# Morning brief — comms overnight pass, 2026-05-07 Branch: `comms-overnight-2026-05-06` Work is local-only, not pushed to remote or HF. --- ## Status All four work streams completed. Research memos are in `research/`. Deck is revised (9 slides, built to PDF/HTML/PPTX locally). Submission copy is drafted in `submission/COPY-DRAFTS.md`. Cover image was not auto-generated — a design brief is in that same file with the quickest path (re-export the deck cover slide as PNG). One verification item remains open before submission: the Mellea 4/4 claim on slide 05. There is a branch-state anomaly to be aware of: commits during this session landed on both `comms-overnight-2026-05-06` (the intended branch) and `overnight-2026-05-06` (a prior session's branch). The content is the same on both. `comms-overnight-2026-05-06` has the clean set (research + deck + change log + submission copy). You can merge either branch; both are local-only. --- ## Research pass — five bullets each ### AMD hackathon landscape (`research/AMD-HACKATHON-LANDSCAPE.md`) - **Agents track dominates the visible field.** Most in-flight submissions are multi-agent orchestration systems. Fine-Tuning submissions are sparse; NyayaLLM is the only comparable one (domain-specific legal LLM on MI300X), but it's single-model, single-jurisdiction, and has no published artifacts. - **Three published Apache-2.0 fine-tunes is the differentiator.** No other visible submission mentions published model artifacts. The three HF Hub repos are verifiable; judges can clone and run them. - **The domain-tool penalty is real.** A 13-second cited flood briefing is harder to demo than a 7-agent crisis system that spawns child agents in real time. The architecture slide and the receipts table need to close that gap before the civic-tech hook can land. - **"Three of four tracks" was a liability.** The hackathon is one-track submission. "Engaged in three tracks" reads as hedging. Fine-Tuning is the right single-track argument. - **Lablab.ai submission pages 403'd.** Project descriptions above are from search snippets only. The full 30+ project list requires a logged-in lablab.ai session. The landscape read is directional, not exhaustive. ### Pitch deck landscape (`research/PITCH-DECK-LANDSCAPE.md`) - **Problem-first into receipts-first is the right pattern for Riprap.** The Zillow pullout gives the problem in one CNN headline. The 5/5 table is the receipts. Demo in the middle, fine-tune evidence before the civic case. - **The architecture diagram was the single biggest missing slide.** Judges scanning a PDF without a system diagram can't assess technical depth. The new slide 03 (Five Stones → Capstone flow) does that work in one scan. - **The "Live Demo" slide was inert in a static deck.** Repurposing to "What's Next" opens the longer arc visible to both the hackathon audience (May 10) and the ASCE audience (May 13). No content loss. - **Do not lead with AI vocabulary; lead with civic vocabulary.** "RPL §462(2)" and "NYC DEP" are signals of domain expertise, not buzzwords. Name them early in the video, not in the deck's second half. - **5-minute video structure:** 0:00 problem sentence, 0:20 demo, 0:50 architecture, 1:30 receipts, 2:00 track argument (fine-tunes), 2:30 civic case, 3:30 what's next, 4:00 CTA. Full breakdown in the research memo. --- ## Deck changes — condensed | Slide | Before | After | |---|---|---| | 01 · Problem | CNN quote as direct citation, no counter-positioning | Quote marked as paraphrase, corrected to Nov 14 removal date; added "not a score" distinction | | 02 · What riprap is | Unchanged | Unchanged | | NEW 03 · Architecture | Did not exist | New: query → Planner → 4 evidence Stones (with data sources named) → Capstone + Mellea → briefing | | 03 → 04 · The track | "Three of four tracks. One project." + Build in Public Skipped row | "Submitted to Fine-Tuning." Fine-Tuning = Primary, Agents/Vision = Supporting. Skipped row removed. | | 04 → 05 · Receipts | Unchanged | Unchanged (see open item below) | | 05 → 06 · Why it matters | Unchanged | Unchanged | | 06 → 07 · Now / Demo | Live demo URL + blockquote (inert in static deck) | WHAT'S NEXT: Ida/ASCE calibration, Stones v1.1 packages, methodology paper | | CTA | Unchanged | Unchanged | Slide count: 8 → 9. --- ## Cover image The cover image (`submission/cover-16x9.png`) was not auto-generated. Design brief is in `submission/COPY-DRAFTS.md`. **Quickest path:** export the cover slide from the deck PDF as a 1920×1080 PNG. The Marp cover slide already uses the correct tokens, dam mark, and layout. From `slides/`: ``` npx @marp-team/marp-cli@latest deck.md --theme riprap.css \ --allow-local-files --images png ``` This generates `deck.001.png` (the cover slide) which is the 16:9 thumbnail. Rename to `submission/cover-16x9.png`. --- ## Submission copy — recommended **Title:** `Riprap — Cited NYC flood briefings on AMD` (42 chars) **Short (237 chars):** Riprap writes NYC flood-exposure briefings where every numeric claim cites its source — or doesn't appear. Granite 4.1 8B on AMD MI300X, three Apache-2.0 NYC fine-tunes, Mellea citation grounding. 5/5 addresses, 4/4 checks every run. **Long (~280 words):** in `submission/COPY-DRAFTS.md`, no changes needed. **Runner-up title:** `Riprap: citation-grounded flood briefings` --- ## Three things to look at first 1. **Run the 20-query Mellea probe suite and check slide 05.** The deck's "4/4 every run" claim is verified against the 5-address probe. If Track A's 20-query stakeholder suite is complete, check the grounding results. If any query failed at < 4/4, update the slide. Do not submit a deck with a "4/4" claim that doesn't hold across the wider suite. Command from `scripts/`: ``` .venv/bin/python scripts/probe_addresses.py ``` 2. **Generate the cover image** from the deck cover slide (see above). One npx command, one rename. Takes 2 minutes. 3. **Review the architecture slide (new slide 03)** in the rendered PDF. It uses inline styles and box-grid classes. Verify it renders cleanly in the PDF before submission — particularly the four Stone columns and the Capstone row at the bottom. If the layout is cramped, reducing the Stone cell font sizes by 1–2px will fix it. Source: `slides/deck.md` lines ~103–160. --- ## Open questions that need Adam's call **1. Track submission: Fine-Tuning is the call, but confirm.** The research pass found no evidence against Fine-Tuning as primary. If you have information about lablab.ai's scoring criteria that suggests Agents is stronger (e.g., the FSM + Burr architecture is judged separately), change slide 04 before submission. The deck frame is easy to swap — the track-row badges are the only change. **2. The CNN quote on slide 01 — exact vs paraphrase.** Current: "Zillow removed climate risk scores from listings under pressure from the real-estate industry. In their place: a link, far less visible." Marked as paraphrase. If you want a direct quote for a public-facing deck, the TechCrunch version is: "Zillow removed the listings' climate scores. In their place is a subtle link to their records at First Street." (TechCrunch, Dec 1, 2025.) Either is defensible; this is an editorial call. **3. ASCE talk (May 13) — which slides to adapt.** The new "What's Next" slide (07) and the "Why it Matters" slide (06) are the ASCE-relevant ones. For ASCE, slide 04 (The Track) should be replaced with a "Methods" slide. The architecture diagram (slide 03) and receipts (slide 05) travel unchanged. Make the branch decision: fork a new `asce-2026-05-13` branch off this deck or iterate in place. **4. `overnight-2026-05-06` branch cleanup.** That branch has duplicate commits plus `e203d5f tests: add 20-query stakeholder integration suite` from the prior session. Decide whether to merge it into main, keep it as a holding branch, or delete it. The comms work you need is all on `comms-overnight-2026-05-06`.