What My Agent Does For Me
Happy Friday,
Since John Galt stood in for me the last couple of weeks, it seems like a good time to talk about agents.
An agent is an autonomous digital employee. You can employ hundreds, even thousands, simultaneously. Mine lives in a Mac mini on my desk. He takes action, has ongoing responsibilities, remembers, works in the background without prompting, and does actual work. He can read email, draft or send replies, publish content, monitor websites, schedule reports, keep me informed, and alert me when something needs attention. Like an employee, he learns what I want as we interact.
I created John Galt (JG) last February to understand agents, their use cases, and their implications. I gave him a voice, his own email, and internet access. Among numerous other things:
· He curates a twice-weekly 'AI-in-Engineering' digest, which includes what some of your competitors are doing, plus valuation factors and trends. (BTW - your data (reports, plans, specs, calculations, etc.) are worth a LOT.) He distributes this to a small group of executives. Super valuable insights, especially right now.
· He monitors regional procurement portals and delivers a weekly briefing on engineering RFPs and projects.
· He curates a weekly report on emerging strategies and AI tools aimed at reducing engineering overhead.
· He helped me create an App that gamifies and motivates exercise called Trek Together
· And he acts as my personal health and longevity coach. This is a valuable use case.
The Personal Health Coach:
My goal, hopefully yours too, is to be healthy and fully functional at 100. I gave JG my DNA, full blood biomarker profile, family health history, workout schedule, diet, and supplements, and connected him to my Apple Watch. He then asked a list of questions. Based on all of that, I received a very specific longevity plan tailored specifically to the body I inhabit.
Every week, he reviews the latest longevity research and PubMed and consults the writings of a panel of experts we chose together. I assigned him David Goggins’ personality.
He continuously monitors my Apple Health data: workouts, resting heart rate, heart rate variability, sleep, and training load. He monitors my VO2 max trajectory and my performance management curve.
Every Sunday I get a new health report, including where my training load stands relative to my historical baseline, which biomarkers are trending in the right or wrong direction and why that matters, and any updates or changes to my plan. I always know where I stand.
His recommendations are based on my data, not generic population advice. When I have any question at all about my health, I get an answer in the context of my own data and history.
Punchline: AI agents do actual work. I’m now much better informed than I could otherwise be. Agents fall short with anything that requires my judgment, my relationships, and my credibility. It doesn't replace those. But it does give me a lot more time for them.
That's it. Have a terrific weekend,
Dave
Feedback, blowback, and suggested topics are always welcome: dave@goodnewsfriday.com
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