Taming AI Context Chaos: How Epic Scale AI Ships Faster with MCP
Tue Nov 04 2025
00:00 Cold open: “Humans of Earth” intro 00:38 Meet the guest: Colin Masters (Epic Scale AI) 02:40 Colin’s origin story (military → construction → NYSE → dev) 04:00 The EPIC method: Explore–Plan–Implement–Check 05:40 Context isn’t a dump: vector DB + forced session search 06:20 Plans = branches (GitHub issues integration) 07:10 Memory bank: standardize decisions (deposits vs withdrawals) 08:40 Feedback to feature: free tier shipped in 3 hours 10:00 Shared vs project context; 30 MCP tools 11:10 Using AI since 2024; choose simple over complex 12:20 Explore phase prompts → define a shippable MVP 13:10 AI-first ops: branches, artifacts, and shared context 14:20 Context bloat and model limits 15:05 The Claude 4.5 rant (pain points) 16:10 Buy vs build: why consider Epic Scale 17:10 Why “last 20 commits” isn’t enough 18:00 Semantic tasks and progress tracking 19:10 Watching cross-branch changes 20:00 Agent loops—with human review 21:00 Human-in-command: no auto-approve 22:10 Quote: “Developers in control of their tools will succeed.” 23:40 Houses vs software: constraints and collaboration 29:10 Where Epic Scale shines (small teams 10) 32:00 Status without Big‑A Agile: stakeholder visibility 34:10 Failing as a learning loop 38:10 Mindset shift: embrace AI or get left behind 39:20 Where AI beats humans (YAML, cross-file reasoning) 41:10 Juniors are crushing it; Go‑to‑Market Engineer 44:00 Speed breaks sales/support; training new grads 47:00 Where to find Epic Scale + free tier note 47:40 OutroAI dev isn’t “dump more into the context window.” Colin Masters from Epic Scale AI breaks down how the EPIC method (Explore–Plan–Implement–Check), an MCP server, and a shared vector memory turn chaos into shipping velocity—especially for small, AI‑first teams.We get practical about plans-as-branches with GitHub issues, memory banks to stop re‑deciding decisions, why auto‑approve wrecks projects, and how a user comment led to a free tier in three hours. We also debate “houses vs software,” the rise of the Go‑to‑Market Engineer, and what juniors are getting right with AI.Recorded: October 14, 2025What you’ll learn:How to replace “tickets” with plans-as-branches and keep context cleanWhy vector DB + retrieval beats giant context windowsGuardrails for agent loops (human-in-command, no auto‑approve)Where AI truly outperforms humans (cross-file reasoning, YAML, refactors)Team shape for AI‑first orgs (small, sharp, 10)How to create stakeholder visibility without Big‑A Agile ceremonyGuestColin Masters — Epic Scale AI: https://epicscale.ai/Chapters See chapter markers above.Subscribe for more on AI engineering, MCP, and practical agent workflows.Hashtags: #AIEngineering #MCP #DevTools #AIFirst #VectorDB #VSCode #GitHub
More
00:00 Cold open: “Humans of Earth” intro 00:38 Meet the guest: Colin Masters (Epic Scale AI) 02:40 Colin’s origin story (military → construction → NYSE → dev) 04:00 The EPIC method: Explore–Plan–Implement–Check 05:40 Context isn’t a dump: vector DB + forced session search 06:20 Plans = branches (GitHub issues integration) 07:10 Memory bank: standardize decisions (deposits vs withdrawals) 08:40 Feedback to feature: free tier shipped in 3 hours 10:00 Shared vs project context; 30 MCP tools 11:10 Using AI since 2024; choose simple over complex 12:20 Explore phase prompts → define a shippable MVP 13:10 AI-first ops: branches, artifacts, and shared context 14:20 Context bloat and model limits 15:05 The Claude 4.5 rant (pain points) 16:10 Buy vs build: why consider Epic Scale 17:10 Why “last 20 commits” isn’t enough 18:00 Semantic tasks and progress tracking 19:10 Watching cross-branch changes 20:00 Agent loops—with human review 21:00 Human-in-command: no auto-approve 22:10 Quote: “Developers in control of their tools will succeed.” 23:40 Houses vs software: constraints and collaboration 29:10 Where Epic Scale shines (small teams 10) 32:00 Status without Big‑A Agile: stakeholder visibility 34:10 Failing as a learning loop 38:10 Mindset shift: embrace AI or get left behind 39:20 Where AI beats humans (YAML, cross-file reasoning) 41:10 Juniors are crushing it; Go‑to‑Market Engineer 44:00 Speed breaks sales/support; training new grads 47:00 Where to find Epic Scale + free tier note 47:40 OutroAI dev isn’t “dump more into the context window.” Colin Masters from Epic Scale AI breaks down how the EPIC method (Explore–Plan–Implement–Check), an MCP server, and a shared vector memory turn chaos into shipping velocity—especially for small, AI‑first teams.We get practical about plans-as-branches with GitHub issues, memory banks to stop re‑deciding decisions, why auto‑approve wrecks projects, and how a user comment led to a free tier in three hours. We also debate “houses vs software,” the rise of the Go‑to‑Market Engineer, and what juniors are getting right with AI.Recorded: October 14, 2025What you’ll learn:How to replace “tickets” with plans-as-branches and keep context cleanWhy vector DB + retrieval beats giant context windowsGuardrails for agent loops (human-in-command, no auto‑approve)Where AI truly outperforms humans (cross-file reasoning, YAML, refactors)Team shape for AI‑first orgs (small, sharp, 10)How to create stakeholder visibility without Big‑A Agile ceremonyGuestColin Masters — Epic Scale AI: https://epicscale.ai/Chapters See chapter markers above.Subscribe for more on AI engineering, MCP, and practical agent workflows.Hashtags: #AIEngineering #MCP #DevTools #AIFirst #VectorDB #VSCode #GitHub