# VANDAM Weekly · VANDAM

> VANDAM Weekly: a free weekly email from Hendrik De Winne on what got released in AI, what it means for companies of 20 to 500 people, and what to try or ignore.

URL: https://vandam.ai/weekly  
Contact: hendrik@vibelab.be

# VANDAM Weekly. What changed in AI this week.

A short email from Hendrik once a week: what got released, what it means for companies of 20 to 500 people, one thing worth trying and one worth ignoring. Free, and readable in five minutes.

[Subscribe by email](mailto:hendrik@vibelab.be?subject=Subscribe%20to%20VANDAM%20Weekly&body=Please%20add%20me%20to%20VANDAM%20Weekly.)

## Who writes it

Hendrik De Winne reads the releases every week for the companies VANDAM works with: the frontier labs, the open-source models, the AI features inside Microsoft 365, Google Workspace and the other tools teams already pay for, and the rules coming out of Brussels and Washington.

The Weekly is the general version of that reading. The longer arguments go into the [notes](https://vandam.ai/notes).

## For your own company

The Weekly is written for everyone, so it cannot know your stack, your industry or the projects you have open. The [AI Colleague](https://vandam.ai/ai-colleague) does the same reading against your company and brings it to a weekly call.

- **VANDAM Weekly**
  One email for every reader
  What changed in AI this week
  Free
- **AI Colleague**
  A weekly call of 30 to 60 minutes, with a brief sent before it
  What changed for your company, your industry and the work you have running
  A monthly price, stop any month

## Recent notes

- [**Who owns what your AI learns.** Y Combinator now asks for startups that help companies own their intelligence. Before a mid-sized company owns a model, it can own the four things every model works with: context, evals, rules and connections.](https://vandam.ai/notes/own-your-intelligence)
- [**Delete the step first and give the agent whatever survives.** Musk’s five-step method puts automation last, and most AI programs start there because an agent is the one step a vendor can sell. I walk accounts payable through the steps in his order and show why an agent that clears exceptions fast hides the steps that should go.](https://vandam.ai/notes/delete-the-step-first)
- [**Your agents need a critic and so does the plan they carry out.** Models grade their own work too kindly, and the labs now separate the agent that makes from the agent that checks, the way finance separates maker and checker. I set out a four-layer review design with a minutes budget, and why the brief itself needs a critic with no stake in it.](https://vandam.ai/notes/agents-need-a-critic)

**VANDAM Weekly** Once a week, free. Send one email to subscribe and one to stop.

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