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Seth's Blog
Glib One of the valid complaints about some AI systems is that they make stuff up, with confidence, and...
11 months ago
85
11 months ago
One of the valid complaints about some AI systems is that they make stuff up, with confidence, and without sourcing, and then argue when challenged. Unsurprisingly, this sounds a lot like people. We often end up with what we are willing to tolerate. Show your work and ask for...
Seth's Blog
Avoiding technology Robert Caro never learned to type. He pecks out his books two fingers at a time on an electric...
a year ago
30
a year ago
Robert Caro never learned to type. He pecks out his books two fingers at a time on an electric typewriter. There are two reasons to avoid learning a proven new technology: You know what it can do and how it will change your life and you don’t want it. You don’t know what it can...
Haterade
Happy Birthday, Haterade The Terrible Twos. Plus, new merch!
over a year ago
Open Culture
How Four Masters—Michelangelo, Donatello, Verrocchio & Bernini—Sculpted David More than a few visitors to Florence make a beeline to the Galleria dell’Accademia, and once inside,...
a week ago
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a week ago
More than a few visitors to Florence make a beeline to the Galleria dell’Accademia, and once inside, to Michelangelo’s David, the most famous sculpture in the world. But how many of them, one wonders, then take the time to view the three other Davids in that city alone? At the...
Open Culture
Enter a Huge Archive of Amazing Stories, the World’s First Science Fiction Magazine, Launched in... If you haven’t heard of Hugo Gernsback, you’ve surely heard of the Hugo Award. Next to the Nebula,...
a year ago
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a year ago
If you haven’t heard of Hugo Gernsback, you’ve surely heard of the Hugo Award. Next to the Nebula, it’s the most prestigious of science fiction prizes, bringing together in its ranks of winners such venerable authors as Ursula K. Le Guin, Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein, Neil...
Open Culture
A Young Jim Henson Teaches You How to Make Puppets with Socks, Tennis Balls & Other Household Goods... By the time he filmed this video archived on Iowa Public Television’s YouTube channel, Jim Henson...
a month ago
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a month ago
By the time he filmed this video archived on Iowa Public Television’s YouTube channel, Jim Henson was just about to strike gold with a new children’s show called Sesame Street. The year was 1969, and he already had 15 years of puppetry experience under his belt, from children’s...
Seth's Blog
Market insulation It’s possible that your day will be more enjoyable if you are insulated from the market. If you have...
a year ago
49
a year ago
It’s possible that your day will be more enjoyable if you are insulated from the market. If you have a boss who has a boss… If you don’t have to review the sales numbers for the products you created or edited… If you have raised a ton of venture investment… If you are embracing...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker - Rebecca Perdue Hello! I'm Rebecca Perdue. I am a printmaker and artist based in a small garden studio in Wiltshire....
a year ago
86
a year ago
Hello! I'm Rebecca Perdue. I am a printmaker and artist based in a small garden studio in Wiltshire. I work primarily in linocut and monoprint, but also paint and make occasional silver jewellery pieces and textiles. I'm very interested in linking work across several...
Seth's Blog
Infinity is not a number Little kids get confused about this… just add a few more to a very big number, and you have...
2 months ago
23
2 months ago
Little kids get confused about this… just add a few more to a very big number, and you have infinity. Actually, infinity is a feeling and a concept built on the presumption that it can never be reached. In a metrics-driven world, infinity is a dangerous thing to wish for, because...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Ieuan Edwards I’m a linocut printmaker and illustrator based in Broadstairs on the Isle of Thanet in Kent, which...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
I’m a linocut printmaker and illustrator based in Broadstairs on the Isle of Thanet in Kent, which is home to a good few other lino folks and a thriving and supportive art scene in general. Describe your printmaking process. I tend to print fairly small runs of reduction linocut...
Seth's Blog
Volition and placebos If a placebo heals your illness, does that mean it was all in your head in the first place? That you...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
If a placebo heals your illness, does that mean it was all in your head in the first place? That you weren’t really sick, or didn’t really want to get better? If expensive wine tastes better to you, but you can’t tell wine apart in a double-blind taste test, does that mean it...
Seth's Blog
Captives of memetic desire How much of what we want, really want, is due to the ideas that culture has given us, and how much...
over a year ago
81
over a year ago
How much of what we want, really want, is due to the ideas that culture has given us, and how much is truly what we need? If memetic desire isn’t making us happy, perhaps we can find some new ideas.
Blog - Mac Pierce
Host Jumping, thinking about viruses and how they’re changing. Thinking about the concepts and reasons behind the making of my work ‘Host Jump’.
over a year ago
Open Culture
RIP Paul Auster: Hear the Master of the Postmodern Page-Turner Discuss How He Became a Writer In the Louisiana Channel interview clip from 2017 above, the late Paul Auster tells the story of how...
a year ago
81
a year ago
In the Louisiana Channel interview clip from 2017 above, the late Paul Auster tells the story of how he became a writer. Its first episode had appeared more than twenty years earlier, in a New Yorker piece titled “Why Write?”: “I was eight years old. At that moment in my life,...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Ian Phillips Hi, I’m Ian Phillips, a printmaker based in Mid Wales. I’m originally from Leicestershire and...
4 months ago
38
4 months ago
Hi, I’m Ian Phillips, a printmaker based in Mid Wales. I’m originally from Leicestershire and studied illustration at Leicester Polytechnic. After graduation I attempted the life of a freelance Illustrator in London, but quite quickly, well after a few years, realised it wasn’t...
Open Culture
André Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto Turns 100 This Year People don’t seem to write a lot of manifestos these days. Or if they do write manifestos, they...
a year ago
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a year ago
People don’t seem to write a lot of manifestos these days. Or if they do write manifestos, they don’t make the impact that they would have a century ago. In fact, this year marks the hundredth anniversary of the Manifeste du surréalisme, or Surrealist Manifesto, one of the most...
escape the algorithm
Foreskin’s Comment What a Billie Eilish Youtube comment diarist can teach us about forging meaningful online rituals
a year ago
Seth's Blog
“Thank you” is a complete sentence It’s a way to offer connection or acknowledgment. It’s a recognition of feedback and the time it...
7 months ago
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7 months ago
It’s a way to offer connection or acknowledgment. It’s a recognition of feedback and the time it took someone to consider us. We can use it after we share something important, or someone shares with us. More than the end of an exchange, it can be the beginning of a relationship....
Stat Significant
The Rise of Faith-Based Films: A Statistical Analysis The economics and origins of the faith-based film industry.
9 months ago
Seth's Blog
Customer satisfaction and tipping In North America, tipping is an unfair system built into the status quo by law. Restaurants aren’t...
a year ago
37
a year ago
In North America, tipping is an unfair system built into the status quo by law. Restaurants aren’t allowed to easily spread tips around, and as a result, they tend to to exacerbate many of the inequities in our culture at the same time that they make it hard to count on a fair...
Seth's Blog
And it can also do that If you were around when the Model T was first announced, you could have built the organizations that...
a year ago
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a year ago
If you were around when the Model T was first announced, you could have built the organizations that became Disney, McDonald’s and Holiday Inn, all of which were powered by cheap, plentiful cars. You could have become a major developer of suburbs, mortgage banking and even pop...
Anarchy Unfolds
Did we really just get taken over by fascists in less than a month? Red Round-up #2
5 months ago
Seth's Blog
Worst possible While it’s tempting to compare suffering, inconvenience, unfairness or general no-goodness, it’s not...
4 months ago
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4 months ago
While it’s tempting to compare suffering, inconvenience, unfairness or general no-goodness, it’s not helpful. Someone else’s trauma doesn’t diminish yours. In fact, when we can find the space to see that others have their own mess to deal with, it opens the door for forward...
Marian's Blog
Lego Part Designer I made a web app that lets you design your own Lego Technic parts and save them as printable STL...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
I made a web app that lets you design your own Lego Technic parts and save them as printable STL files. You can check it out here. I got the idea for this project when I was building with Lego parts and wondered how many of the common parts can be described with a simple rule...
Open Culture
James Joyce, With His Eyesight Failing, Draws a Sketch of Leopold Bloom (1926) James Joyce had a terrible time with his eyes. When he was six years old he received his first set...
2 months ago
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2 months ago
James Joyce had a terrible time with his eyes. When he was six years old he received his first set of eyeglasses, and, when he was 25, he came down with his first case of iritis, a very painful and potentially blinding inflammation of the colored part of the eye, the iris. A...
Prolost
Apple’s “Let Loose” iPad Event was Shot on iPhone — With Panavision Lenses Still from Apple’s “Let Loose” video. Apple unveiled their new line of iPads yesterday in a...
a year ago
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a year ago
Still from Apple’s “Let Loose” video. Apple unveiled their new line of iPads yesterday in a pre-recorded video titled “Let Loose.” As with the previous “Scary Fast” MacBook Pro launch video, “Let Loose” ends with a tag proclaiming “Shot on iPhone” — this time adding “Edited on...
Open Culture
Private Snafu: The World War II Propaganda Cartoons Created by Dr. Seuss, Frank Capra & Mel Blanc Private Snafu was the U.S. Army’s worst soldier. He was sloppy, lazy and prone to shooting off his...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
Private Snafu was the U.S. Army’s worst soldier. He was sloppy, lazy and prone to shooting off his mouth to Nazi agents. And he was hugely popular with his fellow GIs. Private Snafu was, of course, an animated cartoon character designed for the military recruits. He was an...
Open Culture
Hear 2.5 Hours of the Classical Music in Haruki Murakami’s Novels: Liszt, Beethoven, Janáček, and... Haruki Murakami’s hit novel 1Q84 features a memorable scene in a taxicab on a gridlocked freeway...
8 months ago
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8 months ago
Haruki Murakami’s hit novel 1Q84 features a memorable scene in a taxicab on a gridlocked freeway whose radio is playing Leoš Janáček’s Sinfonietta. “It is, as the book suggests, truly the worst possible music for a traffic jam,” writes Sam Anderson in a New York Times Magazine...
Prolost
Slugline 2 From the Slugline Blog: Slugline 2 is a new app that replaces the old Slugline for Mac. It has a...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
From the Slugline Blog: Slugline 2 is a new app that replaces the old Slugline for Mac. It has a slick new UI, which includes a lovely dark mode. Big new features include: a drag-and-drop outline, an awesome new timeline, color-coded notes, Final Draft import/export, and Live...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Robin Mackenzie I am Robin Mackenzie, a Wood Engraver and Lino Cutter based in Dorset.  I create limited edition...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
I am Robin Mackenzie, a Wood Engraver and Lino Cutter based in Dorset.  I create limited edition relief prints using a combination of hand printing and an Albion printing press.  My work explores the British coast and countryside.  Beginning with walks and research trips I seek...
Seth's Blog
The answer to every question If the thing of the moment is the answer to every single question, you might be in a bubble. If,...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
If the thing of the moment is the answer to every single question, you might be in a bubble. If, regardless of the problem, the answer is crypto, homeopathy, or the internet, or perhaps GPT, essential oils or decarbonization, it’s possible we’re taking an easy way out. A new...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Caroline Fearn Hello, I’m Caroline. I live in London. Two years ago I picked up a carving tool and a block of lino....
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Hello, I’m Caroline. I live in London. Two years ago I picked up a carving tool and a block of lino. I quite liked it.   Describe your printmaking process My process is an intuitive one, so I typically just start, and I will see what develops through doing. Experimenting with...
Open Culture
Stream Online Monty Python and the Holy Grail Free on Its 50th Anniversary This year, YouTube celebrated its twentieth anniversary, prompting younger users to wonder what life...
2 months ago
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2 months ago
This year, YouTube celebrated its twentieth anniversary, prompting younger users to wonder what life could have been like before it. The fiftieth anniversary of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which premiered in April of 1975, has inspired similar reflection among comedy...
Open Culture
The Longest Drivable Distance in the World: Discover the Ultimate Road Trip No matter what country we live in, we’ve all fantasized about taking our own great American road...
9 months ago
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9 months ago
No matter what country we live in, we’ve all fantasized about taking our own great American road trip, considering a variety of the infinitely many possible routes. The most obvious would be driving between Los Angeles and New York, a distance of 2,800 miles that would take a bit...
Seth's Blog
The amateur presenter Not “amateur” as in the unprepared professional. Amateur as in the passionate individual, untrained...
a year ago
23
a year ago
Not “amateur” as in the unprepared professional. Amateur as in the passionate individual, untrained but with something to say. If you’re called on to give a talk or presentation, the biggest trap to avoid is the most common: Decide that you need to be just like a professional...
Open Culture
The Amazing Engineering of Roman Baths Few depictions of ancient Roman life neglect to reference all the time ancient Romans spent at the...
a year ago
95
a year ago
Few depictions of ancient Roman life neglect to reference all the time ancient Romans spent at the baths. One gets the impression that their civilization was obsessed with cleanliness, in contrast to most of the societies found around the world at the time, but that turns out...
Seth's Blog
The absence of proof Belief makes us human. Belief is our tool to dance with a possible future, confront our fears, and...
a year ago
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a year ago
Belief makes us human. Belief is our tool to dance with a possible future, confront our fears, and build community. Our personal taste and our preferences belong to us as well, helping us believe in ourselves. For millennia, belief thrived in most parts of our lives. We didn’t...
Seth's Blog
What sort of bicycle? While it’s likely that you own a bike, you probably don’t have a front-wheel recumbent bicycle in...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
While it’s likely that you own a bike, you probably don’t have a front-wheel recumbent bicycle in your garage. Even though it’s more efficient, more comfortable and often faster. How did that happen? In 1933, a twenty-year old speed record was broken by a racer on a recumbent...
Anarchy Unfolds
May '24 Myths & Recs Biden, Kurzgesagt, 90s Christian bands, and more
a year ago
cabel.com
My GDC ’24 Talk: The Playdate Story In January, I was invited to GDC, the Game Developers Conference, to give a talk about Playdate....
a year ago
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a year ago
In January, I was invited to GDC, the Game Developers Conference, to give a talk about Playdate. That talk — “The Playdate Story: What Was it Like to Make Handheld Video Game System Hardware?” — has been made available free for all to view. Now, it’s been 10 years since my last...
Seth's Blog
Design has a language And it changes over time. You and I know what to do when we see a revolving door, or to speak...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
And it changes over time. You and I know what to do when we see a revolving door, or to speak quietly in a library. We have expectations of how the world works and what designers are saying with their work. Here’s a photo of a device with two controls. We’ve been taught our whole...
Marian's Blog
Connecting my fish tank to the Internet of Things – Part 1: Hacking an automatic fish feeder I bought a used automatic fish feeder from ebay. This device is completely mechanic and very old...
over a year ago
18
over a year ago
I bought a used automatic fish feeder from ebay. This device is completely mechanic and very old (older than 1989). It has 27 containers for fish food and a disc that does one rotation per day. By sticking pins into that disc one can trigger one or more feedings per day. A pin...
Seth's Blog
Effect vs affect In a culture fascinated by attitude, gloss and performance, it’s easy to believe that adopting an...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
In a culture fascinated by attitude, gloss and performance, it’s easy to believe that adopting an affect is precisely what you need to make a difference. In fact, the persistent, generous work that happens when no one is looking is what actually makes a difference. Looking the...
Open Culture
Carl Sagan Issues a Chilling Warning About the Decline of Scientific Thinking in America: Watch His... Until the end of his life, Carl Sagan (1934–1996) continued doing what he did all along —...
2 months ago
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2 months ago
Until the end of his life, Carl Sagan (1934–1996) continued doing what he did all along — popularizing science and “enthusiastically conveying the wonders of the universe to millions of people on television and in books.” Whenever Sagan appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny...
Seth's Blog
Comfort and convenience For the last thirty years, the easiest shortcut has been convenience. If a marketer or a politician...
a year ago
72
a year ago
For the last thirty years, the easiest shortcut has been convenience. If a marketer or a politician or an institution wants to gain acceptance, make it convenient. Tim Wu has pointed out that we’ll trade almost anything to save a few moments of hassle or thought. But that doesn’t...
Seth's Blog
Energy and systems complexity Wild animals forage. They spend calories and take risks to acquire food. If the required work and...
2 months ago
20
2 months ago
Wild animals forage. They spend calories and take risks to acquire food. If the required work and risk expended are more than the food they acquire, they go extinct. The goal is to get as many calories as possible for as little effort as possible. If there’s a surplus, their...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Rachael Haggerty Hello, I’m Rachael and I am a printmaker based in Bath, UK. I generally work with linocut and mainly...
over a year ago
95
over a year ago
Hello, I’m Rachael and I am a printmaker based in Bath, UK. I generally work with linocut and mainly print in monochrome or bright primary colours. My work celebrates family life, nature and the local area. Describe your printmaking process. I normally sketch out a composition...
Open Culture
How the Hugely Acclaimed Shōgun TV Series Makes Translation Interesting Many of us grew up seeing hardback copies of Shōgun on various domestic bookshelves. Whether their...
9 months ago
60
9 months ago
Many of us grew up seeing hardback copies of Shōgun on various domestic bookshelves. Whether their owners ever actually got through James Clavell’s famously hefty novel of seventeenth-century Japan is open to question, but they may well have seen the first television adaptation,...
Seth's Blog
The distribution of character Along the way, we have been taught to associate character skills like honesty, rationality,...
12 months ago
65
12 months ago
Along the way, we have been taught to associate character skills like honesty, rationality, agreeableness, grit and care with surface metrics like wealth or power. That’s almost certainly incorrect. And if we make assumptions based on vague measures of class, we’re going to get...
Seth's Blog
Typist/Hypist Not that long ago, you could make a living as a typist. Technology keeps changing the world. Now,...
over a year ago
57
over a year ago
Not that long ago, you could make a living as a typist. Technology keeps changing the world. Now, you’re more likely to find a job doing something that seems a lot less mechanized. But that too will be programmatic soon enough. PS here’s an important new book about perfectionism.
Open Culture
The Ark Before Noah: Discover the Ancient Flood Myths That Came Before the Bible The Lord said to Noah, there’s going to be a floody, floody; then to get those children out of the...
2 months ago
23
2 months ago
The Lord said to Noah, there’s going to be a floody, floody; then to get those children out of the muddy, muddy; then to build him an arky, arky. This much we heard while toasting marshmallows around the campfire, at least if we grew up in a certain modern Protestant tradition....
Open Culture
How Ancient Romans Traveled Without Maps In an age when many of us could hardly make our way to an unfamiliar grocery store without relying...
7 months ago
46
7 months ago
In an age when many of us could hardly make our way to an unfamiliar grocery store without relying on a GPS navigation system, we might well wonder how the Romans could establish and sustain their mighty empire without so much as a proper map. That’s the question addressed by the...
Seth's Blog
“Does it work?” That’s the first question. The second question is, “how do we make it work better?” These two...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
That’s the first question. The second question is, “how do we make it work better?” These two questions, patiently repeated, lead to incremental improvement and an understanding of reality. The opposite approach is, “because I said so.” Reality might not care what you want.
Seth's Blog
What’s a “techie”? A friend’s email said, “I know many of my readers aren’t techies and you’re thinking of putting this...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
A friend’s email said, “I know many of my readers aren’t techies and you’re thinking of putting this newsletter aside…” We should get clear about what we’re talking about when we say “techie.” I’m going to argue that involves a combination of two things: But someone who says,...
Seth's Blog
The strategy sessions I’m workshopping a new book. For the last few months, I’ve been feverishly writing a book about...
a year ago
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a year ago
I’m workshopping a new book. For the last few months, I’ve been feverishly writing a book about strategy. Strategy for individuals, small organizations and large ones as well. Strategy for someone seeking to make a difference, and strategy for people who do projects. Starting...
Infinite Scroll
The New Age of Thought Crime Conservatives raged against woke cancellations. Now they're eagerly doing it themselves.
2 months ago
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Moïra Swann Bonjour everyone! Moïra Swann is an English and Proustian adaptation from my real name Anne-Marie:...
over a year ago
58
over a year ago
Bonjour everyone! Moïra Swann is an English and Proustian adaptation from my real name Anne-Marie: while Anne-Marie lives in France and works full-time in a wonderful museum dedicated to the French painter Anne-Louis Girodet, Moïra Swann does lino printing whenever she can, as an...
Seth's Blog
At all costs Principles have a priority. Isaac Asimov’s three rules of robotics were: First LawA robot may not...
8 months ago
58
8 months ago
Principles have a priority. Isaac Asimov’s three rules of robotics were: First LawA robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. Second LawA robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would...
Open Culture
The First “Selfie” In History Taken by Robert Cornelius, a Philadelphia Chemist, in 1839 In 2013, the Oxford Dictionaries announced that “selfie” had been deemed their Word of The Year. The...
11 months ago
40
11 months ago
In 2013, the Oxford Dictionaries announced that “selfie” had been deemed their Word of The Year. The term, whose first recorded use as an Instagram hashtag occurred on January 27, 2011, was actually invented in 2002, when an Australian chap posted a picture of himself on an...
Seth's Blog
The cheap chocolate system The first step in building a successful and elegant strategy is to see the systems that are part of...
9 months ago
41
9 months ago
The first step in building a successful and elegant strategy is to see the systems that are part of our lives. October is a fine month to take a moment to look closely at one: the system that brings us cheap chocolate. Like most systems, it’s largely invisible. The people in it...
Seth's Blog
The lens or the problem? We often see problems through the lens that we’re used to using. The banker sees a solution around...
over a year ago
74
over a year ago
We often see problems through the lens that we’re used to using. The banker sees a solution around money, the activist might see an opportunity for social justice. The technologist figures that a computer and more data might help, and the bureaucrat is looking for a system to put...
Open Culture
An Architectural Tour of Taliesin West, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Iconic Desert Home and Studio By some estimations, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin West home-studio complex took shape in 1941. But...
a month ago
10
a month ago
By some estimations, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin West home-studio complex took shape in 1941. But even then, the Arizona Republic presciently noted that “it may be years before it is considered finished.” The Taliesin West you can see in the new Architectural Digest video above...
Seth's Blog
Thoughts on audiobooks I’m listening more than reading these days, and I find that a good audiobook can make a real impact...
8 months ago
71
8 months ago
I’m listening more than reading these days, and I find that a good audiobook can make a real impact on the way I absorb and learn from a book. It’s a once in a century sort of shift in this medium. My new book is now available in audio. It’s not on Audible, at least […]
Anarchy Unfolds
3 Pieces for Rethinking Identity Politics Mental health, neurodivergence, orientation, and the path ahead
8 months ago
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Jessie de Salis I am Jessie de Salis. I run a screen printing textile business with my cousin, Alice. We print...
10 months ago
69
10 months ago
I am Jessie de Salis. I run a screen printing textile business with my cousin, Alice. We print colourful patterned fabrics from a Somerset barn, a space we share with the sparrows and house-martins. What inspires you? I love bold and bright design. I always seem to come back to...
Open Culture
Hear Leo Tolstoy Read From His Last Major Work in Four Languages, 1909 In years past, we’ve brought you rare recordings of Sigmund Freud and Jorge Luis Borges speaking in...
a year ago
105
a year ago
In years past, we’ve brought you rare recordings of Sigmund Freud and Jorge Luis Borges speaking in English. Today we present a remarkable series of recordings of the great Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy reading a passage from his book, Wise Thoughts for Every Day, in four...
Seth's Blog
The list of compromises All the no-compromise solutions have failed. If there was a way to solve our problem without giving...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
All the no-compromise solutions have failed. If there was a way to solve our problem without giving something up, we would have done that already. So, if a persistent problem important, the question is not: Should we compromise or not? The question is: Which changes are we going...
Seth's Blog
The slog, the hobby and the quest Here’s a simple XY grid to help you think about your next project, freelance career or startup: All...
a year ago
26
a year ago
Here’s a simple XY grid to help you think about your next project, freelance career or startup: All too common are ‘fun’ businesses where someone finds a hobby they like and tries to turn it into a gig. While the work may be fun, the uphill grind of this sort of project is...
Seth's Blog
Useful assumptions for teachers Not simply in the classroom, but anywhere we hope to inform, inspire or educate: Assume enrollment....
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Not simply in the classroom, but anywhere we hope to inform, inspire or educate: Assume enrollment. Either someone is committed to learning or they’re not. While many situations place people into a spot where they are compelled to show up (exhibit A: learning arithmetic in grade...
Handprinted - Blog
Mark Marking - Using Etching Tools When you’ve degreased and prepared your plate for etching, there are a variety of tools you can use...
a year ago
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a year ago
When you’ve degreased and prepared your plate for etching, there are a variety of tools you can use to mark into the surface. Any marks made into the surface of the grounds will expose your plate to the mordant. When etched, these marks will become sunken areas for ink to sit,...
Open Culture
William Faulkner Resigns From His Post Office Job With a Spectacular Letter (1924) Working a dull civil service job ill-suited to your talents does not make you a writer, but plenty...
a month ago
12
a month ago
Working a dull civil service job ill-suited to your talents does not make you a writer, but plenty of famous writers have worked such jobs. Nathaniel Hawthorne worked at a Boston customhouse for a year. His friend Herman Melville put in considerably more time—19 years—as a...
Seth's Blog
Orange cars In a given neighborhood, just about all the cars are the same. There are few that are pink, orange...
3 weeks ago
13
3 weeks ago
In a given neighborhood, just about all the cars are the same. There are few that are pink, orange or purple, for example. There’s nothing inherently wrong with those frequencies of light. Nothing that modern paint technology can’t deliver, nothing that offends the rods and cones...
Blog - Mac Pierce
Loading, please wait... Starting the 1A2A3D project. Starting out on a project looking at the first amendment, second amendment, and 3-D printing.
over a year ago
Stat Significant
Why Do People Like True Crime? A Statistical Analysis Exploring the appeal of true crime podcasts and docuseries.
11 months ago
Ian Betteridge
Weeknote, Sunday 15th December
6 months ago
Open Culture
Buckminster Fuller’s Map of the World: The Innovation That Revolutionized Map Design (1943) In 2017, we brought you news of a world map purportedly more accurate than any to date, designed by...
11 months ago
72
11 months ago
In 2017, we brought you news of a world map purportedly more accurate than any to date, designed by Japanese architect and artist Hajime Narukawa. The map, called the AuthaGraph, updates a centuries-old method of turning the globe into a flat surface by first converting it to a...
Seth's Blog
“How do I get the most of out my people?” Alas, this is the wrong question for a leader or manager to ask. It’s more productive to wonder,...
a month ago
18
a month ago
Alas, this is the wrong question for a leader or manager to ask. It’s more productive to wonder, “how do we create the conditions for our people to get to where they’re heading?”
The Great Discontent...
Yashas Mitta Yashas is a creative director and ambitious connector. He was also a self-described outsider for...
a year ago
9
a year ago
Yashas is a creative director and ambitious connector. He was also a self-described outsider for much of his life, and his path from Bangalore, India to New York City has been a winding one driven by sheer stubbornness and a keen instinct for creating community wherever he goes....
Seth's Blog
Generosity and gratitude A gift doesn’t diminish the giver. Sharing creates connection, possibility and energy. And the magic...
a year ago
26
a year ago
A gift doesn’t diminish the giver. Sharing creates connection, possibility and energy. And the magic of gratitude is that it improves everything it touches, especially the person who offered it in the first place. So, what holds us back? Fear. Fear of connection, of change, of...
Seth's Blog
We can agree about schismogenesis Anthropologist Gregory Bateson highlighted that often, culture is based on oppositional behavior....
3 months ago
34
3 months ago
Anthropologist Gregory Bateson highlighted that often, culture is based on oppositional behavior. And it can spiral. They say “up” and the easy thing is to say “down.” Literally, “the creation of division.” Your competitor launches a product and you work to undermine it with a...
Blog - Amy Goodchild
Distributing Randomness A good pseudorandom number generator gives an even distribution of results from 0 to 1 but...
over a year ago
20
over a year ago
A good pseudorandom number generator gives an even distribution of results from 0 to 1 but sometimes in generative art we might want something different.
Seth's Blog
Enrollment and engagement Teachers and organizations benefit from both, but they’re not the same. Engagement is the delight we...
2 months ago
22
2 months ago
Teachers and organizations benefit from both, but they’re not the same. Engagement is the delight we have when we lean into the process. Engagement happens when social media is optimized for maximum focus, and it also can be seen in a student who’s in sync with a teacher who...
Seth's Blog
Revisiting stamps for email I started agitating for this in 1997 and wrote about it in 2006. The problem with the magical medium...
over a year ago
85
over a year ago
I started agitating for this in 1997 and wrote about it in 2006. The problem with the magical medium of email is that it’s an open API. Anyone with a computer can plug into it, without anyone’s consent. This creates an asymmetric attention problem. The selfish,...
Infinite Scroll
Infinite Scroll on Offline with Jon Favreau A chat about online media ecosystems
7 months ago
Anarchy Unfolds
Not today, pink elephants of doom Blue Bulletin #1
3 months ago
Seth's Blog
“Not your best ever” In order to have a best ever, hearing this is part of the deal. Each thing is not going to top...
a year ago
86
a year ago
In order to have a best ever, hearing this is part of the deal. Each thing is not going to top everything that came before it. Progress is rarely smooth.
Seth's Blog
“Ready” vs. “Done” Ready means that time is up, spec is met and the user can engage. Done might mean that you believe...
a year ago
62
a year ago
Ready means that time is up, spec is met and the user can engage. Done might mean that you believe it’s perfect and cannot be improved. We’ll settle for ready. In fact, meeting spec means we’re not settling. It’s just what you promised.
Seth's Blog
Consider switching sides One of the spokespeople for the new milk marketing campaign confessed that she doesn’t really like...
over a year ago
60
over a year ago
One of the spokespeople for the new milk marketing campaign confessed that she doesn’t really like drinking milk. Sales are way down, and an entire generation is drinking other beverages. Other than the people who are paid to sell or lobby for milk sales, few people are...
Seth's Blog
The essence of industrialism Efficiency + Convenience. Not everything is industrialized. A backyard garden, a freelance editor,...
2 months ago
35
2 months ago
Efficiency + Convenience. Not everything is industrialized. A backyard garden, a freelance editor, even a chef with a hands-on restaurant. These folks are building a practice and producing value, but they haven’t embraced industrialization. That happens when management steps in,...
Seth's Blog
The pitfall of Big Game thinking In the US, today is a major holiday. The Superb Owl, with nachos, commercials and beer. People who...
a year ago
36
a year ago
In the US, today is a major holiday. The Superb Owl, with nachos, commercials and beer. People who don’t even watch football watch this game, and it’s one of the largest audiences each year on TV. For a certain kind of mass marketer, a Super Bowl ad has been the gold standard for...
Open Culture
The Metropolitan Museum of Art Puts 490,000 High-Res Images Online & Makes Them Free to Use Update: The Metropolitan Museum of Art has put online 492,000 high-resolution images of artistic...
8 months ago
77
8 months ago
Update: The Metropolitan Museum of Art has put online 492,000 high-resolution images of artistic works. Even better, the museum has placed the vast majority of these images into the public domain, meaning they can be downloaded directly from the museum’s website for...
Open Culture
Explore and Download 14,000+ Woodcuts from Antwerp’s Plantin-Moretus Museum Online Archive We appreciate illuminated manuscripts and historical books here on Open Culture, adhere though we do...
7 months ago
36
7 months ago
We appreciate illuminated manuscripts and historical books here on Open Culture, adhere though we do to a much more restrained aesthetic style in our own texts. But that’s not to deny the temptation to start this paragraph with one of those oversized initial letters that grew...
Open Culture
The Writer Who Directed, The Director Who Wrote: Every Frame a Painting Explores the Genius of Billy... When the acclaimed cinema video-essay channel Every Frame a Painting made its comeback this past...
9 months ago
53
9 months ago
When the acclaimed cinema video-essay channel Every Frame a Painting made its comeback this past summer, its creators Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos took a close look at the “sustained two-shot,” which captures a stretch of dialogue between two characters without the interference of...
Open Culture
David Bowie Predicts the Good & Bad of the Internet in 1999: “We’re on the Cusp of Something... “We’re on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying.” The year is 1999 and David Bowie, in...
11 months ago
38
11 months ago
“We’re on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying.” The year is 1999 and David Bowie, in shaggy hair and groovy glasses, has seen the future and it is the Internet. In this short but fascinating interview with BBC’s stalwart and withering interrogator cum interviewer...
Open Culture
Behold the Kräuterbuch, a Lavishly Illustrated Guide to Plants and Herbs from 1462 When Konrad von Megenberg published his Buch der Natur in the mid-fourteenth century, he won the...
11 months ago
38
11 months ago
When Konrad von Megenberg published his Buch der Natur in the mid-fourteenth century, he won the distinction of having assembled the very first natural history in German. More than half a millennium later, the book still fascinates — not least for its depictions of cats,...
Seth's Blog
Password stupidity is no longer viable [Of course, it’s not stupidity. It’s fear and superstition, which often go together. First, the...
a year ago
25
a year ago
[Of course, it’s not stupidity. It’s fear and superstition, which often go together. First, the rant.] It’s 2023. Major corporations should not be posting rules like this: This is not just security theatre. It’s a waste of time, the math makes no sense and it leads people to...
Seth's Blog
The commonweal Thanks to everyone who has read, talked about and taken action around my new book, The Song of...
over a year ago
32
over a year ago
Thanks to everyone who has read, talked about and taken action around my new book, The Song of Signficance. If you have a chance to post a review, that would be great. And you can find the podcasts here. The first step in making things better is talking about it.
Haterade
Introducing: Barbecue Running Gel It's time to smoke the competition.
a year ago
On the Arts
The Sea Has Always Looked the Same A View of the Ocean as a Connection to the Past
a year ago
Seth's Blog
A protest or a project? Protests let off steam. They organize people who might not show up by creating a moment in time...
a year ago
21
a year ago
Protests let off steam. They organize people who might not show up by creating a moment in time where there’s enough opportunity and social pressure that they participate. A protest sends a message. But almost every time, the very things that made a protest appealing mean that it...
Anarchy Unfolds
Is Sexual Orientation Obsolete? Not yet, but maybe it can (and should) be soon
12 months ago
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Hazel McNab Hi I’m Hazel, I live in Cornwall. I moved down just before Covid, very lucky me! And spent lockdown...
a year ago
121
a year ago
Hi I’m Hazel, I live in Cornwall. I moved down just before Covid, very lucky me! And spent lockdown cutting Cornish Landscapes and really getting into my printing. My background is Fashion and Textiles, St Martins School of Art and I think my love of pattern shows in my...
Seth's Blog
Anonymity and Bugs Bunny I came across this (ironically) anonymous quote recently: “The offline world is full of sticks, but...
10 months ago
66
10 months ago
I came across this (ironically) anonymous quote recently: “The offline world is full of sticks, but the internet only has carrots.” When we come together in groups, it can bring out the best in people. When those groups are anonymous, porous and transient, though, the opposite...
Open Culture
Pablo Picasso’s Childhood Paintings: Precocious Works Painted Between the Ages of 8 and 15 It’s hard to imagine from this historical distance how upsetting Pablo Picasso’s 1907 modernist...
a month ago
16
a month ago
It’s hard to imagine from this historical distance how upsetting Pablo Picasso’s 1907 modernist painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon was to Parisian society at its debut. On its 100th anniversary, Guardian critic Jonathan Jones described it as “the rift, the break that divides past...
Seth's Blog
Diagnostics “If it breaks, we’ll know how to fix it.” Old cars had an oil light, and that was about it. Often,...
a week ago
10
a week ago
“If it breaks, we’ll know how to fix it.” Old cars had an oil light, and that was about it. Often, we build things hoping they’ll work. But complex systems are more resilient when we build in the diagnostics for failure from the start. A multi-unit retail chain, a medical...
Seth's Blog
Invention or discovery? We can agree that Isaac Newton didn’t invent gravity. It was here all along, but he gets some credit...
a year ago
92
a year ago
We can agree that Isaac Newton didn’t invent gravity. It was here all along, but he gets some credit for naming it and describing it. And Columbus definitely didn’t discover North America. There had been people living here for tens of thousands of years before he arrived. After...
Open Culture
Watch The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, the Influential German Expressionist Horror Film (1920) In early 1920, posters began appearing all over Berlin with a hypnotic spiral and the mysterious...
8 months ago
40
8 months ago
In early 1920, posters began appearing all over Berlin with a hypnotic spiral and the mysterious command Du musst Caligari werden — “You must become Caligari.” The posters were part of an innovative advertising campaign for an upcoming movie by Robert Wiene called The Cabinet of...
Seth's Blog
It’s simple (it’s complicated) It’s simple: This surgery will fix your problem and you’ll be better. It’s complicated: Changes in...
a year ago
19
a year ago
It’s simple: This surgery will fix your problem and you’ll be better. It’s complicated: Changes in lifestyle, diet and attitude will, over time, help you feel better. Or… Our enemies are bad, and we’re good. Vote for me. The world is a big place that is filled with nuance,...
Not Boring by Packy...
Primer: From Software to Schools Watch now (47 mins) | To fix the school system, build schools
4 months ago
Seth's Blog
Take good notes Facts are important, but facts don’t create learning. Stories do. A story fits into (and changes)...
7 months ago
43
7 months ago
Facts are important, but facts don’t create learning. Stories do. A story fits into (and changes) our understanding of the world. Good teachers are storytellers, and storytellers are teachers. Notes, then, aren’t recitations of facts. They’re story prompts. A good note reminds...
Open Culture
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts Perform a Rollicking Cover of the Mary Tyler Moore Theme Song (1996) ?si=Pblv5Tzpi_F-a6cu Originally written by Sonny Curtis and released in 1970, “Love Is All...
9 months ago
32
9 months ago
?si=Pblv5Tzpi_F-a6cu Originally written by Sonny Curtis and released in 1970, “Love Is All Around”–otherwise known as the Mary Tyler Moore theme song–has been covered by many acts: Sammy Davis Jr, Hüsker Dü, and Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, to name a few. After releasing a studio...
Seth's Blog
Chores They’re essential. The house begins to stink if we don’t take out the garbage. But at work, while...
over a year ago
91
over a year ago
They’re essential. The house begins to stink if we don’t take out the garbage. But at work, while they might be essential, they may not be important. At least, not important enough for us to spend a lot of focus on. Chores are: The bills have to get paid. But they might not have...
Seth's Blog
Maybe it’s in how you tell it The plot of 2001: A Space Odyssey is pretty simple. You could write out a summary in three...
3 months ago
24
3 months ago
The plot of 2001: A Space Odyssey is pretty simple. You could write out a summary in three paragraphs. That’s not what made it one of the most revered movies of all time, and also one of the most difficult to make. Blurting out the plot of what we’re offering seems like the...
Seth's Blog
Better at being better In most competitive markets, when an organization offers a new benefit, others will quickly move to...
7 months ago
59
7 months ago
In most competitive markets, when an organization offers a new benefit, others will quickly move to match it. This means that it’s hard to justify the hard work of creating something better, because it’s just going to become a new standard. It doesn’t pay for a credit card...
Ian Betteridge
Ten Blue Links, “I am your BFDL” edition 1. Tech benevolent dictators are still… dictators in the tech community there is a concept of the...
7 months ago
50
7 months ago
1. Tech benevolent dictators are still… dictators in the tech community there is a concept of the “benevolent dictator for life”. This is a leadership model where one person, usually the founder, has the final say on decisions. They guide the project’s direction, relying on their...
Infinite Scroll
Weekly Scroll: All Hail New Media Censorship, platforms, and exactly who are we empowering?
5 months ago
Open Culture
The Real Reason Why Music Is Getting Worse: Rick Beato Explains Earlier this month, a North Carolina man was charged with generating songs using an...
9 months ago
49
9 months ago
Earlier this month, a North Carolina man was charged with generating songs using an artificial-intelligence system and configuring bots to stream them automatically, thus racking up some $10 million in illegal royalties. Though that amount no doubt startles many of us, in this...
Infinite Scroll
On Consumption vs Production How to improve yourself and be happier, online or offline
7 months ago
Seth's Blog
Working with problems Situations have no solution, they’re not problems, they’re simply the way it is. Problems are...
6 months ago
45
6 months ago
Situations have no solution, they’re not problems, they’re simply the way it is. Problems are distinguished by the fact that they have solutions. But that doesn’t mean that the solution is obvious, easy or convenient. If the problem is important enough, we should pick the best...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: 2023 Round Up! What a fantastic array of makers we've had featured on our Meet the Maker blog this year. We've put...
a year ago
90
a year ago
What a fantastic array of makers we've had featured on our Meet the Maker blog this year. We've put together a round up for you with all of the wonderful advice our makers have given for creatives at any stage of their creative practice. Pop your feet up, grab yourself a nice...
Seth's Blog
Embodied energy It might only cost $2 in the vending machine, but that can of soda is a complicated battery. It...
9 months ago
64
9 months ago
It might only cost $2 in the vending machine, but that can of soda is a complicated battery. It stores the energy of the machines that were used to mine the bauxite, the ship that brought the ore to Iceland, the astonishing temperatures used to create the aluminum, then more...
Seth's Blog
The price of salt Salt is essentially free. A bag of salted nuts is the same price (or less) as an unsalted one. But...
over a year ago
97
over a year ago
Salt is essentially free. A bag of salted nuts is the same price (or less) as an unsalted one. But salt used to be expensive. Truly expensive, like gold. We keep seeing the deflation of things we were sure would remain expensive. Computer chips, disk storage and now, content....
Open Culture
A Bicycle Trip: Watch an Animation of The World’s First LSD Trip in 1943 On August 16, 1943, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann was synthesizing a new compound called lysergic...
a year ago
52
a year ago
On August 16, 1943, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann was synthesizing a new compound called lysergic acid diethylamide-25 when he got a couple of drops on his finger. The chemical, later known worldwide as LSD, absorbed into his system, and, soon after, he experienced an intense...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Rach Lloyd Hello, my name is Rach and I'm a printmaker from Shropshire. I go by the name Rach Lloyd Press, and...
9 months ago
62
9 months ago
Hello, my name is Rach and I'm a printmaker from Shropshire. I go by the name Rach Lloyd Press, and pride myself on making all of my print-runs and editions in very small numbers, so people can own a unique piece of artwork at an affordable price. I am a multidisciplinary artist,...
Infinite Scroll
Weekly Scroll: Killing the Internet Encryption dramas, baby mamas, Reddit paywalls and a wholesome AMA
4 months ago
Open Culture
When a Drunken Charles Bukowski Walked Off the Prestigious French Talk Show Apostrophes (1978) Charles Bukowski didn’t do TV — or at least he didn’t do American TV. Like a Hollywood movie star...
a year ago
87
a year ago
Charles Bukowski didn’t do TV — or at least he didn’t do American TV. Like a Hollywood movie star shooting a Japanese commercial, he did make an exception for a gig abroad. It happened in 1978, when the poet received an invitation from the popular French literary talk...
Seth's Blog
Exceed or maintain? In just about every group, people decide in advance how they’ll show up when it comes to learning,...
a year ago
89
a year ago
In just about every group, people decide in advance how they’ll show up when it comes to learning, to winning and to responding to opportunities. They’re wearing a hat with a label, and over time, it’s not hard to recognize. This can change based on pedagogy, social conditions...
Infinite Scroll
The Weak Men of MAGA How Weak Men create Hard Times
2 months ago
Seth's Blog
When the media is ready (Bongo part 2) Media isn’t a magazine or a website. It’s a system. We can learn to see the system and contribute to...
7 months ago
54
7 months ago
Media isn’t a magazine or a website. It’s a system. We can learn to see the system and contribute to it with leverage. There are three elements to consider in a media system that’s worth a professional creator’s time: Systems are changed by technology. When desktop publishing...
Blog - Mac Pierce
Fort Emplacements and FDM: making Castle Doctrine How I made Castle Doctrine, a 1:1 scale fully 3D-Printed American Revolutionary War era cannon.
over a year ago
Seth's Blog
You’ve already failed No project is going to exactly match every hope you have for it. And even before you ship the work,...
7 months ago
44
7 months ago
No project is going to exactly match every hope you have for it. And even before you ship the work, you’ve already succeeded. No project is totally worthless. So, given that failure and success are on a spectrum, at least partly out of our control, the real question is: Now that...
Seth's Blog
Your own billboard Large sections of Los Angeles are studded with billboards for minor TV shows. These billboards exist...
over a year ago
76
over a year ago
Large sections of Los Angeles are studded with billboards for minor TV shows. These billboards exist nowhere else, even though there are televisions globally. Obviously, there’s ego at work here, but it’s sort of productive. First, there’s the ego of the producers/networks. They...
Stat Significant
Which Car Brands are Frequently Featured in Popular Music? A Statistical Analysis Which car brands are a fixture of song lyrics?
2 months ago
Handprinted - Blog
Kathryn Desforges: Meet The Maker I'm Kathryn Desforges, a Devon-born, Yorkshire-based artist with a passion for printmaking, process,...
5 months ago
58
5 months ago
I'm Kathryn Desforges, a Devon-born, Yorkshire-based artist with a passion for printmaking, process, and material experimentation. I specialise in etching, lithography and woodcut, and alongside my studio practice, my career as a printmaking technician and tutor intertwines with...
Seth's Blog
The length trick It’s possible that the memo or video is simply too long. A 14 minute video explaining how to have a...
a year ago
21
a year ago
It’s possible that the memo or video is simply too long. A 14 minute video explaining how to have a 10 minute brainstorming meeting might benefit from some editing. But it might be that your instruction manual would benefit from some more photos and better in depth explanation....
Open Culture
A Forgotten 16th-Century Manuscript Reveals the First Designs for Modern Rockets The Austrian military engineer Conrad Haas was a man ahead of his time — indeed, about 400 years...
2 months ago
30
2 months ago
The Austrian military engineer Conrad Haas was a man ahead of his time — indeed, about 400 years ahead, considering that he was working on rockets aimed for outer space back in the mid-sixteenth century. Needless to say, he never actually managed to launch anything into the upper...
Seth's Blog
The empathy of useful feedback When a friend shows you work in progress, your best contribution is to imagine the point of view and...
a year ago
26
a year ago
When a friend shows you work in progress, your best contribution is to imagine the point of view and preferences of the person it is being created for. “I don’t like it,” isn’t useful, because it’s not for you. “I could imagine that someone who wants x, y or z would be looking...
Seth's Blog
Checking the date After 2022, it’s hard to tell for sure. And going forward, public life is going to be even more...
over a year ago
82
over a year ago
After 2022, it’s hard to tell for sure. And going forward, public life is going to be even more rumor-driven than it is now. Any video, any voiceover, any photograph–we can’t be sure. If YouTube or the Wayback Machine shows us that it happened after 2022, bring some doubt. AI and...
Seth's Blog
Which inbox? It’s easier than ever to fall into an inbox mindset. There are things to do, and we do them. Inbox...
a month ago
13
a month ago
It’s easier than ever to fall into an inbox mindset. There are things to do, and we do them. Inbox zero is the unattainable goal that fills our days. But it avoids the real question, which is: which inbox are we emptying? There’s the inbox of urgent texts. Or the inbox of...
Seth's Blog
Is there a market(place)? Not all needs have a market (yet). A market is a category. A market is a place with competition. In...
7 months ago
52
7 months ago
Not all needs have a market (yet). A market is a category. A market is a place with competition. In a market, people have habits and budgets and social pressure to engage. There are buyers and sellers. In many cultures, there’s a market for all the items that go with a...
Prolost
The M1 Max MacBook Pros Apple opened their October event with a young musician creating an Apple-inspired music track in a...
over a year ago
26
over a year ago
Apple opened their October event with a young musician creating an Apple-inspired music track in a dingy garage filled with gear worth tens of thousands of dollars. Some viewers commented on the unrealistic portrayal of a creative professional. But I felt like I was looking in a...
Seth's Blog
Normalizing selfishness Shoplifters lurk in the shadows. They realize that they will have an easier time if they quietly...
a year ago
28
a year ago
Shoplifters lurk in the shadows. They realize that they will have an easier time if they quietly steal stuff, because speaking up about it won’t help their cause. Sometimes, though, some people seek to change the culture in a way that celebrates taking. “I own this jetski and I...
Marian's Blog
Adversarial Generation of Continuous Implicit Shape Representations This article provides an overview of the paper "Adversarial Generation of Continuous Implicit Shape...
over a year ago
31
over a year ago
This article provides an overview of the paper "Adversarial Generation of Continuous Implicit Shape Representations", which I co-authored with Matthias Fey. While the paper focuses on the theoretical aspects, I'll provide a higher level explanation and and some visualizations...
Seth's Blog
The last little bit Important hills usually get much steeper at the top. 99% of the training in competitive athletics is...
11 months ago
65
11 months ago
Important hills usually get much steeper at the top. 99% of the training in competitive athletics is devoted to the last 1% of performance. A tenth of a second. The same is true for squeezing the last bit of performance out of a car, a grape or a semiconductor. And healthcare,...
Seth's Blog
The catfight and the construction site We’re quick to stop to see the car wreck, the billionaire having a meltdown, or the professional...
over a year ago
42
over a year ago
We’re quick to stop to see the car wreck, the billionaire having a meltdown, or the professional wrestlers pretending to be political leaders. But it often seems more difficult to take a moment to watch people building something that matters instead. We’ll probably spend billions...
Seth's Blog
Books (and more) Brad Feld has been contributing to and leading the tech community for more than thirty years. His...
a month ago
12
a month ago
Brad Feld has been contributing to and leading the tech community for more than thirty years. His books have always been inspiring and useful, but his new book takes it to a higher level. Adam Becker has written two books that I recently devoured. The first is philosophy, history...
Not Boring by Packy...
Weekly Dose of Optimism #139 Dire Wolves, Base Power, ZBB Regulation, Zipline, Amca, Solano Shipyard
3 months ago
Seth's Blog
2 + 2 Arguments about taste are more common than ever before. The long tail makes it easy to find what you...
a year ago
82
a year ago
Arguments about taste are more common than ever before. The long tail makes it easy to find what you like, and to talk about what you don’t. There’s no accounting for taste, and that’s a good thing. Because taste is useful. Flopping the toilet paper under or over the roll,...
Seth's Blog
Yes, but how does it work? I worked with Arthur C. Clarke at the very beginning of my career. He’s most famous for saying, “Any...
9 months ago
53
9 months ago
I worked with Arthur C. Clarke at the very beginning of my career. He’s most famous for saying, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Magic isn’t such a bad thing. And we certainly have plenty of advanced technology around. Advanced in the sense...
Open Culture
A Stylish 2,000-Year-Old Roman Shoe Found in a Well When the Romans pushed their way north into the German provinces, they built (circa 90 AD) the...
2 months ago
7
2 months ago
When the Romans pushed their way north into the German provinces, they built (circa 90 AD) the Saalburg, a fort that protected the boundary between the Roman Empire and the Germanic tribal territories. At its peak, 2,000 people lived in the fort and the attached village, and it...
Open Culture
How Eyes Evolved: A Fascinating Tour Through the Animal Kingdom Above, Lars Schmitz, a professor at Claremont McKenna College, guides us “through a giant tree of...
2 months ago
10
2 months ago
Above, Lars Schmitz, a professor at Claremont McKenna College, guides us “through a giant tree of life mapping the evolution of eyes in the animal kingdom: how they work, why they’ve taken the form they have, and the evolutionary advantages they’ve unlocked across species.” The...
Open Culture
Revisit Episodes of Liquid Television, MTV’s 90s Showcase of Funny, Irreverent & Bizarre Animation MTV stands for Music Television, and when the network launched in 1981, its almost entirely music...
9 months ago
74
9 months ago
MTV stands for Music Television, and when the network launched in 1981, its almost entirely music video-based programming was true to its name. Within a decade, however, its mandate had widened to the point that it had become the natural home for practically any exciting...
Open Culture
The Secret Link Between Jazz and Physics: How Einstein & Coltrane Shared Improvisation and Intuition... Scientists need hobbies. The grueling work of navigating complex theory and the politics of academia...
a month ago
23
a month ago
Scientists need hobbies. The grueling work of navigating complex theory and the politics of academia can get to a person, even one as laid back as Brown University professor and astrophysicist Stephon Alexander. So Alexander plays the saxophone, though at this point it may not be...
Not Boring by Packy...
Weekly Dose of Optimism #129 Supersonic Boom, DeepSeek, Science Corp, Heart Allografts, New Space, Meter
5 months ago
Seth's Blog
The best intern on the team A great intern brings positive energy, a relentless work ethic and doesn’t cost very much. They ask...
4 months ago
26
4 months ago
A great intern brings positive energy, a relentless work ethic and doesn’t cost very much. They ask a lot of questions, and the most useful questions will help you see an existing situation with fresh eyes. Of course, you’ll expect them to make mistakes, and a professional needs...
Open Culture
Carl Jung Offers an Introduction to His Psychological Thought in a 3‑Hour Interview (1957) In the 1950s, it was fashionable to drop Freud’s name — often as not in pseudo-intellectual sex...
11 months ago
70
11 months ago
In the 1950s, it was fashionable to drop Freud’s name — often as not in pseudo-intellectual sex jokes. Freud’s preoccupations had as much to do with his fame as the actual practice of psychotherapy, and it was assumed — and still is to a great degree — that Freud had “won” the...
Open Culture
A Digital Archive Features Hundreds of Audio Cassette Tape Designs, from the 1960s to the 1990s Audio cassette tapes first appeared on the market in the early nineteen-sixties, but it would take...
10 months ago
83
10 months ago
Audio cassette tapes first appeared on the market in the early nineteen-sixties, but it would take about a decade before they came to dominate it. And when they did, they’d changed the lives of many a music-lover by having made it possible not just to listen to their albums of...
Open Culture
Hannah Arendt Explains the Rise of Totalitarian Regimes–and the Strategies Needed to Combat Them “Adolf Eichmann went to the gallows with great dignity,” wrote the political philosopher Hannah...
a year ago
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a year ago
“Adolf Eichmann went to the gallows with great dignity,” wrote the political philosopher Hannah Arendt, describing the scene leading up to the prominent Holocaust-organizer’s execution. After drinking half a bottle of wine, turning down the offer of religious assistance, and even...
Open Culture
Watch Fantasmagorie, the World’s First Animated Cartoon (1908) Trying to describe the plot of Fantasmagorie, the world’s first animated cartoon, is a folly akin to...
10 months ago
75
10 months ago
Trying to describe the plot of Fantasmagorie, the world’s first animated cartoon, is a folly akin to putting last night’s dream into words: I was dressed as a clown and then I was in a theater, except I was also hiding under this lady’s hat, and the guy behind us was plucking out...
Seth's Blog
Reimagining cities in a few simple questions What would happen if public transportation were free? What if it were paid for by congestion...
over a year ago
54
over a year ago
What would happen if public transportation were free? What if it were paid for by congestion pricing, digitally implemented? What if public toilets were safe, beautiful, well-appointed and consistently maintained? What if there were a tax on empty storefronts, payable after three...
Seth's Blog
Dreams, plans and contradictions Dreams are fine. And dreams involve contradictions. We want this AND that, but both can’t happen....
a year ago
47
a year ago
Dreams are fine. And dreams involve contradictions. We want this AND that, but both can’t happen. That’s what keeps them from being plans. Plans embrace boundaries and reality, they don’t ignore them. Plans thrive on scarcity and constraints. Plans are open for inspection, and a...
Infinite Scroll
13 Things I Learned Reading a 225 Page Report About the Gaming Industry A quick poll for readers before we get started - you may have noticed there’s a lot of politics...
5 months ago
Open Culture
RIP David Sanborn: See Him Play Alongside Miles Davis, Randy Newman, Sun Ra, Leonard Cohen and... It’s late in the evening of Saturday, October 28th, 1989. You flip on the television and the...
a year ago
117
a year ago
It’s late in the evening of Saturday, October 28th, 1989. You flip on the television and the saxophonist David Sanborn appears onscreen, instrument in hand, introducing the eclectic blues icon Taj Mahal, who in turn declares his intent to play a number with “rural humor” and...
Seth's Blog
Find the others: Worldwide Strategy Meetups On October 22, around the world, I’m helping to organize hundreds of in-person get togethers. A...
9 months ago
55
9 months ago
On October 22, around the world, I’m helping to organize hundreds of in-person get togethers. A chance to share your work and have a conversation about your strategy with others. Mutual support and peer connection. All the details are on this page. It’s free. A chance to connect...
Not Boring by Packy...
Weekly Dose of Optimism #137 Mitochondria, Image Generation, Nobels, Vast, Common Sense, AI Lifeguards, Tina He
3 months ago
Seth's Blog
“I didn’t see you there” Someone I’ve worked with over the years happened to be driving down my street. I called out and said...
8 months ago
63
8 months ago
Someone I’ve worked with over the years happened to be driving down my street. I called out and said hello… They ignored me. So I repeated myself. “Oh,” they said, recognizing me. “It’s you.” We’re more likely to see, hear and care if the person over there is actually a person. A...
Seth's Blog
The Big-O conundrum In computer science, Big-O notation is a way of talking about what happens to a solution method when...
a year ago
25
a year ago
In computer science, Big-O notation is a way of talking about what happens to a solution method when the inputs start to increase. For example, sorting numbers is an easy problem when there are only five or six, but when you have to sort 5,000, a totally different algorithm is...
cabel.com
Marching Age This is a short story about something delightful. In 2014, I did a bunch of music for my friends...
a year ago
21
a year ago
This is a short story about something delightful. In 2014, I did a bunch of music for my friends Neven Mrgan and Matt Comi who were making an incredible iOS game called Space Age. I had never written that much music in my life, and it was incredibly fun for me in every way. (You...
Open Culture
The First “Selfie” In History Taken by Robert Cornelius, a Philadelphia Chemist, in 1839 In 2013, the Oxford Dictionaries announced that “selfie” had been deemed their Word of The Year. The...
11 months ago
44
11 months ago
In 2013, the Oxford Dictionaries announced that “selfie” had been deemed their Word of The Year. The term, whose first recorded use as an Instagram hashtag occurred on January 27, 2011, was actually invented in 2002, when an Australian chap posted a picture of himself on an...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Lorenzo Davitti Originally from Florence, Italy, I'm a printmaker and tutor now based in London for the past 10...
a year ago
110
a year ago
Originally from Florence, Italy, I'm a printmaker and tutor now based in London for the past 10 years. I work mainly on abstract art, and I am especially interested in the possibilities that printmaking offers when experimenting with colour, shapes and textures.   Describe your...
Seth's Blog
Banana Equivalents Bananas are (slightly) radioactive. The banana equivalent dose (BED) is a measurement of radiation....
10 months ago
45
10 months ago
Bananas are (slightly) radioactive. The banana equivalent dose (BED) is a measurement of radiation. It’s definitely not enough to hurt you. When we think about risk, the BED is a useful way to find perspective. Is the exposure this new thing will cause on the order of a banana?...
Marian's Blog
Raspberry Pi Wetterstation Um die Daten, die meine Arduino-Wetterstation liefert, verfügbarer zu machen, habe ich mich...
over a year ago
18
over a year ago
Um die Daten, die meine Arduino-Wetterstation liefert, verfügbarer zu machen, habe ich mich entschieden, das Projekt jetzt mit einem Raspberry Pi weiterzuführen. Die Sensordaten werden wieder vom ILC-Board geliefert, das ich für den Schülerwettbewerb Intel Leibniz Challenge...
Seth's Blog
Remarkable pronouncements The scientific rule of thumb is simple: When you make a bold claim, you need significant research to...
over a year ago
32
over a year ago
The scientific rule of thumb is simple: When you make a bold claim, you need significant research to back it up. Telling us that eating vegetables is healthy can be justified by a fairly simple high school science paper. But if you want to claim that the moon is made of celery...
Open Culture
Read the Uncompromising Letter That Steve Albini (RIP) Wrote to Nirvana Before Producing In Utero... Today, Steve Albini, the musician and producer of important albums by Nirvana, PJ Harvey, the Pixies...
a year ago
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a year ago
Today, Steve Albini, the musician and producer of important albums by Nirvana, PJ Harvey, the Pixies and many others, passed away in Chicago, at the all-too-early age of 61. In tribute, we’re bringing you this classic 2013 post from our archive.  Journeyman record producer Steve...
Open Culture
How Carl Jung Inspired the Creation of Alcoholics Anonymous There may be as many doors into Alcoholics Anonymous in the 21st century as there are people who...
a year ago
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a year ago
There may be as many doors into Alcoholics Anonymous in the 21st century as there are people who walk through them—from every world religion to no religion. The “international mutual-aid fellowship” has had “a significant and long-term effect on the culture of the United States,”...
Open Culture
Andy Warhol Hosts Frank Zappa on His Cable TV Show, and Later Recalls, “I Hated Him More Than Ever”... Had Andy Warhol lived to see the internet–especially social networking–he would have loved it,...
a year ago
53
a year ago
Had Andy Warhol lived to see the internet–especially social networking–he would have loved it, though it may not have loved him. Though Warhol did see the very beginnings of the PC revolution, and made computer art near the end of his life on a Commodore Amiga 1000, he was mostly...
On the Arts
The Vertical Beauty of Hong Kong An Interview with Photographer Romain Jacquet Lagrèze
a year ago
Seth's Blog
The 77% threshold When the gas car was first introduced, it couldn’t compete with horses. After all, we’d had...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
When the gas car was first introduced, it couldn’t compete with horses. After all, we’d had thousands of years to optimize our systems around horseback, and this new technology was still nascent. Roads were rare, gas stations were scarce and the cars themselves were unreliable....
Open Culture
Beautiful 19th Century Maps of Dante’s Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, Paradise & More Even the least religious among us speak, at least on occasion, of the circles of hell. When we do...
7 months ago
56
7 months ago
Even the least religious among us speak, at least on occasion, of the circles of hell. When we do so, we may or may not be thinking of where the concept originated: Dante’s Divina Commedia, or Divine Comedy. We each imagine the circles in our own way — usually filling them with...
Seth's Blog
The long-range forecast keeps shifting Exactly. That’s why it’s a forecast, not an accurate account of what’s going to happen in the...
a year ago
28
a year ago
Exactly. That’s why it’s a forecast, not an accurate account of what’s going to happen in the future. This seems axiomatic, but our desire for certainty keeps letting us down. The shifting of forecasts is evidence that they’re merely forecasts.
Open Culture
Jean-Paul Sartre Rejects the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1964: “It Was Monstrous!” In a 2013 blog post, the great Ursula K. Le Guin quotes a London Times Literary Supplement column by...
11 months ago
60
11 months ago
In a 2013 blog post, the great Ursula K. Le Guin quotes a London Times Literary Supplement column by a “J.C.,” who satirically proposes the “Jean-Paul Sartre Prize for Prize Refusal.” “Writers all over Europe and America are turning down awards in the hope of being nominated for...
Open Culture
Igor Stravinsky’s “Illegal” Arrangement of “The Star Spangled Banner” (1944) In 1939, Igor Stravinsky emigrated to the United States, first arriving in New York City, before...
a week ago
9
a week ago
In 1939, Igor Stravinsky emigrated to the United States, first arriving in New York City, before settling in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he delivered the Charles Eliot Norton lectures at Harvard during the 1939–40 academic year. While living in Boston, the composer conducted...
Seth's Blog
PW 2: Productivity in community We need you. But only if you need us. Purple.space is six months old, and there are about a thousand...
a year ago
40
a year ago
We need you. But only if you need us. Purple.space is six months old, and there are about a thousand of us now. It was an experiment, now it’s a useful tool. The initiative hat is often ill-fitting. We rush to take it off and get back to doing chores. And that’s why a community...
Open Culture
Behold a Creative Animation of the Bayeux Tapestry In previous centuries, unless you were a member of the nobility, a wealthy religious order, or a...
9 months ago
60
9 months ago
In previous centuries, unless you were a member of the nobility, a wealthy religious order, or a merchant guild, your chances of spending any significant amount of time with a Medieval tapestry were slim. Though “much production was relatively coarse, intended for decorative...
Seth's Blog
The first draft of your first non-fiction book Writing a book is good for you. It clarifies your thinking and it’s generous as well. You might not...
6 months ago
55
6 months ago
Writing a book is good for you. It clarifies your thinking and it’s generous as well. You might not publish it professionally, but sharing it with people you want to teach and lead is a useful practice. The first draft can be challenging. We’re facing a blank page, trying to find...
Open Culture
How Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd & Jethro Tull Financed the Making Monty Python and the Holy Grail Monty Python and the Holy Grail isn’t a big-budget spectacle, and nobody knew that better than the...
a month ago
21
a month ago
Monty Python and the Holy Grail isn’t a big-budget spectacle, and nobody knew that better than the Pythons themselves. Necessity being the mother of invention, they turned the project’s financial constraints into one of its many sources of humor, fashioning memorable gags out of...
Seth's Blog
The sad compromise of “sponsored results” Google made a fortune and honed sponsored search results into an art form. The theory is that people...
10 months ago
46
10 months ago
Google made a fortune and honed sponsored search results into an art form. The theory is that people who want the traffic the most will pay for the clicks, and of course, if the advertisers don’t have something you ultimately want, they’ll just waste their money. Let the market...
Seth's Blog
There’s always a placebo switch The trick is knowing where it is and using it well. Wanting control doesn’t always mean needing to...
a year ago
27
a year ago
The trick is knowing where it is and using it well. Wanting control doesn’t always mean needing to have control. Sometimes it is simply a desire to be acknowledged. HT to Brian.
Seth's Blog
I was wrong about sun tea The story is a good one: put some tea bags in a mason jar filled with fresh, cold water. Put it in...
a year ago
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a year ago
The story is a good one: put some tea bags in a mason jar filled with fresh, cold water. Put it in the sun. Four hours later, smooth and delicious tea is waiting for you. The photons from the sun go through the clear glass and the water, strike the leaves and transfer radiant...
Seth's Blog
Avoiding the trap questions A trick question is designed to fool us into proposing the wrong answer (example below). A trap...
a year ago
62
a year ago
A trick question is designed to fool us into proposing the wrong answer (example below). A trap question, on the other hand, stops the train completely. A trap question demands an answer, and the answer will paralyze us and keep us from the work at hand. “Yes, but how many...
Seth's Blog
Some simple rules for source control Collaborating on documents and projects has never been easier, which is why we screw it up so often....
9 months ago
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9 months ago
Collaborating on documents and projects has never been easier, which is why we screw it up so often. Sharing and interacting with intent will save you heartache and wasted time. Some things to consider: Naming: Begin by naming your file with a digit and concept and a date....
Seth's Blog
Four-word advice When there’s a complex situation that feels foreboding, you might need a manual, a coach and even a...
3 months ago
27
3 months ago
When there’s a complex situation that feels foreboding, you might need a manual, a coach and even a system to move forward. Or, it’s possible you simply need someone to tell you, “you’ll figure it out.”
Seth's Blog
Expertise and credentials In the ideal world, credentials would be awarded to all experts, and withdrawn from all charlatans....
5 months ago
47
5 months ago
In the ideal world, credentials would be awarded to all experts, and withdrawn from all charlatans. But they don’t always line up as neatly as that. An expert is someone who can keep a promise. Point to the results that demonstrate your skill and understanding and commitment and...
Seth's Blog
Return on effort It’s a pretty simple calculation. How much value per dollar does a freelancer produce for you?...
a year ago
84
a year ago
It’s a pretty simple calculation. How much value per dollar does a freelancer produce for you? What’s the psychic reward for the time you put into your favorite hobby? That machine that takes time and money to set up and run… what does it create when it’s operating? Not...
Seth's Blog
Choose your fuel wisely If worrying about paying the mortgage gets you motivated to lean hard into the next project, don’t...
8 months ago
49
8 months ago
If worrying about paying the mortgage gets you motivated to lean hard into the next project, don’t be surprised if that sort of fear arises every time you have hard work to do. If your goal is to teach the naysayers a lesson, remember that you’ll need to find people who you want...
Open Culture
How Magician David Copperfield Made the Statue of Liberty Disappear (1983) In April, 1983, 50 million television viewers watched the illusionist David Copperfield make the...
7 months ago
71
7 months ago
In April, 1983, 50 million television viewers watched the illusionist David Copperfield make the Statue of Liberty disappear, straight into thin air. If you’re north of 50, you perhaps remember the spectacle. How did he do it? 40 years later, the YouTube channel Mind Blown Magic...
Seth's Blog
The opposite of insubordination “Do as I say.” That’s industrial management in four words. If you don’t follow the instructions to...
a year ago
32
a year ago
“Do as I say.” That’s industrial management in four words. If you don’t follow the instructions to the letter, you’re insubordinate. Not subordinate. Complete subordination might have been the goal in an industrial setting. But now, it’s dangerous, expensive and inefficent....
Seth's Blog
“It seems…” What a simple verb. A five-letter modifier that opens the door to discussion. If we state something...
11 months ago
65
11 months ago
What a simple verb. A five-letter modifier that opens the door to discussion. If we state something as a fact, we’re asking for an argument. But seems opens the door to learning and discussion. What are you seeing that I’m not seeing?
escape the algorithm
Should this be a map or 500 maps? 500 priests, cartographic n00bism, and the limits of scale
a year ago
Handprinted - Blog
Custom Screen Specifications and Artwork Guides If you're thinking about ordering a custom screen with us, we need your artwork to the...
over a year ago
96
over a year ago
If you're thinking about ordering a custom screen with us, we need your artwork to the specifications laid out in this blog post.  First, these are the technical specifications we require Flattened PDF format only (no JPG or PNG) Portrait 300 dpi resolution, no...
Open Culture
Marie Curie Invented Mobile X‑Ray Units to Help Save Wounded Soldiers in World War I A hundred years ago, Mobile X‑Ray Units were a brand new innovation, and a godsend for soldiers...
a month ago
10
a month ago
A hundred years ago, Mobile X‑Ray Units were a brand new innovation, and a godsend for soldiers wounded on the front in WW1. Prior to the advent of this technology, field surgeons racing to save lives operated blindly, often causing even more injury as they groped for bullets and...
Seth's Blog
The problem with marketing puffery It costs more than you think. Last month, I hit the old stock on the Avery labels in my office...
6 months ago
44
6 months ago
It costs more than you think. Last month, I hit the old stock on the Avery labels in my office cabinet. I had a bunch of things to send out, and off they went. It turns out, who knew, that old labels stop sticking. It’s entirely possible some of my really important packages never...
Seth's Blog
Opening the pod bay door A brand new episode of Akimbo this week, all about artificial intelligence. Part one of of two on...
over a year ago
83
over a year ago
A brand new episode of Akimbo this week, all about artificial intelligence. Part one of of two on mediocrity and the choices we’re going to need to make. And, a while in the making, an experimental AI chat bot that has been trained on all 5,000,000 words of this blog. You can...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Jenny Stringer I am Jenny Stringer, and I have been block printing fabrics (and sometimes papers) for the last...
11 months ago
96
11 months ago
I am Jenny Stringer, and I have been block printing fabrics (and sometimes papers) for the last thirty years; as and when possible.  How did you start your creative career?  I was an archaeological illustrator after a brief museum career, and worked with a team of...
Seth's Blog
The maverick and the status quo The future isn’t the same as the past. Technology develops, systems change and most of all, someone...
a year ago
28
a year ago
The future isn’t the same as the past. Technology develops, systems change and most of all, someone cares enough to make things better. The maverick isn’t the selfish gunslinger of myth. In fact, she’s focused on resilient, useful interactions that change what we expect, pushing...
Seth's Blog
The NSE confusions “Nobody wants this” is unlikely. “Somebody will like this” is almost certainly true. “Everyone needs...
3 months ago
32
3 months ago
“Nobody wants this” is unlikely. “Somebody will like this” is almost certainly true. “Everyone needs this” is a trap. The work begins with finding the right somebodies, while ignoring the imaginary everyone. Scale is rarely the first signal of important work.
Seth's Blog
Default to surrender AI chatbots highight a challenge that is worth understanding. It applies to customer service,...
a year ago
33
a year ago
AI chatbots highight a challenge that is worth understanding. It applies to customer service, bureaucracies and teachers as well… If you ask an AI a question and it’s not confident in the answer, it should say, “I’m not sure.” That could be followed up with, “do you want me to...
Seth's Blog
Powerlessness Not a lack of power, but feeling as though we have none. Some people have been indoctrinated to...
2 months ago
30
2 months ago
Not a lack of power, but feeling as though we have none. Some people have been indoctrinated to prefer a life with no agency, as it also brings no responsibility. At the other extreme, some folks have decided that they have more power than they actually do. Video games offer...
Seth's Blog
Credulous Where do con men come from? There are three conditions that need to be met: First, there needs to be...
3 months ago
22
3 months ago
Where do con men come from? There are three conditions that need to be met: First, there needs to be rising societal pressure to get ahead, cut the line and find a win. Second, there needs to be people willing to set aside their ethical principles to take advantage of others in...
Infinite Scroll
The Internet is More Real than Real Life A victory of online spaces over traditional institutions
8 months ago
Prolost
Jurassic Punk If you’re reading this blog, you probably know the story — at least, you think you do. As Steven...
over a year ago
42
over a year ago
If you’re reading this blog, you probably know the story — at least, you think you do. As Steven Spielberg began production on 1993’s Jurassic Park, he and Industrial Light and Magic’s Dennis Muren planned to execute the all-important visual effects component of the film’s...
Seth's Blog
Across and within Media theory pioneer Harold Innis saw it 70 years ago: Some cultures and ideas are built to spread...
4 months ago
40
4 months ago
Media theory pioneer Harold Innis saw it 70 years ago: Some cultures and ideas are built to spread across SPACE. And some spread across TIME. It’s the tension between space and time that lead to the rise and fall of societies and cultures, and they’re worth understanding. Clay...
Blog - Amy Goodchild
Midjourney takes on Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawings Continuing my mission to use AI tools for things they really weren’t designed for and aren’t very...
over a year ago
23
over a year ago
Continuing my mission to use AI tools for things they really weren’t designed for and aren’t very good at and then judging the results.
Infinite Scroll
Why Are So Many Online Trads Still Single? We asked single trads to tell us their secrets
6 months ago
Seth's Blog
True/useful Here’s a simple grid that might change the way you think about internal stories: When we believe in...
a year ago
27
a year ago
Here’s a simple grid that might change the way you think about internal stories: When we believe in something that’s useful but not true, it can serve a helpful purpose. The tooth fairy, perhaps. When we act on something that’s useful and also true, we’ve found a resilient path...
Seth's Blog
Avoiding food waste confusion Everybody eats That’s the biggest problem. While plenty of people drive or play pickleball, eating...
over a year ago
87
over a year ago
Everybody eats That’s the biggest problem. While plenty of people drive or play pickleball, eating is particularly widespread. Seven billion people multiplies into a big number… Creating the food we eat has significant climate impact. Some of the factors, in unranked order: Even...
Open Culture
When the CIA Studied Psychic Techniques to Alter Human Consciousness & Unlock Time Travel: Discover... By now, it’s widely known that the Central Intelligence Agency ran a decades-long program of...
a year ago
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a year ago
By now, it’s widely known that the Central Intelligence Agency ran a decades-long program of experiments involving LSD and other psychoactive drugs called MKUltra from the nineteen-fifties to the seventies. As one might suspect, that wasn’t the only research project into the...
Seth's Blog
Paying attention to attention There are people and organizations that are working overtime to redirect and manipulate your...
a month ago
13
a month ago
There are people and organizations that are working overtime to redirect and manipulate your attention. The question is: Are they more aware and careful in how you spend your attention than you are? The act of focusing on what we focus on pays enormous dividends.
Open Culture
Paradise Lost Explained: How John Milton Wrote His Epic Religious Poem from Satan’s Perspective “Paradise Lost is one of the books which the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take up...
5 days ago
6
5 days ago
“Paradise Lost is one of the books which the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take up again,” Samuel Johnson wrote in the late eighteenth century. “None ever wished it longer than it is. Its perusal is a duty rather than a pleasure. We read Milton for instruction,...
Seth's Blog
The new way of work Amazon is the last one. They are probably the last huge company where hundreds of thousands of...
over a year ago
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over a year ago
Amazon is the last one. They are probably the last huge company where hundreds of thousands of people will be surveilled, measured and ordered to follow the rule book. The pandemic didn’t create distributed work, the laptop did. Human interaction is critical, but the office isn’t...
Open Culture
“The Virtues of Coffee” Explained in 1690 Ad: The Cure for Lethargy, Scurvy, Dropsy, Gout & More According to many historians, the English Enlightenment may never have happened were it not for...
a year ago
53
a year ago
According to many historians, the English Enlightenment may never have happened were it not for coffeehouses, the public sphere where poets, critics, philosophers, legal minds, and other intellectual gadflies regularly met to chatter about the pressing concerns of the day. And...
Open Culture
David Bowie’s 100 Must Read Books Image by Avro, via Wikimedia Commons In 2013, the curators of the touring museum exhibit “David...
9 months ago
65
9 months ago
Image by Avro, via Wikimedia Commons In 2013, the curators of the touring museum exhibit “David Bowie Is” released a list of David Bowie’s 100 favorite reads, providing us with deeper insights into his literary tastes. Covering fiction and non-fiction, the list spans six decades,...
Seth's Blog
What if they’re right? We spend a lot of time in our own heads, certain that our path and our method make sense. We often...
7 months ago
55
7 months ago
We spend a lot of time in our own heads, certain that our path and our method make sense. We often become more certain in the face of criticism or even suggestions. This confidence is essential, as it allows us to lean into our project. Once in a while, though, it might help to...
Open Culture
The Wisdom of Alan Watts in 4 Mind-Expanding Animations Perhaps no single person did more to popularize Zen Buddhism in the West than Alan Watts. In a...
8 months ago
53
8 months ago
Perhaps no single person did more to popularize Zen Buddhism in the West than Alan Watts. In a sense, Watts prepared U.S. culture for more traditionally Zen teachers like Soto priest Suzuki Roshi, whose lineage continues today, but Watts did not consider himself a Zen Buddhist....
Open Culture
Why Most Ancient Civilizations Had No Word for the Color Blue In an old Zen story, two monks argue over whether a flag is waving or whether it’s the wind that...
2 months ago
43
2 months ago
In an old Zen story, two monks argue over whether a flag is waving or whether it’s the wind that waves. Their teacher strikes them both dumb, saying, “It is your mind that moves.” The centuries-old koan illustrates a point Zen masters — and later philosophers, psychologists, and...
The Last...
The Maintenance Of Certification Exam As Fetish no need to wait for the receipt (I had reworked an old post for a psychiatry trade journal, which I...
over a year ago
27
over a year ago
no need to wait for the receipt (I had reworked an old post for a psychiatry trade journal, which I would happily have linked you to, except that page 2 is behind a login wall. So here is the version I submitted before the editors edited it, slightly longer with more typos. I am...
Open Culture
The First Professional Footage of Pink Floyd Gets Captured in a 1967 Documentary (and the Band Also... British filmmaker and novelist Peter Whitehead has been credited with inventing the music video with...
a year ago
60
a year ago
British filmmaker and novelist Peter Whitehead has been credited with inventing the music video with his promo films for the Rolling Stones in the mid-60s. According to Ali Catterall and Simon Wells, authors of Your Face Here, a study of “British Cult Film since the Sixties,”...
Seth's Blog
Adjacent but not relevant There’s a sale on band saw blades, including a really good deal on one that fits the saw you owned...
11 months ago
63
11 months ago
There’s a sale on band saw blades, including a really good deal on one that fits the saw you owned years ago. The folks who live next door to the house you used to live in are having a raucous party. A guy with a name just like yours wins the lottery… These adjacencies can […]
Marian's Blog
Raspberry Pi powered fishtank My fishtank is now internet-connected. It is run by a Raspberry Pi that can do three things: Feed...
over a year ago
23
over a year ago
My fishtank is now internet-connected. It is run by a Raspberry Pi that can do three things: Feed the fish, switch the lights and take pictures. To feed the fish, the Raspberry Pi sends commands to an automatic fishfeeder that I modified. It can empty any container in any order....
Seth's Blog
“And” fatigue Digital abundance creates a new problem. Most of our lives are filled with “or” decisions. You can...
over a year ago
31
over a year ago
Digital abundance creates a new problem. Most of our lives are filled with “or” decisions. You can have this or that. You can save money for the big party or you can go out for lunch. You can have exactly one thing for dessert–cake or fruit. But the war for our attention has...
Seth's Blog
Shields up Years and years ago, I helped the Weekly World News make a book. While their periodical was weekly,...
over a year ago
78
over a year ago
Years and years ago, I helped the Weekly World News make a book. While their periodical was weekly, it certainly wasn’t news. They were just four people in a small office in Florida. They gleefully made stuff up every week. They had a few filing cabinets of stock photos, and they...
Seth's Blog
Good instincts Sometimes, in the absence of data or useful experience, we’re left to act on our instincts. It’s...
2 months ago
37
2 months ago
Sometimes, in the absence of data or useful experience, we’re left to act on our instincts. It’s worth noting that other people have instincts as well. And in a given situation, their instincts might prove to be as right as often as ours. Just because it’s your instinct doesn’t...
Seth's Blog
The right marketing question The wrong question is, “our project isn’t catching on, how do we promote it better?” The right...
over a year ago
33
over a year ago
The wrong question is, “our project isn’t catching on, how do we promote it better?” The right question is a little more nuanced and far more important, “We’re seeking to make a change in part of the world. How do we find the right people and tell them the right (true) story that...
Blog - Mac Pierce
XL Flex Arms, posable mounting for cameras and lighting. Making a few custom mounts for cameras and camera accessories.
over a year ago
Open Culture
The Olympics in the 2020s Versus 1912: See Side-by-Side Comparisons of the Athletes’ Performance... The Olympic Games have their origins in antiquity, but their modern revival has also been going on...
11 months ago
55
11 months ago
The Olympic Games have their origins in antiquity, but their modern revival has also been going on longer than any of us has been here. Even the fifth Summer Olympics, which took place in Stockholm in 1912, has passed out of living memory. But thanks to the technology of the...
Seth's Blog
Appropriate tension Growth usually feels risky. The feeling is a protection mechanism, a way to avoid failure or even...
a year ago
23
a year ago
Growth usually feels risky. The feeling is a protection mechanism, a way to avoid failure or even the fear of failure. Of course, risk also feels risky (or at least it should). Differentiating between the two is difficult, which is why finding institutions, methods or coaches...
Infinite Scroll
Weekly Scroll: Elon's Endgame Plus! Livestreamers in jail, confused Catholics, and the Immigrant Song
8 months ago
Open Culture
Stanley Kubrick’s Annotated Copy of Stephen King’s The Shining The web site Overlook Hotel has posted pictures of Stanley Kubrick’s personal copy of Stephen King’s...
8 months ago
47
8 months ago
The web site Overlook Hotel has posted pictures of Stanley Kubrick’s personal copy of Stephen King’s novel The Shining. The book is filled with highlighted passages and largely illegible notes in the margin—tantalizing clues to Kubrick’s intentions for the movie. The site...
Seth's Blog
The second time through One way to understand creative work is to think about the time and effort required to do something...
3 months ago
27
3 months ago
One way to understand creative work is to think about the time and effort required to do something the first time versus doing it again. A novel might take five years to write. Retyping it takes a day. A company could easily expend 10,000 hours of effort before launching a new...
Seth's Blog
Jargon comes and goes Forty years ago in engineering class, it wasn’t unusual to talk about GIGO or FUBAR. These weren’t...
a year ago
28
a year ago
Forty years ago in engineering class, it wasn’t unusual to talk about GIGO or FUBAR. These weren’t technical terms, they were mild complaints that signaled insider status and cultural cohesion. In a closed profession, like airplane pilots, the insider jargon lasts for...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Corinne Mangan Hello, I’m Corinne Mangan and I live and work in the beautiful Surrey Hills where I find most of my...
2 weeks ago
16
2 weeks ago
Hello, I’m Corinne Mangan and I live and work in the beautiful Surrey Hills where I find most of my inspiration; I’m currently an Artist in Residence at Ochre Print Studio in Guildford. Describe your printmaking process. I have spent the previous year or so working mostly in...
Infinite Scroll
Get a Discount on Infinite Scroll Limited time! 30% off paid access to Infinite Scroll
8 months ago
Seth's Blog
Intuition Intuition is simply a theory we haven’t yet put into words. Once we write down and share our...
8 months ago
53
8 months ago
Intuition is simply a theory we haven’t yet put into words. Once we write down and share our intuition, it becomes more resilient, focused and useful to others.
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Evelyn Polk I'm a full time abstract artist who primarily uses a range of printmaking techniques to make art and...
a year ago
92
a year ago
I'm a full time abstract artist who primarily uses a range of printmaking techniques to make art and sometimes I mix it up a bit by adding paint or collage to my prints. I teach printmaking classes from my studio at home in Suffolk. Describe your printmaking process. I love to...
Open Culture
The Medieval Masterpiece, the Book of Kells, Is Now Digitized and Available Online If you know nothing else about medieval European illuminated manuscripts, you surely know the Book...
9 months ago
46
9 months ago
If you know nothing else about medieval European illuminated manuscripts, you surely know the Book of Kells. “One of Ireland’s greatest cultural treasures” comments Medievalists.net, “it is set apart from other manuscripts of the same period by the quality of its artwork and the...
Seth's Blog
Your preference is not universal You’re entitled to it, and we will do our best to help you find what you want. But it’s unlikely...
over a year ago
82
over a year ago
You’re entitled to it, and we will do our best to help you find what you want. But it’s unlikely that what you want is what everyone wants. It’s hard to believe that there is only one appropriate standard for value, observance, speed or performance. The easiest way for us to help...
Handprinted - Blog
Choosing Printmaking Paper Choosing the paper for your printmaking project can have a significant impact on the way the print...
a year ago
126
a year ago
Choosing the paper for your printmaking project can have a significant impact on the way the print turns out. Changing the colour, thickness or texture of a paper can alter the mood, style or success of a print - it can be great fun to experiment. Although there are no rules...
Open Culture
Ray Bradbury Explains Why Literature is the Safety Valve of Civilization (in Which Case We Need More... Ray Bradbury had it all thought out. Behind his captivating works of science fiction, there were...
11 months ago
64
11 months ago
Ray Bradbury had it all thought out. Behind his captivating works of science fiction, there were subtle theories about what literature was meant to do. The retro clip above takes you back to the 1970s and it shows Bradbury giving a rather intriguing take on the role of literature...
The Last...
Hunger Games Catching Fire: Badass Body Count sorry old man, I have a dress fitting to go to Number of people killed: 15 Number of...
over a year ago
22
over a year ago
sorry old man, I have a dress fitting to go to Number of people killed: 15 Number of people Katniss kills: 1 Number of times she is saved by someone else: 6 Number of times she saves someone else: 0 But boy oh boy, wasn't she spectacular at practice, 9 targets in 30...
Seth's Blog
How many sparks? That’s the tempting question. How much hustle, hoopla and initiative do we need to get this idea...
7 months ago
61
7 months ago
That’s the tempting question. How much hustle, hoopla and initiative do we need to get this idea ignited in the marketplace… But the much better question is: How much kindling do we have? Kindling doesn’t happen all at once. It’s the result of investments over time. We can earn...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Frankie Brown I’m an illustrator and printmaker based in Portsmouth, Hampshire. I’m inspired by nostalgic...
3 months ago
118
3 months ago
I’m an illustrator and printmaker based in Portsmouth, Hampshire. I’m inspired by nostalgic storybooks and I love to create whimsical hand-printed illustrations. I used to work part-time at Handprinted, but in November 2024 I decided to give being a full-time artist a try! It’s...
Seth's Blog
Which agenda? Every day matters. It seems like a waste to spend one as a to-do list item on someone else’s agenda....
a year ago
88
a year ago
Every day matters. It seems like a waste to spend one as a to-do list item on someone else’s agenda. It’s easy to become so focused on checking the boxes that we forget that there are people involved. Peers, colleagues and friends that with something human to offer, if we only...
Seth's Blog
Abundance and ideas A colleague got an angry note. It concluded with, “you should know better.” The transgression? The...
a year ago
31
a year ago
A colleague got an angry note. It concluded with, “you should know better.” The transgression? The sender was offended that my friend had written a post about a concept she’s been developing for nearly a decade. Of course, no idea is unique, and the posted idea sort of rhymed...
Seth's Blog
The positive auction In 2023, I developed a new idea that transforms an old way of doing commerce. In traditional...
a year ago
35
a year ago
In 2023, I developed a new idea that transforms an old way of doing commerce. In traditional auctions, there are rounds of bidding and the high bidder pays to get the prize. The last bid is the amount paid, and no one else is charged anything. This is an interesting ‘game’ in...
Stat Significant
How Do Music Listening Habits Change With Age? A Statistical Analysis How does music listening change as we grow older?
5 months ago
Seth's Blog
Who do you want to become? Emotional enrollment is at the heart of performance, learning and connection. A coach can quickly...
9 months ago
43
9 months ago
Emotional enrollment is at the heart of performance, learning and connection. A coach can quickly tell when someone is committed to changing their approach in order to change the outcome–it’s easy to tell this person apart from someone who simply wants what they’re already doing...
Seth's Blog
Education is free, learning is expensive That’s a complete reversal of how it used to be. Colleges used to be measured by how many books they...
2 weeks ago
12
2 weeks ago
That’s a complete reversal of how it used to be. Colleges used to be measured by how many books they had in the library. Access to courses was restricted. If knowledge was power, controlling access was essential. They even call it the ‘admissions office.’ Part of the status that...
Seth's Blog
Perfect Nothing is perfect… But everything can get better. There’s never enough time… But there’s time...
2 weeks ago
10
2 weeks ago
Nothing is perfect… But everything can get better. There’s never enough time… But there’s time enough to make a difference. Someone will always be opposed to the change we seek to make. And there’s always someone who wants to help. Anything can happen… But something will.
Prolost
Lightroom Adds Video Color Editing, with Prolost Presets From the Lightroom Blog: The same edit controls that you already use to make your photography shine...
over a year ago
25
over a year ago
From the Lightroom Blog: The same edit controls that you already use to make your photography shine can now be used with your videos as well! Not only can you use Lightroom’s editing capabilities to make your video clips look their best, you can also copy and paste edit settings...
Open Culture
David Lynch Releases on YouTube Interview Project: 121 Stories of Real America Recorded on a... Take a sufficiently long road trip across America, and you’re bound to encounter something or...
9 months ago
54
9 months ago
Take a sufficiently long road trip across America, and you’re bound to encounter something or someone Lynchian. Whether or not that idea lay behind Interview Project, the undertaking had the endorsement of David Lynch himself. Not coincidentally, it was conceived by his son...
Seth's Blog
All species are invasive species Human beings as we know them have only been around for 70,000 years or so. Honeybees got to North...
a year ago
24
a year ago
Human beings as we know them have only been around for 70,000 years or so. Honeybees got to North America around the time Columbus did. And the same is true for technologies and companies. Western Union was an interloper, telegrams were the scary new tech that was going to change...
Seth's Blog
Make or buy? If you’re a writer, it probably doesn’t pay to chop down trees and make your own paper, or even to...
a year ago
28
a year ago
If you’re a writer, it probably doesn’t pay to chop down trees and make your own paper, or even to set up a little machine shop to make your own pens. That’s pretty obvious. Should the smoothie shop make its own almond milk? It’s pretty clear that Starbucks should have a team of...
Open Culture
Watch The Cure Perform a Three-Hour Concert in London, Celebrating the Release of Their New Album httpv://www.youtube.com/live/_aWDlaxvEZo Last Friday, The Cure celebrated the release of their new...
8 months ago
53
8 months ago
httpv://www.youtube.com/live/_aWDlaxvEZo Last Friday, The Cure celebrated the release of their new album, Songs of a Lost World, with a three-hour set at the Troxy in London. The band kicked off the show by performing all eight tracks from the album, before then playing another...
Seth's Blog
Podcasts, international covers and more I just received copies of the new reprints of four of my books in the UK: I’m really pleased at how...
a year ago
48
a year ago
I just received copies of the new reprints of four of my books in the UK: I’m really pleased at how the books have stayed relevant and also delighted at what a good job the publisher did with the reissues. Also, the Italian version of This is Marketing just went back for its 14th...
Infinite Scroll
JOB - A theatrical review A Broadway play about Content Moderation
8 months ago
Open Culture
Watch the Earliest-Known Charles Dickens Film: The Death of Poor Joe A little over a decade ago, a curator at the British Film Institute (BFI) discovered the oldest...
a year ago
47
a year ago
A little over a decade ago, a curator at the British Film Institute (BFI) discovered the oldest surviving film featuring a Charles Dickens character, “The Death of Poor Joe.” The silent film, directed by George Albert Smith in 1900, brings to life Dickens’ character Jo, the...
Seth's Blog
Just looking Lots of people go to the beach but very few get in the water. 3,000 students go to the football game...
a year ago
19
a year ago
Lots of people go to the beach but very few get in the water. 3,000 students go to the football game to watch 20 of their peers play. And we go to a conference to meet people and connect, and then spend most of our time hoping someone else will see us and care enough […]
Seth's Blog
The paradigm flip Paradigm shifts are appealing but rarely well executed. A paradigm is our mental model of the world....
a year ago
31
a year ago
Paradigm shifts are appealing but rarely well executed. A paradigm is our mental model of the world. We’re surrounded by people who share a similar model, and as long as the model is working, we live our lives without thinking much about it. If you lived in a space station, the...
Seth's Blog
Moving toward ease “Ease” isn’t the same as “easy.” In fact, they’re often at odds. Easy work is hardly worth our...
8 months ago
59
8 months ago
“Ease” isn’t the same as “easy.” In fact, they’re often at odds. Easy work is hardly worth our effort. It can deaden us instead of giving us the chance to bring our best selves to life. Ease, on the other hand, is the feeling of doing something worthwhile, and doing it well. When...
Seth's Blog
Can you draw it on a graph? Explain it with quadrants? Translate it into Spanish? It’s easy to memorize a few words that purport...
a year ago
50
a year ago
Explain it with quadrants? Translate it into Spanish? It’s easy to memorize a few words that purport to explain something, but all they do is relabel it. If you truly understand something, you can use different modalities to help someone else understand it. The magic of a good...
Handprinted - Blog
Offset Registration for Multi Block Linocuts Accurate registration can be difficult when printing multi-block linocuts. Offset printing will show...
4 months ago
32
4 months ago
Accurate registration can be difficult when printing multi-block linocuts. Offset printing will show you exactly where your design will sit on each block, allowing you to cut a set of blocks that will print in perfect alignment.  Begin by preparing a registration board. This will...
Seth's Blog
Write for someone It’s so tempting to write for everyone. But everyone isn’t going to read your work, someone is. Can...
10 months ago
72
10 months ago
It’s so tempting to write for everyone. But everyone isn’t going to read your work, someone is. Can you tell me who? Precisely? What did they believe before they encountered your work? What do they want, what do they fear? What has moved them to action in the past? Name the...
Open Culture
Oh My God! Winston Churchill Received the First Ever Letter Containing “O.M.G.” (1917) Winston Churchill is one of those preposterously outsized historical figures who seemed to be in the...
a year ago
67
a year ago
Winston Churchill is one of those preposterously outsized historical figures who seemed to be in the middle of every major event. Even before, as Prime Minister, he steeled the resolve of his people and faced down the Third Reich juggernaut; even before he loudly warned of the...
Seth's Blog
The close proximity gap One of the unmentioned causes of division in much of our culture happens because of the shift in...
a year ago
27
a year ago
One of the unmentioned causes of division in much of our culture happens because of the shift in expectations and rules when we begin to live in close proximity to one another. In a non-crowded setting, the default is independence. The expectation is that you can drive as fast as...
Seth's Blog
But it matters a lot to them… To get to the Kebab House Cafe, you’ll need to drive past a dozen fast food restaurants, restaurants...
a year ago
25
a year ago
To get to the Kebab House Cafe, you’ll need to drive past a dozen fast food restaurants, restaurants you can find off just about any interstate. It’s certainly less convenient to go a few blocks off the beaten path, but the food and service and vibe might be worth it. The thing...
Seth's Blog
Your project is important But that’s not why it’s your project. Lots of things are important. Countless problems need to be...
4 months ago
37
4 months ago
But that’s not why it’s your project. Lots of things are important. Countless problems need to be solved, people need to be connected, a living needs to be made. But this work you’re doing now, the work you’re doing instead of everything else–it’s your project. When we talk about...
Seth's Blog
The prevailing conditions It doesn’t matter how hard you try, you’re not going to change the direction of the wind. That...
10 months ago
66
10 months ago
It doesn’t matter how hard you try, you’re not going to change the direction of the wind. That doesn’t mean you can’t get good at sailing, though. And yes, if we do try, we can change the conditions in our household, community or workplace. It might feel like wind, but it’s...
Seth's Blog
The convenience fee Sometimes it’s obvious, like the $1 that you get charged for using an ATM or a credit card, and it’s...
a year ago
24
a year ago
Sometimes it’s obvious, like the $1 that you get charged for using an ATM or a credit card, and it’s simply not worth the hassle to walk a few blocks. And sometimes it’s not, like the cost we all pay for the conveniently wrapped fruits or vegetables at the market–wrapped in...
Infinite Scroll
Crisis PR for Dummies You too can avoid being cancelled!
2 months ago
Seth's Blog
Promises and our best There is a significant difference between, “I promise,” and “I’ll do my best.” Promises are...
8 months ago
52
8 months ago
There is a significant difference between, “I promise,” and “I’ll do my best.” Promises are difficult to keep and ought to be offered with that in mind. Doing our best is assumed.
Open Culture
How a 16th-Century Explorer’s Sailing Ship Worked: An Animated Video Takes You on a Comprehensive... These days, it feels as if you can’t go very long at all before scrolling past another announcement...
10 months ago
69
10 months ago
These days, it feels as if you can’t go very long at all before scrolling past another announcement about some new technological development (realized or scheduled) related to space exploration. Some react to this by wondering what could possibly be out there in the universe to...
Seth's Blog
The perils of doing it live [Relevant aside: If you get this blog by email, apologies for the glitches of the last few days...
a year ago
39
a year ago
[Relevant aside: If you get this blog by email, apologies for the glitches of the last few days caused by my provider. If you ever see a broken link or something that doesn’t render, you can visit the blog. It always has the latest version, typos fixed. It’s much easier to fix...
Seth's Blog
A thoughtful review Thanks to Francis Wade for emailing me this review of THIS IS STRATEGY. Francis works in strategy,...
8 months ago
60
8 months ago
Thanks to Francis Wade for emailing me this review of THIS IS STRATEGY. Francis works in strategy, and I’m so delighted the book resonated the way it did. Case: You are a corporate strategic planner – someone immersed in defining a future for your organization. But lately, you...
Seth's Blog
Actionable feedback “Do you want to know what I think?” The best answer might be, “no.” Because this person is not very...
over a year ago
30
over a year ago
“Do you want to know what I think?” The best answer might be, “no.” Because this person is not very good at offering useful feedback. Because you didn’t create this product or service or performance to please this person. They’re not the customer. Because you’re not going to...
Open Culture
A Visualization of the History of Technology: 1,889 Innovations Across Three Million Years “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” So holds the third and most...
a week ago
7
a week ago
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” So holds the third and most famous of the “three laws” originally articulated by science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. Even when it was first published in the late nineteen-sixties, Clarke’s third law...
Open Culture
Get Unlimited Access to Courses & Certificates: Coursera Is Offering 40% (or $159) Off of Coursera... A heads-up on a deal: Between today and December 2, 2024, Coursera is offering a 40% discount on its...
8 months ago
30
8 months ago
A heads-up on a deal: Between today and December 2, 2024, Coursera is offering a 40% discount on its annual subscription plan called “Coursera Plus.” Normally priced at $399, Coursera Plus (now available for $239.40) gives you access to 7,000+ courses for one all-inclusive...
Stat Significant
6 Reasons to Be (Cautiously) Optimistic About Movies in 2025: A Statistical Analysis Six reasons to be optimistic about the film industry.
6 months ago
Seth's Blog
Good advice The cult of consulting suggests that if you simply had better advice from someone who knew more than...
5 months ago
54
5 months ago
The cult of consulting suggests that if you simply had better advice from someone who knew more than you, your problems could be solved. Generally, the advice isn’t really the hard part. There’s endless good advice just a click away. The art is in creating the conditions for...
Seth's Blog
Muscling your way through When there’s an overwhelming amount of incoming, it’s possible to bear down and simply get through...
5 months ago
38
5 months ago
When there’s an overwhelming amount of incoming, it’s possible to bear down and simply get through it. 200 emails because of a product launch. A project goes viral and there are a lot of fires to put out. A deadline is imminent and it’s going to be a long night… But when the...
Seth's Blog
Omitting the herbs Without salt, human beings don’t survive long. But it’s possible to eat for a month without tasting...
10 months ago
42
10 months ago
Without salt, human beings don’t survive long. But it’s possible to eat for a month without tasting an herb. The food will sustain you. Herbs are an expensive non-obvious addition, while also being a bargain if the goal is to create delight, interest or satisfaction. As we...
Seth's Blog
Curation (vs the road to junk) The independent bookstore down the street is carefully curated. Each book takes up the spot that a...
a year ago
45
a year ago
The independent bookstore down the street is carefully curated. Each book takes up the spot that a different book could inhabit, so the owner makes sure that there’s a great reason a title is included. Amazon, on the other hand, has no shelf space problem, and the Kindle...
Seth's Blog
The rear view mirror It’s almost impossible to safely drive a car while only looking in the rear view mirror. Only seeing...
over a year ago
136
over a year ago
It’s almost impossible to safely drive a car while only looking in the rear view mirror. Only seeing where you’ve been is a terrible way to figure out where to go. But it’s really unsafe to go forward with no idea of what came before. AI plods along into the future, using machine...
Seth's Blog
The conspiracy of mediocrity Solo mediocrity is rampant, of course. We know that toasting the bread before making the sandwich...
10 months ago
57
10 months ago
Solo mediocrity is rampant, of course. We know that toasting the bread before making the sandwich makes it more delicious, but in service of convenience and speed, we skip a step. It becomes a conspiracy when more than one of us is involved. The freelancer who offers cheap and...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet The Maker: Ariana Martin Hi, I’m Ariana - a pattern designer and printmaker from leafy Sheffield. I create joyful patterns...
a year ago
85
a year ago
Hi, I’m Ariana - a pattern designer and printmaker from leafy Sheffield. I create joyful patterns and illustrations, which are particularly inspired by 20th century design, and I produce my own range of stationery and homewares.     Describe your printmaking process. Screen...
Seth's Blog
Asking for directions It hadn’t happened in such a long time that I hesitated to respond. As I was walking through town, a...
3 months ago
26
3 months ago
It hadn’t happened in such a long time that I hesitated to respond. As I was walking through town, a driver pulled up, rolled down his window and said, “is this the way to Irvington?” We now take for granted that we’re unlikely to ever again be in a car and not know where we […]
Seth's Blog
Possibility and opportunity We have the chance to build something that creates connection and generates value. On the other...
a year ago
26
a year ago
We have the chance to build something that creates connection and generates value. On the other hand, a system that diminishes agency and dignity is inherently unstable. When we seek to create scarcity and control and optimize output at the expense of our humanity, it may pay off...
escape the algorithm
Folk search engines Strategies better than plain Google.
a year ago
Open Culture
The Real Story of Easter: How We Got from the First Easter in the Bible to Bunnies, Eggs & Chocolate Popular culture has long since claimed Easter as an occasion for trickster rabbits, dyed-egg hunts,...
2 months ago
30
2 months ago
Popular culture has long since claimed Easter as an occasion for trickster rabbits, dyed-egg hunts, and marshmallow chicks of unnatural hues — none of which are actually in the Bible. Though that probably doesn’t surprise you, you may not be aware of just how far the modern...
Seth's Blog
Spines out I lost a cookbook the other day. After twenty more minutes of searching, there it was, right on the...
a year ago
27
a year ago
I lost a cookbook the other day. After twenty more minutes of searching, there it was, right on the cookbook shelf. But the spine was much more subtle than the cover, and it hadn’t been what I was looking for or expecting. We spend a lot of time on our (metaphorical) book covers....
Handprinted - Blog
Monotype with Natural Materials Like monoprint, a monotype is a print that is one of a kind but does not use a matrix like a cut...
8 months ago
74
8 months ago
Like monoprint, a monotype is a print that is one of a kind but does not use a matrix like a cut block or plate. For this project we're using this simple technique to produce beautifully delicate prints using natural materials and found objects. You can also combine this with...