Pulley, a startup funding tracker used by companies to manage cap tables, is shutting down after seven years of operation. The company, which raised over $50 million, will cease operations after December 8, with rival Carta helping transition customers and offering them discounted pricing for one year.
Chang'an during the Tang Dynasty (particularly 710 CE) was a massive gridded city with six major avenues of varying widths, from 82 feet at the narrowest to 492 feet for the Imperial Way, which facilitated fire containment and connected the southern gates to the northern palace complex. The city's hierarchical layout reflected cosmological principles and imperial authority, with nested districts (outer walls, imperial district, and palace district) oriented toward the south to receive foreign dignitaries.
The author explores how AI technologies like Waymo's autonomous vehicles remove the friction of human interaction, causing us to overlook the hidden benefits of that friction. Drawing parallels to research collaboration, the piece warns that similar frictionless AI tools are quietly eroding collaborative practices in academia, as researchers opt for convenience without recognizing what is being lost.