#37: Adam Menges — Lobe: Machine Learning Made Simple

Microsoft's Adam Menges—founder at Lobe.ai and a former Apple employee—on helping people build intelligence into their apps by making it simple and understandable, his unconventional education, having death present, regret avoidance, grit, and his daily routine for note-taking, file management, meditation, and much more. Adam is a product designer, entrepreneur, and engineer located in San Francisco who specializes in Artificial Intelligence and visual programming languages. He spent time working for both Apple and SendGrid before starting his own company, Lobe, which was acquired in late 2018. Adam is continuing his work on making machine learning more accessible, and researching applications of the technology for video effects. You can contact Adam to find out more at adammenges.com, and reach out to him at [email protected] and +17204840285. Favorite quotes "You wake up in the morning, you reach over to the side of your bed, grab your laptop, and then you go until you're tired and have to go to bed." [22:40] "In order to be wildly creative, in order to increase your creative capacity, you need to be able to see the effect of what you're doing in real time." [24:31] "No one can actually context-switch, even if you think you can multitask." "[Lobe] gives you a springboard to understand what's happening behind the scenes and go for the research elsewhere." "If you are reminded five times a day that you're going to die, it makes each day much more meaningful." "All right, I'm never goin to be the smartest person in the room but I'll outwork everyone, and that'll be me." "You can do anything you set your mind to do. Don't hold yourself back." "If it becomes addictive then the technology is not invisible. It's very present." "The mission of Lobe is to make machine learning simple and understandable for those who are not machine learnists—those that don't code." Books Grit by Angela Duckworth The Rise of Superman: Decoding the Science of Ultimate Human Performance by Steven Kotler Einstein: The Life of a Genius by Walter Isaacson Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers Links AdamMenges.com SendGrid Lobe.ai SmartGeometry CSU University NVIDIA Titan X graphic card Machine learning (concept) ReLU (rectified linear unit) (concept) TensorFlow ResNet ImageNet image database Grasshopper Visual programming (concept) Hacker Paradise Mirrorless cameras Direct manipulation Bear (app) Oak for unguided meditation by Kevin Rose (app) We Croak (app) [34:05] Markdown Love Story Yoga in the mission CrossFit Widget tweet from Adam's countdown Spark AR Instagram filters Shaders (concept) All Birds Statistical death Flow Deliberate practice vvvv (visual programming language) The Future of Programming by Bret Victor (talk) Media Behind the Tech with Kevin Scott The Creative Brain (movie) Abstract: The Art of Design (documentary series) People mentioned Samantha Walker Kevin Scott, Microsoft's CTO Bill Gates Jonathan Ive Markus Beissinger Mike Matas Angela Duckworth Elon Musk Steve Jobs Lindsey Menges Bret Victor Cal Newport Chapters 0:00 · Teaser 1:16 · Intro 2:15 · An unconventional education and avoiding context-switching 4:30 · SendGrid 5:38 · Apple 6:26 · The beginnings of Lobe 7:39 · The machine in my apartment 9:20 · A consumer tool 10:13 · The origins of Lobe 12:17 · Projects people built with Lobe 12:32 · Wind tunnel simulation 15:06 · Parents autoplaying audio books 15:53 · Tracking dolphin migration patterns 16:59 · Is Lobe a black box? 18:53 · Joining Microsoft: From three remote workers to eighteen employees 19:49 · Early days of Lobe: How it was to start the company 21:04 · What do you miss? Building Lobe while traveling the world 22:10 · Visual programming and immediate feedback 22:47 · Photography 23:31 · Direct manipulation 23:58 · Adam's daily routine 25:45 · Meditation 26:20 · CrossFit and Yoga 27:00 · The goal of meditation and focus 27:33 · Distractions and notifications 28:02 · Screen time 29:31 · Death and regret avoidance 31:21 · Habits to have death present 32:51 · A death countdown 33:36 · A file system to be present 34:05 · How many days do you have left? 34:20 · Calculating your statistical death 35:11 · Analog activities 35:43 · Keeping in touch online 37:01 · Grit 41:09 · The Grit Scale: Angela Duckworth's work on grit as an indicator of success 45:19 · Forgetting past fears and struggles 46:52 · Deliberate practice 47:57 · Custom-made clothing 51:39 · Connect with Adam 52:15 · Books 52:37 · Media recommendations 53:22 · A purchase of $100 or less 53:58 · Success 54:24 · Role models 54:42 · A message to the world 54:50 · A healthy relationship with technology 55:38 · Ideas: When and where do you get them? 55:59 · Creativity: What makes you more creative? 56:21 · Slowing down 56:34 · Simple 56:54 · Intuitive 57:13 · Your mission 57:24 · How will artificial intelligence and machine learning impact our lives? 58:35 · Outro I'd love to hear from you. 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