Startups, finance, business and strategy.
It's IEEE Spectrum time again, so it's time to talk about why adding management layers early is the real problem behind $2 trillion in annual software failures. From Canada's Phoenix payroll system to the UK Post Office's Horizon fiasco.
Reflections on building Jamie, an AI assistant for email, and the decision to wind down Pragmatic after not finding product-market fit.
AI is cheap for end-users right now, but only because venture capital is picking up the tab. The reality is that training and inference are still expensive, and someone has to pay. Billions raised by OpenAI, Anthropic, Mistral and others are spent on compute, staff and Nvidia GPUs. Consumers see subsidised pricing, but the underlying costs are enormous.
Reflections on meeting a team of scrappy, multi-faceted engineers and what makes the best startups work
How switching from a broken WordPress site to Luma transformed It's Culture Innit's event management, proving that buying beats building when software isn't your core value.
A founder's warning about why early-stage startups should ignore cloud vendor sales calls and keep infrastructure simple to preserve runway and focus on shipping product.
How unnecessary CAPTCHAs, cookie prompts, and popup modals are driving customers away from websites, with practical advice on reducing friction.
Why VCs should back focused tools that integrate well with existing platforms instead of chasing the next monolithic unicorn that tries to do everything.
Why product teams need to embrace simplicity over complexity, focusing on clear blueprints and agility rather than endless documentation and rigid processes.
The worst kind of bad hire isn't the one who does nothing, it's the one who creates chaos to justify their existence. A single bad hire can become cultural rot, fracturing teams, slowing delivery, and driving away top talent through bureaucratic chaos and toxic behavior. They make your team turn off.