Better with Kent · draft

Watch me make a product call

Then say go

research
judgment
side-quests

Cold open

One word left to type

The agent is mid-conversation. The next message is go.

First: see the product engineering that got us here.

Thesis

Implementation decisions are product decisions

  • Not “write the feature”
  • Own the path: possibility → constraint → ship
  • Agents gather. You decide.

Will King · BEPE

Gathering before executing

Use agents more for gathering than executing — bring back context for your judgment.

Become an Epic Product Engineer · Will King

Beat 1

Research for judgment

  • Ask for evidence, not a PR
  • Measure Artifacts large-file reality
  • ~30 MiB ceiling · no LFS · ugly 413s

[DEMO] Scroll the size table in the agent thread

Beat 2

Almost no skills used

  • Most of the thread: questions + pushback + tools
  • Skills ≠ entry fee for hard product talk
  • conduct only at the go gate

And it demoted — one repo, sequential PRs, not a fleet

Beat 3

Side-quests for other agents

Shade intent

Value → package INTENT.md

Solar brief

Value → tesla-solar docs file

Main thread stays on the product call. Debt gets its own agents.

Pattern

Don't let cleanup hijack the decision

research → judgment → side-quests → go

Beat 4 · the call

What we decided

  • Artifacts / data repos beat computer-as-storage
  • Friendly ~10 MB gate — not opaque pointer rewrite
  • File-level repo sessions (breaking OK pre-launch)

Live

Say go

Judgment first. Authorization second.

PR 1 · size gate → PR 2 · file API

[DEMO] Type go in the Cursor agent

Homework

Before your next “build it”

  • Ask for one research deliverable that could change your mind
  • If it surfaces debt → spawn a side-quest
  • Only then: go

Better with Kent

Judgment with better ingredients

Product engineers use agents to gather — then they own the call.

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