Take a deep dive into the creation of an advanced digital assistant with Jeff McMillan and David Wu of Morgan Stanley. As the Head of AD&I, Morgan Stanley Wealth Management and the Head of Knowledge Management & Generative AI respectively, Jeff and David led the creation of an AI assistant for the global investment firm's advisors. Robb and Josh invite them in for a conversation about the technical work and strategic initiatives that enabled Morgan Stanley to create a knowledge base that's given...
Apr 04, 2024•1 hr 1 min
Well-known researcher, professor, and author Richard Florida joins Robb and Josh for an expansive conversation about the relationship between cities and innovation. His books include "The Rise of the Creative Class" and "The New Urban Decay," which both explore the multi-layered relationship between people and the cities where creativity becomes innovation. Richard is a sought-after speaker and his strategy firm Creative Class Group works with Meta, Microsoft, WeWork, BMW, Cirque do Soliel, and ...
Mar 28, 2024•1 hr 7 min
Payal Arora is a Professor of Inclusive AI Cultures at Utrecht University and Co-Founder of FemLab. She's also the author of the award-winning "The Next Billion Users" from Harvard Press, and her new book "From Pessimism to Promise: Lessons from the Global South on Designing Inclusive Tech" will be released this fall by MIT Press. Payal joins Robb and Josh for a frank and eye-opening exploration of technology and innovation in the Global South.
Mar 21, 2024•1 hr 8 min
As the Global CIO of Zoom, Gary Sorrentino spends a lot of time thinking about how technology can amplify human-to-human collaboration. He joins Robb and Josh for a conversation about the challenges of connecting people in hybrid work environments that are always evolving. As Gary points out, humans are in a joint venture with artificial intelligence, and this episode explores many of the inflection points we need to consider.
Mar 14, 2024•58 min
Author and UX Legend Greg Nudelman was one of the original guests on In Conversation with UX Magazine over eight years ago. He returns for a rich conversation about the frenzied intersection of UX and AI. Greg has honed his craft as a design lead at GE Digital, Cisco, and eBay and has worked with organizations like IBM, Oracle, Associated Press, and Intuit. He's currently a Distinguished Designer at Sumo and has written numerous books including The $1 Prototype and Designing Search. He joins Rob...
Mar 07, 2024•54 min
As a co-author of the often cited (and debated) Stochastic Parrots paper from 2021, Emily M. Bender is a staunch critic of large language models (LLMs). Having worked in computational linguistics for more than 20 years, Emily's deep understanding of LLM mechanics has her questioning many of the emerging use cases we see in the world. Also, Emily hosts Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000, where, alongside sociologist Dr. Alex Hanna, she breaks down the AI hype, separates fact from fiction, and distingui...
Feb 29, 2024•1 hr
Co-founder of VR technology as we know it Jaron Lanier is also an accomplished musician and artist. As the Prime Unifying Scientist at Microsoft, Jaron rejects the deceptive nature of terms like "AGI" and "decentralization" in favor of a vision of technology that's all about people collaborating with other people. Join Robb and Josh for an episode of Invisible Machines that questions everything.
Feb 22, 2024•49 min
Daron Acemoglu, Institute Professor of Economics at MIT and co-author of Power and Progress joins Robb and Josh for a deep exploration of the intersection of technology and economics. Daron's work has explored our thousand-year struggle with technology and prosperity and this conversation touches on how we might incentivize the changes that will improve our experiences as a species. There are layers of centralization that we need to think about in the wake of generative AI, and the trio discusse...
Feb 15, 2024•1 hr
For decades, Gloria Mark, PhD, has been studying technology use in real-world environments that she describes as "living laboratories." Her book "Attention Span" looks for ways that we can live with and use technology while maintaining a healthy psychological balance. She joins Robb and Josh for a fascinating conversation about the ways AI might heal some of the damage done by technology and give us space to focus our attention on things that truly matter. You can learn more in Gloria's Substack...
Feb 08, 2024•1 hr 6 min
Lisa Feldman Barrett is a psychologist and neuroscientist whose research puts her among the top 0.1% of most cited scientists in the world. She joins Robb and Josh for a conversation about the true nature of our brains, and how aspects of brain development are already being mirrored by AI models. Lisa holds appointments at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, where she is Chief Science Officer for the Center for Law, Brain & Behavior. She is also a distinguished professor o...
Feb 01, 2024•54 min
As the Principal Product Designer at Slack, RJ Owen has a hand in shaping a communication channel that's come to redefine productivity while setting a trajectory for how team members collaborate in the post-pandemic world. RJ joins Robb and Josh for a deep conversation exploring the many intricacies of decision management and how the future of productivity might reside in swiping right or left. AI is uncannily good at summarizing information, but as this episode explains, the experience of deliv...
Jan 25, 2024•57 min
Sarah Gibbons and Kate Moran of Nielsen Norman Group join Robb and Josh for a deep dive at the intersection of UX and AI. As the Vice President of NN/g, Sarah shares insights from a recent exploration of anthropomorphism and generative AI. Kate Moran is VP of Research and Content and has done extensive research into interaction design and digital content. As leaders at one of the vanguard experience design firms, Sarah and Kate help navigate the frenzied intersection of UX and AI.
Jan 18, 2024•2 hr 30 min
As the co-founder of Kayak and GetHuman, Paul English has deep insight into the ways technology can bring people closer to what they're actually looking for. Robb and Josh welcome Paul for an exploration of the ways that conversational AI can become the thin UI layer that obscures all of the messy technology cluttering our lives. Having recently co-founded the Applied Artificial Intelligence Institute at UMass Boston, Paul brings his thinking on how generative AI fits into our technology tapestr...
Jan 11, 2024•59 min
Richard Saul Wurman is many things. The creator of the TED conference has also authored scores of books, ranging from revolutionary city guides to a collection of a collection of words by Louis Kahn. Robb and Josh welcomed Richard for a conversation about the LATCH system he devised for organizing information. This early Invisible Machines recording goes to unexpected places as a legendary architect and designer shares his unfiltered thinking on myriad topics.
Dec 21, 2023•58 min
Author of Good Talk and host of The Conversation Factory podcast, Daniel Stillman shares insights from his journey through user experience research and industrial design into designing conversations between people. Robb and Josh welcome Daniel for an exploration of the composition and quality of conversations between humans. The complexity present in our everyday conversational interactions lays bare how strategic we need to be in designing the ways we speak with machines.
Dec 14, 2023•1 hr 4 min
Cathy Pearl has deep roots in conversational design, as the UX Lead on Google Bard and author of Designing Voice User Interfaces (O'Reilly). She joins Robb and Josh for a conversation that explores the changing nature of voice interfaces and the deepening role of experience design. The trio also discusses the ways that conversational AI transcends productivity, potentially improving the quality of our lives in much deeper ways.
Dec 07, 2023•1 hr 20 min
AI researcher, author, and VP and Fellow at Google Research, Blaise Agüera y Arcas has contributed to research papers cited more than 20,000 times, including a seminal LaMDA paper from 2022. His new book, Who Are We Now?, explores how biology, ecology, sexuality, history, and culture have intertwined to create a dynamic “us” that's neither natural nor artificial. Blaise joins Robb and Josh for a philosophical exploration of identity, collective intelligence, and the ways AI might put us back int...
Nov 30, 2023•58 min
Despite the complexity and sensitivity innate to financial institutions, Morgan Stanley was able to partner with Open AI to create AI @ Morgan Stanley Assistant. Chief Analytics and Data Officer Jeff McMillan describes it as the most advanced personal assistant in the financial sector and he joins Robb and Josh to talk about the design process, which involved working closely with Sam Altman and the team at OpenAI. Jeff's experiences creating a sophisticated automated solution in a heavily regula...
Nov 28, 2023•58 min
Massive amounts of system change are necessary to put AI to work in ways that elevate humanity, and Robb and Josh welcome author and experience designer Sheryl Cababa for a deep discussion of the road ahead. Author of the Rosenfeld Media book, Closing the Loop: Systems Thinking for Designers, Sheryl has worked as an experienced designer at Phillips, Adaptive Path, and Frog and is currently the Chief Strategy Officer at Substantial. Her insights into the important convergence between systems thin...
Nov 16, 2023•1 hr 16 min
In a moment when unprecedented amounts of money are flowing toward projects involving AI, Robb and Josh welcome Jake Saper for a lively exploration of the VC mindset. Since 2003, Emergence Capital has invested in companies collectively worth $450B+, including Salesforce, Box, Yammer, and Zoom. As a General Partner, Jake has embraced the transformative power of generative AI. This conversation explores many different ways these technologies are impacting investor thinking as software becomes chea...
Nov 10, 2023•52 min
Robb and Josh welcome Brad Stulberg for a deep conversation about how humans can best respond to the massive changes AI is thrusting upon us. As the bestselling author of Master of Change, Stulberg has explored the cycle of order, disorder, and reorder, and he shares the principles for developing a rugged flexibility mindset—which applies to both personal well-being and AI integration. A former McKinsey consultant and regular contributor to the New York Times, Brad is a professor at the Universi...
Nov 02, 2023•48 min
Robb and Josh welcome Cammy Crolic for an enlivening discussion of hedonic escalation and anthropomorphization. As a professor at Oxford's Saïd Business School, Cammy's research into how human-like bots affect consumer behavior has been featured in the Wall Street Journal. She is currently exploring human perception around AI-generated content.
Oct 26, 2023•1 hr 17 min
Robb and Josh welcome Ben Goertzel for a deep exploration of the narrow AIs we are quickly growing accustomed to and our fraught transition to artificial general intelligence, or singularity. As the founder and CEO of SingularityNET, Ben has been working to democratize access to artificial intelligence through decentralization. He's also a leader of both the OpenCog Foundation and the AGI Society, having helped to popularize the term 'artificial general intelligence'. Topics in this episode incl...
Oct 19, 2023•1 hr 12 min
Robb and Josh welcome David Bingham for an exploration of design and conversational AI, from our homes, to our workplaces, to industrial settings. David is a senior experience design executive who’s held positions at GE and Workday and is currently Director of User Experience at Schneider Electric (named one of Fortune’s Most Desirable Companies four years running and deemed the world’s most sustainable company in 2021). The trio discusses the uncanny valley in conversational AI, the true shape ...
Oct 12, 2023•2 hr 34 min
Robb and Josh welcome industry veteran Yoav Shoham for a thoughtful examination of the inner-workings of AI. As the co-founder of AI21 labs and a former professor in the Computer Science Department of Stanford University, Yoav has a rich history of working with these technologies and thinking through some of their more profound applications. This thoughtful discussion examines just how much the ways we live and work might begin to change as we become further intertwined with AI.
Oct 05, 2023•1 hr 4 min
Robb and Josh welcome Shep Hyken for a conversation about the evolution of customer experience and the role AI will take in moving it forward. As a sought-after keynote speaker and the bestselling author of numerous books, including "Be Amazing or Go Home," Shep has a deep understanding of what companies are up against when it comes to creating truly dynamic experiences. This lively discussion explores those constraints as well as the massive possibilities new technologies have unlocked.
Sep 28, 2023•1 hr 23 min
Robb and Josh welcome food futurist Mike Lee for a sprawling and fascinating exploration of the surprisingly similar worlds of food safety and technology regulation. As the founder of The Future Market, a consultancy in food innovation and strategy, Mike's investigations into the food industry led to hands-on work with generative AI. This conversation provides forward thinking in how we might regulate the unpredictable and now ubiquitous generative tools flooding into all industries and aspects ...
Sep 21, 2023•2 hr 54 min
Robb and Josh welcome Cassie Kozyrkov, Google's First Chief Decision Scientist, for a conversation about the limitations of data and the need to put a face on technology. Cassie is now CEO of Data Scientific and helped shape the technology all around us, and this far-ranging discussion of conversational AI examines the composition of the technologies that go into artificial intelligence, the ways we can use technology to help people make better quality decisions, and why we should look for oppor...
Sep 14, 2023•1 hr 5 min
Robb and Josh welcome renowned publisher and information architect Lou Rosenfeld for a conversation that gets into the roots of experience design, while exploring the full bloom of generative AI. Running Rosenfeld Media for nearly two decades has given Lou incredible insights into the publishing world as well as UX, which most Rosenfeld titles explore in specific ways. This great conversation brings lessons from the past to the fore as we race ahead with technology.
Sep 07, 2023•1 hr 25 min
Robb and Josh welcome Jenna Fizel (Senior Director, Emerging Technology) and Danny DeRuntz (Executive Design Director) of IDEO for a practical exploration of building conversational experiences focusing on their creation, Lotbot. The conversation branches out into the many facets of digital twins, the languages machines might use to communicate with each other, and the blurring edges between bots and brands.
Aug 31, 2023•1 hr 26 min
