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:
- Now is the time for grimoires – One Useful Thing. “I love this framing of generative AI — prompts as spell-books, where closely guarded strings of text drag the Large Language Model to somewhere in latent space that the answer already exists. Ethan Mollick clarifies this: ‘I don’t mean expert prompts… I mean the prompts of experts – prompts that encode our hard-earned expertise in ways that AI can help other people apply.’ Like a Wizard handing someone a scroll, so they can incant on their own. ‘What I would really like to see is large-scale public libraries of prompts, written by known experts and tested carefully for different audiences.’” (Alistair for Hugh).
- Celebrating Marginal Revolution’s 20th Anniversary – Conversations With Tyler. “Launched in August 2003, Marginal Revolution has been an economics blog for 20 years. In that time, it’s dived into technology, society, and more, and has some very famous people as its fans. We think we’ve done well with these weekly Six Links, but this team has written multiple blog posts a day. I think you’ll enjoy this retrospective on 20 years of thinking aloud online.” (Alistair for Mitch and video is below).
- Parking spots are turned into people space as a Lakeview garage becomes an apartment complex – Streets Blog Chicago. “Not sure why I’m so interested in building reuse/repurposing as a topic, but there are a number of forces transforming our world, maybe: Housing costs are way too high, there is a policy imperative to reduce automobile use in a continued effort to reduce carbon emissions, and finally (maybe) there is a long-term towards less office space needs as more people can work from home. It’s not clear that transforming parking buildings into expensive apartments is the answer — and this article outlines some of the challenges — but I guess there’s a lot more transformation to come in housing and building use over the next decades.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- Ane Brun – Big In Japan (Alphaville Cover) – TV Noir. “Remember Alphaville, the 80s German synthpop group and their hit ‘Big In Japan’? Here’s Sweden’s Ane Brun with a scorching cover that I can’t stop listening to.” (Hugh for Mitch and video is below).
- The Bill C-18 Regulation Fake-Out: Setting the Record Straight on When Bill C-18 Takes Effect and the Regulation Making Process – Michael Geist. “I’m not sure if this is what people mean when they talk about ‘a hill worth dying on’, but I do find myself writing, commenting and trying to help everyone understand what, exactly, is going on in Canada between the legacy media companies, the government and Big Tech. The mass media narrative (along with the government’s patter) is that Meta (which includes Facebook and Instagram) are blocking the news, and that this is dangerous for Canadians and democracy. When, in fact, they are not blocking the news. They are blocking links out of Facebook to news media sites (this is not the same thing). If you’re not familiar with the issues, check out this link from the always brilliant, fair and balanced, Michael Geist (who is, truly, a credible source in a world filled with noise). I’ve also done my best to tackle the issue here: Big Tech, Big Media, Big Trouble And Big Lies. This issue really gets under my skin. I’m hoping it starts to do the same for you.” (Mitch for Alistair).
- On the Difficulty of Getting Rid of Books – LitHub. “There is a line in this article that really resonated with me: ‘I never want to get rid of any books. I don’t get rid of them, per se; rather, I set them afloat, in search of new homes.’ I’m fortunate to have a lot of space (home and office) and still, unapologetically, buy books (new, used… you name it). I. Just. Can’t. Stop. And, as I reflect on my bookshelves and this article, I realize how I have zero issue ridding myself of other printed goods (magazines, etc.). Still, there’s something about books. I often feel bad when I see a book in a used book shop that deserves a better fate than sitting on that shelf. I’ll buy it and give it to someone that I know will appreciate it. The way people rescue cats or dogs is the way I think about books. How about you?” (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
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