Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?
My friends: Alistair Croll (Solve for Interesting, Tilt the Windmill, Interesting Bits, HBS, chair of Strata, Startupfest, FWD50, and Scaletechconf; author of Lean Analytics and some other books), Hugh McGuire (Rebus Foundation, PressBooks, LibriVox) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person “must see.”
Check out these six links that we’re recommending to one another:
- GameNGen. “It’s hard to explain how weird this is. Instead of writing a video game, show a thing a video game and it generates one for you. This is like asking someone to use MacOS for billions of years, then hand-paint each screen – even tiny moves of the mouse – without actually understanding what a computer does or how it works. And yet, here we are. We’re well into the realm of strange intelligences now.” (Alistair for Hugh).
- Robot Gamblers Are Making People Poor – Jonathan V. Last – The Bulwark. “Of course they are. Anything digital that can be optimized by an algorithm will be. And we spend a third of our time in a digital world. We aren’t a digital species, we’re an analog one. Our physical bodies can collect energy and turn it into words, ideas, and more of ourselves. That’s not true for our virtual doppelgangers, who need a smartphone, an ISP, a cloud provider, and a whole digital exoskeleton to function there. Algorithms are the native creatures of a digital world, and often they feel like an invasive species in this place we’ve created.” (Alistair for Mitch).
- Tokyo Expands Underground ‘Temple’ Complex To Counter Climate Change Rains – Tom Bateman – Reuters. “Tokyo’s incredible underground floodwater management system gets an upgrade.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- Nick Cave On Singing With Johnny Cash And The Joyful, Uplifting Vibe Of His New Album, ‘Wild God’ – The Late Show – YouTube. “Nick Cave on his reverence for music.” (Hugh for Mitch).
- Rick Rubin & Shane Smith: How Vice Changed Media Forever – Tetragrammaton With Rick Rubin – YouTube. “It’s important to always remember that this story is being told through the eyes of someone who is vested in the outcome and success. Still, I was very lucky to have been around when Vice first started on the streets of Montreal. I would occasionally write for the magazine in the early days. As someone who was also publishing physical magazines at the time, watching their success and how quickly they embraced digital media was a sight to behold. Fast forward only a few years, Vice would completely upend media as we knew it before. Of course, every assent has a descent. Books and articles have been written about what happened to Vice. Here is some additional and interesting perspective – not just on what happened to Vice but how quickly media changed… And maybe – more importantly – how quickly people changed their media diet habits. Well worth the watch…” (Mitch for Alistair).
- Moleskine Mania: How A Notebook Conquered The Digital Era – The Walrus. “If someone is going to write an article about how notebooks are still relevant in the digital age, you can be sure that I will not only hunt it down, read it, enjoy it, but definitely share it here. As much as I love every single one of my digital toys – it can be hardware or software – there is still something I still love very much about taking notes in a physical notebook. I’ve tried many of the digital disruptors to that traditional technology, but there’s nothing like paper and pen… If you ask me. I think there is so much value in taking physical notes, that I’m starting to wonder if it’s not becoming somewhat of a superpower for me, in a world where people will claim that they can do the exact same thing with an Apple Pencil and a screen. Normally, I’m the first to agree, but in this instance… Nothing compares to ink and bark. There are some insights as to why in this article.” (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on X, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
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