Field Notes on Building AI That Earns Its Place
A loosely connected set of essays. I build in three places at once — wine, consumer insights, and AI consulting — and the strange thing is how often the three of them hand me the same lesson. The model is rarely the point. What's defensible, what's trustworthy, what actually changes how someone works: that lives somewhere else. These are my notes on where.
June 2026 · Field Notes
Why the Moat Is the Workflow, Not the Model
Frontier models are a commodity input. What compounds — and what a competitor can't simply buy — is the workflow underneath: the accumulated context, the proprietary data, the traceable trust. A model is a capability. A workflow is a position.
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June 2026 · Field Notes
From Research Reports to Persistent Customer Intelligence
A report answers the questions you thought to ask the day you commissioned it. A persistent intelligence layer answers the questions you have today, against everything it has learned about your customers up to this moment — and it's a little smarter than it was last week.
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June 2026 · Field Notes
What Wineries Actually Need from AI
After 150+ conversations with winemakers, DTC managers, and owners, the pattern is clear: wineries don't need another dashboard or chatbot. They need help inside the tools they already live in — Commerce7, Mailchimp, ShipCompliant — that respects compliance and earns trust before it asks for any.
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June 2026 · Field Notes
Decision Systems, Not Dashboards
A dashboard shows you what happened — a polished way of handing the hard part back to you. The interesting frontier is the layer above: systems that synthesize signal into a call, show their reasoning, and earn the right to commit.
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May 2026 · Field Notes
Building AI for Industries Where Trust Still Matters
In some industries, an AI that's brilliant nine times out of ten and confidently fabricates on the tenth is worse than no tool at all. Wine compliance, financial decisions, customer relationships — trust isn't a feature of the product. Trust is the product.
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Endurance, in long form.
April 2019 · Ironman 70.3
They Put the Ocean Back in Oceanside
The organizers put the ocean back in Oceanside with a beach start — and a well-documented fear of open water meant I had no business on that start line. Here's how it went anyway.
May 2018 · Triathlon
Bermuda-ful Bermuda!
WTS Bermuda — the inaugural World Triathlon Series race on the island, my first race of the season, and my first-ever sprint tri. A race about rediscovering why I do this at all.
September 2017 · Ironman 70.3
Ironman 70.3 Worlds
I toed the start line for the Ironman 70.3 World Championships in Chattanooga. It did not go well. The honest story of a year fighting open-water panic — and the people who carried me through it.
March 2017 · Triathlon
You Should See My Finish Video
Ironman Arizona, two weeks after the NYC Marathon. A 40-minute PR, a finish-chute I genuinely don't remember, and a new personal record I'm not proud of: peeing on myself 16 times.