AI Isn’t Magic – It’s Middleware (And That’s Good News)
Large language models aren’t magic. They’re pivot tables for words. That’s the real breakthrough — not a crystal ball, not a robot overlord, but a new way to roll up […]
Archives: Podcasts
What Exactly IS an AI Agent? We Propose a Friendly, Non-Gatekeeping Definition
This isn’t another AI think-piece, it’s a full-on data brawl. Copilot is out here plagiarizing Rob’s pivot table crusade while the self-appointed nerd police try to lock down the definition […]
Is CoPilot the End of Filters? (Plus a Cautionary Tale)
Pivot tables finally auto-refresh. Humanity wins, but our host Rob Collie is still annoyed. Why? Because he asked for it back in 2007 and got shot down. That little gripe […]
The “Steal My Money” Lever: A Timely Tale of Data Saving the Day
Every campaign has it: that shiny “more reach, lower cost” lever that looks like marketing gold but really just siphons your budget into digital quicksand. We pulled it. The metrics […]
Even in the AI Era, Communication is the Central Theme
AI is rewriting the rules of analytics. Copilot can pull answers straight from your semantic model and bypass the dashboard entirely. But for all the tech fireworks, the same old […]
Episode 200: The Road Ahead for Data and AI
Two hundred episodes in, and we’re done with the warm-up! Episode 200 finds Rob flying solo and pulling zero punches on the question everyone’s quietly asking: what’s the future of […]
The “Dobie Moment” (The Awesome Power of AI/CoPilot Frontends – AND a Cautionary Tale)
Most of us have been in the trenches long enough to know when something’s about to flip the script. And brother, we’re standing at the edge of a cliff most […]
The Million-Token Myth and the Magic of Digital Colleagues
AI looks unstoppable… until you hand it a hundred pages of meeting notes. Rob and Justin dig into why context windows and token limits quietly run the show. That “million-token” […]
Semantic Models Give You (and Microsoft) the AI Upper Hand – Plus a History Lesson on Why Frontends Matter
Back in 2010, Tableau beat smarter tools with a better demo. No brain, all charm and the market loved it. Fast-forward to now: same playbook, new costume. The AI dashboard […]
Everything’s Real, Everything Matters, and Everyone Knows It w/ Quadrant Concrete CFO Joseph Graziano
Let’s say your business runs on sun, sweat, and schedule precision. You’ve got crews in the field, materials that don’t wait, and about 90 minutes to get it right before […]
It’s Time to Start Giving Power BI CoPilot a Serious Look (For End User Interaction)
It started as a side project. Rob Collie built a Power BI model for his rec league hockey team. Just for fun. Just to see what the data could say. […]
Connecting AI to Your Company’s Internal Information
AI wants your data, but it can’t handle the truth . . . “We’ll just plug our data into ChatGPT.” Sure. Sounds easy. Rob thought so too, right up until […]