What's Real And What's Garbage In Tech - EP 56 Peter Barrett

Peter Barrett got a visit from the NSA at 19 after writing some encryption software that caught their attention. And that was just the warmup. The Playground Global GP helped build the original WebTV browser, spent 13 years as a distinguished engineer at Microsoft working alongside Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer, and gave Elon Musk his first Silicon Valley tech job at Rocket Science Games in the early '90s. Now he runs one of the few VC firms where partners actually understand the physics of what they're funding, with quantum computers, superconducting logic, and programmable mRNA therapeutics being built inside their Palo Alto headquarters, which was a former Fry's Electronics that was a cannery before that. Barrett digs into why Jensen Huang is wrong about quantum computing timelines, why humanoid robots are mostly hype (and which robotics companies actually ship product), how AI coding assistants make you faster until they make you want to throw your laptop out a window, and why putting data centers in space requires technology that doesn't exist yet. We also cover the coming collapse of advertising-based business models as AI agents start doing our browsing, Australia's bizarre position as a scientific powerhouse and his genuinely hopeful case for why the next five years could bring breakthroughs in everything from cancer treatment to doubling the productivity of photosynthesis. Subscribe to watch more Core Memory videos    / @corememoryvideos   Check out our podcasts    / @corememorypodcast   https://www.corememory.com/podcast Find Ashlee Vance at www.corememory.com   / ashlee.vance   https://x.com/ashleevance Find Kylie Robison at https://x.com/kyliebytes   / kylie.robison   Chapters 00:00 Intro 01:17 Inside the Former Palo Alto Fry's 02:22 Silicon Valley’s Agricultural Roots 03:10 Playground Global’s Deep Tech Lab 04:15 Underwriting the "Impossible" Technical Risk 05:34 When the NSA Visited Peter 09:39 Software Piracy and Learning Code 11:40 Developing Apple’s First Video Codecs 12:58 The Greatest Video Game Company That Never Quite Made It 14:18 Elon Musk’s First Valley Internship 18:45 WebTV, Microsoft, and Lessons Learned 22:40 Why Microsoft Missed the Mobile Revolution 25:50 Rare Memories of Gates and Ballmer 29:46 Why Software Can't Eat Everything 35:08 Quantum Computing’s Impending Reality 39:27 Solving Global Chemistry with Quantum 48:46 The Agentic Web Kills Advertising 01:02:21 Humanoid Robots: Hype vs Utility 01:13:06 The Real Truth About Fusion 01:15:51 Superconducting Logic in Deep Space 01:21:09 Re-Industrializing Australia and Global Trade 01:27:33 Engineering Plants to Create Abundance