Digital Pulses Dispatch: AI & The Intern Dilemma

Good morning from Madrid!

If you're reading this, you want less noise and more clarity on what's shaping tech, media, and marketing.

This is Digital Pulses Dispatch, where I break down the biggest shifts, emerging tools, and sharpest insights so you can stay ahead without getting lost in the hype.

A bit about me: I work as an international markets representative & MarCom, specializing in digital advertising benchmarking. I've spent over seven years navigating global markets, crafting strategies, and mentoring future digital professionals. More than anything, I love exploring the intersection of tech, creativity, and data—because that's where the real innovation happens.

Now, let's dive into what's making waves.

📈 The Big Trend

AI Is Reshaping Expertise—But at What Cost?

AI just turned consulting's biggest strength into its biggest weakness. For decades, consulting firms thrived on expertise, research, and strategic insight. Then, they disrupted marketing. Now, AI is disrupting them.

One of the most striking examples was the shift that began around 2015, when consultancies entered the marketing world, taking on roles traditionally held by agencies. Firms like Accenture and Deloitte started offering creative, digital strategy, and media buying services—leveraging data-driven decision-making to carve out a new niche.

Ironically, that same wave of transformation is now coming for them.

AI and automation are reshaping the core of consulting, just as consultancies once reshaped advertising. The traditional model—where teams of analysts conducted exhaustive research, synthesized insights, and delivered high-touch strategy recommendations—is being rewritten by generative AI and machine learning.

🟣 From High-Touch Strategy to AI-Driven Insight

Generative AI is accelerating research, automating analysis, and sometimes replacing entry-level consultants with AI-powered assistants. Consulting giants are responding by integrating AI into their workflows:

• McKinsey’s Lilli scans internal knowledge bases and synthesizes insights.

• Deloitte’s DARTbot automates audit and compliance processes.

• PwC, OpenAI’s largest enterprise customer, now uses GPT-based bots to review tax filings and generate reports.

• Accenture is investing $3 billion into its AI expansion, doubling its Data & AI workforce to 80,000 employees.

What are the short-term benefits? Higher efficiency, lower costs, and better margins. But in the long term, AI could fundamentally disrupt the consulting model—just as consultancies themselves disrupted agencies years ago.

🟣 The Intern Dilemma & the Illusion of Expertise

AI is becoming the equivalent of an infinite pool of interns, able to generate reports, summarize research, and draft recommendations. But as Benedict Evans pointed out in his Stratechery interview, there’s a fundamental issue:

• AI doesn’t learn from mistakes in real time. A human analyst can be corrected and improve, but AI confidently provides the wrong answer without knowing it’s wrong.

• This creates a paradox: AI can deliver "expertise" at scale, but without human validation, it risks making consulting faster—but not necessarily better.

🟣 The Commoditization of Knowledge

This AI-driven shift mirrors what we're seeing with DeepSeek—China's latest AI model, which optimized its development to achieve OpenAI-level performance at a fraction of the cost. DeepSeek didn’t beat OpenAI outright, but it showed that once-exclusive AI technology is quickly becoming a commodity.

Similarly, AI is shifting how businesses access strategic insight—challenging traditional consulting models in new ways. AI-powered platforms could offer on-demand "SaaS consulting", giving businesses the tools to generate strategic insights without needing a million-dollar McKinsey engagement.

Meanwhile, smaller firms and independent consultants—once disadvantaged by scale—can now compete head-to-head with the big players. AI allows them to provide high-level analysis and recommendations without the overhead of massive consulting teams.

🔮 The Inevitable Question: Who Gets Disrupted First?

AI is not eliminating expertise but reshaping what expertise looks like. The firms that survive this shift won't just be those that use AI to optimize margins—they'll be the ones that redefine their value beyond what AI can automate.

Ironically, the consultancies that disrupted agencies a decade ago now face the same forces of disruption. Will they adapt—or will AI redefine the industry, just as they once did to others?

👉 Bottom Line: AI isn’t replacing expertise—it’s reshaping what expertise looks like. The firms that survive this shift won't just be those that use AI to improve margins but those that redefine their value beyond what an algorithm can deliver.

✨ Platform Watch

Substack: The Creator Economy’s Media Disruptor—or Just Another Gig Platform?

Substack has undeniably empowered independent writers—but is it a sustainable media alternative or just another gig economy hustle? The answer may depend on how many creators can build a lasting business before the model shifts.

• Substack Disrupts Media Distribution
  Like the printing press or the rise of independent blogs, Substack is the latest evolution of media disintermediation. It cuts out traditional publishers and lets writers connect directly with their readers. With 2 million paid subscriptions, it's proven that people will pay for content they value.

• Network Effects Make or Break It
  Substack isn't just a newsletter tool—it's an ecosystem. Writers engage with readers, cross-promote each other, and, in many cases, monetize an audience before even launching. That interconnectedness gives Substack an edge over competitors like Ghost or Beehiiv.

• The Crowding Problem
  As more writers jump in, the landscape is shifting. Some receive six-figure advances (through the "Substack Pro" program), while others rely on steady but slow audience growth. With Substack now raising money from its users instead of VC firms, the platform itself is starting to mirror its creator economy ethos.

Substack has undeniably empowered independent writers, but the question remains: Is it a sustainable alternative to traditional media, or will it leave most creators hustling for scraps?

👉 If you’re writing on Substack, what’s your take? Hit reply and let me know.
(Meanwhile, this newsletter calls Beehiiv home—because even disruptors need competition.)

🧠 Tool of the Issue

How I Automated Google Alerts to Cut Through the Noise

If you've ever relied on Google Alerts for industry updates, you know the pain—your inbox fills up with emails, forcing you to sift through links to find relevant insights manually. It's inefficient, frustrating, and a waste of time.

I needed a smarter way to extract, categorize, and centralize these alerts so that instead of drowning in emails, I could focus on strategy, not admin work.

If you're tracking industry trends, news, or competitors, this script turns messy email alerts into a structured database in Google Sheets—so you get insights, not inbox overload.

📌 Here’s the core function that extracts clean article links from Google Alerts emails: (full script after the code block)

function extractArticles(emailBody) {
    var links = emailBody.match(/<a\s+href="([^"]+)".*?>(.*?)<\/a>/g);
    var articles = [];

    if (!links) return [];

    links.forEach(link => {
        var cleanLink = link.match(/href="([^"]+)"/);
        var titleMatch = link.match(/>(.*?)<\/a>/);

        if (!cleanLink || !cleanLink[1] || !titleMatch || !titleMatch[1]) return;

        var rawURL = decodeURIComponent(cleanLink[1]);
        var title = titleMatch[1].replace(/<\/?[^>]+(>|$)/g, "").trim();

        if (rawURL.includes("google.com/url")) {
            var matchedURL = rawURL.match(/url=([^&]+)/);
            if (matchedURL) rawURL = decodeURIComponent(matchedURL[1]);
        }

        if (rawURL.startsWith("http")) {
            articles.push({ url: rawURL, title: title });
        }
    });

    return articles;
}

✅ What this script does:

• Scans Gmail for unread Google Alert emails

• Extracts article titles & URLs

• Identifies the publisher & language

• Saves everything to a Google Sheet for easy tracking

Instead of inbox overload, I get a structured, searchable database of industry news—on my terms. If you want to automate similar workflows, I've made the script public so you can adapt it to your needs.

🔗 Get the full script here: GitHub Link

Whenever possible, our time should go into high-value thinking, not manual tasks. Automating recurring workflows is one of the simplest ways to reclaim hours—what's the next process you're streamlining?

🔥 Hot Take

US Government as a Startup? Musk’s 'Efficiency' Revolution Comes with a Price

When Elon Musk took over Twitter, he gutted teams, slashed costs, and broke every rule of corporate governance. He's doing it again—but this time, with the US government.

Here’s the twist: Musk isn’t just advising Trump; he’s actively reshaping federal agencies—gaining access to financial systems, dismantling USAID, and embedding AI into decision-making. His self-proclaimed "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE) is slashing budgets and sidelining civil servants, all under the guise of streamlining bureaucracy.

If this sounds like a tech CEO treating a government like a failing startup, that's because it is. The same "move fast, break things" mindset that defined Silicon Valley is now being applied to public institutions.

That said, government inefficiency is real, and AI could help optimize processes—but is this really about efficiency or who controls the levers of power? When one of the world's wealthiest men has direct access to regulators overseeing his own companies, the line between reform and self-interest starts to blur.

So, is Musk revolutionizing government, or is this just another power grab disguised as innovation? My guess is it's both.

🛠 Cool Resources

• In the last issue, we mentioned how Honey was having a hard time due to the discovery of YouTube Creator MegaLab. Well, creators are now turning to a class action.

• Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella pushes back on AI hype, arguing that the real benchmark for AI success isn’t AGI milestones but actual economic growth—something we haven’t seen yet.

👋 Let’s Connect

That’s it for today’s Digital Pulses Dispatch.

I’d love to hear your thoughts! Hit reply or find me on LinkedIn/Twitter/BlueSky.

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Until next time—keep innovating, one click at a time.

Alessia

Digital Strategist | Tech Enthusiast | Mentor