What it was for
The standup existed because human work was invisible. Nobody could see what anyone else had done yesterday without being told, and blockers stayed hidden until someone said them aloud. Fifteen minutes of mutual disclosure was the cheapest available instrument for making a team's state observable.
The verdict
TRANSFORMS. The disclosure function is dead on arrival in the engine — the inner loop reports its own status continuously, in dashboards and diffs, with better fidelity than any human summary. But the standup was always carrying a second cargo it rarely got credit for: the synchronisation of judgment. Which trade-off are we taking? Whose decision is blocking whose? That cargo survives, and is worth a better vehicle.
What changes
The meeting shrinks and changes subject. Yesterday/today/blockers — all answerable by telemetry — gives way to the only question machines cannot answer: where do we need a human decision, and whose? Attendance logic inverts too: you come when you hold or need judgment, not because the calendar says so.
The strongest objection
Standups carry team cohesion, not just information — the daily ritual is social glue. Conceded, and worth preserving on purpose. But glue should be named as glue. Disguising connection as status reporting got us fifteen wasted minutes a day for twenty years.