Mark Grether, CEO of the ad server Sizmek was on stage giving a keynote about our new “why” as a company, a la Simon Sinek. He had been trying to figure out our purpose and mission for years. “We are here” he said, “to keep the internet free”. We were at a 2019 sales conference. It was a brisk February day, perfect weather for Las Vegas just two months before Sizmek would file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

The year before was a whirlwind. I had spent 2018 on stage doing keynote speeches, moderating panels, and being an AI luminary. Grether had promoted me to being the company’s Chief Visionary - an evangelist role that I was grateful for, although I still cringe at the title’s pretentiousness today. This likely ended up being one of the main reasons why I was let go along with a few hundred other employees during the bankruptcy, quickly classified as an expendable luxury item.

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This year, I’m aiming to put more time into developing my craft as a futurist, media theorist and public lecturer on technology’s impact on humanity. Most of 2019 had been dedicated to building the foundation of several new AI projects, including a general-purpose intelligence platform, Lyrical. Bootstrapping a tech platform and AI practice left little time for thought leadership and speaking engagements, but I realized just how much I loved being a public intellectual, hence my renewed inspiration.

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