Episode 118: Overcoming Hardships, Confident Learning, Dataset Improvement, and The Ph.D. Rapper with Curtis Northcutt

Show Notes

• (01:56) Curtis reflected on his upbringing in rural Kentucky and his gift of education.
• (07:20) Curtis explained how he cultivated mental focus and intellectual fortitude while growing up in Kentucky.
• (10:30) Curtis shared his view regarding online misinformation on social media.
• (14:27) Curtis recalled his undergraduate experience at Vanderbilt University in the early 2010s.
• (22:39) Curtis explained how he learned best via teaching and mentoring.
• (24:04) Curtis walked through the research and industry experiences he obtained throughout college.
• (32:45) Curtis recalled his decision to embark on a Ph.D. in Computer Science at MIT.
• (38:53) Curtis told the story of how he ended up finding his advisor - Professor Isaac Chuang (the inventor of the first working quantum computer).
• (40:36) Curtis mentioned how he invented the CAMEO Detection Algorithm to detect “multiple-account” cheating in massive open online courses.
• (44:47) Curtis unpacked his Ph.D. research on dataset uncertainty estimation.
• (50:08) Curtis dissected confident learning, a family of theories and algorithms for supervised ML with label errors.
• (53:22) Curtis encapsulated how he strategically iterated cleanlab at his various graduate internships.
• (01:00:22) Curtis recalled his time founding his first startup ChipBrain, before founding Cleanlab.
• (01:06:42) Curtis brought up the creation of the labelerrors.com project.
• (01:12:12) Curtis provided lessons learned as a second-time founder.
• (01:14:25) Curtis elaborated on the open-source roadmap of cleanlab.
• (01:17:08) Curtis highlighted the key capabilities of Cleanlab Studio - the no-code, automatic data correction solution for data and engineering teams with robust enterprise features.
• (01:18:50) Curtis touched on Cleanlab Vizzy - an interactive visualization of confident learning.
• (01:20:29) Curtis shared valuable hiring lessons to attract the right people who are excited about Cleanlab’s mission.
• (01:23:23) Curtis gave his thoughts on shaping Cleanlab’s culture.
• (01:26:06) Curtis explained the similarity and differences between being a founder and a researcher.
• (01:29:09) Curtis mentioned how he had helped researchers build affordable state-of-the-art deep learning machines.
• (01:31:46) Curtis brought up his alter ego PomDP the Ph.D. rapper, and how rapping has been an outlet for him to express emotions and creativity.
• (01:40:12) Curtis emphasized how his success had been due to a function of grit, resourcefulness, and friends made along the way.
• (01:44:04) Closing segment.

Curtis' Contact Info

• Academic Website
• LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram
• Google Scholar | GitHub
• PhD Rapper (YouTube | Spotify | SoundCloud | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram)
• L7 Machine Learning Blog

Cleanlab's Resources

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