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In The Loop · July 23 · 16 min

What even is the new AI super skill of taste and judgement? And how can we develop it too?

Taste & judgment. It's the word everyone's obsessed with right now. Every founder, podcast, every VC, every post you scroll past saying it's the one skill that survives once AI can do the rest. Thing is, it's a bit of a sh*t word, like strategy: everyone nods along, then goes quiet the second you ask what it actually means. In this episode of In The Loop, I'm trying to define taste and judgement, by researching what Harry Frankfurt's On Bullshit, Rick Rubin, Pixar's Braintrust, Amazon's memos all reccommend. I get into where taste even comes from and the rituals you can actually run with a team on a Monday. ⏭️ Episode highlights (01:10) – Why "taste" is suddenly everywhere (02:40) – Workslop, and why judging got expensive (04:10) – Frankfurt's On Bullshit, applied to AI (05:40) – Taste vs judgement, and Rick Rubin (07:20) – The apprenticeship we're automating away (09:00) – Rubin's three ideas: attention, sayability, subtraction (11:00) – Rituals worth stealing: Amazon, Pixar, the 11-star bar (12:50) – Where Jack's landed, for now

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show notes

Taste & judgment.

It's the word everyone's obsessed with right now. Every founder, podcast, every VC, every post you scroll past saying it's the one skill that survives once AI can do the rest.

Thing is, it's a bit of a sh*t word, like strategy: everyone nods along, then goes quiet the second you ask what it actually means.

In this episode of In The Loop, I'm trying to define taste and judgement, by researching what Harry Frankfurt's On Bullshit, Rick Rubin, Pixar's Braintrust, Amazon's memos all reccommend.

I get into where taste even comes from and the rituals you can actually run with a team on a Monday.

⏭️ Episode highlights

(01:10) – Why "taste" is suddenly everywhere

(02:40) – Workslop, and why judging got expensive

(04:10) – Frankfurt's On Bullshit, applied to AI

(05:40) – Taste vs judgement, and Rick Rubin

(07:20) – The apprenticeship we're automating away

(09:00) – Rubin's three ideas: attention, sayability, subtraction

(11:00) – Rituals worth stealing: Amazon, Pixar, the 11-star bar

(12:50) – Where Jack's landed, for now