MIT says AI makes us dumber

Plus: Wix spends $80M on vibecoder; Scale AI loses customers

Joey Padgett
June 23, 2025

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Welcome back to Forests Over Trees, your tech strategy newsletter. It’s time to zoom-out, connect dots, and (try to) predict the future.

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What’s up: A new MIT study (not yet peer-reviewed) suggests regular use of ChatGPT may erode critical thinking, especially for younger, developing brains. Researchers asked 54 people to write SAT-style essays with either ChatGPT, Google Search, or no assistance. Those using ChatGPT showed the lowest brain activity across 32 EEG regions and performed worst on linguistic and memory measures — especially over time, as they relied more on AI.
So what: I don’t doubt the results of the study, but the interpretation lacks nuance…. Of course brain activity goes down for essay writing itself! The purpose of using tools to make things easier is that they become easier (calculators make math easier too!). But when you make the basic stuff easier, you can take on harder problems. That said, I fully believe that there’s deeper learning when you learn fundamentals without tools (i.e. basic math before calculators), so I’m not saying the impacts on education and childhood development aren’t real…

What’s up: Scale AI says it will remain independent after Meta invested $14.3 billion for a 49% non-voting stake. Co-founder Alexandr Wang has left to lead Meta’s new artificial superintelligence (ASI) lab, taking a few employees with him. Interim CEO Jason Droege emphasized Scale’s continued commitment to serving multiple clients and staying model-agnostic. Meanwhile, OpenAI and Google are reportedly winding down partnerships with Scale following the Meta deal.
So what: As much as Scale tries to argue they are still independent, they aren’t. Meta only stayed below 51% to avoid regulatory scrutiny on the acquisition, but they are effectively in control of Scale now. For Google and OpenAI, there’s too much IP and competitive intelligence at stake in the AI race between them and Meta for them to stick around… (for context: Scale helps its customers generate and label AI training data for model development).

What’s up: Wix acquired Israeli startup Base44 for $80M in cash just six months after launch. The vibe-coding platform, built by Maor Shlomo and a small team of eight, had reached 250,000 users and $189K in monthly profit. While not a true “solo unicorn,” Base44’s bootstrapped rise and product-market fit drew major attention. Wix gains a profitable LLM-powered no-code builder, while the team receives $25M in retention bonuses.
So what: No-code platforms like Wix are absolutely under threat by vibecoding apps like Cursor, Lovable, Replit, etc. Nocode and vibecode both appeal to non-coders and speed things up, but vibecoding is 10x faster/easier. So on the surface this acquisition makes sense… but it feels like an underwhelming response to the size of the threat! If Wix — founded ~20 years ago with 5,000+ employees — is serious about pivoting to stay relevant, it’ll take more than 8 people from a tiny AI startup to do it.

What’s up: Meta unveiled Oakley Meta smart glasses, starting at $399 and geared toward athletes. The $499 limited-edition version launches July 11, offering 3K video, 8-hour battery life, and IPX4 water resistance. Features include open-ear audio, Meta AI integration, and support for phone calls and translation. This builds on the success of the Meta Ray-Ban smartglasses, and is part of Meta’s goal to sell 10M smart glasses annually with EssilorLuxottica by 2026.
So what: It still breaks my brain to think of Meta as a hardware company, but it’s undeniable that they’re leading the smartglasses race right now thanks to this brilliant partnership. That said, I’m glad they’re not resting on their laurels — under the hood, these new Oakley glasses are way better than the 2023 Ray-Bans (battery life doubled, camera quality way up from 1080p, and water resistance to make them more rugged).

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Top startup cities in the world — pretty cool visual here, and I’m proud to see Los Angeles in the top 5!

World’s best coder talking about AI — Absolutely loved this talk from Andrej Karpathy. He’s one of the best coders of all time, so it’s helpful to hear his 50,000 foot view and advice on how to navigate software 3.0.