Watch Steve's talk from TechBlick Boston earlier this June.
He sounded the alarm on a major disruption facing brands and retailers:
AI agents are poised to disintermediate the customer relationship, replacing today’s e-commerce and omnichannel strategies with something far more powerful.
This shift will make recent changes feel like mere tremors before a much larger AI-driven earthquake — one where companies like OpenAI, Google, and Meta sit between consumers and products, armed with more data, context, and influence than ever before.
Without intervention, brands risk being commoditized, their merchandising tools outmatched by personal AI shoppers who know consumers more intimately than any marketer ever could.
We urgently need to secure the interface between the physical world and AI. A promising path forward is through JTC 24 — a standard that can help ensure privacy, control, and brand equity are preserved in this new era.
Collaboration between brands, retailers, and consumers is essential.
The window to act is closing.