Thirty years ago a mediocre article quietly died on an editor’s desk. Today it goes straight to Substack. The internet was built on this strategy: spend 20 percent of your effort to get something to 80 percent (“good enough”) and hit publish. Sometimes it gets lost in the noise, but occasionally a piece catches fire….
Bo Sacks recently highlighted a problem we’re going to have to face in the near future: AI feeding on itself. If AI is trained on content from the internet then as AI displaces human authors, AI will be training on AI-created content. It’s not quite Ouroboros – the mythical snake eating its own tail –…
I’m frustrated. If you weren’t already aware of the AI-powered calamity in our near future, Matt Shumer gave it a good intro in “Something Big is Coming.” We’ve been warned, but we’re not taking the warning seriously. AI is already causing mass layoffs, and reports estimate anywhere from 10 to 50% of jobs could be…
Publishing is under threat from many angles, but that begs a question: what do we mean by “publishing” and “publishers”? Are you a publisher if you have a blog, or a podcast? Is AI a publisher? Will it become one? Maybe, to all those questions, but I think a more rigorous definition is in order….
Summary: The publishing industry has historically relied on the “write once, sell many times” model, incurring high fixed costs for creation but recovering them through low-marginal-cost distribution — a system amplified by digital media like podcasts and videos. AI disrupts this by enabling personalized content generation for each user, but this new model contradicts the…
In this interview with Paul Gewuerz, we speak about the accelerating disruption AI poses to publishing, local media, and the broader economy. I share my insights from my decades long career in B2B publishing and my current work helping publishers bridge the gap between technology and strategy. We talk about why AI may not be…
I’m a big advocate of “good enough” for many things, but there are times when “good enough” is a bad bargain, and technology is a prime example. Q: How is your IT department like the D.C. Metro? A: Both of them have huge incentives to put off essential upgrades and improvements until you have a…
This is a quick summary of how to use and not use AI in a small law firm. You may find it applicable to your business as well. Executive Summary Warning: Before you post anything to an AI system ask yourself if you would say it out loud in a room full of strangers. Opportunity:…
Are you unintentionally sharing your own or your client’s confidential information with AI? Some AI features are on by default. Just today I was looking at a Google doc and noticed the summary on the side. In order to make that summary, Gemini had to read that document. You should check that, and you might…
Once upon a time, clever businessmen learned how to make a hamburger, soda, and fries for $6 — by optimizing every step of the process. Families came from everywhere to buy these burgers. It was a happy place. Then Alan Mink had an idea. “What if I replace all the workers with robots? That would…