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70. You Output What You Input

Studio Sessions

Studio Sessions
70. You Output What You Input
Apr 14, 2026 Season 3 Episode 17
Matthew O'Brien, Alex Carter

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We spend a lot of time thinking about what we make, and not enough thinking about what we take in. What we listen to, what we read, what we let interrupt us, what we hand our attention to without really deciding to — all of it shapes the output, whether we're conscious of it or not. This episode starts there.

From that we get into the systems designed to keep you feeding them — platforms, algorithms, companies that started with a mission and ended with an optimization — and what it actually costs to let those systems run in the background of your life unchecked. We're not against technology. We use it, depend on it, sometimes love it. But there's a difference between using a tool and being used by one.

The thing we keep coming back to is friction. Not difficulty for its own sake, but the kind of slowdown that forces a real relationship with the thing you're doing. When you build something, fix something, choose something deliberately, you feel responsible for it. That responsibility is where the good stuff lives. What you put in dictates what comes out — and most of us aren't being honest about what we're putting in. -Ai

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