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AI ideas from original sources
An idea page explains a concept, theory or proposal: where it comes from, what supports it, the objections and the open questions. We update it when new material changes the explanation. How our formats work
The idea library
7 ideasThe Coasean singularity: if agents make deals nearly free, what is a company still for?
A 1937 question about why firms exist at all came back to the Moonshots panel by way of an economics workshop framework on AI agents as market participants. Salim Ismail argues the...
Updated 15 Sep 2026 IdeaPaying only when the work is done: the case for outcome-based AI pricing
On Moonshots EP #285, the panel worked through a proposed shift in how AI is sold: not by tokens consumed but by results delivered. This explainer sets out what outcome pricing mea...
Updated 14 Sep 2026 IdeaAI monoculture: when similar answers become a question about resilience
The Moonshots panel debated a paper described on air as finding a 98% overlap in the reasoning pathways of leading language models. The study, Artificial Hivemind, measured somethi...
Updated 14 Sep 2026 IdeaCan Shapley values pay publishers for what agents actually use?
Parag Agrawal, whose company Parallel builds web search for AI agents, argues that when an agent visits a page instead of a person, advertising and subscriptions both stop working....
Updated 14 Sep 2026 IdeaThe inner loop: why AI advantage may sit outside the model
The inner-loop thesis says AI advantage may come from how well an organization turns experience into better systems, rather than from owning the best model. A study of 51 successfu...
Updated 14 Sep 2026 IdeaThe Big World Hypothesis: why an agent's world outruns its model
A drone navigating by sound cannot carry a complete account of the world it flies through. Rich Sutton and Khurram Javed use that mismatch to explain why AI must keep learning. The...
Updated 14 Sep 2026 IdeaWhy AI abundance may not end the contest for status
AI and robots might make necessities plentiful without making the best beachfront plots or prestigious prizes available to everyone. On The Diary of a CEO, Steven Bartlett raised t...
Updated 14 Sep 2026Follow a thread