Dan, Toby, and Chmiel end the year by flipping the script. After letting Dan respond to everyone else's provocations in a previous episode, this time Toby and Chmiel throw Dan's hottest takes, weirdest perspectives, and biggest contradictions right back in his face. From his prediction that linear TV advertising would be dead by now to his thoughts on gobbledygook and autonomous cars, Dan defends (or admits he got wrong) his most memorable moments from the past year.

Details of the show:

• Dan's contradictions on generated slop
• The transformative influence of ChatGPT in 5 years (but not now)
• What "transformative" actually means at CES
• How to pronounce gobbledygook

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dan, Toby, and Chmiel invite two last-minute guests with competing perspectives about the future of IP and AI. On one side is Craig Elimeliah, Chief Creative Officer at Code and Theory who wrote a provocative LinkedIn post that Eriq Gardner, Founding Partner at Puck (and Dan's brother) called "gobbledygook spit out by a machine."

Details of the show:

• Why Craig thinks Disney's Sora deal represents a fundamental shift in how IP works
• Eric's skepticism about whether this is meaningful change or just corporate partnership jargon
• Whether "invitation to participate" is a real framework or just nice-sounding language
• Why media companies are scrambling to figure out AI deals before they understand what they're dealing with

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dan, Toby, and Chmiel break down their 3rd annual Provocations Not Predictions event, where ON_Discourse members submit their most challenging questions for the year ahead. In this episode, they debate whether AI will actually deliver transformative change in 2026 or if we're stuck automating yesterday's workflows with tomorrow's tools.

Details in the show:

• Why provocations force harder thinking than predictions
• The difference between automating old processes and fundamentally changing how we work
• Whether new hardware (glasses, wristbands, connected ecosystems) will actually ship in 2026
• Why we might already have everything we're going to get
• What it means when three years after ChatGPT, the only real change is tactical efficiency

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We are broadcasting Toby’s panel at Web Summit in Lisbon, featuring Dan and Don McGuire, CMO of Qualcomm. Don and Dan think the future of marketing is "human-led, technology-powered.” Behind that concept is a new org-chart, workflow, and a concept called PTSB - permission to sh*t the bed. It sounds a lot different than automation…

Details in the show:

• The problem with the traditional compartmentalization of marketing into separate 'brand' and 'performance' silos
• Why the "nerve center" of marketing organizations should shift to creativity, away from product and communications
• How "context is the new creativity" and why many brands fail to apply it
• A disagreement about what upskilling means
• Why the concept of "The internet is closing" means marketers must figure out new methods to "own your customer"

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dan, Toby, and Matthew announce the launch of new company and product called (domain) - a collaboration platform that connects your work to your network. It is built on the thesis that the future of work isn't about AI giving you answers, it's about AI helping humans collaborate better. In this episode they break down why they think we're on the edge of a collaboration revolution.

Details in the show:

• The problem with AI flattening all outputs to "good enough"
• Why collaboration skills will be what separates people in the future of work
• How we turned lessons in discourse into a modern collaboration platform

Join the (domain) waitlist here: https://ondomain.ai

Enter code PODCAST

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Everyone agrees customer experience matters. Everyone agrees AI will transform business. So why is almost nobody actually doing anything about it? Dan and Matthew dig into new research showing that 93% of C-suite leaders say their digital CX needs improvement - even though they know it drives revenue. The problem isn't technology as much as it is imagination. While companies chase efficiency gains they can put in a spreadsheet, they're missing the bigger opportunity to fundamentally reimagine how they serve customers.

Details in the Show:

* Why 76% of enterprises feel behind on AI transformation

* The difference between efficiency gains and relationship innovation

* How ChatGPT's retro campaigns signal something deeper about consumer AI

* How autonomous lawn mowers help us think about CX

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

ChatGPT and Claude are going direct to consumers with nostalgic commercials and friendly interfaces, but underneath the marketing is a fundamental shift in how we interact with technology. Dan, Toby, and Matthew dig into what happens when AI systems become the primary interface for everything - and whether these platforms will be truly open or just feel open while quietly controlling distribution, data, and dollars.

Details in the Show:

* Why ChatGPT's retro marketing makes us want to watch Stranger Things

* The difference between open protocols and closed ecosystems

* How agentic systems change the attention economy (and who controls it)

* Why platform dependency always ends the same way

* What Amazon's playbook tells us about AI's future

About ON_Discourse

ON_Discourse is a private community of C-suite leaders, investors, and innovators who come together to challenge assumptions, sharpen ideas, and drive transformation through discourse. 

As an experiment in modern discourse, the show’s hosts co-founders, Toby Daniels, Dan Gardner, and Head of Discourse, Matt Chmiel, explore how emerging technologies, such as AI are reshaping business, creativity, and culture, grounded in the real-world experiences that emerge from our community’s private Group Chats.

Learn more about becoming part of the community: ondiscourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

AI is making predictions cheaper, faster, and easier at scale. But forecasting is still guessing, and NYU Stern Professor Jamyn Edis argues that what AI can't replace is human judgment. In this conversation, we dig into why defining "intelligence" matters, how business actually works versus how we pretend it works, and what happens when we confuse prediction with decision-making.

Details in the Show:

* Why judgment and intelligence aren't the same thing

* The difference between prediction and decision-making in business

* How AI changes what we measure, not whether we should trust the measurement

* Academic vs. business discourse (and why one is afraid of being wrong)

* Putting tomatoes in fruit salad

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

ChatGPT just released Sora 2, a tool that lets you create videos starring your own digital avatar. Add that to last week's Pulse, and suddenly we're not just consuming content. we're becoming it. But who actually asked for this? And what happens when synthetic content floods the same feeds we're already exhausted by?

Details in the Show:

* The cameo feature and personalized synthetic content

* Whether people want algorithmically generated entertainment

* How OpenAI is closing the web by moving from tool to ecosystem

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

ChatGPT recently launched Pulse, a feature that reads everything you do, repackages your work back to you, as if you are the subject of a daily newsroom. It's like taking notes that talk back, or having someone present your own thoughts better than you could. Is this useful or just another feed we'll forget about in three weeks.

Details in the Show:

* Behavior-driven media vs algorithmic targeting

* The difference between relatability and utility in AI-generated content

* How context plus specificity changes your relationship with information

* Whether this is the start of something bigger or just yesterday's weather report

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The AI revolution promised to transform everything. Instead, we got chatbots that sound smart but deliver work that looks like a duck, walks like a duck, but turns out to be a goose. This episode digs into why the agentic AI hype hasn't delivered transformative experiences, and what's really holding back the next phase of human-computer interaction.

Details in the Show:

• Why "not everything needs to be a conversation" is the key insight missing from AI design
• How the volume knob reveals the flaw in invisible interface thinking
• Why better thinking doesn't equal better doing in the agentic world
• The difference between multi-step reasoning and true agency
• How the internet became static again, and where the UX designers went
• Why AI tools still require you to do your actual work

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Andrew Rosen’s ESPN vs. NYT breakdown is generating headlines, not because it’s about sports or news, but because it’s about institutions facing disruption. This episode doesn’t just recap his argument, it asks a harder question: What does it look like when legacy brands adjust too slowly to seismic shifts in distribution, personalization, and participation?

Details in the Show:

* Why Rosen says NYT is adapting, and ESPN isn’t

* How personalization is breaking legacy distribution models

* What AI-native fandom reveals about the future of content

* How legacy instutions in legacy platforms should adapt to the AI revolution

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Dan, and Chmiel set out to decode vibe coding but end up in a more urgent conversation about thinking. What happens when our tools get smarter, but our minds get lazier? Who wins in the battle between machine automation and human inspiration?

Details in the Show:

* How vibe coding is amazing (and frustrating)

* The rise of synthetic synthesis and what it’s doing to original thought

* How AI enables performance over understanding

* What happens when the internet becomes a memory prosthetic, and we stop remembering anything ourselves'

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Dan, and Chmiel dig into the implosion of Gartner’s market cap, and what it reveals about the future of knowledge work. The conversation starts with a provocative question: if the business of certifying value no longer creates value, what’s next?

Details in the Show:

• Why Gartner lost half its value
• The crumbling authority of research firms in a world of AI-generated synthesis
• Why “knowledge work” was always a proxy for service
• If AI can truly replace what Gartner does
• Plus: the annual lobster roll competition, and what it teaches us about surf, turf, and interface friction

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Dan, and Chmiel examine LinkedIn’s strange grip on our professional lives. What starts as a confession, Toby admitting to opening the app 30 times a day, turns into a bigger question: is LinkedIn a tool, a feed, or just another dopamine trap? Together, they unpack why the platform feels indispensable yet indistinguishable from TikTok or Instagram, and what that says about the state of “professional” culture online.

Details in the Show:

• Why LinkedIn use feels more like compulsion than utility
• The collapsing distinction between LinkedIn, TikTok, and Instagram feeds
• Dan’s take on why “professional content” isn’t as unique as it once was
• How the platform serves as both a temperature check and a time sink
• Whether compulsive usage equals value or just digital junk food
• What LinkedIn’s stickiness reveals about the broader internet economy of attention

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chmiel sits down with ON_Discourse members Natalie Monbiot and Craig Elimeliah for a sharp dive into AI’s hidden cost: the erosion of human cognition. Natalie, founder of Virtual Human Economy, shares research showing how over-reliance on LLMs can short-circuit learning, while Craig, Chief Creative Officer at Code and Theory, explores how design choices can either feed (or fight) that decline. Together, they unpack why today’s AI interfaces make it too easy to bypass thinking, and how reimagined UX could keep humans in the loop without slowing progress.

Details in the Show

• Why cognitive “bypassing” is more a UX problem than an AI inevitability
• The MIT Media Lab study showing how starting with AI leads to zero recall and weaker encoding of ideas
• What “caring” means in creative work, and why instant AI answers kill it
• How better interface design could encourage iteration, reflection, and deeper engagement
• Craig’s view on designing AI experiences that empower rather than overwhelm users
• Why friction is the spark for meaning-making and growth
• A challenge to AI product teams: stop optimizing for speed at the expense of human depth

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby and Chmiel continue last week’s conversation on human ingenuity with a founder who’s putting it to the test. Katherine von Jan (KVJ to those who know her) joins the pod to talk about her new venture, Tough Day, and its mission to unlock the best of human potential in an AI-saturated workplace. As a longtime ON_Discourse member and former Salesforce exec turned startup founder, KVJ has a sharp perspective on where AI helps, where it hurts, and why the future of work depends on not automating away what makes us human.

Details in the Show

• Why KVJ believes the next wave of AI should elevate human problem-solving, not replace it
• The overlooked cost of frictionless workflows, and why some struggle is essential to great ideas
• How “human ingenuity gaps” show up inside organizations, and what tools can close them
• Lessons KVJ carried from big tech leadership into startup building in the AI era
• Why today’s obsession with scale blinds us to the micro-moments that define good work
• A challenge to AI founders: build tech that makes people better, not just faster

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Matt, and Dan wrestle with what it means to have a “voice” in an AI-mediated world, and what happens when that voice gets flattened, filtered, or faked. This episode digs into the paradox of human ingenuity in the age of synthetic output, the strange intimacy of talking to machines, and why friction, not fluency, might be the future of AI design.

Details in the Show

• Why AI-generated content feels increasingly soulless and how “sludge” became the internet’s new texture
• The performance of trust: how we signal presence in an era of invisible agents
• A defense of friction: what gets lost when AI makes things too easy
• How real-time collaboration with AI can sharpen and not replace human ideas
• Why product interfaces may need less wizardry and more humanity

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Dan, and guest Craig Hepburn step inside the AI browser wars, and ask if the future of the internet is being quietly rewritten not by models, but by interfaces. This episode zooms in on Perplexity’s new agentic browser Comet, the real promise (and limits) of context-aware assistants, and what gets lost when AI "helps" too much.

Details in the Show

• Why “the browser” might be AI’s most important battlefield, and what Perplexity’s big bet reveals
• The rise of agentic interfaces and the myth of productivity-as-progress
• The paradox of better UX: does frictionless mean future-proof, or forgettable?
• Why Google is still sleeping at the wheel, and how fast that could change
• What Craig learned from testing five AI browsers, and which one might actually stick
• The power (and danger) of right-click reversal: what happens when the browser starts prompting you
• A little “closed system vs. open protocol” debate
• How context layers could finally fix the broken web… or break it entirely

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Toby, Dan, and Chmiel interrogate the quiet crisis hiding inside the AI boom: we’re offloading too much thinking and calling it strategy. This episode explores what gets lost when cognitive offloading becomes the norm, and why the future of leadership may depend on friction, not flow.

Details in the Show

• Why “upstream of strategy” isn’t just a catchphrase—it’s a call to rethink how we think
• Cognitive offloading, groupthink, and the invisible atrophy of over-automated ideas
• What AI can't replicate: disagreement, unpredictability, and taste
• Why trust, vulnerability, and gut-checks still outperform generative polish
• The difference between provocation and prompting—and why AI doesn’t know the difference
• How “the weak ties” in your network might be your sharpest strategic inputs
• The real value of feeling dumb: learning, not performance, is the point

Learn more at ON_Discourse.com

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