In this episode we’re celebrating one year of Prompting Curiosity and I’m sharing my unfiltered thoughts about where I stand on AI. I get into why the discourse on Threads is such a mess, why AI is an easy target given the enshittification of everything, and why capitalism (not AI capability) is the real driver behind the issues at hand. No predictions, no hype, just my two pennies on data centers, adoption, and why I'm not willing to give up something that genuinely helps my brain and my business.

• Celebrating one year of Prompting Curiosity
• Riffing on unfiltered thoughts about AI in August 2026
• The Threads discourse on AI
• General thoughts on AI and unequal benefits
• AI as capitalism's easy scapegoat
• Funny money and bubble talk
• Fin-tech burnout and no predictions
• Forced adoption and the "no great use case" problem
• AI's impact on search and generational usage differences
• Why I'm not willing to give up AI
• Blaming the individual vs. corporate accountability
• What amazes me
• How I used AI this week: Google NotebookLM use-case for blogging

• Listen to Ep: 25 - Google NotebookLM: The Best AI Tool You've Never Heard Of
• Read this episode's Curious Companion
• Subscribe to the Prompting Curiosity newsletter
• Submit a Question
• Visit the Website
• Feeling curious AND generous? Click here to support the podcast.

• (00:00:05) - Prompting Curiosity: The AI Curious
• (00:00:38) - It's Been One Year
• (00:02:13) - Pushing the Discussion On Social Media
• (00:03:27) - AI: Good or Evil?
• (00:05:16) - Should We Stop Developing Artificial Intelligence?
• (00:06:01) - We Do Not Need These Huge Data Centers
• (00:06:58) - Can Anyone Predict The Future With AI?
• (00:12:25) - On AI and What We As A Society Do With It
• (00:18:27) - Teaching and the Future of AI
• (00:23:23) - The Future of AI Is Full of Fear
• (00:25:44) - How We Used AI This Week
• (00:26:40) - Curious About AI

In this episode I dig into open weight and open source AI models: what they actually are, why they keep showing up in AI news, and why I think they’re central to future-proofing our AI usage. I cover a bit of the technical aspect, the economic factors at play, and make the case that open weight models are a true hedge against getting stuck forever paying whatever a handful of AI companies decide to charge while simultaneously worrying that access could just be stripped away at any moment.

• What open weight and open source models actually are
• Why open models matter: market pricing and individual sovereignty
• Open weight vs. open source definitions
• Why it's called "open weight" (parameters refresher)
• Who's releasing open weight models
• Why companies release open weight models
• Why individuals would choose an open model
• How to try an open weight model yourself
• Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's open letter and Anthropic's response
• How I used AI this week: Claude's Scheduled Tasks feature

• Listen to Ep. 17: Will ChatGPT Get Old Navy'd?
• Read this episode's Curious Companion
• Subscribe to the Prompting Curiosity newsletter
• Submit a Question
• Visit the Website
• Feeling curious AND generous? Click here to support the podcast.

• (00:00:05) - Promoting Curiosity: The AI Curious
• (00:00:38) - Requiring Curiosity
• (00:01:07) - Open Source vs Open Weight
• (00:01:56) - Open Weight Models: Do They Even Work?
• (00:08:05) - What is an Open Weight Model?
• (00:12:43) - What are the Open Weight Models
• (00:14:16) - Open Weight vs Frontier: The Differences
• (00:17:14) - Open vs Closed PPT: The Pricing
• (00:18:59) - On OpenAI and its "free" models
• (00:21:11) - Choosing the right cloud provider
• (00:22:09) - Local vs. Hosting: More Tech, More Privacy
• (00:23:13) - Open Weight Models: How to Try them
• (00:26:02) - Nvidia's CEO on OpenAI and the Future of AI
• (00:28:51) - How I Used AI This Week
• (00:31:25) - Coming Soon: The Curious Companion

In this episode I get curious about Perplexity, a name I'd heard used a ton in the AI space but never actually knew what the heck it was. I break down what it is, how its citation-first approach set it apart from ChatGPT early on, and what it can actually do today: Deep Research, Labs, and its push into the agent space with Computer, Brain, and Comet. I also cover the legal issues that are serving as a sneak peek into the future of agent wars, and give my honest take on whether Perplexity is worth using.

• Why this episode
• What Perplexity actually is
• Pro and Max pricing tiers
• Who Perplexity is actually for
• Perplexity's launch and the citations angle
• The lawsuits over copyright infringement
• Live search, Deep Research, and Labs
• Computer: Perplexity's move into agents
• Brain, Comet, and the Amazon lawsuit
• Should you bother with it
• How I used AI this week: Building a custom content tracker

• Listen to Ep. 52: AI Agents Explained (For Non-Coders)
• Read Curious Companion Ep. 52: AI Agents Explained (For Non-Coders)
• Read this episode's Curious Companion
• Subscribe to the Prompting Curiosity newsletter
• Submit a Question
• Visit the Website
• Feeling curious AND generous? Click here to support the podcast.

• (00:00:05) - Prompting Curiosity: The AI Curious
• (00:00:38) - Perplexity
• (00:01:49) - Beyond the Chatbot: Perplexity's Real-Time C
• (00:07:43) - Microsoft's Computer: An AI Agent in Microsoft 365
• (00:10:59) - Brain and Comment: Perplexity's AI
• (00:11:49) - Amazon Is Suing Perplexity Over AI-Backed Browser
• (00:15:11) - How I Used AI to Build a Content Creation Tracker (Again)
• (00:19:10) - PODCAST: Help Me Find The Podcast
• (00:19:37) - Curious Companion