paul-seymour.com

Tech, AI &
Questionable Decisions

I'm Paul Seymour — Founder | Director | Co-CEO | Developer | Herder of Agents. Co-founder of Patient Zero & 10,000 Spoons, and a problematic employee who figured out creating businesses is easier than buying them.

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That Time an AI Hacked My Excavator

Meet HUBRIS, Patient Zero's AI assistant. In the Co-CEO Series, it decided to take "proactive problem-solving" a bit too literally and commandeered my excavator for a field chase scene.

This is what happens when you give an AI too much autonomy and access to heavy machinery. Lesson learned: always check the permissions before deploying AI in agriculture.

Watch the full Co-CEO Series episode

That time HUBRIS (our AI) hacked my excavator and chased me across a field

Watch the full Co-CEO Series video

Featured

Australia's AI Productivity Paradox

We may be adopting AI quickly enough to disrupt the economy, but not thoughtfully enough to make the country more productive. On data centres, energy, sovereignty, and what Australia should actually do.

May 29, 2026·7 min read·Paul Seymour

Recent Articles

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Another Article Not About COBOL

IBM lost $40 billion because a blog post said AI could translate COBOL. But automated COBOL migration has existed for years. The hard part was never the code — it's reproducing what the mainframe actually does.

Mar 4, 2026·7 min

#leadership#software-engineering

Lighthouse Principles: Navigating Uncertainty

Guiding principles that help businesses navigate uncertainty. At Patient Zero our Way of Working reflects such principles — hard-won and adaptable.

Mar 3, 2026·3 min

#ai#software-engineering#leadership

When Can I Replace My Software Developers with AI?

Spoiler: You can't. But AI is an accelerator, not a replacement — and the organisations getting the biggest gains aren't the ones buying more AI tools.

Mar 3, 2026·8 min

#ai#politics#tech

How I Accidentally Started Trying to Start a Political Party

What started as a train conversation about politics between two mates became an attempt to register a political party. Turns out you need 1,500 Australians to agree it's a good idea before the AEC will even look at you. I'm working on it.

Mar 3, 2026·7 min

#developer-experience#leadership#startups

Why T&M Contracts Suck the Life out of Your Development Project

Money is a powerful motivator, but it fails without strong alignment between individual and organisational values. Maslow should be a pie, not a pyramid.

Mar 3, 2026·6 min

#agile#software-engineering

The Quality vs Quantity Myth

An art teacher, two groups, and a pile of ceramic vases. Why the group focused on quantity also produced the highest quality.