Eenie Meenie Mynie Mylow…
Welcome to Friday, futurists.
Does no one have a middle schooler over at The Home Depot? Their new GenAI tool, Magic Apron bears resemblance neither to anything magical nor apron. It looks like a butthole.
The harried announcement is understandable because it comes mere hours after rival Lowes revealed its own “first AI-powered home improvement virtual advisor,” Mylow.
What we're witnessing is the Great AI Christening of 2025—retail giants competing not just in technological capabilities but in the semiotics of AI naming conventions. Home Depot's Magic Apron purports to guide you through everything from lawn aeration to deck staining, acting as your 24/7 digital contractor who never needs coffee breaks. Meanwhile, Lowe's Mylow (exclusive to rewards members, naturally) serves as your personal home improvement consigliere, with voice capabilities coming soon to whisper sweet nothings about proper grout application techniques.
The divergence in strategy is telling: Home Depot has integrated Magic Apron deeply into their digital ecosystem, betting on comprehensive coverage across their product universe, while Lowe's takes a more curated approach with Mylow, developed in partnership with OpenAI.
What's most fascinating, however, is how these anthropomorphized tools reflect our paradoxical relationship with AI—we demand both utility and personality, functionality and familiarity. We want our AI helpers to feel approachable (hence the cutesy names) yet omniscient. Perhaps next time, though, someone might consider running the logo design past a focus group of seventh graders before unleashing it upon an internet primed to see anatomical references in everything from cloud formations to corporate branding exercises. Just a thought.
— Phillip
P.S. Speaking of dumb, this week on the podcast, we talk about the rise of AI grifting. Watch on YouTube or listen on Spotify.
The Gluteus Maximum-ization of Times Square. Skims inflated a colossal 60-foot Kim Kardashian over Times Square to herald their latest swimwear—a perfect inversion of commerce norms as traditional retailers retreat to digital while this digital-native brand invades physical space with what can only be described as the largest posterior to grace Manhattan's skyline since Kong scaled the Empire State Building in 1933. The once-purely-online brand's spectacular out-of-home strategy arrives precisely as legacy brands dabble in faux-OOH installations, highlighting our increasingly blurred physical-digital commercial landscape.
AI Agents Go Shopping. Last month, eCommerce startup Qeen.ai secured $10 million in seed funding to scale its autonomous shopping agent platform throughout the Middle East. Founded by Google and DeepMind alumni, the company is creating “just in time” agents to save merchants time and money. Novel pricing models allow agents to optimize SEO and create performance marketing campaigns on a per-SKU basis, which is markedly different to other SaaS competitors.
Our Take: Qeen's approach to monetization represents a fascinating evolution in SaaS pricing models. Rather than the standard seat-based or flat subscription approach, they've implemented a hybrid value-based system where merchants pay per active SKU ($0.10-$0.20 monthly) for content automation and per-interaction for their AI marketing agent. This model aligns perfectly with eCommerce economics, where scaled inventory management directly correlates with revenue potential.
By attaching their fortunes directly to their clients' product portfolios and customer engagement metrics, Qeen creates a remarkably aligned incentive structure. Their decision to target MENA first—a region projected to reach $50 billion in eCommerce by 2025 yet underserved by sophisticated AI tools—showcases strategic geographic positioning rather than battling in saturated Western markets. This combination of innovative pricing and regional focus could provide the differentiation needed to stand out in an increasingly crowded AI agent landscape.
Shall We Play a Game? The Department of Defense is tapping Scale AI to integrate autonomous agents into military planning and operations, raising the specter of algorithmic warfare. One can only hope the Pentagon's AI architects have screened "WarGames" and understand that teaching machines the concept of "mutually assured destruction" requires a deft touch… but let’s not cast Matthew Broderick this time around.
The Digital Divine. Bryan Johnson, longevity obsessive and Blueprint adherent, is now constructing a full-fledged religion called "Don't Die," which he boldly predicts will become "history's fastest-growing ideology." The Silicon Valley approach to spirituality continues its inevitable march: if you can't disrupt death through science alone, perhaps repackaging mortality as a subscription-based belief system will do the trick?
Our Take: This is really, really dumb; which is precisely why it should scare you.
.svg)
