Digital Stories

S5 Ep. 3 - Your browser will be the next tech empire

SUBCRIBE [https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/digitalstories-exe-7388138546441732096/] Read more here [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/your-browser-next-tech-empire-giulio-ranucci-eiwcf/?trackingId=rYV2Kq0ISE2P9dPo%2Bcr%2BUg%3D%3D]: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/your-browser-next-tech-empire-giulio-ranucci-eiwcf/?trackingId=rYV2Kq0ISE2P9dPo%2Bcr%2BUg%3D%3D For nearly two decades, the web browser has been the most stagnant piece of consumer software in tech. We upgraded from Internet Explorer to Chrome, from Safari to Firefox, but the fundamental experience never changed: open a window, type a URL, click around. A tab here, an incognito mode there. Billions of people settled into a browser inertia the quiet assumption is that the browser is a solved problem. Recently this assumption died. A new browser battle started. But unlike the 2000s, this one isn’t being fought over rendering engines, tab management, or JavaScript benchmarks. In a time were LLMs are still struggling to define a solid business case (recent MIT report [https://fortune.com/2025/08/18/mit-report-95-percent-generative-ai-pilots-at-companies-failing-cfo/]), AI tools are pushing to integrate browser experience as a necessity since now the user must visit a website or an app to use the single LLM. Three players are racing to define what the next decade of internet interaction will look like: * Perplexity launched Comet [https://www.perplexity.ai/comet], a browser with an AI researcher built directly into the interface. * The Browser Company, known for the cult-favorite Arc, pivoted to Dia [https://www.diabrowser.com/] its vision for a fully “AI-native” browsing experience. * OpenAI, with nearly a billion ChatGPT users, recently lunched Atlas [https://chatgpt.com/it-IT/atlas/] its own AI browser, deeply integrated with its agents and multimodal models. What’s coming isn’t search glued onto a sidebar. It’s a redefinition of what the browser is. Why this moment matters AI’s models already do what traditional browsers never could like execute code, call APIs, analyze documents, interpret and generate images and videos and take actions across the web. The moment these capabilities are bundled inside the browser itself, the browser stops being a vessel and becomes an agentic workspace a place where your assistant doesn’t just answer questions, but acts on your behalf. Imagine planning a trip without hopping across ten different websites. Your assistant can compare flights, book an hotel, optimize the itinerary and store receipts all in one flow. Or researching a vendor: it can scrape pricing pages, compare features, analyze reviews, and draft an RFP email. Not a suggestion engine. A digital analyst. If Chrome is a highway, AI-native browsers are self-driving vehicles. The Chrome Problem: built fast not built smart Chrome is still the global behemoth, a browser (73% market share [https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share]) with billions of users and an ecosystem of extensions as large as some app stores. But its architecture is a liability in an intelligence-first era. Chrome was engineered as a fast, extensible shell. Everything smart is bolted on from the outside: plugins, sidebars, extensions or Google Search itself and it's still the dominante player on field. If OpenAI, Perplexity, or The Browser Company create a browser where intelligence isn’t an accessory but the foundation, Chrome enters dangerous territory. If search, navigation, and execution all merge into one AI-native interface, Google’s grip on the value chain begins to loosen. Because why “search” when your browser can do? ChatGPT remains the gravitational centre of AI chat, but the shape of the universe is shifting, while Gemini offers reach, Perplexity offers depth, Claude (Anthropic) owns the dev crowd and DeepSeek proves lightning can strike outside Silicon Valley. None of this means OpenAI’s rumored browser will dethrone Chrome overnight. Uphill Battle: Has Google Already Won? Chrome commands roughly 3 billion users. Google is rapidly folding its Gemini models into Chrome and Search. And According to SimilarWeb [https://www.similarweb.com/blog/marketing/geo/decline-in-gen-ai-traffic/], Google’s generative AI traffic share is rising not falling at OpenAI’s expense. For all its innovation, OpenAI is still the insurgent. Google built not just the browser but the ecosystem, the distribution, and the default pathways that billions take every day. The recently anounched Atlas (OpenAI’s browser) might electrify the tech world. But excitement doesn’t equal dominance. If AI is a race, Google didn’t just get a head start. Google built the stadium.  Why browsing is bigger than search At first glance, this looks like a battle over who can summarize a webpage better. But that misses the point entirely. Like Napster for music, Uber for rides or Whatsapp for texting, this is not a challenge about search it’s about user experience. We are witnessing the browser’s transformation from a passive window into an active participant a system that understands your task, predicts your next step, executes actions across apps bridging workflows between websites. For decades, the browser was the hallway that led to your digital tools. Now, the hallway is becoming the entire workspace. Browser as the new Operating System Consider the broader ecosystem, AI agents operate inside enterprise dashboards, automated finance agents reconcile invoices, HR agents fill forms in workday or SAP, customer care agents and many others. Today, these agents hack their way through the browser. Tomorrow, the browser will be built for them. The AI browser becomes the base layer for agentic automation not just for consumers, but for global enterprises. In this model, the browser is no longer the gateway to the web, it's the operating system and holds all our precious data. The next empire: Agentic Internet Original browsers battle were about rendering speed. The second era was about cloud integration. The third was about mobile-first design. The fourth, the one unfolding right now, is about intelligence. Winners won’t simply shape how we browse. They’ll shape how we work, how we learn, how we automate, and how we interact with the global economy. The stakes are not tabs or search bars. The stakes are the future of digital itself. And still after twenty years, browsers are still one of the most exciting battleground in technology and the best is yet to come. Giulio Ranucci SUBSCRIBE [https://giulioranucci.substack.com/]

S5 Ep. 2 - The Uncomfortable Truth about AI

SUBCRIBE [https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/digitalstories-exe-7388138546441732096/] Read more here: [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/uncomfortable-truth-ai-giulio-ranucci-wvmcf/] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/uncomfortable-truth-ai-giulio-ranucci-wvmcf/ Full text: Everywhere you look, read and scroll AI is the conversation. The hype is huge, the possibilities are endless… BUT here’s the uncomfortable truth: we're adopting faster than we're adapting.And by “adopting” I don’t just mean having the latest tools or enterprise licenses. I mean knowledge, training, and the ability to understand what’s actually happening beneath the surface.When OpenAI launched its public beta on nov 30th 2022, it didn’t just launch a product — it rewired the way humans interact with information. We’ve been carrying AI-powered devices in our pockets for decades (predictive text, search engines, digital assistants) but this time it felt different. The interaction became human. The machine became a companion.Over 100 million users adopted ChatGPT within two months, making it the fastest-growing consumer technology [https://epoch.ai/gradient-updates/after-the-chatgpt-moment-measuring-ais-adoption] in history.That single milestone forced entire industries to reimagine their workflows, from education to law.Now, the ripple effects are shaking the foundations of global business. Major companies [https://companiesmarketcap.com/largest-companies-by-revenue/], some generating over $600 billion in annual revenue, are actively rethinking their models around AI. Search, the internet’s primary money engine, is being rewritten in real time: Gemini, Google’s large-scale AI platform, is closing the gap [https://africa.businessinsider.com/news/watch-out-chatgpt-googles-gemini-is-catching-up/fgmxc7e] with ChatGPT (650mln monthly active users vs 900mln on OpenAI), while Alphabet, has spent the past two years re-engineering its core products to remain competitive. But here’s the deeper issue: If we’re changing the core mechanics of how humans search, learn, and communicate, even the web’s foundational protocols, like HTTP, may soon be reimagined.So we need to ask ourselves: Are our education systems, media ecosystems, and digital habits truly prepared for this shift? Are businesses investing in AI literacy not just AI tools? And as individuals, are we aware of how fast this transformation is redefining the way we interact with knowledge itself?Because AI isn’t just another technology trend. It’s a knowledge infrastructure revolution.And as McKinsey & Company noted [https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/tech-and-ai/our-insights/the-economic-potential-of-generative-ai-the-next-productivity-frontier], while AI could contribute up to $4.4 trillion in annual global productivity gains, the gap between organizations that experiment with AI and those that embed it deeply is widening [https://www.wsj.com/lifestyle/workplace/ai-workplace-tensions-what-to-do-c45f6b51] fast. Turning back to the beginning, technology is evolving at unprecedented speed, but here's the uncomfortable truth we're all dancing around: the real challenge isn't building smarter machines it's whether we humans can keep pace without losing ourselves in the process.We're witnessing an inversion of the traditional learning curve. For centuries, humans mastered tools that extended our physical capabilities the wheel, the printing press, the assembly line. We had time to adapt, generations even, to integrate each innovation into the fabric of society. But AI compresses that timeline from decades to months. We're no longer learning to use a tool; we're learning to coexist with an intelligence that learns faster than we do. This creates a peculiar paradox: as AI becomes more capable of handling complexity, are we becoming more capable of handling nuance? The machines excel at pattern recognition, but understanding context the messy, contradictory, deeply human context remains our domain. For now. The question is whether we're sharpening that advantage or letting it atrophy.The untold truth isn't about artificial intelligence at all. It's about human adaptability. It's about whether we'll use this moment to become more thoughtful, more creative, more deliberately human or whether we'll outsource so much of our cognitive labor that we forget what made us indispensable in the first place. The machines are getting smarter. The question is: are we? SUBSCRIBE [https://giulioranucci.substack.com/]

S5 Ep. 1 - Video k(B)ills the Radio star

Subscribe here [https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/digitalstories-exe-7388138546441732096/]: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/digitalstories-exe-7388138546441732096/  Full text: TUDUM! Spotify and Netflix are teaming up [https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/netflix-spotify-video-podcasts] to bring sports, culture, lifestyle and true crime video podcasts from Spotify Studios [https://artists.spotify.com/it/spotify-music-studios] directly to Netflix {full list here [https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/netflix-spotify-video-podcasts]} to complement the streamer’s existing programming.Spotify needs broader audiences, Netflix content and new nice in the in the "attention economy" the real diamond for any tech & data company. This strategic move (terms and details of the deal were not disclosed) allows the swedish company to leverage Netflix's large global subscriber base for its creators and provides it's platform with a new content category that fits into its diversification strategy beyond scripted shows and films. Being following the potential merge for a while now [https://www.quora.com/Would-it-make-sense-for-Netflix-and-Spotify-to-merge] reality is they are both just to small compared to Amazon, Apple or Alphabet more specifically YouTube: This should be a first step to see how complementary those audiences really are since Podcasts are mostly vertical to topics and opinions while media streaming platforms covers all genres for different generations. Video, which is heavily consumed by Gen Z users in particular, offers more opportunities for ad products and monetization, the company now believes. As of Q2 2025 [https://s29.q4cdn.com/175625835/files/doc_financials/2025/q2/Q2-25-Earnings-Call-Prepared-Remarks.pdf], the company said it now has more than 430,000 video podcasts on its service, and video consumption is growing 20x faster than audio-only consumption since 2024. More than 350 million Spotify users have also streamed a video on its platform, up 65% year-over-year.While global podcast market is projected to grow to $43.2 billion in 2026, up from $39.6 billion in 2025 Key Podcast Statistics for 2026 [https://www.podcastvideos.com/articles/podcast-statistics-2026/], with North America accounting for 46.3% of listeners Podcast Statistics and Insights 2025 [https://dataglobehub.com/podcast-statistics/]. By cross-distributing content, Spotify and Netflix are capitalizing on this growth while reducing reliance on single-platform monetization models. For investors, this signals a shift toward ecosystem-based revenue strategies, where platforms collaborate rather than compete to maximize returns.2026 looks already very interesting for a new era of Cross-Platform Monetization. SUBSCRIBE [https://giulioranucci.substack.com/]

S5 Ep. 0 - Stories are back!

Stories are back!  SUBSCRIBE [https://giulioranucci.substack.com/]

S4 Ep. 11 - Super Nintendo Entertainment System

History of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. SUBSCRIBE [https://giulioranucci.substack.com/]