A plenary / welcome speaker in front of the Connected Places Summit branding and presentation screen.

At the Connected Places Summit today. Lots of talk about AI, SMEs and data infrastructure. Should be interesting!

From freelance to studio UX, with Fran Cook, Thu, Mar 26, 2026, 4:00 PM | Meetup In **[our next Open UX Design meetup](https://community.openux.design/c/events/21-from-freelance-to-studio-ux-with-fran-cook)** we’ll be meeting and hearing from **Fran Coo

Next week I’ll be chatting to awesome designer Fran Cook about what it means to be a freelance #ux designer PLUS what it’s like to start a collective / studio. Come hang with us on Thursday ☺️

#uxuidesign #uxdesign

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius:

“There will be no military participation.. We have a situation which we did not provoke.. This war started without any consultations.. What does Trump expect from a handful of European frigates in Strait of Hormuz that the mighty US Navy can't manage alone?"

Excuse me for reposting this thread but, frankly, it took me a while to write and I quite like my little rant 🥸☺️ #genAI #AI #uxdesign

A really good thread! Thank you! I should use this with our clients 😅 🧵

My US Big Tech iPhone keeps trying to autocorrect “sociocracy” to “sociopath”.

Figures 😅

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And recap it he does. In a kinda formal, stilted way, that feels like a #genAI summary... 🤖

Suddenly cold sweat washes over me. I’m sitting on the AI train to the future, reading an AI recap of a genAI’d comic of an AI-advocate’s podcast.

This is the train to the future! Toot toot! 🚂

But phew, luckily the huge awks of this moment are brought to an end… by the end of the comic!

And so it’s over to the author Jakob, to handily recap what we’ve been reading.

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Woah! Let's not get started on a discussion of conquering and colonialism! Because I don’t want to consider what it means to be colonised when talking about #AI. Let's leave politics out of it, ok?

Anyway I bought a ticket to BUILD the future. Not have the future to be DONE to me, ok?

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And whilst I’m at it, something else is bothering me. Why is it always Alexander the Great in these kind of arguments? Rather than another conqueror like… I don’t know… Genghis Khan? 🥷

26/

I thought that this was the route to being super-empowered? That's what you promised earlier.

So do the masses get the AI-filtered stuff, whilst the direct access goes to those who can afford it? 🤯🤔

25/

Didn’t we say earlier that one-to-one, direct access to thinkers was for the super-privileged elite? I thought we were accessing education through the lens of genAI? That it was doing the thought for us?

24/

“Marc prizes direct access to domain practitioners: founders, researchers, experts who actually do the work”

Yes! So muscular! So alpha! People! Direct access! Like, one-on-one style! It’s like my very own, one-to-one education!

BUT HOLD ON A SECOND!! 🤯

23/

No time to figure it out! I’ve just got to keep my lunch down and bask in the “tremendous amount of alpha” smashing into my eyes!

A term that’s definitely not eewww, btw. I should focus instead on everything I’m benefitting from right now. Like "direct access to experts"!

22/

BTw... as I push my face into the X content firehose, how am I meant to filter out the massive amount of “wrong” predictions from its 6,000 tweets per second?

21/

I'm definitely going to do this. Although... maybe ideas in old books are so relevant because of natural filtering?

I mean, aren’t there so many ‘good’ old books because… the crap & irrelevant ones fell out of print? No?

20/

The dumbbell approach. Hey, we made reading tough! Muscular reading.

Yes I’m still kicking sand in your face, Newton. Haha what a dweeb.

19/

Comic panels. Marc Andrees explains his "barbell strategy" for consuming media (whilst sitting under a floating barbell). He reads old books only. He consumes X content. And he listens to actual practitioners in the field. There's so much "alpha" in that.

God damn. I like all this big, muscular imagery in this newsletter. Dams. Infrastructure. Warriors on horseback. If only everything could be muscular. Like reading. BUT WAIT, IT CAN!

18/

Damn straight Marc, where ARE the new cities?! We’ve wasted the last 100 years building the invisible! Rights. Social care. Economic security. Wellbeing. 😡

We need more monuments and statues to point to!

17/

Comic panels. March Andreeson pointing at large infrastructure like dams, built in the 1930s. He demands to know where the new dams are? The new cities? Uh oh here's a mid-build railway bridge tied up in reams of red tape (handily labelled "regulations").

Here comes Marc again, pointing at all the big things:

16/

Comic panels showing dark clouds, shuttered schools, empty playgrounds, charts showing a downward trend. Marc Andreeson explains that we are self-euthanising our economy through depopulation, and that we need AI to do all the jobs people aren't available to do.

That’s right. We’d be in a land of trouble without AI!

Although why does the economy getting smaller - in an age where growth is eating the planet - mean we're “self-euthanising”?

But never mind that! We need the robots to help us maintain consumption at our current levels. Hooray! 🥳💃
14/

And we’ve got to get on this quick, right? Because what’s that I see in the distance? Dark clouds ahead!

13/

Let’s get building. Especially “building” the kids. Because like you say, “The goal is to make them spectacularly great. To build the super-empowered individual.”

Which is definitely not dystopian sounding at all!

12/

And thanks for helping me focus on the REAL work of “building” guys! 👷🛠️

Not that *non-work* of caring, maintaining, fixing. Or making systems, social care, processes, rights, legal frameworks, healthcare. 🥱

That’s the "passive" stuff that “observers” are doing. BORING!
11/

So… we’re *not* bothered about democratising education for everyone? Now we’re only benefitting kids with “agency”?

Okay, got it. I’ll update my notes. This is a do-ocracy after all. We want “participants” rather than “passive observers”.

Participants like you and me, I guess Marc? Agency!

10/

"Agency"?

Says author: “The term describes initiative, the willingness to just do things, being a “live player” who participates in events rather than passively observing.” 😊

But wait.... 9/

Comic panels. Kids are shown pulling AI levers, burning books with the title "Old Rules" whilst Marc Andreeson says "AI should be the ultimate lever for a kid with agency to say, 'I can fully participate. I can change things.'"

Ah, our AI train is truly underway now and chugging into a future full of productive cities with high performing schools and offices. Why?

Because they’re rich with AI - of course! - which rewards citizens who are “participants” and who have “agency”. 🦸 8/

Anyway! Thanks to #AI, we’re all going to be GREAT. Our kids are going to be top achievers! Apparently AI means everyone's going to be "in the 98th percentile"!

'tho I’m not sure who’s going to be left in the other percentiles if everyone’s now in the top bracket. I mean *that’s* confusing but 🤷
7/