A well-known developer named Matt Pocock published something quietly personal this week: the exact set of instructions he uses to make Claude — the AI assistant — behave the way he wants it to. He called them skills, put them online for free, and within days over 31,000 people had saved it.
That number matters. GitHub stars aren't sales — they're bookmarks from people who build things for a living. When something trends that fast, it usually means it touched a real nerve.
The idea is simple: instead of typing out long explanations every time you start a new conversation with an AI, you install a skill — a small, pre-written set of instructions — and the AI already knows how to behave.
Think of it like briefing a new member of staff. Normally you'd explain your preferences from scratch each time. Skills let you hand them a one-page brief instead.
The skills cover things like planning a project properly before jumping in, testing ideas carefully, and even writing in a specific style. Other people can now take Matt's brief, adapt it, and share their own version.
The community is quietly building a shared library of "how to work with AI well." You don't have to be technical to benefit — you just need someone on your team (or a good freelancer) who can pull in the right skill for your situation.
Worth asking: what would your skill look like? What's the one-page brief you'd hand any AI before it touched your business?
Claude — An AI assistant made by a company called Anthropic. Similar to ChatGPT, but many developers prefer it for complex work.
Skills (in this context) — Pre-written instruction sets that tell an AI how to behave in a specific situation. Like a recipe, but for how to think.
GitHub — A website where developers share and store code publicly. When something trends there, it means the people who build software think it's worth paying attention to.
Open-source — Made freely available for anyone to use, copy, or adapt. No licence fee, no vendor lock-in.