Deepfake concerns hit a historic high in our Panoptica Storyboards this January. But this wasn't based on a theoretical warning or concern - by late December 2025, a surge in non-consensual sexual imagery was being generated at scale by users of Grok's "Spicy" mode. The gap between threat and crisis collapsed overnight stirring a regulatory backlash against xAI that's still developing. Here's what happened when the safeguards companies claimed to have built revealed themselves as choices they'd simply chosen to make.

What if the only competitive advantage that actually matters is being genuinely, distinctly yourself? Watch Carly Valancy and Spencer Kier - two strangers before this blind introduction - discover they arrived at the same insight independently: your weirdness is the key to scaling your network. From breaking networking's unspoken rules to treating yourself as always in beta mode, they make the case that authenticity compounds.

Currencies shift through redirection over decades. Bretton Woods embedded the dollar after WWII. The Suez Crisis revealed Sterling's fragility in 1956. The global financial crisis planted doubts about dollar dominance in 2008. Russia's frozen reserves in 2022 confirmed what central banks already suspected. Grant Williams traces how this 80-year arc brought us here, and what happens next.

What makes a formative moment formative when you're living through it? Allison Wolfe (Bratmobile) and Brianna Collins (Tigers Jaw) trace parallel paths from opposite coasts and different eras. Olympia's '90s DIY explosion and Scranton's 2000s basement scene. The answer involves moms, surprise art reveals, and recognizing you can't see what you're building while you're building it.

When two writers from rural Wisconsin and Oklahoma sit down for the first time, it becomes immediately clear they've been living the same story, just at different angles. Both grew up around machinery that took fingers. Both defied every signal that people like them became writers. So naturally, when they met, they recognized each other immediately. This conversation is about the mentors who showed them the way before the way was clear, and what it means to build a literary voice from something harder than books.

The 4% rule is hitting its highest storyboard signal in a decade right now. Matt Zeigler distinguishes between Rules of Thumb (inherited statistics) and Rules of Big Toe (hard-won lessons from real volatility and client experience). The second kind is messier, less statistically defensible - and absolutely differentiating for anyone looking to separate themselves from the herd when the market finally stops cooperating.

When your life has been a series of reinventions, what does consistency even mean? Phil Pearlman brings new life to a clip from Nancy Burger and Julia Duthie, two executives who've radically transformed themselves, and asks a question that shouldn't work. The answer reveals something more powerful than any rigid routine ever could.

Ten conversations. One through-line: the people you invite into your world determine the life you'll build within that world. Just Press Record is a show about human connection, and if you're interested in building a better, more humane world, we think you'll love these clips on authenticity, reinvention, and finding "switched-on" people to build with.

The poverty debate that took over social media missed the actual problem. Adam Butler and Ben Hunt dig into precarity instead - why the gap between official metrics and lived reality matters, and what it means when people sense capitalism has failed them without being able to name what comes next.

The US is waging an AI war. The problem is, China doesn’t seem to be fighting back. Matt Zeigler examines how narrative shapes capital allocation, drawing on conversations with Ben Hunt and Louis‑Vincent Gave to show why the stories we tell ourselves about competition can matter more than what’s actually happening.

Superheroes and villains start from the same place - alone, unsupported, hurting. Tyrone Ross Jr. and Neils Ribeiro-Yemofio meet for the first time to discuss origin stories, the power of what you tell people, and why hope is both a tool and a weapon.

Eric Pachman returns to discuss a clip about serendipity and the architecture of lasting work. Fresh off another career pivot, he's launching Data 4 The People - a mission to expose uncomfortable truths about SNAP, poverty, and who we are as a society.

Mike Green published a piece redefining the poverty line at $140k. Some people debated his math. A lot of people just said "he used AI" and moved on. Watch how institutions dodge uncomfortable questions - not by winning the argument, but by telling a story that spreads faster.

Trump claimed Thanksgiving dinner is 25% cheaper this year. Fact-checkers immediately noted how the basket changed. But both Trump and his critics are correct. Because when you can choose which groceries to count, you control the inflation narrative. A data-driven look at how institutions select their truths this holiday season.

Anthropic released a threat report at the same time as Perscient's narrative tracking hit all-time highs on "we must spend to beat China." But the actual capability gap? Quietly buried. Hallucination problems in the attacks themselves? Also quietly buried. Infrastructure skepticism simultaneously at all-time highs? Doesn't move the needle. They'll be back. And next time, everyone ready to benefit will have more funding, faster timelines, fewer questions to answer. We're taking notes.

In a world obsessed with narrative warfare, earnestness has become a quiet competitive advantage. We've spent the past year and change documenting strategic thinkers who stayed genuine despite every incentive to become calculation machines for The Intentional Investor on Epsilon Theory. Here's why that matters now more than ever - AND, where to find them.

Bill Pulte walked into Mar-a-Lago with a high school posterboard and sold Trump on 50-year mortgages. By Monday, the White House was walking it back. The real story isn't whether it's good policy—it's what this reveals about how policy actually gets made.

Ben Hunt and Rusty Guinn of Perscient have developed a revolutionary technology for tracking narratives in real time.

The stories we're told precede the decisions already made. Ben Hunt and Rusty Guinn teach us to see the narrative architecture beneath the headlines – the way language is weaponized, how certainty is constructed, and how we're brought along to support predetermined conclusions. Using Perscient's Semantic Signatures technology, they reveal what Storyboards can show us: how narrative operates across media, politics, and markets – not just finance. This isn't cynicism. It's literacy. The question isn't whether the ending is inevitable. It's whether you're discovering it or being led toward it.

When institutional stories stop matching reality, the world changes overnight. Here are three techniques to help spot narrative shifts while they're building towards a shift. If there's one muscle you need to build in 2025, it's "why am I reading this now?"—because the bankruptcies, the whispers, and the hidden disconnects are already here.