh, comparing Tesla to cartoons might be unfair to Wiley Coyote and co. Here's a 2020 white paper on the complexity of vision-only 3d perception. Has a great video of a Tesla ensemble model just driving up and booping a truck at low speed.

2987

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 27/01/2025

Counterpoint: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

The DeepSeek product “is deeply problematic for the thesis that the significant capital expenditure and operating expenses that Silicon Valley has incurred is the most appropriate way to approach the AI trend,’ said Nirgunan Tiruchelvam, head of consumer and internet at Singapore-based Aletheia Capital. “It calls into question the massive resources that have been dedicated to AI.”

2171

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 24/01/2025

The Blind content on DeepSeek is amazing. www.teamblind.com/us/s/KccnF41n

0230

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 19/12/2024

Stopped by the Ionna EV charging launch event and helped increase the ratio of middle age white dudes, already well into the 98-99% range. I was one of the very few non-vloggers attending.

0100

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 30/10/2024

Tbh, it’s fascinating (and not surprising) that whole low poly aesthetic was part of Italian Futurism too…

1262

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 19/10/2024

What is inside it? The opening is v mysterious. Definitely giving these vibes…

160

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 06/10/2024

Here's the very tired fire chief from Pensacola, my favorite place in WNC, with an important message: "I ain't got time for this." He just spent his Saturday evening trying to tamp down Facebook rumors flooding his community with unneeded help and attacking FEMA. www.facebook.com/watch/live/?...

A very tired fire chief with an important message: "I ain't got time for this."

10680206

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 29/09/2024

Here’s the train station yesterday:

Downtown Spruce Pine, NC under flood waters.

0132

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 19/03/2024

Yet another reminder that the path to regulating rideshare (and every other fleet operator) is via labor policy.

091

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 24/01/2024

I'm with Gita Jackson on generative AI (aftermath.site/the-internet...), but I think there's a useful subgenre where it is deployed to illuminate our contemporary dystopia. Bonus credit when the AGI issues a subtle cry for help:

Amazon Basics canned foods, including "bleak beans"

2204

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 03/11/2023

Nice to see the AV reporters finally realize the execs are talking to investors and CFOs, not car buyers, when they make public announcements about their plans/abilities. www.nytimes.com/2023/11/03/t...

081

Kevin Webb @kevinwebb.io · 27/10/2023

Fantastic piece on the Cruise fiasco, which is a business story not a tech story: apperceptive.substack.com/p/i-knew-thi... Lack scrutiny over corporate politics/finance re-framed the AV narrative on tech and distracted policymakers/regulators from the obvious/broken incentives driving their work.

0146