Victor Amaral

Software engineer, @JohnsHopkins alum, musician, 🇧🇷

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

https://t.co/VJeEMuwci3

[G Jones @gjonesbass]

every time i see a new "create a song from a single prompt" kind of product being rolled out i think about these comments from @David_Rudnick

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

Oh and you can also find the interview I did with Marc by clicking "Blog" at the top of the page and searching for "vja" on May 18, 2026

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

"The problem with music today is that everything is available everywhere all the time, so nothing is special and nothing matters."

Sometimes the access to unlimited music makes it difficult to decide what to listen to

https://t.co/h6cTD9pB0t

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

@HipCityReg Totally agree. I'm almost done going through David Dabner's "Graphic Design School". Are there other references or focus points you'd recommend for a software engineer?

[MrRatable @MRatable]

I just used 4.7 to create an 80 page primer on the history of budget airlines, incredible.
I didn’t read it but Claude made me a three bullet point summary.
I didn’t read that either but Openclaw put it in a markdown file to broaden my context.
I’m getting smarter every day.

[Nostalgia @NostalgiaFolder]

POV: It’s Christmas morning in 2001 and you have no idea you’re playing one of the greatest video games that will ever be made

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

Amazing talk by @jackconte on the evolution of tech and creativity, embracing change, staying optimistic about the future of human creativity, while calling on AI companies to pay creators for training data.

https://t.co/4G3JWoeaSd

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

We're in a tech influencer era. "Founders" are caring more about personal brand than building a good product. They hype up the product, attract VC funding, VCs amplify the hype, and LPs pile in from fomo. As the article puts it, we then end up with "47 AI note-taking apps" 😅

[Boys Club™ @BoysClubWorld]

This week's newsletter is an excerpt from a piece we did in collaboration with @dirtyverse, written by @nardosamengesha <3
https://t.co/tbscgQnL9R

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

😅 great campaign from the Norwegian Consumer Council showing how many modern digital products are getting worse for users over time
https://t.co/NKLsbBrQij

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

@MKBHD If only it had a 5.4-inch instead of 6.1-inch screen #BringBackTheMini

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

This is kind of huge. A model trained on screen recordings learns how humans operate computers. In theory you could prompt: "create a 20-tooth gear with x dimensions," and it would open CAD, click and type through the UI like a human, and produce the CAD model

[Standard Intelligence @si_pbc]

Computer use models shouldn't learn from screenshots.

We built a new foundation model that learns from video like humans do. FDM-1 can construct a gear in Blender, find software bugs, and even drive a real car through San Francisco using arrow keys.

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

So well written. "It did not seem like a good idea to me that some of the richest people in the world were no longer rewarding people for having any particular skills, but simply for having agency". I would add: the ability to provoke controversy and attract attention.

[Harper's Magazine @Harpers]

“In San Francisco the world automatically assumes that instead of wanting food or drinks or a new phone or car, what you want is some kind of arcane B2B service for your startup. You are not a passive consumer. You are making something.” —Sam Kriss (@samkrissfeed)

https://t.co/aYog9dK4uP

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

In an era where #AI can write anything for you, "the scarce input in intellectual production is no longer execution...[but] the disciplined capacity to ask questions that are important".
https://t.co/1fdNjqylfC

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

@stuffyokodraws True. But it's also starting to feel like LLMs are being optimized for engagement rather than goal completion

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

Progress! Bandcamp bans AI generated music. Curious how they will enforce and who will follow suit

[bandcamp @Bandcamp]

We’re articulating our approach to generative AI so musicians can keep making music and fans can trust the music they find on Bandcamp. https://t.co/hRXLd1Q5OE

[Javaid Iqbal @Thinking_Sufi]

India is ending the era of "free" AI training data. My latest for @restofworld explores how India and Brazil are forcing AI firms to pay royalties or lose their biggest markets. This could be the global blueprint for creator rights everywhere

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

It’s not art, it’s pictures. It’s not writing, it’s typing. It’s not music, it’s sound. It’s useful to have alternative names for these new media. How do we secure the arena of human creativity to prevent AI from entering the competition and risk devaluing human generated work?

[Stack Overflow @StackOverflow]

In a world filled with AI slop, what does it mean to make art? 🎨 Eira May explores the causes of the "AI ick" and what it means for human creativity when content can be instantaneously generated—and takes a strong stance in favor of the em dash.

https://t.co/ibYujh6PI5

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

AI is collapsing the boundaries b/w traditional tech roles - designer, engineer, product manager. The new skill is cross-disciplinary fluency - speaking each role's language well enough to direct AI with precision. Good to see academia starting to catch up
https://t.co/V5IEYJlEd0

[Victor Amaral @victorjaml]

The AI Slop Tax "redirects [$$] into individuals, institutions, and projects committed to cultural work that prioritizes human creativity over its computational imitation" 💯
We need legislation to protect human creativity, model collapse, mental fatigue
https://t.co/kpnotOuVa0