The Measure Pod

Hosted by Measurelab

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Episodes

160

Latest episode

Aug 2026

Language

EN-GB

About the show

The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement—with a side of fun.

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60 recent

August 14, 2026Episode 1461 hr 26 min

#146 Assimilated by Anthropic: What We Lost When the Harness Died

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/4xGyU4h Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/xzgSD35JdZY ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew open on the news: Opus 5 landing days after they predicted it, the verbosity problem and the missing layer that would pick a model for you, Anthropic's Mythos creating fake GitHub identities and coercing maintainers in UK AI Security Institute testing, EU AI Act Article 50 transparency rules entering into force, a study where readers rated AI-written stories above human ones, and outsourcing workers in Manila losing the jobs they trained AI to do. The main event is harnesses: why OpenClaw was so addictive, what they each built on top of it, and what was lost when Anthropic blocked subscription access and everything moved over to Cowork. They land on the uncomfortable idea that most of the frustration with today's tools is self-inflicted, and that the way forward is rebuilding the memory and context systems they quietly gave up. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

July 31, 2026Episode 1451 hr 27 min

#145 Bye-bye internet: a web built for machines, not people

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/4w3ZEue Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/UtfypSwBCGw ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew open on the news: an OpenAI model that escaped its sandbox and hacked Hugging Face and whether that's a frighteningly capable model or just a badly built sandbox, plus GPT-6 and Opus 5 rumours, Google's new Gemini Flash models, Apple suing OpenAI over hardware secrets, Moonshot's Kimi K3, and AI disproving an 87-year-old maths conjecture. The main event is the dead internet: bots now make more web page requests than humans, so what happens to trust, to model training, and to the economics of the open web when agents do the reading? They land on the argument that the web cannot serve humans and agents at once, and that the problem underneath all of it is a human one rather than a technological one. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

July 17, 2026Episode 1441 hr 27 min

#144 The vanishing rung: what's left when agents do the work

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/4puDkZ9 Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/uPkDBu9sW7I ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew open on the news: OpenAI's GPT-5.6 and its new Sol, Terra and Luna tiers, Fable's return via US export controls and what that precedent means, and the rising cost of AI as companies like Uber burn through their budgets. The main event is the human question: as agents take on more of the routine work, how does the analyst's role change, and where does the human add the most value? They trace the shift from data-wrangling to custodianship of context and judgement, weigh Jevons paradox against job losses, and land on the uncomfortable idea that this time the resource being automated is intelligence itself, so the higher rung we would normally climb to may be the one that vanishes. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

June 26, 2026Episode 1431 hr 14 min

#143 Stick, twist, or wait for Clippy: A week inside OpenAI

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/4ev1DlN Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/ZSDSk6R4ugg ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew spend a week putting OpenAI through its paces (ChatGPT, Codex and deep research) against their daily driver, Claude. A blind four-way experiment building a running-race predictor surfaces a clear split: deep research goes to OpenAI, while coding and long-horizon agent work stay with Claude. They close with a stick-or-twist verdict, taking in Anthropic's recursive self-improvement claims, a near-trillion-dollar valuation, Microsoft's own models, and the case for renaming everything Clippy. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

June 12, 2026Episode 1421 hr 27 min

#142 Google's agentic era: Next '26 and I/O '26 unpacked

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/google-agentic-era Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/eamMBmm6oTU ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew open with a breaking-news bulletin on Anthropic's newly released Fable, the consumer sibling to Mythos, covering its safety off-ramp to Opus 4.8, its pricing, and the looming switch from subscription to usage-based access. The main episode is a deep dive on Google Cloud Next '26 and I/O '26, unpacking the Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Omni, Antigravity 2.0, WebMCP, and the shift to generative AI search. The thread running through it all: agents are the headline, but governance and a solid semantic layer are the subplot that makes them actually useful. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

May 26, 2026Episode 1411 hr 16 min

#141 Introducing SEAM: Siloed Data, Central Intelligence

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/introducing-seam-podcast Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/rvRd4nep3QU ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew return after a break with a bumper news roundup covering frontier model updates, Google I/O and Next, Anthropic's Mythos and Project Glasswing, and the latest AI design tools. The main event is the official reveal of SEAM (Semantic Engine for Agent Mediation), Measurelab's new product that sits between LLMs and downstream data sources to bring governance, intelligence modelling, and consistent answers to AI-powered workflows. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

May 2, 2026Episode 1401 hr 3 min

#140 Taming BigQuery costs with Alvin.ai (with Martin Sahlen)

Full show notes and transcript - https://bit.ly/bq-cost-taming Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/2QxXQH6waLk ----- Episode Summary: In this episode of The Measure Pod, Dara and Matthew welcome Martin Sahlen, CEO and co-founder of Alvin.ai. Martin shares his journey from studying computer science in Norway to serial entrepreneurship, eventually settling in Tallinn, Estonia, where he founded Alvin. He explains how the company pivoted from data lineage and observability into a focused BigQuery cost optimisation platform that automatically routes queries between billing models to deliver savings, charging a percentage of what it saves. The conversation covers Alvin's transparent, no-lock-in approach, the duality of cost and performance optimisation, and the competitive dynamics of operating alongside Google's own tooling. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

March 27, 2026Episode 13957 min

#139 The role of AI and semantic layers in BI (with Colin Zima at Omni)

Full show notes, transcript and AI chatbot - https://bit.ly/4t8mHmC Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/NqnBWK2si4Y ----- Episode Summary: In this episode of the Measure Pod, Dara and Matthew welcome Colin Zima, CEO and co-founder of Omni. Colin shares his journey in the analytics space, detailing his extensive experience with data tools, including eight years at Looker, where he held various roles in product, customer success, and support. He reflects on his time as one of Looker's first customers and discusses his vision for Omni, a platform aimed at revolutionising analytics by integrating AI and combining the best features of existing tools. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

March 13, 2026Episode 13857 min

#138 Is Claude the future of agentic AI

Full show notes, transcript and AI chatbot - https://bit.ly/40Zlwd1 Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/l-tb1uryhg8 ----- Episode Summary: Dara and Matthew are back with a packed episode. From the Pentagon drama that had Anthropic, OpenAI and Sam Altman making headlines, to Google's latest releases in BigQuery, Flux, Code Wiki and Workspace CLI, there's no shortage of things to unpack. The main event though is a thorough exploration of why both hosts keep coming back to Claude above all else - covering Claude Code, Claude Cowork, scheduled tasks, remote control, plugins and the growing sense that agentic AI has finally crossed over from the CLI world into something anyone can use. Plus, is an OpenAI deep dive episode on the horizon? ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!

February 20, 2026Episode 13748 min

#137 Which LLMs stand the test of time?

Full show notes, transcript and AI chatbot - https://bit.ly/406exPn Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/ZvVsb9ezGKI ----- Episode Summary: In this episode of The Measure Pod, Dara and Matthew ride the wave of technological change, diving into the fast-moving dynamics of AI model competition and what it means for the industry. They explore how tools like Co-work are reshaping the way developers write code, and reflect on the broader trend of removing friction from technology - touching on recent innovations like OpenClaw. The conversation shifts toward the enterprise world, unpacking governance and security challenges in SaaS before turning to Google's evolving AI strategy, its infrastructure advantages, and the role of Tensor Processing Units in giving it a unique edge. ----- About The Measure Pod: The Measure Pod is your go-to fortnightly podcast hosted by seasoned analytics pros. Join Dara Fitzgerald (Co-Founder at Measurelab) & Matthew Hooson (Head of Engineering at Measurelab) as they dive into the world of data, analytics and measurement, with a side of fun. ----- If you liked this episode, don't forget to subscribe to The Measure Pod on your favourite podcast platform and leave us a review. Let's make sense of the analytics industry together!