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Codenight Weekly

Edition: 043

Codenight is back with the latest!. This week's newsletter features amazing apps, web projects that defy expectations, and debates that spark innovation. Read it here.

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I am watching a lot of promo everywhere about the new TikTok like app developed for Ethiopians.

I am not sure about the level of investment made by the developer company (Infra Tech).
But, the main challenges are what called network effect, users join because their friends or creators from around the world are already there, and creators join because users are there, so it attract more users, It’s extremely difficult to break this loop When you think at large scale, like to get a million of users.

The second challenge is technical. TikTok is not just app, its AI feed requires advanced tracking, high expertise in machine learning, research, massive data processing, and powerful infrastructure to process all those videos with advanced compression and store for recommendation ,all of which are costly and complex. Trust, safety, moderation, and platform management also become major responsibilities.

So I hope they consider these realities beyond the hype they are creating. If they start with a small community first and scale gradually, we might see a successful social media platform emerge from Ethiopia.

I wish them the best of luck. I just hope they don’t end up delivering only a basic video player app.

If you are wondering to know about the trending conflict between Anthropic (Claude AI) and Pentagon (Department of War) here is the story in short


A few months ago, Anthropic signed a big $200 million deal to let the U.S. military use Claude on secret networks for defense tasks like intel analysis and planning.

Anthropic was actually the first big AI company to put its model on the military's super-secret classified networks. Everyone seemed happy.

Things went well, until the Pentagon demanded: "Remove all your limits. We need to use it for any lawful purpose, no exceptions."

Anthropic said no to two specific things:

- No mass surveillance of everyday American citizens inside the U.S.
- No fully autonomous weapons (AI that picks and kills targets without a human okay)

The Defense Secretary (Pete Hegseth) gave them a Friday deadline: drop those red lines or face consequences. Anthropic's CEO Dario Amodei refused, calling it a matter of safety and rights.

After the deadline passed:
- President Trump ordered all federal agencies to stop using Anthropic's AI (military gets 6 months to switch).
- The Pentagon labeled Anthropic a "supply chain risk" to national security (a tag usually for foreign threats like Chinese firms), blocking military contractors from working with them.
- Anthropic called it unfair and said they'll fight it in court.

OpenAI's response came fast: Hours later, they announced their own deal to put their models on classified DoD networks. CEO Sam Altman publicly said OpenAI shares the same red lines (no mass domestic surveillance, no fully autonomous offensive weapons). The Pentagon accepted their terms quickly.