English edition
Technology, the future, and society — from Uruguay
English editions of essays by Justin Graside: artificial intelligence, entrepreneurship, digital government and what it all does to us. The originals live in Spanish — leelas acá.
Artificial Intelligence
What if AI regulates itself? The bet — and the risk — of thinking about it like a nuclear bomb
The brake on harmful uses of artificial intelligence may never come from a treaty, but from a stalemate of power between companies and governments — the same one that kept the nuclear peace.
Entrepreneurship
The New Barrier to Entry Isn't Code Anymore — It's Physical
As a tech founder, the question I ask myself most these days isn't whether someone can copy my software — anyone can do that now — but which part of my business depends on something you can't buy with an AI subscription.
Artificial Intelligence
The Chip Cold War: The Invisible Map Behind Every AI Answer
A simple chat box changed everything in 2022, but what keeps artificial intelligence running doesn't live in the cloud: it lives in Taiwan, in a handful of Dutch machines, and in a data center's electric bill.
Future & Society
The Digital Will: What Happens to Everything You Leave Online When You Die?
Your chats, your social accounts, your search history: when you die, all of it remains. Almost no one has decided what to do with their digital remains — and there are already tools, countries, and even posthumous books that show why you should.
Future & Society
The Dead Answer Texts Now: Digital Immortality Has Arrived
A young woman who died years ago "revived" as a chatbot, a teenager who took his own life after bonding with an AI, and a question that's no longer science fiction: what does talking to someone who isn't there do to our minds?
Future & Society
I'd Like to Talk to My Grandmother: The Case for Reviving Voices with AI
The risks of chatbots of the dead are plain to see. And yet there's a conversation I've owed myself for thirty years, and for the first time, technology is offering it to me.
Artificial Intelligence
Distrust by Default (but Only in Politics): A Method for Not Falling for a Fake
We can't verify everything, and living in constant distrust is no way to live either. There's a more surgical way out: a suspicion mode activated only for political content — and a two-step method for checking fast.
Artificial Intelligence
How to Build an AI Disinformation Campaign (and Why You Should Know How)
I did the uncomfortable exercise of thinking like an unscrupulous political operative: with today's AI tools, how would I run a dirty campaign? The answer is frightening — and knowing it is the best defense.
Artificial Intelligence
I Trained an AI on Every Law in Uruguay — Here's What It Taught Me About How People Ask
The same technology that manufactures election lies can do the opposite: bring the rules of the game within anyone's reach. What Politea, an impartial chatbot of laws and campaign proposals, left behind after nearly 15,000 queries.
Artificial Intelligence
Do You Think That's Air You're Breathing? If an AI Calms Your Anxiety, the Relief Is Real
A friend confessed he asks ChatGPT for romantic advice. The debate that followed forced an uncomfortable position: the bond may be simulated, but the effect it has on you is not.
Artificial Intelligence
"Part of This Month's Salary Should Go to ChatGPT": How a Programmer Who Delegates 60% Works
A developer who has been coding since age 11 confessed the exact share of his work that AI now does. The interesting part isn't the number: it's why most of his colleagues still resist.
Entrepreneurship
I Went to Play Ping-Pong and Nobody Was There: The Fully Autonomous Business Is Already Running
I booked through an app, the door unlocked itself, a tablet kept score, and the venue recorded my best points. Nobody worked there. A chronicle of my afternoon in the future of retail — and its fine print.
Entrepreneurship
The Hair Salon in Salto and the Barrier That Isn't Technological
I traveled to Uruguay's interior to give a talk on digital tools for small businesses. What I found wasn't a technology problem: it was people convinced that "this isn't for me." That's the real barrier.
Entrepreneurship
The Welfare-Case Founder and the Invisible Shopkeeper: Who We Applaud and Who Holds Up the Economy
Nine out of ten businesses in Latin America are micro-enterprises: the corner-store owner, the butcher, the woman selling cakes on Instagram. But the stage, the funding, and the applause go to another character — and I'm part of the problem.
Entrepreneurship
I Evaluate Public Startup Funds: This Is What I Demand Before Handing Over a Peso
I sit on the committee that assigns state seed capital to ventures in Uruguay. The rule is simple and sparks internal arguments every time: if the market hasn't bought anything from you yet, neither should the state.
Entrepreneurship
Companies Don't Automate When They Want To: They Automate When They Can't Take It Anymore
A friend who runs a process-automation company told me the truth of the business: nobody shows up out of vision for the future. They show up with the warehouse on fire. And the one blocking the change is almost never the manager.
Entrepreneurship
The Startup Ecosystem Is Making You Dizzy
Programs, accelerators, events, ambassadorships, the laptop-and-latte photo. Fifteen years inside this industry leave an uncomfortable conclusion: much of the ecosystem is a distraction from the real work.
Entrepreneurship
Making Money Is Much Harder Than They Tell You (and the Metrics That Matter)
Between get-rich-quick courses and LinkedIn gurus, an elementary truth got lost: invoicing, collecting, making payroll, and only then turning a profit is a long staircase. What I learned from a friend obsessed with efficiency.
Artificial Intelligence
Nobody Wants to Watch a Robot Run the 100 Meters
Robots could already break every Olympic record, and we don't care. That indifference hides the best clue about which jobs and experiences will stay human — and about the world where kids who talk to Alexa are growing up.
Future & Society
The Future Is Already Here — It's Just Badly Distributed
A freelancer trains AI models for a company he can't name, for pay he doesn't understand, with not a single labor right. William Gibson's line has never been so literal — and that's the real problem.
Artificial Intelligence
The 80/20 Rule for Not Getting Left Behind by AI (and How to Ask It for Things Properly)
The question I get most is "so what do I do?" My answer fits in one old rule and four new instructions: identify the 20% of your work nobody can do for you, and delegate the rest — delegated well.
Digital Government
The Citizen as the State's Errand Runner: Why Digitizing Paperwork Is Social Justice
When Colombia mapped its more than 70,000 government procedures, only 3% were digital. Behind that number are people traveling five hours to deliver a photocopy — and rackets that live off the line. The story of the woman who tried to fix it.
Digital Government
The Digital Agenda Shouldn't Wear Party Colors
With every change of government, modernization projects get treated as spoils: dismantled, then started over. Losing four or five years to political whim carries a cost no country is bothering to measure.
Digital Government
Startup Nation, State Edition: What France Figured Out Ten Years Ago (and We Still Haven't)
A government that champions open source, data scientists advising the prime minister, and startups incubated inside ministries. It's not Silicon Valley: it's the French public administration — a decade ago.
Sustainability
Trash Is a Design Error (and Recycling Is the Worst of the Good Ideas)
France pays people to get their shoes fixed, and it isn't a whim: the country throws away 700,000 tons of clothing and footwear a year. Why recycling is the last strategy that matters — not the first.
Sustainability
Eco-Anxiety: What Do We Do With Climate Dread (Besides Feeling It)?
Mentions of "eco-anxiety" have exploded more than 4,000% in just a few years. Between paralyzing panic and "why sort my trash when Taylor Swift flies private," there's a middle path — and it has a name: culture change.
Sustainability
Where Is the Green Business Nobody Wants to Build?
Israel invests 5.6% of its GDP in R&D; Latin America, 0.6%. And of the region's tech startups, almost none go after environmental problems. That double absence is a map of opportunities.
Future & Society
The Anatomy of Luck: Lessons from the Guy Who "Retired" at 40
Federico Lavagna founded a chain of 23 hostels across seven countries and wrote a book with a tricky title. What it really teaches isn't how to stop working: it's how luck works — and why it's almost always manufactured.
Future & Society
Tourism Doesn't Switch Back On (Which Is Why It's a Refuge for Human Work)
Four years after the pandemic, flying still costs nearly twice as much. It isn't greed: an industry made of people doesn't reboot like a factory. That same slowness hides the best labor news of the future.
Future & Society
Uruguay Is the Belgium of South America (and That Demands a Different Tourism Strategy)
Nobody crosses the ocean to see Belgium: people visit because they were already in France. The same happens to Uruguay — and competing on "natural" against Brazil and Argentina means starting three goals down. A three-pillar plan, told by someone who lives off tourism.
Artificial Intelligence
The 6 Percent Who Got There First: The AI Gap Has Already Opened, and Almost Nobody Saw It
Months after the ChatGPT boom, only 6 percent of Uruguayan workers had tried it — and among those who never finished high school, 0 percent. The technology that promised to democratize is dealing out advantage along an educational gradient.
Artificial Intelligence
Signing Little Letters Won't Stop Progress (but Concentration Should Worry You)
The letter calling for a six-month AI pause was the Luddism of the twenty-first century. The real risk is something else, and almost nobody discusses it: for the first time in the history of tech revolutions, capital is the barrier to entry.
Artificial Intelligence
An Intern Partner on Call 24/7: Real AI Uses for Real Jobs
The burger joint that doesn't know whether to sell combos, the freshly minted lawyer, the freelancer who isn't getting paid: concrete cases of how AI gets used when nobody taught you — and the anatomy of a well-made request.
Future & Society
The Future Announces Itself Playing Cricket on the Rambla
Signals of change don't arrive by press release: they show up in the street, disguised as anecdote. Learning to read them is the skill that separates those who anticipate from those who find out — and it can be trained.
Future & Society
The Jobs of the Future Already Have a Ranking (and the Planet Made the Podium)
The World Economic Forum projected which roles will grow fastest by 2030: artificial intelligence came first — and sustainability analysts came second. Two careers almost nobody is studying, for the two problems nobody can dodge.
Future & Society
The Mecca of Social Innovation Isn't in Silicon Valley. It's in Nairobi
In Kenya, people were sending money by text message before the modern smartphone existed — no bank, no internet. Scarcity invents better than abundance, and that flips the map of where to look.