Drew Breunig. Writer and product thinker who publishes practical observations on AI systems, agentic coding, and the hidden costs that surface when teams deploy AI at scale. Best known for naming the "free as in puppies" trap: AI generation removes the creation cost of code but not the ownership, maintenance, or security cost that follows.
Operating themes
- Spec-first discipline Implement to learn, tests to measure, humans to hold the ship/no-ship call before scale.
- Hidden cost accounting The real cost of agentic systems shows up in maintenance and support, not initial generation.
- Human checkpoints as architecture Structured human gates are the design pattern, not a concession to AI's limits.