Welcome back to Forests Over Trees, your weekly tech strategy newsletter. It’s time to zoom-out, connect dots, and (try to) predict the future.

Here’s the plan:

• Tech News Takes — super-short analysis and commentary

• Strategy Tools — strategy nuggets (for business and life)

• F/T Shoutouts — sharing launches, tech events, and other reads

Anthropic is smart to dumb-down AI

Plus: Iger’s exit plan, DoD’s recruiting plan

⚡ Tech News Takes ⚡

Disney’s Ongoing Succession

• What’s up: Disney announced they plan to name CEO Bob Iger’s successor in early 2026. Iger was CEO from 2005-2020, and has been back in charge since 2022 after the board requested his help turning things around.

• So what: Announcing that you plan to announce something?! C’mon. This is “vaporware”, but for succession plans. And as we’ve covered before, activist investors like Nelson Peltz are sharpening their knives for another fight (and have pointed to succession plans as one of their primary concerns).  Expect more noise here.

Anthropic releases models with “computer use”

• What’s up: Anthropic released new 3.5 models this week, and added computer use as a new feature in beta. This lets developers use Anthropic’s models to navigate native interfaces in browsers and apps to perform tasks – they don’t need to rely on APIs for those apps.

• So what: This is incredible. While this beta still requires some technical know-how, it’ll be easier for users to see the models’ power up close and personal (rather than relying on technical benchmarks and the say-so of well-meaning tech writers 😊). Plus, empowering people to automate-away the tedious tasks in their lives is more human-friendly than the story about AI “taking jobs”.

DOD joins war for tech talent

• What’s up: The US Department of Defense is starting to recruit CTOs and other senior tech professionals into the reserves. The goal is to scale to thousands of reservists in the next few years, and they could be summoned for short-term, part-time projects in cybersecurity, data analytics, etc.

• So what: Tech gets faster and more complicated every day, so it’s smart for the military to seed stronger connections with tech leaders they can learn from. Plus, it’s on trend. Just look at the rising tide of tech defense firms (Anduril, Palantir, etc.).

I recently listened to Walter Isaacson’s book about Elon, and I loved it.

But here’s the thing, it was waaay too long. I’m talking 20+ hours, folks!

So I was pumped to discover this company doing mini-summaries for books, podcasts, news articles, you name it (their “Elon” summary is only an hour...).  

If you have a stack of books on your “to read” list, and not enough hours in your day, you should check them out – they’re called Shortform, and they’re this week’s sponsor.

(P.S. They hooked us up! Free trial and 20% off if you use Shortform.com/joey.)

🛠️ Strategy Tools 🛠️

Anthropic is smart to dumb-down AI

Today’s strategy lesson is about growing through innovation curves.

Specifically, it’s a chance zoom-out on Anthropic’s “computer use” feature, and why it has people freaking out (in a good way).

To help do that, let’s get acquainted with this week’s framework – the theory for the Diffusion of Innovation.

The theory seeks to explain how new tech/products spread through populations over time. And it chunks people into five adoption segments:

1. Innovators (2.5%) – These people are risk-takers and visionaries. They tinker with new tech “just because”, and they don’t mind the rough edges.

2. Early Adopters (13.5%) – These folks spot trends early. They are quick to identify when an “obviously better” product comes along. They don’t hesitate to switch.

3. Early Majority (34%) – They want to see proven success first, but they can be convinced. They want a smoother experience.

4. Late Majority (34%) – They are skeptical of new tech, but they’ll come around if most of their friends and colleagues are on-board.

5. Laggards (16%) – They fight most changes tooth-and-nail.

Per usual, for my visual learners – ze visual!