Welcome to The Autonomy Loop!
The greatest newsletter about building AI-enabled robots, maybe
Feels good to be writing and building
For a decade, I was a product manager at Netflix, Google, and Meta. PMs write a lot, and I was no exception. Fortunately, I like writing. I’ve liked it ever since starting a weekly newsletter at Netflix that covered the streaming industry. It became popular, and I enjoyed sharing what I learned.
Before that, I spent over a decade as an engineer working on everything from iOS apps to networking equipment. There is a thrill you get from turning an idea into reality and I suspect many engineers feel the same way.
Writing and building are like mixing peanut butter and chocolate (feature request for Substack: let subscribers send Reese’s instead of money). I get to share what I learn as I come up to speed on an exciting technical frontier full of opportunity. It’s also motivating to report each week on progress towards building a smart, useful robot.
About the name
Why is this blog called The Autonomy Loop anyways? Well, a smart, useful robot has to adapt to a continuously changing environment by itself. An autonomy loop is a fancy name for a mechanism that lets a robot do that by observing its environment, deciding what to do, acting on the decision, and learning from the result - all without needing a babysitter. I like the name because it captures what this newsletter is about: the intersection of AI and Robotics.
What you can expect
When I was a PM, part of my job was writing about strategy, go-to-market, product capabilities, etc. I’ll write about some of these things from time to time, but they aren’t the main focus. At The Autonomy Loop, you can expect a weekly newsletter that covers:
my progress as I attempt to build an AI-enabled robot prototype that solves a real problem (for me and possibly others)
posts about helpful resources I find, including research papers, online courses, and technical articles
posts that go deeper into a technical concept
share-outs of articles, podcasts, and books
It’s probably worth clarifying a couple of things:
I am not an expert. Early posts will focus on coming up to speed, but the intent is to shift as quickly as I can to more practical topics.
Building an AI-enabled robot has many interesting technical aspects but I don’t want it to become a research project. The goal is to build a prototype that solves a specific problem.
If all of this sounds like your cup of coffee, then this blog is for you. Welcome!