Grab Bag: Smart TV Liposuction Edition

Black October

Cybersecurity had one of its worst weeks ever.

You know things are rough when the NSA and Japanese government officials are telling people to take their websites offline. At times, the Internet Archive (yes, the literal backup of the internet) was down for almost half a day.

AI models are finding dozens of major security flaws daily, and humans are struggling to patch them in time. But before you panic… yes, it will get worse before it gets better. But it will get MUCH better. Once these critical bugs are fixed, we will have a much more secure and robust internet.

Smart TV Liposuction

Sorry for the terrible visual, but your Smart TV is likely full of spam apps (to serve you ads for your enjoyment, of course).

Well, the AI community has discovered you can hook up Claude and suck all that fat right out.

You’re welcome.

“I Can’t Find Talent”

The big (and justified) concern about AI is that it’s going to take everyone’s jobs. And there is plenty of evidence of people in tech who have been searching for over a year and just can’t get hired (see Mo’s recent thread).

But the flipside is happening as well.

Multiple colleagues are having trouble sifting through 1,000s of AI-generated and AI-enhanced resumes. Everyone seeking jobs is burying hiring managers in so much AI slop that it’s hard to find the right candidates.

Spoiler alert: human networking is working great, and more important than ever.

Explore Your Backyard: Part 2

In my last Grab Bad Edition, I shared why exploring your backyard matters. Since then, I took my own advice. Results:

• Reptile convention (this was shockingly awesome for the kids)
• College Tour (2-hour tour of the local campus).
• Weekend visit to Arkansas (first SEC football game).
• Makerspace (my kids are going to LOVE the 3D printer samples).

Now I have my Grok Bot scanning local news for any upcoming family-friendly events.

Friendly reminder: there’s so much happening in your backyard, you gotta look! And take the plunge.

Sales Is The Next Bottleneck

Coding used to be the hard part. Now it’s trivial, and many developers find themselves stumped by the following question: “What should I build next?”

When one thing becomes easy and abundant, something else becomes hard and scarce.

I believe that is sales, marketing, and BD. Now that the world is flooded with vibe-coded products and tools, actually finding and maintaining customers becomes the critical need.

Prediction: If you want to be invaluable in 2027, get better at sales.

Kids Are Best AI Skeptics

Parents fear kids will get sucked into using AI to replace thinking.

I bet this is happening, but I’m also observing the reverse.

My oldest daughter uses AI but rejects it as a primary creator. She uses it only as a sparring partner and refuses to let it write for her.

I’ve seen some of her peers outright reject or mock it. “Oh, that’s an AI song, bleh.”