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:
- Wet Shapes – Adult Swim Infomercials – YouTube. “Since I’m doing absurd videos this week, anyone remember Adult Swim‘s weird shorts? I’m not going to post Too Many Cooks, because that’s simply too dark, but this one’s pretty close. Only you can help fight Wet Shape Degenerative Disease. Adult Swim, sometimes we didn’t deserve you.” (Alistair for Hugh).
- Burning Man 2010 – Ashram Galactica – Not gonna be a show – Bronson Vieira – YouTube. “I recently finished Ted Lasso, and absolutely loved it. One of the creators (who played Coach Beard) is a Burner from Montreal, and there are easter eggs all over the episodes. Season 2, Episode 9, Coach Beard After Dark, is basically a mini-Burn, complete with a meltdown at the Temple (a church) and a ride in an art car (a Limo). As I went down the rabbithole of his history, I found this video of a musical he performed from Burning Man 2010, with Brendan Hunt. Genius.” (Alistair for Mitch).
- The case for doing (almost) nothing about climate change – National Post. “Ever since I saw a talk at Bitnorth about climate change, I’ve been fascinated by the (scientifically based) counter-arguments to the dominant messaging on climate change (ie that humanity is at existential risk soon). The speaker, a non-expert, tried as hard as he could to dig into the worst case scenarios for climate change, and came away underwhelmed. Sea level rise, yes, migration, yes, health impacts (sort of) etc. are real problems, but perhaps less damaging than we believe, and maybe not as bad as some of the cures we are fixated on imposing. I started working on climate change policy in the energy industry in 1998, continued working on alternative energy until around 2005, so I’m a true believer. But recently I’ve started questioning how we think about climate change. A single for instance: I saw a recent piece about how much migration will be forced due to sea level rise by 2070 (lots!). But that begs the question: How much migration has happened in the past 47 years? Answer: A huge amount. For instance 20% of Canadian residents were born in other countries. That doesn’t make climate migration easy, but it’s likely not existential. In any case, I am reading more these days suggesting we should continue our efforts on climate change, but with just a little less (rather than more) panicking dread in our hearts. Here’s another provocative article in that vein.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- These Island Homes Were an Affordable Dream – Until Residents Started to Age – Bloomberg – CityLab. “If you are ever in Toronto and have an afternoon to kill, I highly recommend a visit to the Toronto Islands, the largest urban car-free community in North America. These islands are just a short ferry ride from downtown Toronto, and brings you right into cottage country in minutes. It’s an amazing place. I did not realize though that the Islands are managed by a Land Trust, which restricts how properties can be bought or sold, with a waiting list of potential buyers and price restrictions keeping the houses affordable (cool eh?). However, the laws of unintended consequences are hard to avoid, and the result of the price controls is that older members of the community are stuck. Prices/house values on the Islands have not kept pace with Toronto’s chronically overheated real estate market, with average prices at $1.16 million. So you sell your island paradise home for 400k, and can’t buy anything in the City of Toronto. This is especially problematic for older people who can no longer live on the Islands.” (Hugh for Mitch).
- The ends of knowledge – Aeon. “There are so many questions about the value and the future of what the post-secondary world of education might look like. Disruption from all sides, and now a growing concern that AI is coming for everyone who works with their brain (most of us?!?!). From this article: ‘We believe the time has come for scholars across fields to reorient their work around the question of ‘ends’. This need not mean acquiescence to the logics of either economic utilitarianism or partisan fealty that have already proved so damaging to 21st-century institutions. But avoiding the question will not solve the problem. If we want the university to remain a viable space for knowledge production, then scholars across disciplines must be able to identify the goal of their work – in part to advance the Enlightenment project of ‘useful knowledge’ and in part to defend themselves from public and political mischaracterisation.’ There is so much rich content to think about in this article, and it’s not just about Academics, but… it kinda is.” (Mitch for Alistair).
- There’s never been a better time to listen to comic books – Fast Company. “What’s wrong with me? I love podcasts. I love comic books. Comic book podcasts, you say? Sure, I know all about the pods hosted by passionate comic book nerds disecting why, exactly, Alpha Flight continues to be a vastly under-used asset in the Marvel universe, but serialized story content featuring these amazing comic book characters and original stories? I don’t know about you, but count me in… it sounds like the perfect audio companion to a flight or walk in the woods…” (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on X/Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
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