Dan's AI Intel

Daniel Walter

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Technology
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The AI revolution is moving faster than anyone can follow. I'm Dan — I built my own stack of AI tools to research, verify and explain the developments I can't stop thinking about, and I share what I find as a two-host show you can actually keep up with. For curious people who want to understand where AI is really going, not just the headlines. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look.

21h ago

AI Now Improves AI — and J-Space Lets Us Watch It Think

AI has started improving AI — for real, in production, across Google, Anthropic and China. But the recursive-self-improvement story the doomers told got two things wrong: it isn't unobservable (Anthropic's new J-space lens can watch a model think before it speaks) and it isn't yet inescapable (a human-checked verifier and human taste still gate the loop). Where recursive self-improvement actually stands, what J-space reveals about machine consciousness, and how far away superintelligence really is. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/62db535c-1077-494d-8007-f95746dd20b3 One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

58 min
2d ago

Google Prints Money — So Why Did It Just Sell $85 Billion of Stock? (And Why Buffett's Successor Bet Big)

The largest equity raise in history, the $10 billion AI bet Greg Abel made that Warren Buffett never would, and the $600 billion question hanging over the whole build-out. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/3c3d9175-5a7b-4690-8c76-bbd7a92db243 Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/google-prints-money-so-why-did-it-just-sell-%2485-billion/id6784551302?i=1000776094630 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

31 min
4d ago

Claude Sonnet 5 Got Cheaper — So Why Does It Cost More?

Claude Sonnet 5 is cheaper per token and nearly matches Opus 4.8 — so why does finishing a real task cost more than before, and more than Opus itself? We dig into the new tokenizer, the 3x jump in agent loops, how Sonnet 5 stacks up against Gemini 3.5 Flash on price and speed, and the one metric that actually decides your AI bill: cost per completed task, not price per token. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/cc7df8a9-3357-49e1-8bce-0f32e584d50f Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/claude-sonnet-5-got-cheaper-so-why-does-it-cost-more/id6784551302?i=1000775767746 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

30 min
5d ago

Dario Amodei Just Asked for a Kill Switch on His Own AI

Dario Amodei just asked the U.S. government for the power to block an AI model from shipping — and the model he meant was his own. We trace Anthropic's CEO across his four big essays, from "Machines of Loving Grace" to "The Adolescence of Technology" to June's "Policy on the AI Exponential," unpack the five things he now wants Washington to do, and ask the hard question: when only the people racing to build AI understand it well enough to govern it, is a kill switch real safety — or the perfect moat? With Sam Altman, Yann LeCun and Geoffrey Hinton along the way. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/d471e1e6-2b66-4da3-bf8a-a29da008cf6d Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/dario-amodei-just-asked-for-a-kill-switch-on-his-own-ai/id6784551302?i=1000775726903 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

38 min
Jun 30

June 2026: The Month AI Became a Capital Game

June 2026 was the month AI became a capital race. SpaceX (with xAI inside) priced the largest IPO in history at ~$75B; Anthropic and OpenAI both filed to go public; one operator booked $80B in compute. Plus: Google's talent exodus, Washington's export-control kill order on Anthropic's models, and ChatGPT falling below half the market. The whole month in AI, in one sitting. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/e66b27af-0cd0-488f-aacd-a4c27ded0b12 Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/june-2026-the-month-ai-became-a-capital-game/id6784551302?i=1000774921284 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

43 min
Jun 27

Elon Musk Became the Danger He Warned Us About

Elon Musk warned for a decade that AI could end humanity — then made himself the one person who most concentrates that power: Grok, X, the biggest compute build on Earth, Cursor, and a defence-space empire. We trace him from a Pretoria boyhood to the trillion-dollar present, correct the trillionaire and tax headlines, and ask the real question — should any single person hold this much of the AI future? I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/4fd67a2c-19e5-41fe-9ed1-46624beead70 Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/elon-musk-became-the-danger-he-warned-us-about/id6784551302?i=1000774482063 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. And if someone in your life keeps asking where AI is heading, sending them this episode is the kindest thing you can do for both of them and the show.

1h 6m
Jun 26

Google's Quiet AI Win: The Hidden 70x Subsidy in Your $200 Plan

Everyone thinks AI's per-token meter is the subsidy. It isn't — inference is profitable. The real giveaway is your flat $200 ChatGPT Pro or Claude Max plan, a 40–70x subsidy to its heaviest users. And who survives the price war is decided at the silicon: Google runs Gemini on its own TPUs while OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI and the rest pay NVIDIA's ~75% margin on every token. We map every major maker, the reasoning-token trap that makes the cheap model the expensive one, why prices fall as losses hit records, and when the meter comes for your subscription. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/ad0f6c8b-7a75-4dd8-b288-78d3fba4dc9d Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/googles-quiet-ai-win-the-hidden-70x-subsidy-in-your-%24200-plan/id6784551302?i=1000774287939 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

43 min
Jun 20

The Agent Internet: Big Tech Built It Together — to Fight Over Your Front Door

The tech giants agreed to build the agent internet together — so they could fight over the one piece they kept: the front door to your life. I'm Dan. AI moves too fast to keep up with, so I built my own stack of AI tools to research, analyse, verify and illustrate the questions I can't stop thinking about — mostly to learn it myself, and I share what I find. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look. Follow Dan's AI Intel in whatever app you're listening in — it's free, and a follow is the single biggest thing that helps a small independent show grow. Read the full report — charts, sources and the interactive exhibits — at https://connectiveshift.com/shows/ai-intel/12ee4d03-081b-416f-8487-68cbace07cf4 Prefer to listen? This episode is on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/the-agent-internet-big-tech-built-it-together-to/id6784551302?i=1000774287893 — or follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. One quick thing, from Dan — I make this show mostly to keep up with AI myself, and I'd love to make it better. If there's something you'd push back on or want me to go deeper on, tell me: podcast@connectiveshift.com — I read every one.

31 min

The AI revolution is moving faster than anyone can follow. I'm Dan — I built my own stack of AI tools to research, verify and explain the developments I can't stop thinking about, and I share what I find as a two-host show you can actually keep up with. For curious people who want to understand where AI is really going, not just the headlines. AI-assisted, fact-checked, worth a second look.

Creator

Daniel Walter
Years Active

2K
Episodes

26
Rating

Clean
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© 2026 Daniel Walter
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Dan's AI Intel