Logo
Search
Log in
Subscribe
Oliver Buchannon
Anirudh Sharma

Building systems, breaking illusions, and sharing learnings.

From 50,000 Dimensions to 384: Compression That Powers AI

From 50,000 Dimensions to 384: Compression That Powers AI

How models learn semantic relationships in language

Feb 9, 2026

The $0.002 That Decides If Your AI App Makes Money

The $0.002 That Decides If Your AI App Makes Money

The survival of your AI app depends on your token economics

Feb 2, 2026

Why Non-English Speakers Pay 2x More For LLMs

Why Non-English Speakers Pay 2x More For LLMs

The Invisible Tax of AI Tokenization: Why Non-English Speakers Pay More

Jan 26, 2026

What Happens in the 200ms After You Hit Enter on Your LLM?

What Happens in the 200ms After You Hit Enter on Your LLM?

How your prompt becomes vectors, attention, and text in milliseconds

Jan 19, 2026

The Geometry of Meaning

The Geometry of Meaning

How words find their place in semantic space through push, pull, and careful trade-offs

Jan 12, 2026

The Hidden Order in How We Use Words

The Hidden Order in How We Use Words

How a simple observation about language created modern AI's understanding of meaning

Jan 5, 2026

The Algorithmic Evolution of One Powerful Idea

The Algorithmic Evolution of One Powerful Idea

The 35-year engineering journey that turned a linguistic insight into AI's foundation

Dec 29, 2025

Why Embeddings Confused Me at First

Why Embeddings Confused Me at First

How I stopped seeing vectors as magic and started seeing them as the geometry of meaning itself.

Dec 22, 2025

Tokenization: The First Bridge from Language to Thought

Tokenization: The First Bridge from Language to Thought

Should you build a custom tokenizer? A production decision framework

Dec 15, 2025

Tokenization: Fairness Starts at the Token Level

Tokenization: Fairness Starts at the Token Level

Why Swahili speakers pay 1.8x more than English speakers—and how to fix it

Dec 8, 2025

Tokenization: How Machines Learn Language Fragments

Tokenization: How Machines Learn Language Fragments

From GPT to BERT to T5 - the algorithms that learned to speak 100 languages

Dec 1, 2025

Tokenization: Before Words Become Numbers

Tokenization: Before Words Become Numbers

How the invisible step before training shapes model intelligence, costs, and fairness.

Nov 24, 2025

Caching: Mastery and Advanced Ops

Caching: Mastery and Advanced Ops

Uncover the sources of cache inconsistency, its impacts, and hands-on strategies to measure and mitigate it for reliable systems.

Nov 17, 2025

Caching: Mitigating Inconsistencies

Caching: Mitigating Inconsistencies

Uncover the sources of cache inconsistency, its impacts, and hands-on strategies to measure and mitigate it for reliable systems.

Nov 10, 2025

Caching: Memory Management, Eviction, and Common Pitfalls

Caching: Memory Management, Eviction, and Common Pitfalls

Keeping Your Cache Lean and Mean

Nov 3, 2025

Caches Lie: Consistency Isn't Free

Caches Lie: Consistency Isn't Free

Caching Fundamentals and Core Patterns

Oct 27, 2025

Lessons Beyond B-Trees: Embracing Systems Thinking

Lessons Beyond B-Trees: Embracing Systems Thinking

Exporting B-Tree Wisdom to Caches, Queues, and Distributed Architectures for Real-World Wins

Oct 20, 2025

When 1,000 Threads Hit the Same B-Tree

When 1,000 Threads Hit the Same B-Tree

Databases don’t just store data in B-Trees - they update them concurrently at massive scale.

Oct 13, 2025

Trade-offs Inside B-Trees: Tuning for Real Hardware

Trade-offs Inside B-Trees: Tuning for Real Hardware

Every byte you leave empty, every split you delay, and every page-size decision trades space, latency, and bandwidth - here’s how to choose.

Oct 6, 2025

B-Trees Aren’t Trees — They’re Bandwidth Optimizers

B-Trees Aren’t Trees — They’re Bandwidth Optimizers

The Hidden Design Principle That Makes B-Trees Endure

Sep 29, 2025

The Main Thread

Principles over hacks. Systems over shortcuts.

© 2026 The Main Thread.
Report abusePrivacy policyTerms of use
beehiivPowered by beehiiv