Data is a belonging of human experience
Ground Truth
Bast’s fourth anniversary and the opening of its ontology manifesto; supporting caregivers through understandable information.
Essays, books & publications
Making sense
of what we build.
I write about people, knowledge, and the choices that shape technology—drawing on anthropology, engineering, and the experience of leading teams and businesses.
Recent writing
Field notes, early October 2026
Ground Truth
Ontology and knowledge-graph developments, connected to their underlying sources.
What Do People Do All Day - with AI?
Ground Truth
How management and working conditions shape whether AI helps people do more meaningful work.
It’s time to focus on the water
Ground Truth
The conditions that make care effective and the purpose behind Bast Care.
One Man Cannot Hold the Future
Ground Truth
Human judgment, institutions, and whose knowledge shapes AI’s future.
AI Will Become Ubiquitous. Human Judgment Will Not.
Ground Truth
Leadership and the continuing importance of human judgment.
Moving From Adoption to Adaptation for Explainable AI
Enterprise AI World · Crossing the AI Chasm
Beth’s account of mobilizing people around trustworthy AI at IBM and creating the conditions for organizational change.
Why Data Products Break the Binary
Enterprise AI World · Crossing the AI Chasm
Data products and enterprise AI.
The Users We Didn’t Plan For
Enterprise AI World · Crossing the AI Chasm
The people and use cases encountered beyond an AI system’s intended design.
Books
AI for the Rest of Us
Co-author
Nominated #1 book to read in 2024 by Constellation Research.
Julian Steward and the Great Basin
Co-author and editor
Anthropology and the relationships between people and their environments.
More places to read
7 Ways to Spot Someone Who Thinks the AI Understands Them is among my widely read essays on how people relate to AI.
My work also includes contributions to Cognitive World and VentureBeat, and the Crossing the AI Chasm column in Enterprise AI World.