Hello from Alberta and the Columbia Ice Fields. During the drive I’ve put together a Case study in how Shopify is Building a key piece of the new model. Also drill down on monetization as the Gordian Knot that will determine how Agentic Commerce Operates.

I’ve been in the payments and retail space for almost three decades. I was there for the dot-com boom and bust, the shift from plastic to mobile wallets, the birth of amazon and Google, and the rise of the platform economy. I’ve seen enough hype cycles to fill a library. Each time, we were promised a revolution that would change everything. And while some of those shifts were significant, they were ultimately evolutionary. eCommerce added a channel, mobile created more shopping interactions and more points to influence,  but were mostly the same commercially. 

This time, I have to admit, it feels different. The rapid advancements in Artificial Intelligence aren’t just creating a new channel; they are actively dismantling the foundational economic bargain of the internet. The core paradigms I’ve operated on for my entire career is being invalidated in real-time.