The Apple factory: What perfect coordination feels like
physical-ai.ghost.io
physical-ai.ghost.io
My intent was to use Apple as a metaphor for interoperability, but it came across as a fantasy post totally disconnected from the real world hell of industrial automation. I skipped the why (legacy hardware, safety, vendor lock-in) and it made the whole post feel naive. That's on me.
As for the AI feel everyone picked up on, You're not wrong. I wrote the original draft and all the core ideas, but I did use an LLM to help review and polish the language.
I see now that was a huge mistake. It polished away all the personal voice and in the trenches, grit that made my previous posts work. It turned a real idea into that slick, empty keynote feel you all hated.
It's a painful but really valuable lesson in authenticity. Thanks for keeping me honest. I'll stick to the gritty, unpolished engineering problems from now on.
The problem is that this is relatively easy if you have 5 devices, but extremely hard if you have 10.000 devices and as many humans in the mix.