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John Carmack

@ID_AA_Carmack4.2M followers

AGI at Keen Technologies, former CTO Oculus VR, Founder Id Software and Armadillo Aerospace

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Oct 16
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Posts 89 posts
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1Apr 15, '23I still get nervous even for other people’s rocket launches. The knowledge that all your work could go up in a giant explosion is a special kind of frisson. But for everyone that h32.7×8.1M20k1.3k78
2Dec 17, '22I resigned from Meta, and my internal post got leaked to the press, resulting in some fragmented quotes. Here is the full thing:31.5×7.8M22k2.6k2.1k
3Jul 17, '24I’m sad to see the glee that some on the right have at the opportunity to deploy cancel culture over post-assassination-attempt comments. I’m a hard core free speech advocate, and 20.7×5.1M6k334569
4Mar 18, '23From a DM, just in case anyone else needs to hear this.13.8×3.4M19k3.5k2.5k
5Feb 26, '24“Coding” was never the source of value, and people shouldn’t get overly attached to it. Problem solving is the core skill. The discipline and precision demanded by traditional prog11.1×2.8M17k2.5k4.5k
6Apr 10, '25I have never seen it expressed exactly like that, but I wholeheartedly endorse it: Feedback beats planning. My plea at Meta was “No grand plans, follow the gradient of user value”.11.1×2.7M10k1.3k1.9k
7Apr 13, '24I regret not doing more to support and defend @PalmerLuckey at Facebook. We were in different states and divisions, and I was largely out of the political loop, but when I became a10.6×2.6M7.7k5541.2k
8May 7, '24Act on press This is a UI design hill I will die on, and it dismays me how often and hard I have had to fight for it. Almost all interaction methods have a “press” and “release” ev10.6×2.6M6.2k6681.6k
9Jul 18, '20Someone noticed that when you have hundreds / thousands of cores in a supercomputer, the individual utilization boxes in Task Manager start to look like pixels. People started maki10.0×027k7.3k659
10Oct 10, '23Be an Open Source Absolutist! It is hard to overstate how much value Open Source Software has added to the world, and how broadly empowering it is. Operating systems, development t9.8×2.4M8.5k1.7k873
11Mar 9, '23I don’t think I had ever seen the term “malinformation” — something that is true, but likely harmful from some points of view. It popped up twice today in different contexts, and I9.8×2.4M3.4k294139
12Jan 9, '23When I first started getting successful in my 20s, I went through a period where I loaned money to anyone that asked me. Well into six figures went out — “emergency” expenses, star9.2×2.3M6.8k342625
13Oct 2, '23This is written without any wild eyed fear mongering, and I like some of the historical perspectives, but he is clearly a statist. He previously worked in government, expresses con8.8×2.2M4.6k550691
14May 4, '23Last week, when my Uber driver asked where I had been and I said “watching a rocket launch”, she lit up with excitement, because she had watched it online. She was from Kenya, and 8.7×2.1M6.1k255162
15Apr 27, '23Last night I downloaded Quake III Arena on Steam. I always looked back at it as my favorite Id game, but it had been many years since I had actually played it. There are a few poli8.5×2.1M11k606272
16Jun 16, '25I never saw an official video, so here is my little bit from the induction of Quake into the Strong Museum’s World Video Game Hall of Fame last month.8.3×2.1M7.6k831774
18Jan 2, '24It is exciting that Argentina has elected a hard core libertarian, but I am almost completely ignorant about the situation there — any good pointers for English reading to get up t7.0×1.7M5.7k437640
19Feb 21, '24The AI behavior guardrails that are set up with prompt engineering and filtering should be public — the creators should proudly stand behind their vision of what is best for societ6.3×1.6M11k1.4k927
20Mar 11, '23The fact that sealed bottled gardens can last for decades with trivial effort makes it hard for me to credit the idea that space colony ecosystems will be extremely difficult to su6.3×1.5M3.6k264419
21Jul 20, '24Tesla full self driving has made significant strides in the last year, and I am feeling very confident about this bet. I have made multiple two hour drives without touching the whe6.1×1.5M5.5k454656
22May 2, '23I don’t feel it, and I don’t think it is rational, but I do see it. The zeitgeist of the thought leaders does tend negative. I remember waving my flag of technological optimism in 6.1×1.5M4.2k503340
23Nov 4, '25I appreciate how Grok doesn’t sugar coat corrections.5.7×1.4M4.2k445243
24Jan 21, '24Considering that muffin tops are the best part, it occurs to me that in zero gravity on the ISS, you could bake spherical muffins that are “all top” by just floating a ball of doug5.3×1.3M6.5k337245
25Dec 4, '22I love seeing game crossovers — totally supportive of Doom Slayer in Fortnite!5.1×019k1.2k295
27Aug 4, '21A troll was trying to get a rise out of me yesterday, suggesting that I should somehow feel bad about Elon's success after my failed aerospace venture. I can't overstate how alien 4.8×019k723107
28Aug 23, '21Starbase is extremely impressive. There is a lot of bemoaning that we culturally can't build physical things anymore, but this is China Speed and then some. Rows of engines, hangar4.5×017k1.1k211
30Feb 10, '24I have a bar of titanium and a bar of silver in the refrigerator to give Trista a visceral demonstration of how thermal conductivity changes the perception of temperature.4.2×1M4.3k180418
31Jun 19, '24I occasionally consider the people that have gained more wealth by just getting into bitcoin / nvidia / etc at the right time than I have through my entire career of diligent work 4.1×1M5.8k263639
32Sep 4, '23The annoying beep from smoke detectors when their battery is low can be very difficult to localize because the audio HRTF (head relative transfer function) gets much of the informa4.1×1M3.4k170306
33Feb 16, '23I find it surprising that Windows considers it an acceptable default to just reboot users’ machines after applying an update in the middle of the night.4.0×990k6.5k30678
34Apr 11, '23By my mid 20s I had made some conclusions about myself like “I’m not a higher math guy” and “I’m not a Unix guy”, and I have let them color my work for decades. I work with math an3.9×971k3.8k229475
35Sep 21, '20Great! I think Microsoft has been a good parent company for gaming IPs, and they don’t have a grudge against me, so maybe I will be able to re engage with some of my old titles.3.8×012k1.7k83
36Apr 20, '23Wow. That was really something! The entire building was shaking! Enormous levels of competency at SpaceX.3.7×923k5.5k24392
37Jun 18, '25A chunk of this is just @Project2501_117 dressing me in tighter shirts, but I did put on several pounds of muscle this year after switching my random grab bag of vitamins and suppl3.7×904k6.9k1891.1k
38Oct 17, '24Surprising stat — general anesthesia for healthy patients has five times the fatality rate of bungee jumping or skydiving.3.7×903k8.8k4671.6k
40Jan 24, '25I am always bemused by programmers that don’t use debuggers. It isn’t just about breakpoints and examining variables, but also being able to break into a process that has been runn3.3×808k4.7k1931.1k
41Feb 18, '25For ages, the sophisticated nihilistic view has been that shrinking the federal budget is hopeless because it is dominated by politically untouchable entitlements. The possibility 3.2×790k6.5k442429
42Jul 3, '23Bigscreen Beyond feels like a prop for a futuristic movie, but it works! Far and away the smallest and lightest PC VR headset.3.1×773k4.9k310317
44Jun 26, '25I like em dashes, and I hate that some people now take them as evidence of text being AI generated.3.0×742k7.1k499239
45Apr 22, '23It is 18 months after Connect 2021, and my $10k bet that “Roblox will not be surpassed in revenue by a decentralized, web based metaverse” is handily won. Does anyone know Shaw Wal2.9×722k3.7k161153
46Oct 17, '23Playing a virtual reality game with remote friends through a satellite internet connection from a solar powered off grid location that you drove to in your electric car does indeed2.9×715k6k327198
47Jun 6, '23If anyone from Apple wants to send me one of the new headsets, I’ll do a thorough review and offer suggestions. 😀2.8×703k6.6k24581
49Dec 4, '23I was helping with some C code yesterday and got a bunch of errors — I hadn’t put a semicolon on any of the lines. I’m writing too much python code!2.7×659k4k130107
50Mar 15, '23With all the GPT4-will-change-everything hype and fanfare happening now, it is worth mentioning that I just had to deal with some rural contractors that DIDN’T HAVE EMAIL ADDRESSES2.6×652k4.3k317139
51Mar 1, '24I was continuously distressed at Meta over how few people in the VR org would actually talk to customers using the products, or even read the app reviews and user voice comments th2.6×637k4.3k337515
52Jan 17, '23A candle produces roughly the same amount of energy as a resting human — 80 to 100 watts, also consuming about the same amount of oxygen and producing the same amount of CO2. In an2.5×626k3.5k244251
53Jan 13, '25When I was at Meta, I asked the hardware team what I should read to learn the details of modern consumer HW development so I could work more effectively with them. The consensus wa2.4×598k4.3k1551.7k
55Dec 3, '24I’m concerned to see Pat Gelsinger ousted as Intel CEO. He wasn’t a firebrand visionary, and it wasn’t exactly going great, but he was deeply technical, and I don’t expect his repl2.4×592k5.7k347419
56Jun 10, '25Translucent UI is usually a bad idea outside of movies and non-critical game interfaces. The early moments of joy are fleeting, while the usability issues remain. Windows and Mac h2.3×580k6.8k545644
57Nov 8, '22It is interesting how multiple polls show that most respondents think Twitter will likely be somewhat better in the future, but the conversation on Twitter itself is dominated by c2.3×08.3k42577
58Aug 21, '20So, 50 years old now. I am down a point of Str and Dex from my younger days, but I'm a more capable engineer than ever. I'm noticing more people in their 70s that seem sharp and sp2.2×08k44981
59Nov 12, '22It is hard for people today to comprehend how slow an original IBM PC was. By some measures, a 4090 is a billion times faster, which means a PC working continuously for 40 years co2.1×06.8k652406
60Feb 6, '24For the last several years at Id Software, almost all of my coding was inside a single monolithic codebase, with the utilities integrated. Visual Studio was a delight to work with.2.0×506k4k210580
61Jun 5, '23I spent *hours* today debugging something that turned out to be a single wrong letter in the code: a .ge() should have been .gt(). Beginning programmers sometimes despair when debu2.0×489k4.2k246162
62Jun 24, '23AAA game dev often does a lot of analytics around where they lose players, and how “stuck” they get in various places. Amazon could provide similar info for kindle books, and autho1.9×480k3.4k130181
63Nov 9, '24Someone should make a proxy system to simulate mars latency and projected bandwidth and start figuring out how to make effective use of the internet from mars. Good hobby project. 1.9×467k4.1k206673
64Oct 14, '24A couple years ago, I made a $10k bet with a random developer about adoption of a distributed metaverse vs Roblox. It took a little prodding, but despite the account recently disap1.8×445k7k136290
65Nov 11, '17Anyone that has me on too high of a pedestal should see me fumbling around with git.1.7×04.9k1.2k4
66Aug 23, '22I do not have “magical” discipline and focusing ability — I struggle with distractions like everyone else. Often it is better to just remove the option to distract yourself instead1.7×04.8k412918
67Oct 16, '18I had been considering writing something along these lines myself. I'm surprised how many people are so eager to see @elonmusk brought low. I admire him.1.7×06.1k61023
68Dec 11, '17My kids asked me if I had heard of a YouTuber named Weird Al Yankovic.1.6×05.4k8561
69Aug 19, '22I mentioned this in the Lex interview, but it is official now: Keen Technologies, my new AGI company, has raised a $20M round, led by @natfriedman and @danielgross, with @patrickc,1.6×05.1k362355
70Jan 15, '21It is @Wikipedia 's 20th anniversary today. It is hard to remember from today's perspective how viciously the idea of a publicly edited encyclopedia was mocked by many traditional 1.5×05.2k67034
71Nov 25, '24I didn’t realize the old @joerogan episodes were back up on YouTube, presumably after the Spotify terms lapsed. Meta was super nervous about having me on the show back then, and st1.5×373k4.3k100286
72Aug 19, '20I still feel pretty good about the commencement speech I gave a few years ago:1.5×04k393560
73Mar 14, '19It is true, I incorrectly recalled the tenth digit of Pi.1.4×04.3k92226
74Nov 14, '19<cracks open diet coke, fires up Visual Studio>1.4×04.9k43341
75Nov 19, '20The spinal cord has about the same number of neural connections as the optic nerve — to your brain, all of your body from the neck down is worth about one eye.1.4×04.7k380153
77Jan 8, '20Just ordered a couple 1TB thumb drives for $30 each. I still find myself awestruck by tech progress -- I desperately wanted a 10MB hard drive for my IIGS as a teen, but didn't have1.4×04.6k48346
78Feb 19, '25Loading the sodas into the refrigerator will add heat to the room more energy efficiently than the space heater, because it will act like a heat pump as it cools them down. Yes, th1.3×330k4.2k139431
79Dec 2, '19It is Quake 3’s 20th Anniversary today. I still have one of the trade show launch props in my garage.1.3×04.2k62021
80Dec 18, '20Forgive me the dad-brag, but my son got a perfect SAT score on his first try, and I am very proud of him!1.3×05.5k3723
81Sep 20, '24I passed by a cool lounge with an extensive collection of old books. I browsed the shelves and started to pull one down. They… they… GLUED ALL THE BOOKS TOGETHER! I was APPALLED!1.3×311k6.2k219155
82Sep 7, '20If a future Neuralink implant is to allow bidirectional communication between a human and an AI, it is unclear which entity would be the peripheral. Even today's narrow AI can be s1.2×04.3k28865
83Dec 16, '24Drones should blink an ID number on their running lights at 15 baud so two seconds of blurry cell phone footage can identify it. Doesn’t do anything for nefarious uses, but most ow1.2×292k3.9k246255
84Sep 24, '21Something I have been pushing on for years is going to come to pass soon: We are going to make available an unlocked OS build for the Oculus Go headset that can be side loaded to g1.1×03.6k39589
85Mar 15, '21A common mistake I see in UI work is fades/transitions taking too long. UI should work in "game time", not "cinematic time". A transition should happen as fast as an impatient user1.1×03.7k361149
86Jul 19, '20I used to say that AI research seemed to have an odd blind spot towards automation of programming work, and I suspected a subconscious self-preservation bias. The recent, almost ac1.1×03.6k412131
87Apr 22, '21Docker containers are kind of neat. They are also kind of a craven surrender to the rotting mess of excessive software complexity.1.1×03.6k44474
88Nov 11, '24I was reminded recently of one of the more dumb-ass things I have done. In one of the Armadillo Aerospace vehicles we ran an alcohol feed pipe through a liquid oxygen tank. It had 1.1×267k3.6k119278
89Oct 4, '20Hey @elonmusk -- How about Teslas as VR input devices. Add a 'controller mode' that allows a headset to pair with the car to get steering / pedal / switch input. Better than a dedi1.1×04k20152
90Oct 11, '22I’m looking forward to the moon and Mars having indigenous people.1.1×03.8k18729
91Aug 27, '19Heading out to LA to do the @joerogan show tomorrow!1.0×03.6k29211
92Jul 3, '2420 years ago in the space access circles, there was a good bit of discussion about how a reusable launch vehicle would be used once it ate up the entire existing launch industry. S1.0×247k3.7k260274
93Feb 6, '18I know there are decent odds something will go wrong with the @SpaceX launch today, but I'm not really nervous, because I know that even in the worst case, they will clean up the r1.0×03.5k3671
94Feb 13, '25The standard SpaceX / @elonmusk strategy is to simply identify the next obstacle on the critical path and efficiently crush it from first principles, largely letting the problems o0.9×230k3.6k251974
95Jul 31, '21Old programmers instinctively recognize powers of two, but a younger generation of higher level programmers often don’t. I was pleasantly surprised when my young son was considerin0.9×03.4k20259
97Jan 16, '25I recently did a no-internet isolation retreat for a few days, just to see how it felt. I planned ahead for the resources I needed to work, but I kept a tally and saw that I wanted0.9×216k4.2k117252
99Dec 25, '24Merry Christmas everyone!0.4×102k3.6k10814

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