Notes on data, AI, IT
and security
No marketing fog. The way I think about real problems with founders and managers.
Data transformation in SQL: why it belongs in a repository
How moving from scattered scripts to versioned transformations changes the maturity of an analytics team.
Feature flags: how incremental delivery reduces release risk
What feature flags are, why teams that use them release faster and break things less, and what an owner or manager needs to know before adopting them.
Agentic AI: the first questions a manager should ask
What AI agents are, how they differ from standard LLM tools, and which questions to ask before deploying them.
LLM hallucinations: why they happen and what it costs the business
A practical explanation of why language models confidently state things that are not true - and how to decide whether that risk is acceptable in your case.
Vendor concentration: the hidden single point of failure in IT
Why depending on a single infrastructure or software supplier is an operational risk, not just a negotiation position.
EU AI Act is in force: what providers and deployers need to do now
A practical breakdown of the first obligations under the European AI regulation for those building or deploying AI systems.
CrowdStrike: how one content update tears the global operational fabric
A breakdown of the July 2024 incident and what it reveals about business operational resilience.
RAG in production: why a large context window does not solve the problem
Why RAG architecture often disappoints in production, and where the real bottleneck sits.
Data contracts between teams: a simple tool that prevents a class of breakages
What data contracts are, why they solve a problem that technical tools cannot, and how to start without a large project.
Shadow AI tools: managing risk without banning everything
How companies can manage the risks from employees' unsanctioned use of AI tools - without making a blanket ban the only answer.
Kubernetes: what founders discover after the migration
An honest look at the operational and financial realities of Kubernetes for mid-sized companies - what the container adoption presentations leave out.
GPT-4o and the normalisation of real-time multimodal UX
What the GPT-4o announcement means for companies designing AI-powered interfaces: voice, vision, and text in a single stream is becoming a standard expectation.