TypeDoc now lets us refer to parts of other files via {@includeCode}. In this blog post, I explain how that works and why it’s useful.

Karina Nguyen leads research at OpenAI, where she’s been pivotal in developing groundbreaking products like Canvas, Tasks, and the o1 language model. Before OpenAI, Karina was at Anthropic, where she led post-training and evaluation work for Claude 3 models, created a document upload feature with 100,000 context windows, and contributed to numerous other innovations. With experience as an engineer at the New York Times and as a designer at Dropbox and Square, Karina has a rare firsthand perspective on the cutting edge of AI and large language models. In our conversation, we discuss:

• How OpenAI builds product

• What people misunderstand about AI model training

• Differences between how OpenAI and Anthropic operate

• The role of synthetic data in model development

• How to build trust between users and AI models

• Why she moved from engineering to research

• Much more

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Brought to you by:

• Enterpret—Transform customer feedback into product growth

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• Loom—The easiest screen recorder you’ll ever use

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Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/why-soft-skills-are-the-future-of-work-karina-nguyen

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Where to find Karina Nguyen:

• X: https://x.com/karinanguyen_

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karinanguyen28

• Website: https://karinanguyen.com/

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Where to find Lenny:

• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com

• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/

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In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) Introduction to Karina Nguyen

(04:42) Challenges in model training

(08:21) Synthetic data and its importance

(12:38) Creating Canvas

(18:33) Day-to-day operations at OpenAI

(20:28) Writing evaluations

(23:22) Prototyping and product development

(26:57) Building Canvas and Tasks

(33:34) Understanding the job of a researcher

(35:36) The future of AI and its impact on work and education

(42:15) Soft skills in the age of AI

(47:50) AI’s role in creativity and strategy development

(53:34) Comparing Anthropic and OpenAI

(57:11) Innovations and future visions

(01:07:13) The potential of AI agents

(01:11:36) Final thoughts and career advice

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Referenced:

• What’s in your stack: The state of tech tools in 2025: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/whats-in-your-stack-the-state-of

• Anthropic: https://www.anthropic.com/

• OpenAI: https://openai.com/

• What is synthetic data—and how can it help you competitively?: https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/what-synthetic-data-and-how-can-it-help-you-competitively

• GPQA: https://datatunnel.io/glossary/gpqa/

• Canvas: https://openai.com/index/introducing-canvas/

• Barret Zoph on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barret-zoph-65990543/

• Mira Murati on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mira-murati-4b39a066/

• JSON Schema: https://json-schema.org/

• Anthropic—100K Context Windows: https://www.anthropic.com/news/100k-context-windows

• Claude 3 Haiku: https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-3-haiku

• A.I. Chatbots Defeated Doctors at Diagnosing Illness: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/17/health/chatgpt-ai-doctors-diagnosis.html

• Cursor: https://www.cursor.com/

• How AI will impact product management: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-ai-will-impact-product-management

• Lee Byron on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lee-byron/

• GraphQL: https://graphql.org/

• Claude in Slack: https://www.anthropic.com/claude-in-slack

• Sam Altman on X: https://x.com/sama

• Jakub Pachocki on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakub-pachocki/

• Lennybot: https://www.lennybot.com/

• ElevenLabs: https://elevenlabs.io/

• Westworld on Prime Video: https://www.amazon.com/Westworld-Season-1/dp/B01N05UD06

• A conversation with OpenAI’s CPO Kevin Weil, Anthropic’s CPO Mike Krieger, and Sarah Guo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxkvVZua28k

• Tuple: https://tuple.app/

• How Shopify builds a high-intensity culture | Farhan Thawar (VP and Head of Eng): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-shopify-builds-a-high-intensity-culture-farhan-thawar

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Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com.

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Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

Get full access to Lenny's Newsletter at www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe



Download audio: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/155278140/29b336399f6f9226d3378537755f1d38.mp3

In this episode, I'm joined by JJ Allaire, founder and executive chairman at Posit, and Carlos Scheidegger, a software engineer at Posit, to explore Quarto, an open-source tool revolutionizing technical publishing. We discuss how Quarto empowers users to seamlessly transform Jupyter notebooks into polished reports, dashboards, e-books, websites, and more. JJ shares his journey from creating RStudio to developing Quarto as a versatile, multi-language tool, while Carlos delves into its roots in reproducibility and the challenges of academic publishing. Don't miss this deep dive into a tool that's shaping the future of data-driven storytelling!

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Download audio: https://talkpython.fm/episodes/download/493/quarto-open-source-technical-publishing.mp3

This quote pretty much sums up what happens to successful people as they grow older. They lose the ability to risk it all. The more successful they are, the more they want to protect what they have. You go from being a creator to a protector/hoarder.

One doesn’t have to look too far — those making headlines these days are too worried about the future, instead of trying to build a better one. It is not just individuals — even companies become a bit more complacent and take fewer chances. And nowhere is it more on display than it is in Silicon Valley, where companies are starting to age and are hampered by their valuations. The former risk-takers have become risk-averse.

For me, the hardest challenge is to unlearn, and be willing to embrace change, however scary it might appear to be. I try and do this every day — whether it is in foods I try, clothing trends I embrace or simply just jumping headfirst into new technologies. And then stress test them against the “meta data” of life, which can also be labeled as “knowledge.”

For whatever it is worth, “The Silent Season of a Hero” is perhaps one of my favorite stories by Gay Talese. It is as much about Joe DiMaggio as it is about all of us who know that someday, the lights will dim, the applause will end, and an eerie quiet will begin.

February 9, 2025. San Francisco

PS: I accidentally published a draft version of this piece, and it got emailed to those who have subscribed to get my posts as emails. My deepest apologies — teaches me a lesson to not use the WP mobile app!=

Apple has released a new app called Invites that is designed to make it easy to create custom invitations for events using an iPhone or on the web. Invites is Apple’s version of Partiful, a popular invitation app that was crowned Google Play’s Best App of 2024.  Invites lets you create and share invitations, RSVP […]

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Consumer demand for alternatives to Big Tech’s social apps is heating up. Alternative social networks like Bluesky and Mastodon are gaining traction with people looking to leave X, while others are building ban-proof TikTok alternatives on open protocols. Similarly, many independent developers are also working on open, decentralized alternatives to Instagram, Meta’s flagship photo-sharing app […]

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