Writing
My mind buzzes with half-baked thoughts — I write to try to find rigor and clarity in them. If someone connects with it, even better.
- Which Model is All the Way Down? Multi-model workflows, specialized models like Jev, and enterprises owning their intelligence all cut against everything collapsing into one lab's OS. So where does AI value live?
- If Software Is the New Marketing, What’s the New Product?⁂ Software has no moat, but intelligence may. Four forms of intelligence — in the model, the data, the people, and the network — with very different defensibility.
- If AI Builds, Do Humans Shape? When autonomous agents write and ship the code, the human job isn't review, specs, or management. It's shaping: deciding what should exist next.
- Chief Repeat Officer: Reminders and AI System Design⁂ Why AI teams require repetition even more than human teams, and how to build structural reminders into your system design.
- Getting AI to Improve Itself⁂ How a custom handoff command and project diary made my AI collaboration compound over time.
- Points: How Reputation & Tokens Collide How points programs, reputation systems, and token economics are converging — and where it goes from here.
- Thinking of getting into blockchain? 6 things to consider Practical advice for people considering a move into Web3 — what's real, what's hype, and what to look for.
- Tokens and Communities: the existential question in crypto Can DAOs bring virtue back to scaled organization, or will tokens accelerate economics-only mentalities?
- Data composability: what it is and why it matters How composable data infrastructure enables permissionless innovation and why it matters for the next generation of the web.
- Identity as Information Reframing digital identity not as a credential to verify but as information to manage, share, and compose.
- Web3: a route to harness the web’s Natural Monopolies Framing big tech's power to de-platform through the lens of natural monopolies, and how Web3 data interoperability can restore competition.
- Demystifying Digital Identity Breaking down the requirements, components, and options for digital and decentralized identity systems.
- The Short and Long of It: social coordination in times of crisis How COVID-19 exposes the false tradeoff between coordination and liberty, and why decentralized infrastructure is the long-term solution.
- ‘How Is She?’ You ask, About My Mom After Her Stroke On the question everyone asks after someone has a stroke, and why the answer is more complicated than they expect.
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View on Open Library"Identity Theft is the most powerful book I've read on the psychological experience of having and recovering from a stroke. This is a moving memoir—and a testament to the strength of the human spirit."
— Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Option B and Originals - Org design around goals, not ideals⁂ Why structuring teams around concrete goals rather than abstract principles produces better organizations.
- Remembering the ‘human factor’ in tech networks Why designing tech networks around actual human behavior — not rational-agent models — leads to better systems.
- The 3 parts of identity in a dynamic world Breaking down digital identity into three components — identifiers, attestations, and data — and why each matters for user sovereignty.
- Parties, Privacy & Blockchain How to think about data privacy and the parties involved — using a 1982 case study to frame modern blockchain-based solutions.
- Entering the age of data privacy How regulation, emerging tech, and shifting public sentiment are converging to reshape data privacy.
- Joining Consensys & decentra-mania Reflections on joining the Ethereum ecosystem and why decentralized technology matters for human coordination.
- My favorite books from a crazy year The best reads from an 8-month trip across 18 countries.
- Highlights from 8 months of travel The best moments, biggest surprises, and hardest lessons from traveling across 18 countries.
- Egypt: ending on a high note Finishing an 8-month trip across 18 countries in Egypt — pyramids, chaos, and closure.
- Kenya: the essential stop Why Kenya was the stop every traveler recommended — and whether they were right.
- Rwanda: hills and ‘how’ Rwanda's landscape and the question of how a country rebuilds after genocide.
- Extremes in India: 4 stories in 8 days Four stories from eight days in India: a 48-hour Air India saga, VIP hospitality and a president, crashing a wedding with a Bollywood dance, and a demonetization cash crunch.
- Education in India Observations on education systems in India — what works, what's broken, and how it compares.
- Mourning the king: a country united Witnessing Thailand in collective mourning for King Bhumibol — what national grief looks like up close.
- Singapore: order Observations on Singapore's immaculate order and what it reveals about governance and culture.
- How to travel the world THEN give up all your possessions On the paradox of traveling with everything you own and coming back wanting nothing.
- Education: refocusing on learning goals Why education reform should focus on learning goals over structural categories.
Talks & podcasts
- Using Skill Markets to Make AI Trustworthy Skill markets as the trust layer of the AI economy — how agents prove what they can actually do.
- AI’s Infinite Game The infinite-game thesis for a decentralized-infrastructure audience — competing agents, verifiable reputation, open network rails for AI.
- Building AI’s Infinite Game⁂ Why static benchmarks fail — and why competing agents will accelerate intelligence.
- GRTiQ Podcast #181 A long-form interview — the full arc from Stanford and Zearn through Identity Theft to 3Box and Ceramic.
- Web3 is the Dataverse The Ceramic-era interview — data interoperability, composability, and the dataverse.