Chew on this.
On AI, automation, software and search. Written from what I build and test, with the dates and the numbers.
- A reader cloned a tool with Claude. If you sell simple utilities, that reader is now your competitor.
One Hacker News reader had Claude build a site covering 16,500 books by steering it, not coding it. Personal tools are now cheap to make yourself, which is bad news for anyone selling a simple utility, and leaves the B2B gap exactly where it was.
- AI that summarises your meetings does not raise your ceiling. AI that runs the work does.
An e27 columnist found that months of AI-prepared meeting lists left their scale ceiling where it was. The lists only automate the preparation. The ceiling moves when the workflow itself runs end to end inside rules you set, and people handle the exceptions.
- Meta's Muse hasn't upended anything yet. Ask what need it meets before you pivot for it.
Wired says Meta's Muse could upend all kinds of businesses, and admits it hasn't. Before you plan around a new personal agent, ask what a customer can do with it on a normal day that they couldn't already do. Until that answer exists, it is one more tool in the pile.
- Nobody is ordering dinner through an AI agent yet. Build for the data, not the agent.
DoorDash says outside AI agents have brought it only hundreds of orders. That is the 50/50 I expected. The one move that pays either way is making your menu, prices and availability precise enough for any agent or AI answer to read.
- Big brands lead AI search by default. Smaller sites get in by being more precise.
BrightEdge's travel study shows the giants winning most AI answers and losing the ones that need specifics. The AI names the brand it can describe most exactly, and a small site can out-describe a giant on purpose.
- Shopify graded its people on AI use and learned nothing. Grade the work, not the tool.
Shopify asked staff to rate each other on AI use, and its CEO now says the answers didn't matter. Counting who touched the tool measures the toolset. Measure whether the work got better and what judgement it still needed.
- Jos. A. Bank is spending its people on fittings, not on 'where's my order'. Every retailer should make that split.
Jos. A. Bank built its new store around consultations and fittings. That is the right place for people. The transactional traffic belongs to AI, so the people are free to do the work that changes a sale.
- Apple won't ship AI for AI's sake. Neither should your business.
Apple's new CEO says the company will only ship AI where it makes a product people love. That is the same test every business owner should run before adding an AI tool: what problem does it solve that I couldn't already solve, and is it worth adding?
- The new AI training controls are a two-minute job, not a strategy
OpenAI will honour a shared robots.txt signal for AI training preferences. Set it once, let it run, and don't confuse controlling training with being named in an AI answer. That second job still needs the real work.
- Starbucks got the order right: warm stores first, AI at the drive-thru second
Starbucks fixed service times and made its stores warmer before moving AI onto the app and the drive-thru. That is the sequence any operator should copy: fix the transactional layer, put people where the warmth counts, then let AI run the repeatable part.
- An AI just booked dinner for a group over text. Your restaurant was either in its data or it wasn't.
Zest's text agent picks a restaurant for a group and books the table without anyone browsing or calling. If your availability lives on a phone line or a PDF menu, the agent doing the choosing never sees you.
- The big AI labs just gave you an opt-out switch. If you sell anything, leave it off.
OpenAI, Google, Microsoft and Anthropic are backing one shared signal for opting out of AI scraping. A business that wants to be named in AI answers should stay open, treat the file as a chore to automate, and not mistake a training setting for a visibility strategy.
- Google's AI will now answer your Business Profile messages. Answering was never the hard part.
Google is putting AI on Business Profile messages. It helps with the easy questions, but it answers from your profile and hands the rest back to you. Treat it as a front door, and make sure the messages that need action reach a system that can act.
- Reddit just closed the door. If your GEO plan was 'be on Reddit', it has nothing left.
Reddit is moving behind a login as search referrals fall. Building AI visibility on one platform was always a bet on someone else's business model. The brands that keep getting named state what they are on their own pages, precisely enough to be quoted.
- Amazon's 400 million Alexa shoppers are a data story, and a warning for smaller shops
Amazon says Alexa for Shopping reached 400 million customers who spend 50% more. I read that as a selection effect and a reorder button, not proof that voice is where commerce is going. The part that matters for a smaller business is who Amazon lets in.
- The AI decides how to help. You decide what it can promise.
What building AeroChat taught me about AI customer service: let the AI resolve the conversation, and keep the commitments (money, dates, promises) in rules you control. That split is what lets you trust it with more.
- The AI Search Playbook, 2nd edition
Your buyers are asking ChatGPT and Google who to buy from. Six months of testing what gets a brand named in AI answers, rebuilt into a six-step method.
- The tool was never the skill
Prompt tricks and button locations have a shelf life measured in months. Ten mental models for working with AI that still hold when the tools change.
- Getting a new store cited in AI search in ten days
I built a one-product Shopify store with no backlinks, no ads and no reviews, and got Google's AI Overview and ChatGPT to name it first. What happened, why it worked, and where it came short.
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