Velocity11 blog
Plain-language posts on AI, automation and owning your tools.
Nov 2, 2026
84% of US small business owners are confident customers can find them online. 46% haven't checked AI search.
BrightLocal's 2026 small business report: owners are confident about being found online, but nearly half have never checked AI search - where 45% of consumers looked for local business recommendations last year.
Oct 30, 2026
80% of surveyed leaders at big US companies say AI pays off. 28% say it pays off big.
Wharton's 2026 AI Adoption Report compares what the strong-return group has in common - what they measure, how settled their tools are, and how they oversee AI agents. Associations, not proof of cause.
Oct 28, 2026
Weekly AI users are much more likely to have good jobs - but which came first?
Gallup's 2026 job quality survey: 52% of weekly AI users hold quality jobs, versus 32% of workers who never use AI. The survey cannot say which came first - and that matters.
Oct 26, 2026
Small businesses aren't firing people for AI. They're just not hiring.
A survey of 533 US small businesses finds AI rarely causes layoffs - only 3.3% let someone go. But 13% skipped a hire they would have made. The quiet change is the job that never appears.
Oct 21, 2026
The people building AI expect a different 2030 than you do
Anthropic compared a representative survey of 10,980 US adults with 1,334 of its own staff. The two groups agree on what AI can do today - and disagree wildly about what comes next.
Oct 19, 2026
AI tutors made students learn less (in a real experiment)
In a randomized trial of 2,379 university students, sections that got an AI tutor finished with lower grades and far less course participation. Here is what happened, and the rule that separates AI as a crutch from AI as a coach.
Oct 16, 2026
AI isn't firing people. It's not hiring them.
Payroll data on millions of US workers shows no economy-wide AI job loss. But workers aged 22-25 in AI-exposed jobs are 19% below trend, because companies stopped hiring them.
Oct 14, 2026
AI felt 20% faster. It measured 19% slower. Then they measured again.
A controlled experiment found developers worked 19% slower with AI while feeling 20% faster. A year later the same experiment flipped. Here is what changed.
Oct 9, 2026
Will AI make us think less? What the surveys say, and a 3-step habit
53% of Americans expect AI to make people worse at creative thinking. A Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon study of 319 workers adds a twist. Here is what both say and a simple habit.
Oct 7, 2026
AI made people faster. So why are they more worried?
In a survey of 81,000 AI users, people who got the biggest speedups worried most about their jobs. Here is why that makes sense.
Oct 5, 2026
Why more people are scared of AI than two years ago
Pew's 2026 data shows more Americans are worried about AI, and young adults flipped the most. Here are the numbers in plain words.
Oct 3, 2026
Will AI take my job? What people in 37 countries actually said
A plain look at what a 37-country Pew survey and 81,000 AI users say about jobs and AI.