Alexandr Wang: “This is a Once-in-a-Civilization Opportunity”

章节 1：从洛斯阿拉莫斯到 MIT：Alexandr Wang 创立 Scale AI 之路

📝 本节摘要：

Garry Tan 介绍 Alexandr Wang，并请他回顾少年时期的经历。Alexandr 在新墨西哥州洛斯阿拉莫斯长大，热衷数学和计算机竞赛。高中毕业后，他受朋友影响来到硅谷，间隔一年在 Quora 工作，随后进入 MIT，在那里训练了第一批模型并萌生了 Scale 的想法。一年后他申请并进入 YC，19 岁创立 Scale。他认为在公司工作和在 MIT 自由探索都至关重要，并称赞 YC 既支持创业者，又敢于直言不讳。

[原文] [Garry Tan]: All right, full rockstar treatment for Alexandr Wang, everyone. All right.

[译文] [Garry Tan]: 好，各位，用欢迎摇滚巨星的规格欢迎 Alexandr Wang！好。

[原文] [Garry Tan]: So, why don't we start out... backstage we're saying, you know, one of the cool ways to think about this event is like, you know, this room is actually full of people who are just like us, but when we were 18 or 20 or, you know, there's some 16-year-olds in this audience, you know. Let's jump to your story. I mean, you got it, came up always really smart, like math olympiad. Like, jump us to, you know, the Alex of that time. Like, what were you feeling? What were you thinking? And what drove you down this road?

[译文] [Garry Tan]: 那我们就从这里开始吧……刚才在后台我们还聊到，看待这场活动有个挺酷的角度：这个房间里坐满了跟我们一样的人，只不过是 18 岁、20 岁时的我们，你知道，观众里甚至还有 16 岁的。我们直接进入你的故事吧。你从小就特别聪明，参加过数学奥林匹克之类的。带我们回到当时的那个 Alex：你当时有什么感受？在想些什么？又是什么驱使你走上这条路的？

[原文] [Alexandr Wang]: Yeah, I am... Well, I grew up in New Mexico, Los Alamos, New Mexico, which now Oppenheimer famous, but it really was the middle of nowhere. And I remember I did all these math competitions, all these computer science competitions, but then I knew I wanted to do really big things, and it was like not exactly clear how or what the exact path to do that would be. And I had a friend who was really into programming and, you know, after high school got an internship in the Valley.

[译文] [Alexandr Wang]: 好的。我是在新墨西哥州的洛斯阿拉莫斯（Los Alamos）长大的，现在因为《奥本海默》出了名，但那里当时真的是个偏僻得不能再偏僻的地方。我记得自己参加了各种数学竞赛、各种计算机竞赛，但我知道自己想做真正的大事，只是具体怎么做、该走哪条路，并不太清楚。我有个朋友特别热爱编程，高中毕业后就在硅谷拿到了一份实习。

[原文] [Alexandr Wang]: I think his first internship was at Palantir. And he, you know, he was kind of this influence for me, and so after I finished high school, I ended up working at Quora here in Silicon Valley. And then I worked there for a year. I took a gap year to work there, and then I went to MIT. And this is... I was 19 when I worked at Quora, I was 18 when I went to MIT, and I was 19 when I started Scale. And I remember this period from like 17 to 19, it was... I felt like I was constantly changing, like, you know, exactly what I want to do was constantly changing. You know, I was learning so much just from the people around me, and it was just like I felt like I was drinking from the firehose

[译文] [Alexandr Wang]: 我记得他的第一份实习是在 Palantir。他算是对我产生了影响的人，所以高中毕业后，我就来到硅谷，进了 Quora 工作。我在那里干了一年——我休了一个间隔年去那里工作，然后才去了 MIT。当时的情况是：我在 Quora 工作时 19 岁，去 MIT 时 18 岁，创立 Scale 时 19 岁。我记得 17 到 19 岁那段时间，我感觉自己一直在变，究竟想做什么也一直在变。光是从身边的人身上我就学到了太多东西，感觉就像在对着消防水管喝水，

[原文] [Alexandr Wang]: pretty constantly during that time. And I would definitely recommend, you know, the two things that were really important. One is, I think working at a company was really valuable, because like, I think from the outside in, you have no idea how companies work. You have no idea what it looks like to actually build something. You have no idea what it looks like to iterate on something. You have no idea what it looks like for groups of people to make decisions. And so I thought that was really important.

[译文] [Alexandr Wang]: 那段时间几乎一直是这种状态。我非常推荐两件对我来说很重要的事。第一，去公司工作非常有价值，因为站在外面看，你根本不知道公司是怎么运作的，不知道真正把一个东西做出来是什么样子，不知道迭代一个东西是什么样子，也不知道一群人是怎么做决策的。所以我觉得这一点非常重要。

[原文] [Alexandr Wang]: And then going to school at MIT was actually really important, because it just gave me a lot of opportunity to explore what was interesting. And so it was at MIT that I started training my first models, and that I like played around with TensorFlow, which had just come out that year, at MIT, and where I like ultimately came up with the idea of Scale. And then after one year at MIT, I applied to YC. You know, it felt like kind of like a miracle to get in at that time. And YC was really critical to my entrepreneurial journey. Like, I don't think... like, YC is this amazing blend of, you know, they're very supportive and they obviously want you to succeed, but they also give it to you very real, and they tell you when you're being a

[译文] [Alexandr Wang]: 第二，在 MIT 上学其实也非常重要，因为它给了我大量机会去探索自己感兴趣的东西。正是在 MIT，我开始训练自己的第一批模型，摆弄那年刚发布的 TensorFlow，也最终想出了 Scale 这个点子。在 MIT 读了一年后，我申请了 YC。当时能被录取，感觉简直像个奇迹。YC 对我的创业历程至关重要。YC 是一种很奇妙的结合：他们非常支持你，显然希望你成功，但同时也对你说真话，你犯傻的时候他们会直接告诉你

[原文] [Alexandr Wang]: dumbass, which I think is, you know, that's what we all need in life. So, yeah, that was, I think, the story till then. I was 19, started Scale, and the rest is history.

[译文] [Alexandr Wang]: 你是个蠢货，而我觉得这恰恰是我们人生中都需要的。所以，这大概就是到那时为止的故事：我 19 岁创立了 Scale，之后的事大家都知道了。