Seeking collaborators to build hardware devices for biosecurity or AI safety

Would anyone be interested in collaborating to develop an EA-aligned hardware product? As a side project, or potentially with the goal of launching a non-profit or startup.

If that sounds interesting to you, or if you’d just enjoy discussing ideas, feel free to grab a meeting with me some time in the next week at the calendar link below. Happy to chat with anyone!

https://cal.com/stevet

My own background is in mechanical engineering. I’ve got about 8 years of experience joining small hardware startups to shepherd new IoT devices through R&D and design-for-manufacturing, and then building out supply chains for them at factories in the US and overseas.

Some complementary skills might be electrical engineering, firmware development, software development, operations, and sales. Even if you're not in one of those fields, please feel free to reach out. If you're on the fence about booking a meeting, I encourage you to go for it!

Below are a few ideas I’ve been tinkering with. Very open to other ideas as well.

• “Trustworthy cameras” for AI safety
  • Tamper-resistant cameras for datacenter security (see here)
  • Alternatively: cameras that can vouch for recorded content as “real” and not AI-generated
    • Would apply cryptographic signatures to recorded content, and use multiple sensors (e.g. accelerometers, geolocation, ToF) to verify imagery
    • For use by journalists, law enforcement, and other applications that are sensitive to misinformation
• Home air filters that are optimized for CADR
  • Stealing this idea from Jeff Kaufman’s post
  • It might look something like a version of this Wirecutter favorite redesigned for standard MERV 13 filters.
• A simple open-source PAPR design that can be manufactured rapidly in the event of pandemic
  • Designed to rely as much as possible on manufacturing that can be easily scaled with relatively short lead times (e.g. injection molded parts, standard off-the-shelf motors, 18650 Li-ion cells, etc)
  • There may be some grant funding available for developing a design like this.
  • OTOH, there are also some existing designs, and perhaps minimal room for improvement.