Ashley Faus

Kogan Page Publishing

My book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI" features three frameworks to help marketers build trust and attract, convert, and retain customers.

Key messages:

-	Trust is the key: People buy from people they trust, and people trust people like themselves. As marketers, we need to build trust with our audience to win and re-win their hearts, minds, and wallets.

-	The human connection becomes more important in the age of AI, because more technology makes it harder to find people you can trust and make authentic connections.

-	The Playground mindset shift: Marketing needs to evolve to match the modern journey. It’s no longer about rushing people to a purchase, it’s about building trust and rapport for long-term value exchange.

-	The Social Media Spectrum (communication, conversation, community): Social media continues to evolve, but too many brands are still focused on driving and participating in conversation about the brand, instead of meeting the audience where they are and fostering community.

-	4 Pillars of Thought Leadership (credibility, profile, prolific, depth of ideas): Thought leadership helps build trust, but it’s not the only type of content or creator that you need in the marketing mix.

Author, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI"

Atlassian

Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio

Director of Integrated Product Marketing

Product Marketing Lead, Software Teams Content 

Sr. Manager, Integrated Media

Sr. Corporate Communications Manager

Skyport Systems

Skyport Systems, acquired by Cisco, provides secure, hyperconverged infrastructure to modernize the DMZ, protect Active Directory, and secure legacy applications and remote branch operations.

Sr. Product Marketing Manager and Content Strategist

Palerra

Palerra, acquired by Oracle, pioneered the API-based Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB).

Sr. Manager, Content Strategy and Marketing Communications

Duarte, Inc.

Strategy and execution for all things marketing.

In addition to previous duties, manage budget, forecast, and annual planning for marketing strategy.

Sr. Marketing Manager

Manage a team of creative experts
Marketo integration, strategy, and execution
Analytics/KPI reporting and analysis
IP launches - Resonate multimedia, Slidedocs, Persuasive Presentations eCourse
Email campaigns, social media, and ad campaigns
Website branding and content updates
Editorial content strategy and execution
Executive presentations

Marketing Manager

Killick Aerospace

Killick Aerospace encompasses several companies that provide engine maintenance, accessory maintenance, airframe support, and parts and engine sales to the aviation industry. I oversaw the marketing activities for all companies in the Killick Aerospace portfolio. My duties include, but are not limited to:

Work with management and IT department for requirements gathering, implementation and documentation of CRM strategy 

Manage 3rd party programmer to update company websites, content manager for company websites

Manage relationships with outside vendors including designers and promotional representatives 

Coordinate all aspects of trade show exhibits, including marketing collateral, shipments, promotional items, and travel logistics

Co-creator and co-manager for print advertising budget

Track and measure success of marketing activities, including website traffic/SEO, referral lead source, and email campaigns

Marketing Coordinator

UserTesting.com

I helped research and implement a social media strategy, including Twitter and reaching out to bloggers. I also helped with customer service.

Independent Contractor

Solar Designs, Inc

Account manager for the company’s largest project, a commercial solar installation, worth $150,000

Improved profit margin by 5% through bulk-price negotiations with supplier

Grew affiliate partnerships from 2 to over 50 within 8 months, used direct Marketing to offer qualified leads and guaranteed revenue to new partners

Increased revenue opportunity by creating a training package for installers

Strategic analysis of customer and installer needs, led to over-hauling information-gathering form and presentation of final customer proposal

Wrote proposals with details about solar system design, environmental impact, and financial implications including up-front costs, rebates, ROI, and payback

OpenTech Media, Inc.

Research, layout, and copy for corporate brochure and website to present a more cohesive message to customers

Virion Interactive Agency

Competitive analysis, post-project analysis, client invoicing and work order processing

Account Management Intern

Director of Integrated Product Marketing, Atlassian

Marketer, writer, speaker by day... singer, actor, fitness fiend by night!

I've handled all aspects of marketing strategy and execution, from product marketing, to demand-gen, to content and events. I love telling the high-level stories that resonate with an audience and connecting the dots between types of assets and distribution channels.

My writing has been published on TIME, Forbes, The Journal of Brand Strategy, and The Muse, and I've spoken on various marketing topics for INBOUND, Harvard Business Review, and MarketingProfs.

Visit https://ashleyfaus.com/ for more information about my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI".

(Views are my own)

When you're friends with smart marketers, you feature each other as an example when you write a book 😀

Devin Bramhall released her book recently, and she featured my Playground framework.

I released my book in May, and I featured her community work from her time at Help Scout.

Per usual, there's a blooper pic if you swipe through 😂

Buy "Human-Centered Marketing": https://amzn.to/480QQLI

Buy "B2B Content Marketing Strategy": https://amzn.to/4i3SLne

(Thanks to MarketingProfs B2B Forum for the cozy background and in-person photo opp 😊)

Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Portfolio at Atlassian

I don't have many rituals before I step onstage to speak.

But I DO love my glitter face mask tradition 😀

Excited to speak about building trust in the buyer's journey MarketingProfs B2B Forum this morning, 10:20am EST!

Grateful for another award for my book, "Human-Centered Marketing: How to Connect with Audiences in the Age of AI" 🎉

Need a gift for yourself or a marketer you love? Get 40% through December 1st!

Grab a copy: https://lnkd.in/eJWZHRF8

Need some light reading en route to allllll the Thanksgiving dinners?

Free sneak peeks:

Thought leadership: https://lnkd.in/eXCZ2qPf

Buyer's journey playground: https://lnkd.in/esQDz9EK

Congrats to all the winners: https://lnkd.in/emxkNFZ2

When I was VERY early in my career, I had to make an expensive decision on behalf of the business.

I was SO worried about it!

Tons of money.
Literally minutes to make the choice.
No time to call my boss for approval.

I decided to spend the money, and trusted that my boss would be ok with it once I finally talked with her.

Y'all... It was paying $50 for valet parking.

But at that time in my life, $50 for parking seemed absurd.

At that time in my career, I wasn't well-versed in how businesses expenses and vendor agreements worked.

And I was genuinely worried about confirming with a vendor that they could pay $50 for valet parking because they were running late to film a customer testimonial during a big conference.

My boss was thrilled that I made the decision to spend the $50 on faster parking vs. potentially losing the filming slot with the customer.

Now as a seasoned marketer, I cringe at my younger self, thinking how silly it was for me to even worry about $50 valet parking. 

OF COURSE that is a no-brainer call!

But... does your team know when it's a no-brainer decision? 

Do they trust that their leaders will back them up when they need to make real-time "expensive" choices?

Do they have a framework for when to escalate?

If you're rolling your eyes at folks making bad calls, it's worth taking a step back to understand whether they have context and trust to make good calls.

Because it's ACTUALLY expensive to do things cheap.

"Which bakery did this come from?"

"Wait, YOU made these!?!"

"You should open a bakery..."

People say this to me frequently when I bring treats to the office, the theater, birthdays, etc.

There's some AMAZING commercial-scale bakeries out there, AMAZING home bakers out there, and everything in between (including my amateur baker status).

After baking treats and buying treats over the years, I've started applying my marketing nerdery to the questions of perception, compliments, trust, etc. in this space.

And so, I'm curious...

In the comparison below, which option would you pay more for?

How much would you pay for a dozen of the cupcakes shown in the picture?

Assume that each option has comparable cost of goods sold, etc. to not bias the results too much, and you can make whatever assumptions you want about where the cupcakes came from, who took the pictures, if they're AI-generated vs. human, etc.

Please nerd out with me about the intersection of my baking hobby and my marketing brain 😋

"When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure." - Goodhart's Law

I've been on a bit of a metrics and attribution kick lately, and I talked a bit about Goodhart's Law in my conversation with 🍁 Glenn Schmelzle on the Funnel Reboot podcast.

The heart of it is something that marketers continually struggle with...

We know we gotta measure.
But we know we can't measure everything.
And without everything, it kinda feels like we have nothing.

The problem is that we're so focused on capturing every. little. detail. in a way that we can easily show in a dashboard, but we miss the big opportunities that actually help people move through a buying process.

We talked about the core frameworks in my book that help you do just that: create a journey that helps the HUMANS make decisions, take action, and solve their problems (and yep, drive revenue for your business)!

Hear the full episode: https://lnkd.in/emxHSDgk

Grab a copy of the book: https://amzn.to/480QQLI

Trust Insights

I'm the resident AI person at Trust Insights. Got a marketing data, analytics, or AI strategy problem? I'll help you solve your mysteries.

I've built AI-powered attribution modeling (to know what's working and what isn't), predictive analytics for content marketing (to know what to publish and when), and digital customer journey mapping (to know what to say and where) - long before ChatGPT existed. In fact, I've been working in the AI field since 2013.

Today, I speak and teach around the world about how to make the most of the three classes of AI (including generative AI) for your business.

Co-Founder and Chief Data Scientist

Marketing Over Coffee

I'm the co-host of one of the top marketing podcasts, largely thanks to my talented co-host, John Wall. Each week we discuss old and new marketing, tips, tactics, methods, ideas, strategies, and much more to get more out of your marketing efforts. With over 700 episodes and a million downloads, it's one of the most popular marketing podcasts in the world.

Visit http://www.MarketingOverCoffee.com for more information and how to get the show for free.

Co-Host

Social Media Pulse

Member of the Social Media Advisory Board. I provide guidance to the team about social media trends, especially as they relate to marketing analytics, social media marketing analytics, social media and data science, and social media and artificial intelligence.

Board Member

The Order (Non-Profit)

The Order advocates for equitable treatment and representation of LGBTQ+ and female-led media and entertainment. Through strategic fundraising, public support campaigns, and advocacy, we aim to promote greater diversity, equity, and inclusion in the entertainment industry. Our vision is a world where all forms of media are celebrated and valued, regardless of creators' gender, sexual orientation, or background.

In my role as Head of Data Science for The Order, I:
- Led comprehensive data science initiatives, driving targeted advertising campaigns, analyzing advertising media landscapes, and conducting custom audience analysis.
- Developed and implemented advanced models and algorithms for audience inference, Twitter data processing, and propensity score risk assessment.
- Orchestrated the creation and management of custom software solutions for social media management, email marketing with integrated data, and media monitoring.
- Conducted extensive research on latent demand patterns, media consumption, and strategic acquisition opportunities, providing valuable insights for marketing strategies and decision-making.
- Produced captivating video ads and implemented innovative influencer marketing programs, expanding brand reach and driving engagement.
- Utilized predictive analytics to forecast demand patterns and develop propensity score risk models, optimizing resource allocation and decision-making processes.
- Crafted and executed public relations strategies, managing brand reputation and external communications.
- Oversaw survey data processing and reporting, generating actionable insights for marketing and business strategies.

Head of Data Science

SHIFT Communications

At SHIFT, I help clients understand how earned media and public relations impact their marketing efforts and demonstrating how to measure PR, marketing, and finding ROI in a big picture view. I run many of the inbound marketing and lead generation programs for SHIFT's own marketing, from CRM administration to Pardot marketing automation to Google Analytics and more. In the first 3 months, I exceeded my lead generation targets by 16x using proven, tested lead generation and content marketing strategies, implemented cutting edge data science and machine learning practices, and I've built a multimillion dollar business unit.

Learn more at http://www.shiftcomm.com

Vice President of Marketing Technology

National Speakers Association

I had the honor and privilege to address NSA about the future of public speaking, augmented by artificial intelligence. Feedback included:
"Your presentation was fantastic! Thank you for sharing a portion of your brilliance with us! #nsa18"
"@cspenn did a great job explaining how #AI will disrupt speaking! Wise speakers will take actions to leverage AI! #nsa18 #Speaker #disrupt"
"I loved the way you married great presentation style, data and analytics, and relevance to the group."

Speaker

Social Media Dallas

I had the honor and privilege to address Social Media Dallas about predictive analytics for social media marketers. Feedback included:
"Can you tell I was excited to be at #SMDallas? Thanks for the great presentation on predictive analytics @cspenn. "
"Thanks @cspenn and @SM_Dallas for a great presentation tonight!"
".@cspenn is blowing our minds teaching us about Predictive Analytics! #smdallas"

Keynote Speaker

Marin Software

Delivered the opening keynote at Marin Masters, New York City on cognitive marketing.

I spoke on the Rise of the Citizen Analyst, how the democratization of analytics tools is fueling the citizen analyst movement.

World of Watson 2016 Speaker

HubSpot

Delivered the track keynote on building a data-driven customer journey.

Track Keynote Speaker

Christopher S. Penn is an authority on analytics, digital marketing, marketing technology, data science, and machine learning. A recognized thought leader, best-selling author, and keynote speaker, he has shaped five key fields in the marketing industry: Google Analytics adoption, data-driven marketing and PR, modern email marketing, marketing data science, and artificial intelligence/machine learning in marketing. As co-founder and Chief Data Scientist of Trust Insights, he is responsible for the creation of products and services, creation and maintenance of all code and intellectual property, technology and marketing strategy, brand awareness, and research & development.

Mr. Penn is a 2024, seven-time IBM Champion in IBM Data and AI, a Brand24 Top 100 Digital Marketer, an Onalytica Top 100 AI in Marketing influencer, and co-host of the award-winning Marketing Over Coffee marketing podcast. Prior to co-founding Trust Insights, he built the marketing for a series of startups with a 100% successful exit rate in the financial services, SaaS software, and public relations industries. His work has served brands such as Twitter, T-Mobile, Citrix Systems, GoDaddy, AAA, McDonald’s, and many others.

Mr. Penn is an IBM Watson Machine Learning Certified Professional, a Google Analytics Certified Professional, a Google Ads Certified Professional, a Google Digital Sales Certified Professional, and a Hubspot Inbound Certified Professional. He is the author of over two dozen marketing books including bestsellers such as AI for Marketers: A Primer and Introduction, Marketing White Belt: Basics for the Digital Marketer, Marketing Red Belt: Connecting With Your Creative Mind, and Marketing Blue Belt: From Data Zero to Marketing Hero, and Leading Innovation.

Learn more about Christopher here:

https://www.ChristopherSPenn.com
https://www.MarketingOverCoffee.com
https://twitter.com/cspenn
https://www.trustinsights.ai

Important: If your first message after connecting is a pitch, then with regret I need to report your message as promotional/spam to LinkedIn and remove the connection.

Christopher Penn

In all the news about Gemini 3 this morning - and there was a lot - this one stuck out:

Gemini 3 in AI search is going to create interactives and visuals for some select search results.

Read that again. Gemini 3 will create interactives and visuals for some search results. 

In a paper the Gemini team published this morning, they demonstrated that AI-generated visuals and interactives are much more satisfying than other search content.

What this essentially means is Google is generating a website on the fly that answers the question of a searcher, particularly for information queries and unbranded queries. 

And at least in testing, it's what users want. The research paper Google released shows a 27% increase in results satisfaction with a generated web page rather than the content of the top search result.

What does that mean for us? Well, for those of us who are website owners, it means even less traffic for unbranded and informational search. Google will literally generate a net new web page rather than send us traffic.

As this rolls out, expect to see even less organic search traffic for unbranded and informational searches in the weeks and months to come. Be prepared to explain to stakeholders what's happening, and what, if anything, you can do about it.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Co-Founder and Chief Data Scientist at TrustInsights.ai, AI Expert

"Home isn't a place, it's a people." - paraphrasing Thor Ragnarok

Lots of events build community in some fashion. I've had the pleasure and privilege to speak at many of them, from Boston to Melbourne.

Lots of events create value for attendees, sponsors, and speakers.

Lots of events are worth going to.

But very, very few events feel like home, and one of them is MarketingProfs B2B Forum, which just wrapped up. For 2+ days, B2B marketers from around the globe make the trek to Boston to learn, share, and grow their marketing skills.

What makes #MPB2B feel like home? Care and attention to detail. From the moment you arrive, to the fine dining (and I mean that unironically, the food at MPB2B is second to none), to the decor (this year, a rustic lodge theme for Thanksgiving), all sets the mood and tone for attendees. Come on, how good is that lounge that Katie Robbert and John J. Wall and I are standing in?

We feel looked after. Cared for. Loved, maybe, to the extent you can do so within professional boundaries. And that in turn changes the tone and tenor of the event, encouraging everyone attending to share more, to be more present, to relate more.

When you feel looked after, even the dreaded "networking" changes tone, from a self-centered "what can you do for me?" attitude prevalent at many events to "how can we relate and enjoy this shared experience". I know I felt it - sitting at meals, more often than not I busted out my laptop and taught something impromptu. At breakfast on day 1 at a roundtable, I showed one person how to build a competitive marketing strategy with AI. At lunch on day 2, I gave an impromptu tutorial on generating leads using generative AI at my table.

I gave without asking in return in part because that's what you do when you're at home with friends and family.

If you want to know how to throw an event the right way, MPB2B is a master class. If you want to experience an event that has few peers, MPB2B is the place to go.

Thanks to the entire team but especially the crew that helped me, including Tenessa Gemelke Kelley Whetsell Dina-Marie Nicovic and of course the incomparable Ann Handley.

And see you next year in Boston for MPB2B 2026.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Excited to announce that I will be attending and speaking at Social Media Marketing World once again this year.

Want to catch up in person? Let me know and we can chat.


#SMMW #SMMW2026

NotebookLM got a HUGE upgrade. Several of them, in fact.

The two newest additions to the system include:
- an infographic maker
- a slide maker

As well as improved video show makers, and adding full Deep Research to the system.

And when you use the Deep Research tool, not only does it load the synthesis in as a source, it also loads all the sources it used into the notebook as sources, which means you get the original goods as well as the synthesis.

It's difficult to overstate just how useful these quality of life upgrades are to the tool. It was already a fantastic summarization and synthesis tool. Now it's a great generation tool as well.

But to get the most out of it, you have to remember one KEY principle:

It's Gemini under the hood.

I'll say that again: it's Google Gemini under the hood.

All the prompt frameworks and best practices you use with Google Gemini apply doubly so to NotebookLM. What separates good from great is the use of Gemini best practices. Prompting NotebookLM is the same as prompting Gemini.

For example, in the prompt for making infographics? Include your Gemini-optimized style guide, and you'll get infographics that are far more aligned to your brand style guidelines. 

You can use things like the Trust Insights CASINO prompt framework for research throughout the tool with incredible effect.

Here's one simple use case for you. Put ALL your emails and conference calls and work product from 2025 into NotebookLM. Then have it synthesize a performance review for you. Then convert that review into a source and have it build an infographic of your performance for 2025. You'll be amazed at how much you accomplished and perhaps your manager will be as well.

Go try the newly upgraded NotebookLM!

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Google is creating AI-generated search results now.

This is different than AI mode. This is different than AI overviews. This is a completely synthesized set of search listings, an experiment called Web Guide.

This evening I went to search for "phaser games audio library" to find something for a coding project, and I got these results.

Look at the notes in the footer:

"Headers and descriptions are AI generated and may include mistakes."

Now, apparently this was announced back in July, but this is the first time I saw it in my standard Google results. On my personal account, I've opted into pretty much anything experimental, but this is the first time I've seen it invoked - and I didn't specifically ask for it.

I have to wonder if the new Gemini launch included a big compute upgrade that lets them roll this out more widely.

What you'll notice is that the page titles and descriptions are different from the originals - Gemini is summarizing them to be more helpful from its perspective.

Think about what this means for content creation, when even the search listings themselves are intermediated by AI. All that SEO software you paid for to optimize snippets and page titles? Perhaps time to re-evaluate that if this experiment succeeds and Google sees better user satisfaction from what Gemini has to say about your site rather than what you have to say about it.

Over on Reddit, folks are commenting that Web Guide has been turned on in their accounts as well without asking for it specifically. Rand Fishkin Lily Ray Dale Bertrand Aleyda Solís Marie Haynes Joost de Valk Kevin Indig are you folks seeing an uptick in Web Guide rolling out?

Maybe the test is going bigger. Either way, this is a good hint about where Google thinks things should be going in its ecosystem.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Plan big, act small has never been more important.

This is Principle 27 in my book, Almost Timeless: 48 Foundation Principles of Generative AI.

In the last month, we've had 3 MAJOR foundation model releases: GPT-5.1, Gemini 3, Claude Ops 4.5. These new models are incredibly capable. They're super smart.

They're also really compute and money expensive. If you've done more than 5 minutes of work with any of them and you're not paying top dollar for Max/Ultra/Bro plans, you've likely hit rate limits/model not available/come back later/pay me more notices.

The top mistake most of us make is using one model for everything, which burns up costly resources on trivial tasks. Instead of thinking of your favorite AI tool as a monolithic interface, a black box with one button, think of it like a consulting firm.

A senior consultant with a big billing rate shouldn't be doing intern or junior consultant work. 

A junior consultant should not be a project lead.

When you go to do a project, be it write a novel, build some code, design a website, etc., think like a manager. Delegate the hardest tasks to the senior consultant (expensive models like Gemini 3 Pro, Claude Opus 4.5, GPT-5.1 Thinking).

Once you've got your plan/outline/skeleton/framework, then delegate the implementation to a junior consultant (cheap models like Gemini 3 Flash, Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.1 Mini). You will dramatically increase your productivity and not run up big bills, especially if you are paying as you go. (API vs. subscription)

On top of that, it boosts your AI sustainability footprint. You don't take a Harrier fighter jet to the grocery store, you take a car (or better yet a bicycle or even walking). Don't use the biggest models for everything - the smaller the model, the less of an environmental footprint you leave.

Again, think like a manager. Would you have your most expensive lawyer summarizing trial transcripts, or would you have your cheapest paralegal do that?

Plan big, act small.

Image generated by Gemini 3.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Of all the models DeepSeek has released lately, none is more interesting to me than DeepSeek Math V2.

Not because I have a particular affinity for math. I really don't. It was the subject I did worst in school. (I credit my 5th grade teacher for instilling a deep seated lack of confidence in me by berating me publicly in class frequently for my present day math skills. Thanks, Mrs. Lalley!)

What makes DeepSeek Math V2 so interesting is that it's focused specifically on mathematical reasoning above all else. Where models like GPT-5.1-Codex focus on coding, DeepSeek Math focuses on proving theorems.

DeepSeek Math bests every model except Gemini 3 on ProofBench - in many cases handily. It's more than double the capability of OpenAI's GPT-5.

You might be thinking, I don't do a ton of theorem proofs day to day in my business job. Neither do I. We're not the audience for this particular AI model. What this AI model shows is a distinctly long point of view: building the tooling to build the tools.

An AI model that writes better content is good. An AI model that writes better code is great. But an AI model that writes better math unlocks entirely new fields of AI or optimizations we just haven't thought of yet. 

Recall way back in January when DeepSeek V3 came out and Silicon Valley lost a trillion dollars of valuation in a day. Why? Because in a single paper on GRPO, DeepSeek and similar Chinese companies showed that even with export restrictions, they could build better AI because they had better math.

Better AI comes from better math.

The trillion dollar data center build outs that have propped up the US economy in 2025? They are 1 math paper away from becoming obsolete before they're even built, because better math - better theorems especially - could cut compute costs by orders of magnitude. Suddenly the US government plan to subsidize AI looks like a giant money sinkhole rather than an avenue to the future.

And DeepSeek Math V2's architecture has some fascinating tricks up its sleeve - like the ability to automatically label new training data, effectively teaching itself how to do better math. It generates harder problems, then solves them, then verifies that it solved them, and then it trains on what worked and what didn't.

An AI that genuinely self-learns.

What this unlocks for a company like DeepSeek is the ability to generate smarter, faster, more powerful, and more efficient AI models than human mathematicians could build alone. This will increase the pace of change and, if other countries' AI labs don't keep up, enable Chinese AI companies to leap ahead ever faster in AI capabilities.

Better AI comes from better math.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Imagine having to say the quiet part out loud to AI.

"Claude, your job is to screw the customer over as much as possible, maximizing profitability at all other costs, including customer happiness."

Associate Professor at The Wharton School. Author of Co-Intelligence

"Alignment for whom" is going to be a big question inside organizations as they deploy external-facing AI solutions...

(From Anthropic’s testing of Claude 4.5 Opus)

In this issue, I answer Chris Brogan's comments about AI use and explore how upgrading your vocabulary serves as the ultimate lever for better artificial intelligence results.
You'll discover why using specific industry jargon unlocks superior precision from large language models. You'll see how borrowing technical terms from software development forces AI to apply logical structure to your requests. You'll understand the critical difference between prompt recipes and data ingredients for generating accurate content. You'll master the art of context engineering to guide AI tools toward exact results rather than generic approximations.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

Almost Timely News: 🗞️ Better Vocabulary for Better AI Results (2025-11-30) :: View in Browser The Big Plug 🚨 Watch my latest keynote, How to Succes

Open article: Almost Timely News: 🗞️ Better Vocabulary for Better AI Results (2025-11-30) by Christopher Penn • 19 min read

Almost Timely News: 🗞️ Better Vocabulary for Better AI Results (2025-11-30)

Fastest way to spot AI content: when the bot powering it is completely unable to handle a context switch.

Last night on Xitter, I posted about Apple TV's new show, Plur1bus, and a bit of scientific speculation based on the episode. It is a complete context change from what I normally post about, which is marketing and AI. It talks about processing human bodies, among other things.

Sentences like this:

"A dairy processing plant could be retrofitted to have its centrifuges isolate blood serum instead of milk."

And someone replied immediately with:

"this intriguing concept raises important ethical conversations. How do we balance creativity with responsibility in storytelling? 📚 #ThoughtLeadership"

Bro.

Why does this happen? Some folks have their AI bots programmed to simply parrot and reply to anything posted by specific accounts. The language model - and it's undoubtedly something very fast, very light, and very cheap like Meta Llama 4 - jumps right in based on a rudimentary prompt, and you get... slop.

Hilariously irrelevant slop.

If you want to see who's human and who's not, try a context switch from time to time on the social network of your choice and see just whose bots completely miss the memo.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

In this week's In-Ear #Insights (the @TrustInsights #podcast) @katierobbert & @cspenn teach you how to build unforgettable workshops and professional development resources. Break boredom and make your next meeting or event remarkable!

Kimi K2 Instruct. Deepseek. Alibaba Qwen.

Three of the world's best AI model families. Financed and supported in part by the People's Republic of China. World class coding and tool handling.

I read the new paper from Anthropic about Chinese hackers supposedly using Claude Code to try breaking into different systems. The paper is very good technically but provides absolutely ZERO evidence of any kind that a Chinese group was behind it.

Not a stitch. Not even a hint of how they made that determination. They just claimed the fact and assumed latent xenophobia would make us nod and accept the claim without evidence.

A Chinese state sponsored hacking group isn't going to use Claude Code. They're going to use an open source fork of it with Chinese models because STATE SPONSORED means the government is funding it. It would be trivial for the government to spin up a protected Kimi K2 cluster with the open source version of Claude Code modified specifically for attack purposes (which is equally trivial to do), and build out robust attack infrastructure that way.

Unless they're absolute morons, they're not going to use off-the-shelf Claude Code.

So if it wasn't mysterious Chinese hackers, what is it? This is pure speculation on my part. What do Moonshot, Alibaba, and Deepseek all have in common? They all release their models as open weights models, meaning that you can download them and run them for free if you have the infrastructure to do so.

I use Chinese models like Qwen locally on my laptop. Completely free. Fast. Very smart. Completely private - no data ever leaves my laptop. Qwen Coder is a beast and it runs without an Internet connection.

Guess what that means for companies like Anthropic, OpenAI, and others? When your Chinese competitors are giving away their state of the art models for free, it's awfully hard to charge a premium or get billions of dollars from investors or even taxpayer-funded backstops.

Regulatory capture refers to companies using the government to lock out competition or make illegal the use of competitors' products. In the absence of any proof that would pass even a first year law student's inspection, it's just as likely Anthropic is trying to scare the Western governments into blocking Chinese models as it is actual Chinese hackers.

#AI #GenerativeAI #GenAI #ChatGPT #ArtificialIntelligence #LargeLanguageModels #MachineLearning #IntelligenceRevolution

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taplio

The Battle

Ashley Faus

Christopher Penn

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Ashley Faus's LinkedIn Performance

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Performance ScoreAshley Faus's LinkedIn Performance