The Every Podcast

Subscribe to Every (free for 14 days): https://every.to/youtube-every-offer Can AI create good art?  Fred Graver thinks the answer depends on you. The Emmy Award–winning writer, producer, and founder of AI Writer’s Studio says AI can help with many parts of the creative process—but it can’t give you something to say. Without your own point of view, AI will only make your work more average. On this week’s episode of The Every Podcast, Natalia Quintero sits down with Graver. They discuss why every writer should have a ‘who I am as a writer’ document, the cast of AI collaborators he’s built into his own writers’ room, and the human quirks that make characters endearing—the part he insists AI can’t supply. Get Fred’s Skill: https://every.to/context-window/every-model-has-a-six-month-shelf-life-now Links to resources mentioned in the episode:  • Follow Every: https://x.com/every  • Follow Natalia Quintero: https://x.com/NataliaZarina  • Follow Fred Graver: https://x.com/fredgraver • AI Writers Studio: https://aiwritersstudio.substack.com/ • Compound Writing plugin: https://every.to/guides/compound-writing  • Compound Engineering plugin: https://every.to/guides/compound-engineering • Thesis conference: https://every.to/thesis-2027 • Follow Katie Parrott: https://x.com/kplikethebird  • Follow Kieran Klaassen: https://x.com/kieranklaassen • Follow Dan Shipper: https://x.com/danshipper Timestamps: 0:00 Introduction 2:22 Fred’s path from National Lampoon and Letterman to Twitter and Microsoft 7:47 The “I want in” instinct behind every career pivot 12:19 How Best Week Ever taught Fred to build with the audience 13:26 Using AI as a virtual writers’ room, not a ghostwriter 16:07 Codifying industry expertise and studio culture into an AI core 20:32 The three phases of making entertainment with AI 26:27 Why you should brain-dump your idea before opening AI 38:47 Fred’s thesis: Success is knowing what the audience wants before it does 43:44 Fred’s day-to-day workflow across Claude, ChatGPT, and NotebookLM

Check out Gemini Audio: https://goo.gle/Every-Gemini-Audio Every time a new AI model drops, companies face the same dilemma: Figure out what’s new and how to use it, or focus on getting work done. Every solves this dilemma with a frontier team: a small group that tests new models and turns useful experiments into tools and workflows for the rest of the company. On this week’s episode of The Every Podcast, Natalia Quintero sits down with all seven members of Every’s frontier team to ask what they’re building—from a tabless browser that helps protect your attention to a personal agent orchestrator called Minga—and what they want to try next. Subscribe to Every (free for 14 days): https://every.to/youtube-every-offer?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=audio&utm_campaign=companyagentepisode Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Follow Every: https://x.com/every Compound Writing plugin: https://every.to/guides/compound-writing Every’s vibe checks: https://every.to/vibe-check Follow Dan Shipper: https://x.com/danshipper Follow Natalia Quintero: https://x.com/NataliaZarina Follow Mike Taylor: https://x.com/hammer_mt Follow Jack Cheng: https://x.com/jackcheng Follow Arielle Shipper: https://x.com/ArielleShipper Follow Katie Parrott: https://x.com/kplikethebird Follow Jannik Jung: https://x.com/JannikJung 0:00 Introduction: Why every company needs a frontier team 2:42 Why the best frontier teams have pirates and architects  4:57 How Head of Evals Mike Taylor builds personal benchmarks  6:46 How Opus edited an explainer video using Slack messages and meeting notes  10:20 Working with AI means protecting other people’s attention  12:26 Why a frontier team needs a “wrangler” like Arielle Shipper  18:58 Why senior editor Jack Cheng built a tabless browser  24:37 How resident writer Katie Parrott teaches her AI writing plugin who the reader is 30:51 Inside engineer Jannik Jung’s personal AI orchestrator  35:41 Compound engineer Kieran Klaassen uses AI to build power tools

Check out Gemini Audio: https://goo.gle/Every-Gemini-Audio Bet on founders who understand the technology, because their first idea probably won’t be the one that sticks. That’s the view of Matt Hartman, founder and managing partner of Factorial Capital. In 2016, as a partner at Betaworks, Hartman was part of the team that wrote the first check into Hugging Face, which was then a chatbot app for teenagers. Today it’s the largest hub for open-source AI, and Nvidia has agreed to buy it for about $13 billion. On this week’s episode of The Every Podcast, Hartman tells Natalia Quintero how backing Hugging Face shaped his investment thesis, how Factorial grew into a “family tree” of technical founders who help him scout deals, and why vibe-coding his own app gave him a new respect for SaaS. Subscribe to Every (free for 14 days): https://every.to/podcast-every-offer?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=audio&utm_campaign=matthartmanepisode Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Factorial Capital: https://factorialcap.com Ghost Pepper, Matt's open-source voice-to-text app: https://github.com/matthartman/ghost-pepper Superpowers, Jesse Vincent's skill for Claude Code: https://github.com/obra/superpowers Hugging Face: https://huggingface.co Follow Every: https://x.com/every Follow Natalia Quintero: https://x.com/NataliaZarina Follow Matt Hartman: https://x.com/MattHartman 0:00 Introduction 5:06 How Hugging Face went from a teen chatbot to the home of open-source AI 9:52 The three decisions that set Hugging Face on its path 12:49 Hartman’s approach to finding the newly technically possible 18:10 Why Hartman backs technical founders 21:10 How Factorial’s portfolio founders source its next deals 27:09 Why faster iteration makes product insight the most valuable skill 34:28 What Hartman learned building Ghost Pepper, an open-source voice-to-text app 40:02 Hartman’s current theses, from non-language models to full-stack AI apps 44:14 Why the best founders right now are experimenting

Subscribe to Every (free for 14 days): every.to/podcast-every-offer?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=audio&utm_campaign=companyagentepisode  On this week's episode of The Every Podcast, Dan Shipper sits down with Willie Williams, Every's head of platform and one of the driving forces behind the Every Agent, which launched this week. They discuss how Every went from everyone running their own OpenClaw to relying on one shared company agent—and where they think personal agents belong in everyday life.  Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Willie Williams on X: https://x.com/bigwilliestyle The Every Agent: https://every.to/agent?utm_source=podcast&utm_campaign=podcast&utm_content=1006companyagent OpenClaw: https://openclaw.ai Tend, Dan's open-source feed app: https://every.to/tend?utm_source=podcast&utm_campaign=podcast&utm_content=1006companyagent Every’s Vibe Check on Dots: https://every.to/vibe-check/vibe-check-dots-always-on-agents-in-chatgpt?utm_source=podcast&utm_campaign=podcast&utm_content=1006companyagent Dot from OpenAI: https://openai.com/index/introducing-dots/ 0:00 Introduction 5:58 How OpenClaw spread through Every  11:13 Why everyone's personal agents eventually died  14:51 The difference between building for builders and building for operators  16:20 Why work will run on company agents while personal agents will stay personal  19:56 How engineering management has changed in the age of AI  21:43 Using an AI-powered feed to see everything happening across a product launch  23:53 Why Willie's token usage fell off a cliff  29:05 The benefit of having separate AI coaches for each part of your life  31:45 How Every is building its agent to surface information unprompted

Sam Altman's Dot, OpenAI's new always-on agent, gave him back the most productive part of his day. The OpenAI CEO would lose his early mornings—his window of "maximum creativity"—to whatever fire needed putting out. Now, his Dot triages those issues and flags only what's truly urgent. It's also gotten him building again: In spare moments, he gives his Dot ideas for a feature, and his Dot builds five or six versions for him to review. On the first episode of The Every Podcast (formerly AI & I), Dan Shipper interviews Altman at OpenAI's DevDay. They discuss how Altman uses his Dot to protect his time, why he only prompts on Ultrafast, and his belief that AI will spark a new Renaissance. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Go to https://attio.com/every and get 15% off your first year. To hear more from Dan Shipper: • Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe  • Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Chapters: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:00:55 Why AI hasn’t replaced developers 00:04:45 OpenAI’s platform bet on the rise of small-team companies 00:05:45 Why the AI era is more “Renaissance” than “Industrial Revolution” 00:07:40 How Sam’s Dot, OpenAI’s always-on AI agent, gave him back his mornings 00:12:00 Sam’s process for building new features with his Dot 00:16:00 Inside OpenAI’s “live documents” that agents and humans can build together 00:20:55 What bring-your-own-subscription changes for app developers 00:24:00 Why “OpenAI just killed X startup” never comes true 00:27:55 Sam’s life on Ultrafast and the push to make speed as cheap as intelligence Links to resources mentioned in the episode: • Sam Altman on X: https://x.com/sama  • Codex: https://openai.com/codex  • Space: https://help.openai.com/en/articles/20001549-getting-started-with-space-in-chatgpt • Every's Vibe Check on Dots: https://every.to/vibe-check/vibe-check-dots-always-on-agents-in-chatgpt?utm_source=podcast • Every's Vibe Check on OpenAI DevDay 2026: https://every.to/vibe-check/vibe-check-openai-devday-2026?utm_source=podcast