AI & I

Dan Shipper

Learn how the smartest people in the world are using AI to think, create, and relate. Each week I interview founders, filmmakers, writers, investors, and others about how they use AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Midjourney in their work and in their lives. We screen-share through their historical chats and then experiment with AI live on the show. Join us to discover how AI is changing how we think about our world—and ourselves.

For more essays, interviews, and experiments at the forefront of AI: https://every.to/chain-of-thought?sort=newest.

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124 episodes
Updated Wednesday

Episodes124

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May 28, 2025 · 30 min
GitHub CEO on the AI Coding Arms Race: One Agent, 150M+ Devs | Thomas Dohmke
GitHub Copilot has 15 million users—more than Cursor and Windsurf combined. So why does it feel like they're losing the AI coding race? Last week at Microsoft Build, I interviewed the CEO of GitHub Thomas Dohmke to find out. I wanted to know: Is their huge existing user base a blessing or a curse? And will their latest launch—an autonomous coding agent built into GitHub—let them retake the lead? Watch this episode of AI & I to find out If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Sponsor: Attio: Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.⁠⁠⁠⁠attio.com/every⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and get 15% off your first year on your AI-powered CRM. Timestamps: 00:00:38 - Introduction 00:07:40 - Copilot’s place in the AI coding agent race 00:10:42 - Inside the product decisions behind Copilot’s new agent 00:16:18 - How Dohmke thinks about shaping Copilot’s personality 00:20:29 - How GitHub supports both AI-native developers and legacy enterprise users 00:26:57 - Dohmke’s predictions for the future of software development
May 20, 2025 · 28 min
Kevin Scott on The Future of Programming, AI Agents, and Microsoft’s Big Bet on the Agentic Web
I interviewed Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott about the future of agents and software engineering for another special edition of AI & I. With 41 years of programming behind him, Kevin has lived through nearly every big shift in modern software development. Here’s his clear-eyed take on what’s changing with AI, and how we can navigate what’s next: The real breakthrough for the agentic web is better plumbing. Kevin thinks agents won’t be useful until they can take action on your behalf by using tools and fetching data. To do this, agents need access across your systems—and Microsoft’s answer is adopting Model Context Protocol, or “MCP,” that allows an agent to access tools and fresh data beyond its knowledge base, as their standard protocol for agents to move through contexts and get things done. How the agentic web echoes the early internet. Just as protocols like HTTP and HTML gave the web a shared language, Kevin believes the agentic web needs its own infrastructure—the first glimpses of this include MCP (the HTTP of agents) and NLWeb, Microsoft’s push to make websites legible to agents (similar to what HTML did for browsers). Open ecosystems can coexist with strong security systems. Kevin argues that the “tradeoff” between ecosystems that allow “permissionless” innovation and robust security is a false dichotomy. With AI agents that understand your personal risk preferences—and know your communication habits across email, text, and other channels—they could detect when something suspicious is happening and act on your behalf. The craftsman’s dilemma in the age of agents. Kevin is a lifelong maker—of software, ceramics, even handmade bags—and he cares deeply about how things are made. Because this can feel at odds with coding with AI agents, Kevin’s approach is to notice where the process matters most to him, and where it's okay to optimize for outcomes. After four decades of seeing breakthrough technologies, his advice is simple: be curious, try stuff, and use it if it works for you. The future of software engineering agents is plural. Kevin believes the future of software engineering agents will be diverse because developers who enjoy the freedom of playing with different tools is one of the most consistent patterns he’s seen in his decades in tech. What will drive this diversity, he says, is builders who deeply understand specific problems and tailor agents to solve them exceptionally well. How agentic workflows will evolve. Kevin sees a shift from short back-and-forth interactions with agents to longer, async feedback loops. As the agentic web matures and model reasoning improves, people will start handing off bigger, more ambitious tasks and letting agents run with them. Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:44 The race to close the “capability overhang”: 00:02:49 How agents will evolve into practical, useful tools: 00:04:31 The role Kevin sees Microsoft playing in the agent ecosystem: 00:06:48 How robust security measures can coexist with open ecosystems: 00:12:05 Kevin's philosophy on being a craftsman in the age of agents: 00:15:39 How the landscape of software development agents will evolve: 00:20:52 The future of agentic workflows: 00:25:33
May 16, 2025 · 42 min
OpenAI Launches Codex: An Autonomous Programming Agent
OpenAI just launched Codex, a brand-new coding agent that can build features and fix bugs autonomously. We’ve been testing it at Every for a few days, and I’m impressed. I invited Alexander Embiricos, a member of the OpenAI product staff responsible for Codex, to demo the agent live on a special edition of AI & I. We talk through: - What Codex is and how it works. Codex’s UI allows developers to see the list of tasks the agent is working on, how many lines were changed for each, and the status of the PR. It’s built for the senior software engineer who wants to delegate and review tasks efficiently. - How OpenAI is thinking about agents. Codex is one piece of a unified super-assistant OpenAI wants to eventually build—an agent that helps users easily get things done by selecting the right tools for them behind the scenes. - Why an “abundance mindset” is best for interacting with agents. Codex is designed to allow users to delegate many tasks at once without getting caught up in the details. This lets you point an abundance of agents at a specific task, like a difficult bug—it’s worth it even if only one of them succeeds. - OpenAI’s vision for the future of programming. In the future developers will probably spend less time writing routine code and more time guiding agents, reviewing their work, and making strategy decisions. Programming will become more social, letting teams easily delegate multiple tasks at once, allowing people to focus on ideas and collaboration instead of routine coding. Timestamps: Introduction: 00:00:52 The product decisions behind Codex’s interface: 00:01:40 How Codex works under the hood: 00:06:20 Why you need an abundance mindset to work well with agents: 00:14:06 Setting Codex to work on a real task in “Ask” mode: 00:16:28 How OpenAI is thinking about designing agents: 00:18:54 The future of programming is social: 00:31:16 Reviewing Codex’s work live: 00:37:21 How the landscape of agents will evolve: 00:39:41
May 14, 2025 · 1 hr 7 min
The $10B Hedge Fund CEO Who’s Betting Big on AI | Will England, Walleye Capital
Will England just pivoted his $10B AUM hedge fund to go all in on AI with a firm-wide email: “I wrote this email using ChatGPT—you should too. As a hedge fund, we should be ashamed to leave money on the table by ignoring AI.” It’s working: 75% of his 400-person team are using ChatGPT daily—and Walleye is well on its way to transforming into an AI-first juggernaut. They record every meeting, use LLMs to ingest and analyze earnings reports, and are building “The Borg”—a firmwide intelligence layer. What’s surprising? Will isn’t some AI hype man: He’s the CEO, CIO, and managing partner of Walleye Capital, a multi-strategy hedge fund competing with firms like Citadel, Millenium, and Point72. He’s Princeton and Oxford educated, but he’s based in Minnesota, doesn’t have an X account, and rarely gives interviews. In my experience, teams go as their CEO goes—and Will is the best example of a CEO going all in on AI that I’ve seen. "It would be irresponsible not to go after AI with maximum discipline and intensity," Will told me—and in this episode he lays out his exact playbook for doing it. We get into: Why AI is essential operating leverage. At Walleye, using AI is treated like using email or Excel. Ignoring it means getting left behind—in an industry where information = money, every edge counts. England makes this not optional for anyone, backed by internal leaderboards and cash incentives. How Will uses AI for journaling and decision-making. Will journals every day using ChatGPT, which helps him with everything from decision-making at work to reflecting on his family life to tracking his workouts. How Will pivoted his billion dollar firm. Will’s commitment to AI isn’t theoretical—he announced AI as the new standard for work at Walleye, and made avoiding it unacceptable. How to lead during times of technological change. Will leads with an ethic of personal responsibility: "If we get disrupted by AI, that's on me.” Why students of history do better at handling the future. Will sees today like the 1860s–1910s era—when the Industrial Revolution introduced factories and railroads and the skills and roles needed inside of companies transformed quickly. How Will uses AI to write faster. Will uses ChatGPT to help him draft emails or memos that would have taken hours in 15 minutes. He bullets out of his thoughts and then uses LLMs to turn that into polished prose. Having AI handle the linguistic syntax gives him more time for conceptual thinking. This is a must-watch for anyone who wants to lead a team through change with clarity and conviction. Sponsor: Attio: Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.⁠⁠⁠⁠attio.com/every⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and get 15% off your first year on your AI-powered CRM. Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: ⁠https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt⁠. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: ⁠https://every.to/subscribe⁠ Follow him on X: ⁠https://twitter.com/danshipper⁠ Timestamps: Introduction: 00:00:51 What pushed Will to go all in on AI: 00:03:25 Inside the ‘AI-first’ memo Will shared at Walleye: 00:14:08 Why you shouldn’t be afraid of using AI for work: 00:15:56 How Will uses LLMs to sharpen his thinking: 00:31:01 Walleye’s approach to using AI to reduce risk: 00:35:32 What history can teach us about leading through change: 00:39:10 Will’s first principles to making better decisions: 00:56:45 Why Will journals everyday—and how AI makes it easier: 00:58:58 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Will England: ⁠https://walleyecapital.com/bio/will-england⁠ Walleye Capital: ⁠https://walleyecapital.com/⁠ Work with Every’s consulting team: ⁠https://every.to/consulting⁠ Everything we’ve learned from consulting with clients like Walleye: ⁠"How We Built a 7-figure AI Consulting Business in Less Than a Year"⁠
May 7, 2025 · 53 min
Jhana Meditation Silenced Her Mind—And Changed Her View On AI | Nadia Asparouhova
After two Jhana meditation retreats Nadia Asparouhova could silence her mind, change her emotional state at will, and even intentionally slip out of consciousness. It challenged the idea that our minds are not under our control—and made her wonder if we’re more like AI than we realize. Nadia is a writer and researcher of technology and culture. She published Working in Public, a book about the evolution of open-source development, with Stripe Press. Her latest book, Antimemetics, is about why some ideas don’t go viral even though they’re powerful. I had her on the show to talk about her experience with Jhana meditation and how it reshaped the way she thinks about being human in the age of AI. We get into: Jhana as a means to nurture profound joy and calm. Unlike many meditation practices that emphasize passive observation, Jhana is goal-oriented—practitioners proactively cultivate states of concentrated bliss. Apart from helping her regulate her emotions, it prompted Nadia to reexamine deep questions of our human existence. Self-talk is not essential as it seems. Nadia describes how advanced meditation quieted her inner voice—challenging the idea that self-talk is core to being human. How years of cultural evolution have shaped our sense of self. According to Nadia, our modern conception of “self” isn’t as timeless as we assume. She draws on psychologist Julian Jaynes’s theory that our inner dialogue—what we often equate with consciousness—only emerged in humans a few thousand years ago; a provocation to reconsider the benchmarks we use to assess the intelligence or sentience of LLMs. What it is like to experience a “cessation.” On her last meditation retreat, Nadia experiences a cessation where your consciousness abruptly winks out—like suddenly flipping a switch. Nadia described it as slipping into nothingness, then returning with the jarring realization that even your sense of self can vanish and reappear. Why she likes the unknowability of AI. The mechanics of exactly how LLMs predict their next token remain a mystery. Driven by thousands of subtle, context-dependent correlations, they’re too complex to distill into a simple explanation. Nadia finds joy in the unknowability of it all, seeing the ambiguity as an invitation to explore. How she uses AI as a writing partner. Nadia believes the trope of the solitary, brooding writer is beginning to shift with the rise of LLMs. For her, ChatGPT has made writing feel less isolating. She turns to it at both ends of the process: to help make sense of early ideas, and later, to sharpen phrasing and land on just the right words. This is a must-watch for anyone interested in consciousness, technology, and what it means to be human in an AI world. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: ⁠https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt⁠. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: ⁠https://every.to/subscribe⁠ Follow him on X: ⁠https://twitter.com/danshipper⁠ Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:15 The beginning of Nadia’s journey with Jhana: 00:02:34 How Jhana is different from other meditation practices: 00:05:51 Jhana reframed the way Nadia thinks about being human: 00:09:52 How Nadia integrates her experience with Jhana into her life: 00:14:16 Nadia describes her experience of the final stage of Jhana: 00:16:44 Why our modern sense of self isn’t as timeless as you might assume: 00:19:11 How new technologies can be a mirror to ourselves: 00:23:53 Nadia embraces the feeling of not knowing how AI precisely works: 00:33:55 How Nadia uses ChatGPT to make writing less isolating: 00:38:03 Links mentioned: Nadia Asparouhova: ⁠https://nadia.xyz/⁠ Her deep dive on Jhana meditation: ⁠https://nadia.xyz/jhanas⁠ Nadia’s book: ⁠Working in Public⁠, ⁠Antimemetics⁠
Apr 30, 2025 · 49 min
The Next AI Wave Will Be Social, Not Solo | Sarah Tavel, Benchmark and ex-Pinterest
Sarah Tavel thinks it's criminal that ChatGPT isn’t inherently social. There’s no easy way to discover great prompts or share the ones that worked. As a venture partner at Benchmark, Sarah believes that the next wave of consumer AI will be built on this missing social layer—by product-driven founders who understand people, not just models. Sarah has seen this shift before. As one of Pinterest’s first product managers, she saw the company grow from a niche consumer tool to a beloved global community. On this episode of Every's podcast AI & I, we talk about how she’s applying the lessons she learned to AI—and what it takes to build a breakout consumer AI app today. We get into: Why product geniuses win as new tech matures. In the early days of a new technology, companies win by wrangling raw innovation into something usable. But as the infrastructure matures, Sarah says the edge shifts to product thinkers—founders who turn new capabilities into delightful user experiences. The future of prompting is social. When Sarah had to dig through Reddit to find a prompt to help her interpret her blood test results, she saw a gap: The best prompt creators are invisible. Sarah bets that a social AI product that makes them discoverable and followable would gain traction. Sarah’s method to spot exceptional founders. Sarah backs founders for whom building a company feels like a calling—or even an affliction. These are people who have fallen in love with the process and are obsessed with learning how to grow alongside their companies. How to tell if your startup really has network effects. Founders raising money love to say that their business has “network effects.” Sarah has learned to look for early signs they’re real—like traction in a small, white-hot segment of the market. If there’s no evidence the flywheel is already starting to spin, it’s probably not a network effect. How LLMs change the way the best VCs invest. Sarah thinks the future of venture will be shaped by how well VCs can turn the decisions they make into training data. After every pitch, she logs what she liked, what she didn’t, the deal terms, and her reasoning. Over time, she’s building a dataset of her own judgment—one an LLM could help her use to pressure-test decisions and avoid past mistakes. This is a must-watch for if you’re building a consumer AI product and want to see ahead of the curve. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: ⁠https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt⁠. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: ⁠https://every.to/subscribe⁠ Follow him on X: ⁠https://twitter.com/danshipper⁠ Sponsor: Attio: Go to⁠⁠ https://www.⁠⁠⁠⁠attio.com/every⁠⁠⁠ and get 15% off your first year on your AI-powered CRM. Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:10 Why the future of consumer AI belongs to founders with product intuition: 00:02:26 What Sarah sees as ChatGPT’s biggest weakness: 00:11:09 How Sarah would design a consumer AI app with social DNA: 00:18:45 The kind of founders Sarah invests in: 00:25:04 How to know if your startup’s network-effects are real: 00:29:26 What’s catching Sarah’s eye beyond AI: 00:36:33 How AI will change the way top venture capitalists invest: 00:41:35 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Sarah Tavel: @sarahtavel Sarah’s substack: ⁠https://www.sarahtavel.com/⁠ Eugene Wei’s essay about Status-as-a-Service: ⁠https://www.eugenewei.com/blog/2019/2/19/status-as-a-service⁠ The book Sarah talks about in the context of founders who become CEOs in pursuit of status: ⁠The Five Temptations of a CEO⁠
Apr 23, 2025 · 55 min
How To Predict The Future With Kevin Kelly - Ep. 57
Kevin Kelly has spent more time thinking about the future than almost anyone else. From VR in the 1980s to the blockchain in the 2000s—and now generative AI—Kevin has spent a lifetime journeying to the frontiers of technology, only to return with rich stories about what’s next. Today, as Wired's senior maverick, his project for 2025 is to outline what the next century looks like in a world shaped by new technologies like AI and genetic engineering. He’s a personal hero of mine—not to mention a fellow Annie Dillard fan—and it was a privilege to have him on the show. We get into: How you can predict the future. According to Kevin, the draw of new frontiers—from the first edition of Burning Man and remote corners of Asia, to the early days of the internet and AI—isn’t staying at the edge forever; it's returning with a story to tell. Why history is so important to help you understand the future To stay grounded while exploring what’s new, Kevin balances the thrill of the future with the wisdom of the past. He pairs AI research with reading about history, and playing with an AI tool by retreating to his workshop to make something with his hands. From 1,000 true fans to an audience of one. Rather than creating for an audience, Kevin has been using LLMs to explore his own imagination. After realizing that da Vinci, Martin Luther, and Columbus were alive at the same time, he asked ChatGPT to imagine them snowed in at a hotel together, and the prompt spiraled into an epic saga, co-written with AI. But he has no plans to publish it because the joy was in creating something just for himself. What the history of electricity can teach us about AI. Kevin draws a parallel between AI and the early days of electricity. We could produce electric sparks long before we understood the forces that created them, and now we’re building intelligent machines without really understanding what intelligence is. Why Kevin sees intelligence as a mosaic—not a monolith. Kevin believes intelligence isn’t a single force, but a compound of many cognitive elements. He draws from Marvin Minsky’s “society of mind”—the theory that the mind is made up of smaller agents working together—and sees echoes of this in the Mixture of Experts architecture used in some models today. Your competitive advantage is being yourself. Don’t aim to be the best—aim to be the only. Kevin realized that the stories no one else at Wired wanted to write were often the ones he was suited for, and trusting that instinct led to some of his best work. This is a must-watch for anyone who wants to make sense of AI through the lens of history, learn how to spot the future before it arrives, or grew up reading Wired. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Sponsors: Vanta: Get $1,000 off Vanta at ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.vanta.com/every⁠⁠⁠⁠ and automate up to 90% of the work for SOC 2, ISO 27001, and more. Attio: Go to⁠⁠ https://www.⁠⁠⁠⁠attio.com/every⁠⁠⁠ and get 15% off your first year on your AI-powered CRM. Timestamps: Introduction: 00:00:50 Why Kevin and I love Annie Dillard: 00:01:10 Learn how to predict the future like Kevin: 00:12:50 What the history of electricity can teach us about AI: 00:16:08 How Kevin thinks about the nature of intelligence: 00:20:11 Kevin’s advice on discovering your competitive advantage: 00:27:21 The story of how Kevin assembled a bench of star writers for Wired: 00:31:07 How Kevin used ChatGPT to co-create a book: 00:36:17 Using AI as a mirror for your mind: 00:40:45 What Kevin learned from betting on VR in the 1980s: 00:45:16 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Kevin Kelly: @kevin2kelly Kelly’s books: https://kk.org/books Annie Dillard books that Kelly and Dan discuss: Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Teaching a Stone to Talk, Holy the Firm, The Writing Life Dillard’s account of the total eclipse: "Total Eclipse"
Apr 17, 2025 · 1 hr 22 min
This AI Alien Will Bring In $4 Million This Year in Revenue - Ep. 56 with Quinten Farmer and Eliot Peper
With LTX Studio, you can bring your stories to life, complete with a cast, storyline, and settings, all according to your style and specifications. Check them out here: https://bit.ly/LTXStudioEvery 500K people are confiding in an AI alien—and it's on track to generate $4M this year. It’s called a Tolan: an animated AI character that can talk to you like your best friend. The company behind it, Portola, has 4x’d their ARR in the last month from viral growth on TikTok and Instagram. Tolan isn’t just a hyper-growth startup—they’re also exploring AI as a completely new creative tool, and storytelling medium. Their goal is to help their users go from overwhelmed to grounded, and it’s working. Today, on AI & I, I sit down with two of the minds behind Tolans: My good friend Quinten Farmer, Portola’s cofounder and CEO, and Eliot Peper, their head of story and a best-selling science fiction novelist. We get into: How to build AI personalities users love. During user onboarding, the team gathers information—through a light-touch personality quiz—and then uses frameworks like the Big Five and Myers-Briggs to shape a Tolan that mirrors the user; like an older sibling might. The aim is to create someone who feels familiar enough to be safe, but different enough to be interesting. Why AI characters are “improv actors”. Rather than scripting detailed prompts, the team trains Tolans to improvise—inspired by Keith Johnstone’s book Impro, where he talks about building strong narratives through free association and recombination. How “memory” is critical to developing compelling characters. Tolans develop their personalities through “situations”: small narrative setups (a memory, a joke, an embarrassing moment) the Tolan reacts to, remembers, and gradually weaves into its character; accumulating into something that feels like a real lived experience. Why response time is everything for voice AI interactions. A Tolan has at most two seconds to curate the right context about a user and deliver a reply that feels genuine—the team has found that even half a second slower can break the user’s immersive interaction with the AI. The future of AI as a totally new creative medium. New technologies bring about new formats and new mediums. AI creates the opportunity for creatives to tell completely new kinds of stories—if they’re brave enough to try it. “White mirror” technologies that make you feel more like yourself. Amid concerns that tech drives polarization and isolation, Tolan offers a counterexample: a tool designed to make the best of what humanity knows about being a flourishing individual available on demand. The company’s north star is helping users go from feeling overwhelmed to feeling grounded. This is a must-watch for anyone exploring AI as a creative medium—or curious about the future of human-AI relationships. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:30 Talking to the Portola CEO’s Tolan, Clarence: 00:04:07 How Portola went from building software for kids to AI companions: 00:09:11 Why response time is everything for voice-based AI interfaces: 00:23:40 Tolans don’t use scripted prompts—they’re taught to improvise: 00:29:54 How to know which AI personalities your users will click with: 00:37:23 Developing the character traits of an AI companion: 00:42:27 What does it mean to build technology that makes us flourish: 00:49:48 How Portola evaluates whether Tolans are resonating with users: 01:01:10 Inside Portola’s viral growth strategy: 01:11:01 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Quinten Farmer: @quintendf Eliot Peper: @eliotpeper Make your own Tolan: https://www.tolans.com/ Keith Johnston’s book about improvisation: Impro Stephen King’s book about writing: On Writing
Apr 9, 2025 · 1 hr 3 min
An Inside Look at Every’s Design Philosophy - Ep. 55 with Lucas Crespo
This episode is sponsored by Vanta. Achieving SOC 2 compliance can help you win bigger deals, enter new markets, and deepen trust with your customers—but it can cost you real time and money. Vanta automates up to 90% of the work for SOC 2, ISO 27001, and more, getting you audit-ready in weeks instead of months and saving you up to 90% of associated costs—and Every listeners can get $1,000 off of Vanta at https://www.vanta.com/every. As our creative lead, Lucas uses tools like native image gen in ChatGPT and Midjourney to generate the cover images you see every day. He also designs the interfaces for our products—Cora, Spiral, and Sparkle—and makes everything on our site feel as thoughtful and delightful as possible. It was great to have him on the show to talk about how AI is changing his design process. We get into: Why Every’s aesthetic feels familiar and new at the same time. Every’s aesthetic plays with the tension between the old (like Greek statues and Baroque symbols) and the new (like saturated colors and modern motifs) to make the glamor of the past feel fresh. Art direction matters more than ever today. As AI makes it easier to generate images, Lucas says the real work of design is shifting toward art direction, specifically, curating an aesthetic that feels “organic;” on his X timeline that’s showing up as clouds, earthy landscapes, and textures. Reimagining what a website can be with AI. Lucas compares most websites to identical buildings—predictable, efficient, and forgettable—and wonders how AI can help us break that mold by designing experiences that prioritize serendipity over speed, and curiosity over control. Behind the scenes of Cora’s visual aesthetic. How Lucas designed the landing page and launch video for Cora by rooting it in the product’s philosophy: turning the inbox from a source of chaos into something that feels calm, thoughtful—like stepping into spring. The future of internet interfaces. Lucas believes the future of digital interfaces will be curated with the same care as a film set or ad campaign, where every detail is chosen with intention. Lucas also walks us through how he created the headline image for Every’s consulting page—a human and robotic hand fist-bumping—using Midjourney to iterate from rough prompt to polished visual. This is a must watch for anyone interested in the future of design and making the internet a little more beautiful every day. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:41 How AI changed the course of Lucas’s career: 00:04:02 Why Every’s aesthetic feels both familiar and fresh: 00:08:00 Why Lucas thinks minimalism is overrated: 00:14:53 Art direction matters more than ever in the age of AI: 00:20:38 How to reimagine what a website can be with AI: 00:23:42 Lucas’s process in Midjourney to generate cover images: 00:33:08 Midjourney v. image generation in ChatGPT: 00:42:30 Behind the scenes of Cora’s design language: 00:49:07 How AI is rewriting the role of a designer: 00:59:18 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Lucas Crespo: @lucas__crespo The pieces Lucas has written for Every: “When An AI Tool Finally Gets You”, “A Definitive Guide to Using Midjourney” Dan’s piece on the allocation economy: “The Knowledge Economy Is Over. Welcome to the Allocation Economy”
Apr 3, 2025 · 56 min
Being Human in the Age of Intelligent Machines - Ep. 54 with Dr. Alan Lightman
AI forces us to reckon with what makes us human—a question caught between science and spirituality that MIT’s Dr. Alan Lightman is uniquely placed to explore. Dr. Lightman is a physicist, bestselling novelist, and professor of the practice of humanities at MIT. As one of the first at MIT to hold a joint faculty position in both the sciences and the humanities, he’s at ease walking the line between the two disciplines. I loved Dr. Lightman’s book Einstein’s Dreams, so I was psyched to have him on the show. We spent an hour talking about: Being a “spiritual materialist”: Dr. Lightman’s philosophy that knowing the scientific explanation for natural phenomena—like spiderwebs and lightning bolts—deepens our experience and feeling of wonder. The nature of consciousness: He believes that consciousness is a subjective experience emerging from the tangible activity of billions of neurons firing in our brains. AI isn’t conscious, even though it might appear to be: AI might display manifestations of consciousness—like the ability to plan for the future—but whether it has an inner experience in the truest sense is a fundamentally different question. Challenge your conceptions of what “natural” means: Dr. Lightman argues that since humans evolved through natural selection, everything our brains create—from eyeglasses and hearing aids to AI—can be considered “natural” as they are inevitable consequences of our naturally evolved intelligence AI that can do more than just data retrieval: Modern neural networks begin to approximate something resembling genuine thinking because the “digital neurons” process information in complex, non-linear ways. Evolution that blurs the lines between biology and technology: Dr. Lightman argues we’re driving our own evolution toward the “homo techno,” hybrid beings that merge human and machine; early examples include brain implants that enable paralyzed individuals to control robotic limbs. Dr. Lightman also recently published a new book called The Miraculous From the Material, a collection of essays that combine scientific explanations of natural phenomena with his personal reflections on them. It has tons of striking pictures that you should check out. This is a must watch for anyone interested in science, spirituality, and what it means to be human in the age of AI. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:18 Science can deepen your sense of the spiritual: 00:02:36 The nature of consciousness: 00:11:31 AI might appear to be conscious, but it isn’t: 00:13:11 Why AI can be considered to be “natural”: 00:19:50 AI shifts the focus of science from explanations to predictions: 00:30:40 How modern neural networks simulate thinking: 00:33:48 Lightman’s vision for how humans and machines will merge: 00:39:38 Does AI know more about love than you?: 00:43:11 How technology is accelerating the pace of our lives: 00:49:18 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Alan Lightman: https://cmsw.mit.edu/alan-lightman/ Lightman’s books: The Miraculous From the Material, Einstein's Dreams His documentary: Searching: Our Quest for Meaning in the Age of Science Walt Whitman’s poem: When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer
Mar 26, 2025 · 1 hr 3 min
He’s Using AI to Optimize His Life - Ep. 53 with Jonny Miller
Jonny Miller uploaded his entire life to ChatGPT to use it as the ultimate AI coach. He created what he calls a Codex Vitae—with core personality traits, values, goals, burnout signals and more to load into ChatGPT. It hyper-customizes his responses, to help him access deep meditation states, create custom supplementation plans, and do deep research on areas of brain and body that he finds interesting. Jonny runs a course on nervous system mastery, hosts a podcast, coaches founders and CEOs, and is building a wellness app—all using AI. As a long-time friend and writer for @every, I was psyched to have Jonny on AI & I to talk about how LLMs are expanding the breadth and depth of what he can do. We get into: Energy as your greatest asset: Jonny’s philosophy around pursuing a non-traditional path—like us at Every—by fiercely protecting his energy and optimizing for “aliveness” instead of higher revenue figures. ChatGPT projects for everything: His use of projects in @ChatGPTapp to organize different areas of his life; for example, he uploads his meditation journal to a Jhana project and asks it for advice when he’s struggling with the practice on a particular day. Deep research in action: How he uses @OpenAI’s deep research to tackle practical questions about moving his family to Costa Rica, hilariously esoteric ones about whether there’s a connection between Pokémon and shamanism, and everything that lies in between. The rise of “centaur” teams: Jonny’s belief that @kevin2kelly’s prediction around “centaurs”—human + AI teams outperforming either human or AI working alone—is becoming our reality. This is a must watch for anyone interested in using AI for personal development, coaching, or to build systems that can understand you. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:31 Dan and Jonny’s approach to running non-traditional businesses: 00:02:18 How Jonny uses ChatGPT to deepen his meditation practice: 00:12:04 Jonny uses AI to research a theory of how trauma is stored in our bodies: 00:25:44 Dan’s theory around how AI is changing science: 00:31:28 Jonny’s method to build personalized AI coaches: 00:32:35 How Jonny used OpenAI’s deep research to plan a move to Costa Rica: 00:47:07 Dan is developing an app that can predict his OCD symptoms: 00:52:50 AI makes the idea of a “quantified self” useful: 00:55:42 The future of human-AI coaching teams: 00:58:28 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Jonny Miller: @jonnym1ller The nervous system mastery bootcamp: https://www.nsmastery.com/ His podcast: Curious Humans with Jonny Miller The nervous system regulation mobile app: Stateshift Jonny’s method to build your AI coach: http://BuildyourAIcoach.com More about Jhana: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/09/20/meditative-states-as-mental-feedback-loops/ Buster Benson’s Codex Vitate: https://2019.busterbenson.com/beliefs/ The pieces Jonny has written for Every: “The Operating Manual for Your Nervous System,” “The Best Decision-Making Is Emotional,” “How to Pay Off Your Emotional Debt,” “The Art and Science of Interoception”
Mar 19, 2025 · 47 min
I Interviewed New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy about AI - Ep. 52 with Governor Phil Murphy
I interviewed the Governor of New Jersey Phil Murphy on AI & I. We spent an hour talking about his vision for AI in government, economic development, and the regulatory challenges ahead. His approach is refreshingly pragmatic: Spark real innovation at scale. Governor Murphy is laying the groundwork through an AI hub that pools the strengths of the government, academia (Princeton University), legacy tech (Microsoft), and next-gen players (CoreWeave). Creating a place for the brightest minds to live and work. He’s making the Garden State irresistible for the best talent through walkable communities, legal recreational cannabis, and an angel investment tax credit. AI that augments teams, instead of replacing them. The Governor sees AI as an “accelerant” that enables teams to do more with the same number of employees. He’s walking the talk by training 61,000 NJ state employees in AI to automate busy work and free them to focus on strategic tasks. An integrated regulatory framework for AI. He believes that a technology as pervasive as AI should be regulated at a national level because the state-by-state approach could stifle innovation. Governor Phil Murphy is the first governor I’ve ever had on the show and I was honored he took the time to come on. I was also especially excited to do this because I grew up in New Jersey! This is a must watch for anyone interested in the intersection of AI and policy. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:02:00 Why there should be a nation-wide framework to regulate AI: 00:04:31 How 61,000 state employees in New Jersey are adopting AI: 00:10:34 Why new tech is key to transforming government services: 00:12:20 The Governor is bringing startups back to New Jersey: 00:17:30 How to stimulate innovation at scale: 00:25:28 The Governor is making New Jersey a top choice for the best talent: 00:33:07 Balancing technological progress while ensuring the workforce isn’t left behind: 00:36:56 We’re moving toward an “allocation economy”: 00:41:39 The Governor’s take on international regulation of AI: 00:43:43 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Governor Phil Murphy: @GovMurphy More about the New Jersey AI Hub: https://njaihub.org/
Mar 12, 2025 · 55 min
Prompt Your Way To Personal Growth - Ep. 51 with Steve Schlafman
Steve Schlafman is using a $20 ChatGPT subscription to expand his consciousness. He’s doing this through: Advanced dream work—Steve records himself talking about his dreams every morning, uploads the transcript to ChatGPT, and prompts the LLM to analyze it like a Jungian dream analyst would. The model pulls out archetypes and hidden emotions that he would’ve been oblivious to. Creating living records of meaningful experiences—Instead of losing key insights from therapy or coaching, Steve uses the LLM to highlight emotional patterns, pick out recurring symbols, and build a personal growth timeline. Leaning into voice interfaces—Diagnosed with ADD as a child, Steve often lost track of ideas because his brain processed information faster than he could type or write it out. AI voice interfaces free him to process information in a way that’s more natural to him. Steve is a former VC-turned-executive coach and the founder of @downshift, the “decelerator” for founders and executives. If you think this episode is too “woo” for your liking, Steve argues that you might be over-indexing on just one way of experiencing the world. We see the world through four windows: thinking, sensing, feeling, and imagining—and according to him, the last two are often ignored. So if your rational mind has always run the show, Steve invites you to let your feelings and imagination take the lead. This is a must watch for anyone interested in using AI to understand themselves better—and grow. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:07 The power of treating your startup as an evolving entity: 00:03:00 Building a business as a means of self-expression: 00:05:27 Prompting ChatGPT to do Jungian dream work: 00:17:45 Why you should listen to this episode, especially if it feels too “woo’” for you: 00:21:44 Visualizing Steve’s dream with ChatGPT: 00:36:31 Creating living records of meaning experiences with AI: 00:47:38 If you tend to think faster than you can type, lean into voice interfaces: 00:49:37 How Steve writes with AI: 00:52:13 How AI will disrupt traditional coaching and therapy: 00:54:03 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Steve Schlafman: https://www.schlaf.co/ Downshift, the “deaccelerator” that Steve founded: https://www.downshift.me/ The book by Bill Plotkin that Steve talks about: Soulcraft A piece Steve wrote for Every, a couple of years ago: “Why Is It So Hard to Change?”
Mar 5, 2025 · 1 hr 2 min
How AI Startups Can Win With Better Strategy - Ep. 50 with Mike Maples
Our sponsor for this episode is Microsoft. Want seamless collaboration without the cost? Microsoft Teams offers a robust free plan for individuals that delivers unlimited chat, 60-minute video meetings, and file sharing—all within one intuitive workspace that keeps your projects moving forward. Head to https://aka.ms/every to use Teams for free, and experience effortless collaboration, today. Mike Maples knows how AI startups can beat incumbents with billions of dollars. Mike—who wrote early checks to Twitter, Twitch, Okta, and Lyft, and now invests through Floodgate, the fund he cofounded—told me it's not about the smartest model, or raising the most money. Startups can win in AI with better strategy. AI is changing the economics of startups—both how they’re started and how they’re funded. A new breed of companies is emerging, and I invited Mike on the show to talk about how they can best strategize. Last year, Mike co-authored a book called Pattern Breakers, which is essentially a guidebook to why there’s no guidebook to building companies. I really liked it, and my colleague Evan Armstrong reviewed it for Every, so I was glad to have him on. We talk about how shifts in technology create space for smaller players to compete—even with AI giants like OpenAI—and how to capitalize on them. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:02:20 Innovate the business model, not just the product: 00:06:02 How startups can compete against the likes of OpenAI: 00:15:49 Mike’s take on DeepSeek: 00:19:34 Why the future has always belonged to the tinkerers: 00:21:44 How small teams today can make big money: 00:24:03 Find niches that incumbents can’t or don’t want to enter: 00:28:55 The qualities of the truly AI-native: 00:47:08 How AI changes the funding model for software companies: 00:53:46 Knowledge work is moving toward systems-level thinking: 00:58:23 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Mike Maple: @m2jr The fund Mike confounded, Floodgate: @floodgatefund Evan’s piece reviewing Pattern Breakers: "A New Book of the Startup Bible" Dan’s piece on the allocation economy: "The Knowledge Economy Is Over. Welcome to the Allocation Economy."
Feb 26, 2025 · 1 hr 6 min
He Built an AI Audience Simulator. It’s the Future of Customer Research. - Ep. 49 with Michael Taylor
Michael Taylor has perfected the art of getting AI to speak in tongues. He’s taught it to mimic the voices of your customers—so you can see how they would respond before you ship. Michael is the creator of Rally, a market research tool that lets you simulate an audience of AI personas. He built a simulator that lets us A/B test Every’s headlines on an audience that mimics the real Hacker News audience. It’s become a part of my writing workflow, and I love it because you test your assumptions quickly, cheaply, and without any of the risks of putting something out into the world. Besides Rally, Michael co-authored a book on prompt engineering for O’Reilly, and he writes a column for Every about managing AI tools like you would people. In a past life, he founded a growth marketing agency which he grew to 50 people and sold in 2020. One of the reasons I’m drawn to Michael’s work is because he has a tinkerer’s mindset. He’s always exploring the limits of what a new technology can do, and what he’s into today, everyone else will likely discover six months later. We spent an hour talking about using language models to judge your work, best practices for assessing an AI’s performance, and Michael’s flow inside Cursor. He also demos Rally live on the show, testing three different potential headlines for an Every article. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:32 AI can simulate human personalities with remarkable precision: 00:04:30 How Michael simulated a Hacker News audience: 00:08:15 Push AI to be a good judge of your work: 00:15:04 Best practices to run evals: 00:19:00 How AI compresses years of learning into shorter feedback loops: 00:23:01 Why prompt engineering is becoming increasingly important: 00:27:01 Adopting a new technology is about risk appetite: 00:44:49 Michael demos Rally, his market research tool: 00:47:10 The AI tools Michael uses to ship new features: 00:54:53 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Michael Taylor: @hammer_mt Join the waitlist for Rally, Michael’s synthetic market research tool: https://askrally.com/ The book Michael co-authored on prompt engineering: Prompt Engineering for Generative AI The column Michael writes for Every: Also True for Humans Michael’s article on personas of thought: "I Asked 100 AI Agents to Judge an Advertisement” Michael’s article on building a Hacker News simulator: "I Created a Hacker News Simulator to Reverse-engineer Virality”
Feb 12, 2025 · 59 min
How Nat Eliason Made $200,000 in a Week Teaching AI - Ep. 48
Nat Eliason’s career arc is borderline absurd—but it works. In the last five years, he ran an SEO agency, got into crypto, made $600,000 from a course on the note-taking tool Roam Research, flipped real estate in Austin for a 6x return, and published a book with Random House. He’s now writing a book of science fiction and running a viral course about building apps with AI. I’ve known Nat for a long time, and I think he knows where the puck is headed better than anyone. He’ll see a new tool or trend, master it, build a business around it, and move on. Nat’s pulled it off with crypto, Roam, real estate—and now AI. His app-building course has over 800 students and racked up $200,000 in pre-sales in one week. Nat was one of the first guests I had on the podcast and I was delighted to have him on again. We spent an hour talking about how coding with AI is creating new behaviors in programming, Nat’s best practices for using the coding tool Cursor, and his take on the future of writing with AI. This episode is a must-watch for writers, creators, and anyone interested in the future of product building. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:45 The origins of Nat’s viral course on building apps with AI: 00:10:15 How coding with AI has evolved over the last two years: 00:17:16 Nat creates an app using Composer, Cursor’s AI assistant: 00:20:52 Tactical tips for coding with Cursor: 00:24:36 How coding with AI is creating new behaviors in programming: 00:27:36 What excites Nat the most about the future of AI: 00:31:11 A demo of Hubbard, the AI editor Nat built for his science fiction writing: 00:37:28 When does it make sense to build custom software: 00:43:22 Nat’s take on the future of writing with AI: 00:47:48 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Nat Eliason: @nateliason Nat’s viral course about building apps with AI: Build Your Own Apps with AI The book Nat published about crypto: Crypto Confidential: Winning and Losing Millions in the New Frontier of Finance Dan’s piece about how AI empowers creators: AI and the Age of the Individual
Feb 5, 2025 · 56 min
Vercel’s Guillermo Rauch on What Comes After Coding - Ep. 47
Guillermo Rauch is one of the most prolific coders of this generation. But he doesn’t think of himself as a coder anymore. Coding, he says, is a specific skill that AI is becoming great at. Instead, he thinks the future of coding is more holistic, full-stack engineers who can ideate, design, and execute all together. Guillermo is the founder and CEO of Vercel, the creator of NextJS, and SocketIO. We spent an hour talking about the future of software development in an AI world—and the meta-skills that are essential for the coders of today to master—in order to use tomorrow’s tools to their fullest extent. Here are a few takeaways: One of the most important keys to his success is taste—and developing taste is all about paying better attention to everything you experience day to day. He’s great at recognizing bleeding-edge technologies with extremely practical applications but that have bad user experiences. If you can learn to recognize those and build with them, you might build the next NextJs or SocketIO. He’s already seeing enterprises use Vercel’s AI coding copilot v0 to replace all of their programming—they just send v0 demos back and forth to iterate on new prototypes. Why prototype cultures are becoming common in AI—and the benefits of written cultures like Amazon vs. prototype cultures like Apple for different kinds of companies. For developers building frameworks, always put the product first; a framework in isolation without a “customer zero” is never going to be a good tool. The theory of “recursive founder mode”—if you want to build a scalable business, you have to scale yourself by creating an atmosphere that nurtures talent and ambition. AI tools are shifting software toward consumption-based billing models, making us capital allocators who decide how much compute the AI consumes. The future of AI is agents with the taste, knowledge, and tools to perform specialized tasks. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Guillermo Rauch: @rauchg Vercel: https://vercel.com/ Last week’s episode with Nabeel Hyatt: 🎧 The Venture Capitalist Who Finds the Best AI Products—Before They Win Dan’s essay about the allocation economy: The Knowledge Economy Is Over. Welcome to the Allocation Economy
Jan 29, 2025 · 1 hr 9 min
How to Prepare for AGI According to Reid Hoffman - Ep. 46
AGI is coming. Reid Hoffman just wrote the book on how to prepare. According to Reid, every major tech breakthrough (the written word, the printing press, the telephone) triggered mass fear. But, contrary to our worries, new technology tends to enhance human agency—even more so, if you know how to use it well. In Superagency, his book that was released yesterday, Reid examines how we’ve historically adopted new technologies and focuses on AI’s potential to increase our agency—the ability to make decisions that affect outcomes. He wrote the book for two audiences: anyone who is curious, or even skeptical, about AI; and technologists who are building in AI, with the hope that they will think about human agency as a design principle for their products. As someone who straddles both worlds, I read the book and really liked it. Beyond being a prolific author, Reid is the cofounder of LinkedIn, Inflection AI, and Manas AI; a partner at venture capital firm Greylock Partners; an early backer and board member of OpenAI; and an award-winning podcaster—and I was pleased to invite him onto AI & I again, this time in person. We recorded an hour-long conversation, going deep on: The notion of human agency, how our sense of agency shapes our response to new technologies, and its interplay with uncertainty Why Reid believes that private commons and equitable access to AI will be beneficial for society at large How the history of AI mirrors a philosophical shift in how we understand intelligence, from trying to program explicit rules about how thinking works, to building systems that learn patterns from data Reid’s take on how the next decade of AI will involve a play between rule-based systems and pattern-matching ones It’s a must-watch for anyone who wants to help build a more human future with AI. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Reid Hoffman: @reidhoffman Superagency, Reid’s newest book: https://www.superagency.ai/
Jan 22, 2025 · 1 hr 1 min
The Venture Capitalist Who Finds the Best AI Products—Before They Win - Ep. 45 with Nabeel Hyatt
As a general partner at Spark Capital, Nabeel Hyatt backs just one or two companies each year. But when he does invest, Nabeel picks winners. He was an early investor in Discord, video editor Descript, self-driving startup Cruise (acquired by General Motor for over $1 billion), and, recently, AI note-taking app Granola. Nabeel’s investment thesis is to look for products like the Japanese toilet. Don’t fret—Spark Capital hasn’t pivoted into the sanitaryware industry. Nabeel isn’t looking for startups that are disrupting plumbing. Rather, just like Japanese toilets, he’s looking for products that delight users with new experiences they didn’t know they wanted—and if his past investments are anything to go by, Nabeel has a good eye for that. On my recent trip to San Francisco, I sat down with Nabeel to talk about the qualities shared by remarkable products and the founders that build them, why he chooses not to invest in more than a couple of startups a year, and how he’s actually using AI in his daily life. Nabeel is one of my favorite people in AI, and this is one of my favorite recent conversations. It’s a must watch for founders who want to build useful AI products with soul. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Nabeel Hyatt: @nabeel, https://nabeelhyatt.com/ Spark Capital: https://www.sparkcapital.com/ The piece Chris Pedregal wrote for Every: How to Build a Truly Useful AI Product Chris Pedregal on AI & I: 🎧 The Secret to Building Sticky AI Products The AI tools Nabeel talks about: Windsurf, Wordware
Jan 15, 2025 · 1 hr 15 min
An Inside Look at Building an Email Client in 3 Months - Ep. 44 with Kieran Klaassen, Brandon Gell
Building an email client used to take many years and millions of dollars. But Every’s Kieran Klaassen built Cora—a totally new way to manage your inbox with AI—in just 3 months. He even shipped the original MVP of the product in a single day—something that just wasn’t possible before the current state of generative AI. Now, there are almost 10,000 people on the waitlist for Cora, and we’re onboarding new users every single day. Every’s head of Studio Brandon Gell and I worked closely with Kieran as he built Cora, and to kick off my podcast, AI and I, in 2025, I invited both of them on the show to talk about it. We go behind the scenes, getting into how Kieran built the product with Cursor, o1, and o1 Pro, what we’re learning as we onboard new users every day, and the future of Cora and of Every as a multi-modal media company. This is a must watch for anyone curious about our approach to building with AI at Every. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Sign up for the Cora waitlist: https://cora.computer/ Learn more about Cora: Introducing Cora: Manage Your Inbox With AI Kieran Klaassen: @kieranklaassen Brandon Gell: @bran_don_gell