HBO comedy Silicon Valley has been a breakout hit. Delving deep into the inner-tech world of Silicon Valley, California, the show follows a group of developers as they try to take their revolutionary software into the big leagues. Every cog in the SV tech wheel is parodied, from the over-confident incubator to the reclusive engineer, the eccentric VC to the laid-back yet money-hungry lawyer. If you’ve ever heard a stereotype about the California tech hub, this show has given it a good send-up.
Related: Stream Silicon Valley on Amazon now
While the show is fictional, it’s a little too accurate to be completely ungrounded in reality. Keen-eyed viewers will notice some striking similarities between some of the characters — not to mention companies — and real-life tech personalities. We’ve outlined six characters from the show that are, at the very least, loosely based on real-life tech entrepreneurs.
Silicon Valley airs every Sunday at 10 p.m. ET on HBO. The third season debuted on April 24, 2016.
Note that there will be a few spoilers.
Some of the best shots in Grok Imagine’s AI-made Odyssey don’t contain actors. Ancient landscapes stretch into the distance. Close-ups of grimy hands suggest people who have touched something rougher than a keyboard. For a few seconds, the illusion holds.
https://twitter.com/imagine/status/2113712964419063911
YouTube videos could soon look better without eating quite so much data, right? Thankfully, the platform plans to introduce a new video format called AV2 on its web player in early 2027, promising more efficient streaming and potentially fewer playback hiccups on slower internet connections. The big headline is a roughly 30% improvement in compression efficiency over AV1, YouTube's existing video format. That doesn't guarantee every video will use 30% less data, but it could make streaming a little easier on both internet connections and data allowances.
What is AV2, and why should viewers care?
YouTube is changing how its Home page works, giving viewers more control over what shows up there and making some of the app’s most-used sections easier to reach. Custom Feeds are now replacing the existing topic chips for eligible users, while YouTube is also testing a redesigned top bar on mobile that moves Subscriptions closer to the Home feed.
YouTube first started experimenting with Custom Feeds earlier this year, letting you type out what you wanted to watch and turning that request into its own stream of recommendations. Now, the feature is starting to look less like a side experiment and more like something YouTube actually wants people to use as part of their everyday Home page.