Selected Writing

Brendan O’Leary

Essays on technology and the people who use it — on artificial intelligence, the craft of building software, faith, family, and the quiet question of how we ought to live now.

Start here

  1. 01 End of Beginning AI tools can help us think, but they become dangerous when leaders confuse speed with judgment and humans with process. Essay
  2. 02 The Death of Morality How America abandoned moral reasoning for tribal loyalty Essay
  3. 03 What I learned at GitLab that I don't want to forget Key lessons from 5 years at GitLab about writing things down, empowerment, and transparency Essay
  4. 04 The Space Between AI Hype and AI Denial Don't fear AI, be curious about it. Kilo Blog
  5. 05 The Year Senior Engineers Stopped Rolling Their Eyes at AI Coding Maybe 2025 wasn't the year of the Linux desktop, but in retrospect it may be the year AI coding went mainstream. Kilo Blog
  6. 06 Grace Hopper Would Love AI Coding From machine code to natural language: Admiral Hopper's legacy lives on. Kilo Blog

The archive

Writing published here and elsewhere, collected in one place. Links marked with an arrow open the original publication.

2026

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018