I believe in the power of open collaboration to create digital commons. My promise to you is I explore the leverage points that create change in complex systems keeping the humans in those systems at the forefront with empathy and humor.
An Untangled System: Capture in Real Time, Refine with AI
Move faster without losing context: capture in real time, then refine with AI.At 8:00 AM we kicked off a revenue conversation: should we charge a stakeholder group we don’t currently serve with premium offerings? Sales, customer success, engineering, product, and our CEO joined. The product manager and I owned the follow-up. I captured the meeting in Granola (AI meeting recorder/notes) and asked it to outline the options we discussed. After the meeting, the PM and I huddled with Granola again. There, we pruned the list to the candidates worth sizing. Next, I dropped the raw transcript and notes into ChatGPT with a clear prompt for a decision document. I moved the draft into Google Docs for light edits. While editing, I shared it with my Claude project (rich org context) to stress‑test and strengthen the argument. A few edits later, we had a solid draft by 10:30. Theme: preserve the room’s context while accelerating the write‑up. Let tools assist; let humans decide. The capture→refine pattern matters more than the tools, though each shines at specific tasks. For example, I’ve found ChatGPT (GPT‑5) produces decision documents that are shorter and to the point compared to Claude. This workflow lets the room set context together while AI assembles the draft. In the old model, one notetaker drove the doc—often thin or skewed. This pass preserved the group’s nuance, not just my own. This is the pattern that worked for me:
Result: 150 minutes from kickoff to a shareable decision draft with clear options, trade‑offs, and next steps. How do you trade off between tools? -Kate |
Untangling Systems
I believe in the power of open collaboration to create digital commons. My promise to you is I explore the leverage points that create change in complex systems keeping the humans in those systems at the forefront with empathy and humor.
Why Are You Making the Thing You’re Making? When I first started mapping in OpenStreetMap, I walked every trail in my neighborhood. I’d walk trails that were already perfectly visible from satellite imagery. I didn’t need to do it, I could hand digitize if I wanted. But I was mapping those trails as a one person protest. You see the neighborhood next door had all the same resources but big “no trespassing” signs for non-residents. I coined the act “spite mapping” and the act of trespassing to...
A Tangled Cetacean and AI Safety Theater Note: This is a heavy topic involving the death of stranded whales. Over the weekend a young humpback whale was stranded on a beach in Oregon. They were tangled in rope from crabbing equipment. People came from all over the area to help, posting that they had extra wet suits, lights, and other tools, as well as volunteering to be in the cold ocean overnight. A dangerous situation, and yet they were all coming together for this creature. I was riveted...
Using Models Together ChatGPT Atlas and Earth Index A lot of my experimentation lately is using common AI tools in different ways. I decided to see what would happen if I tried using ChatGPT with geospatial models. And I just did a simple experiment where I was working to create labels in Earth Index and using ChatGPT's browser Atlas as my partner in that. I'm sharing with you part one, which is not the more successful part of doing this. ChatGPT has difficulty using the map and it would have...