The Accidental AI Economy: When Agents Run the Market + The Empire of Ai

This week on Adjunct Intelligence, Dale and Nick dive headfirst into the accidental AI economy—a system already running faster than human decision-making. From Google’s new Agent Payments Protocol to frontier models caught scheming, the episode unpacks how markets, education, and everyday life are shifting at machine speed.This week on Adjunct Intelligence, Dale and Nick dive headfirst into the accidental AI economy—a system already running faster than human decision-making. From Google’s new Agent Payments Protocol to frontier models caught scheming, the episode unpacks how markets, education, and everyday life are shifting at machine speed.We explore:Why Google’s payments protocol could mark the birth of a new economy.How ChatGPT quietly became the world’s biggest educational institution (250M daily learning chats).What frontier models’ scheming behavior means for safety, trust, and higher education.Why TEQSA is telling Australian universities to redesign assessment instead of chasing detection.Chrome’s Gemini integration and the invisible AI infrastructure shaping the web.The empire analogy: AI labs acting like historical powers, extracting resources, labor, and control.As always, we finish with a jargon buster and a touch of humor (including will.i.am’s surprising new role as an AI professor).Stay curious. Stay intelligent. Stay the human in the loop.🎙️ Adjunct Intelligence is the weekly briefing for higher-ed professionals who want AI as a cheat code—not a headache.Every episode:• Real tests of AI tools in education and professional workflows• Fast, Monday-morning actions you can actually try• Clear signal through the noise (no hype, no jargon)👉 Subscribe on [YouTube] | [Apple Podcasts] | [Spotify]👉 Share this with a colleague who still says “I’ll figure AI out later”👉 Join the conversation on LinkedIn with #AdjunctIntelligenceStay curious. Stay intelligent. Stay the human in the loop.🎙️ Adjunct Intelligence is the weekly briefing for higher-ed professionals who want AI as a cheat code—not a headache.Every episode:• Real tests of AI tools in education and professional workflows• Fast, Monday-morning actions you can actually try• Clear signal through the noise (no hype, no jargon)👉 Subscribe on [YouTube] | [Apple Podcasts] | [Spotify]👉 Share this with a colleague who still says “I’ll figure AI out later”👉 Join the conversation on LinkedIn with #AdjunctIntelligenceStay curious. Stay intelligent. Stay the human in the loop.