Betterment

If we remove impediments that are in the way of where our customers seek to go, they support us. But when we remove the friction that gives people traction on their journey, they flounder. Remove t…

Running a startup means making hundreds of decisions a week – some of them simple – which brand of coffee to stock in the kitchen – and some of them impossibly complicated –…

Even the experts inventing AI don’t know what will happen next. Is artificial general intelligence even possible? Can scaling continue? Will we need massive compute centers to make AI, or can we do it with a mere 25 watts like … Continue reading →

The Western left's recurring failure to tell the difference between opponents of power and agents of it.

The way players cheese games reveals how markets, networks, and other systems are exploited.

Technology changes things. Sometimes better, sometimes worse. When a powerful new technology arrives, it offers us wishes. Too often, we waste them, asking it to take on simple chores or offer us t…

New technology often upends the careers of experienced professionals. When the Mac offered typesetting to the masses, typographers were incensed. They had grown up with lead or photo composition, t…

Everybody’s best friend on the Internet, the relatable Elyse Myers (3.9 million followers on Instagram, with a New York Times best seller to boot),

When there is motion, it creates an impact of the environment. First, the path is barely noticeable. But then, others see the hint of a path and walk on it, making it more clear. Finally, the path …

Multi-tasking is mostly an illusion. What we’re actually doing is slicing our focus, jumping from one thing to another and then back again. All that jumping decreases our productivity and wor…

What does it mean for us to own something? If we own a piece of land and the rain washes the topsoil downstream, do we go and get the topsoil back? Do we own our reputation? We have influence over …

Modern life has confused comfort and stimulation for genuine fulfillment. Could the Ancient Greek distinction between hedonia and eudaimonia help pull us out of this trap?

Most engineers are excellent implementers but fail at architecture. Hayk (Senior Engineer) breaks down the one topic that defines the $300k gap.

Artists like to reinvent themselves. It’s what they do. Compare the Beatles’ music and the way they dressed between the early 1960s versus 1970. Or how

The org chart shows formal accountability. It rarely shows how work actually moves. Expertise, decision paths, institutional memory, and boundary-spanning people shape execution far more than most plans admit.

Anthropic’s latest Economic Index report shows how AI is transforming work — and why those who don’t adapt risk falling behind.

We Americans all know the Founding Fathers. Washington. Adams. Jefferson. Franklin. The usual suspects.  What we talk less about is the Founding Mother.

Pricing is an exchange of value. This for that. But price is also a story. When you have competition, your story doesn’t have to justify the absolute price, simply the difference between you …

Some reflections on how I managed to stick to exercising every day, and what might have held me back in the past.

What I am working on at the moment (Apr 2026) Professional AgendaScope — a SaaS platform designed for teams growing from ‘founding team’ to ’leadership team’ to solve issues around priority, misalignments, decision making and the inevitable meetings. AgendaScope is built by myself and Alan Bradburne. It is an Elixir LiveView application. Some use of coding agents but the app pre-dates them by some time. Welcome Our New Robot Overlords — a newsletter for people thinking about implementing artificial intelligence in the business and/or personal life that I am writing in collaboration with Chris Bateman of International Hobo.

Maybe my reading taste buds are dull. Maybe I’m in a lazy slump. Do I need more books? More appealing choices? Am I even asking the right question?

Some vegans don’t eat avocados. They’re concerned that the bees that are trucked in to pollinate the trees are mistreated, and so they choose to not support this practice. But we live i…

The following article originally appeared on Addy Osmani's blog site and is being reposted here with the author's permission.Comprehension debt is the

If you’re hoping for this meeting or this performance or this engagement to produce something extraordinary, why are you setting it up as if it’s ordinary? The hard work of a brainstorm…

There’s a difference between telling someone their work can become better and saying it can become even better. When we say even better, we lock in a foundation — we’re affirming that s…

“Fight Club” (1999), starring Ed Norton (as “The Narrator”) and Brad Pitt (as “Tyler Durden”) is considered one of the best movies of its decade. A real

Engineers, scientists, and most of all, businesses are looking for the right answer. It’s such a common quest that we take it for granted, but it’s new, and it continues to cause stress…

Three of my friends got hacked this week. You get an ecard and click. It asks you to log in to your email. Boom, done. It hacks your email account, steals all of your contacts and then sends itself…

Not only are AIs far more agreeable than humans when advising on interpersonal matters, but users also prefer the sycophantic models.

This newsletter is free to read, and it’ll stay that way. But if you want more - extra posts each month, no sponsored CTAs, access to the community, and a direct line to ask me things - paid subscriptions are $2.50/month. A lot of people have told