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Seth's Blog
Getting AI to do your work That’s the first step, certainly. If you don’t, your boss will. The second step is to take the time...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
That’s the first step, certainly. If you don’t, your boss will. The second step is to take the time you’ve freed up and do work that the AI can’t do.
Open Culture
How Audrey Hepburn Risked Death to Help the Dutch Resistance in World War II Audrey Hepburn may not have had the most prolific Hollywood career, but a fair few of her characters...
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Audrey Hepburn may not have had the most prolific Hollywood career, but a fair few of her characters still feel today like roles she was born to play. Perhaps the same could have been true of the part of Anne Frank, had she not refused to take it up. When Anne’s father Otto Frank...
Stat Significant
Who's the Worst Actor in Movie History? A Statistical Analysis Who's the worst actor of all time, and why?
11 months ago
Open Culture
13 Experimental Animations of Osamu Tezuka, “the Godfather of Manga” (1964–1987) If you enjoy modern Japanese animation, you can no doubt name several masterpieces of the form off...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
If you enjoy modern Japanese animation, you can no doubt name several masterpieces of the form off the top of your head, whether acclaimed series like Neon Genesis Evangelion and Cowboy Bebop to the work of cinema auteurs like Satoshi Kon and Hayao Miyazaki. What may cross your...
Seth's Blog
Better pockets Every coat needs better pockets. There are categories of products or services where there’s a...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Every coat needs better pockets. There are categories of products or services where there’s a universal area for improvement. When in doubt, make the pockets better. The interesting work is in realizing that you might offer a product or service where there are non-universal...
Open Culture
Death: A Free Online Philosophy Course from Yale Helps You Grapple with the Inescapable It pays to think intelligently about the inevitable. And this course taught by Yale professor Shelly...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
It pays to think intelligently about the inevitable. And this course taught by Yale professor Shelly Kagan does just that, taking a rich, philosophical look at death. Here’s how the course description reads: There is one thing I can be sure of: I am going to die. But what am I to...
Seth's Blog
When did we lose consciousness? In medical TV dramas, losing consciousness is something that happens suddenly and dramatically. We...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
In medical TV dramas, losing consciousness is something that happens suddenly and dramatically. We can all tell… the body is still there, but the mind is gone, at least for now. Unfortunately, this happens in real life. At work. In our personal lives. For a few minutes or even a...
Open Culture
Michio Kaku Demystifies the God Equation: The Key to Understanding Everything It speaks to the importance of discoveries in physics over the past few generations that even the...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
It speaks to the importance of discoveries in physics over the past few generations that even the disinterested layman has heard of the field’s central challenge. In brief, there exist two separate systems: general relativity, which describes the physics of space, time, and...
Seth's Blog
Celebrating the thousand with a special package [Lots of links in this post… US offer is here, international is here.] Ideas travel horizontally....
11 months ago
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[Lots of links in this post… US offer is here, international is here.] Ideas travel horizontally. Not from the creator to the audience as much as from one person to another. It’s easy to misunderstand the insight of Kevin Kelly’s 1,000 True Fans. Decades ago he argued that the...
Open Culture
Watch The Idea, the First Animated Film to Deal with Big, Philosophical Ideas (1932) A vague sense of disquiet settled over Europe in the period between World War I and World War II. As...
11 months ago
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A vague sense of disquiet settled over Europe in the period between World War I and World War II. As the slow burn of militant ultranationalism mingled with jingoist populism, authoritarian leaders and fascist factions found mounting support among a citizenry hungry for...
cabel.com
Thank Goodness I’ve Written Some Ad Music This summer, a new video game came out that changed the way we think about comedy in games, becoming...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
This summer, a new video game came out that changed the way we think about comedy in games, becoming an instant smash hit in the process. That’s right, I’m talking about Thank Goodness You’re Here! from Coal Supper. Ok, yeah, sure, I work for Panic and we published the game, so I...
Seth's Blog
A labor of love That’s magical. To have the resources to expend labor on something that fills us with joy. If you’re...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
That’s magical. To have the resources to expend labor on something that fills us with joy. If you’re lucky enough to encounter this, perhaps it makes sense not to confuse the issue by also trying to turn it into labor for maximum profit. When we focus on one, we often decrease...
Anarchy Unfolds
Pride, noise, and fear Sleep deprivation is a social justice and public health issue
11 months ago
Seth's Blog
The bitterness loop Spoiled leads to bitter. A sense of entitlement is a trap, because bitterness demands more evidence...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Spoiled leads to bitter. A sense of entitlement is a trap, because bitterness demands more evidence and seeks to maintain dominance over the other emotions. When we’re busy looking for more reasons to be bitter, we’re not taking the time to do generative work, to connect and to...
Open Culture
How 2001: A Space Odyssey Became “the Hardest Film Kubrick Ever Made” Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey has been praised in all manner of terms since it came out...
11 months ago
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Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey has been praised in all manner of terms since it came out more than half a century ago. An early advertising campaign, tapping into the enthusiasm of the contemporary counterculture, called it “the ultimate trip”; in the equivalently trendy...
The Great Discontent...
Brad Montague Brad Montague is an illustrator, speaker, picture book author, video creator, and all-around maker....
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Brad Montague is an illustrator, speaker, picture book author, video creator, and all-around maker. He’s a self-proclaimed dreamer and doer. Above all, he’s a storyteller, “working to create a better world for kids with kids” through Montague Workshop, the creative studio he runs...
Open Culture
Every Frame a Painting Returns to YouTube & Explores Why the Sustained Two-Shot Vanished from Movies Video essayists don’t normally retire; in most cases, they just drift into inactivity. Hence the...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Video essayists don’t normally retire; in most cases, they just drift into inactivity. Hence the surprise and even dismay of the internet’s cinephiles when Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos declared the end of their respected channel Every Frame a Painting in 2016. We here at Open...
Seth's Blog
Empathy at a distance … is almost as difficult as empathy up close. That person that’s not like you, from way over there,...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
… is almost as difficult as empathy up close. That person that’s not like you, from way over there, the one that’s on the other team–it’s hard to imagine what they’re dealing with. They don’t believe what you believe, they haven’t experienced what you’ve experienced. And the...
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...
11 months ago
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11 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...
Handprinted - Blog
Meet the Maker: Gemma Berenguer (Monostereo) My name is Gemma Berenguer and I'm from Barcelona. I'm a printmaker specialising in screen printing,...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
My name is Gemma Berenguer and I'm from Barcelona. I'm a printmaker specialising in screen printing, although I also dabble in etching and block printing as well. I run Monostereo, a screen printing company in Barcelona, which has been operating for 15 years now.  I first...
Stat Significant
How Are Hit Songs Rediscovered Decades Later? A Statistical Analysis How does music undergo a cultural revival long after its original release?
11 months ago
Seth's Blog
Compared to perfect Perfect is useful. It’s an absolute measure, a north star, a chance to improve our work. But it’s...
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11 months ago
Perfect is useful. It’s an absolute measure, a north star, a chance to improve our work. But it’s also a shortcut to persistent dissatisfaction. Compared to perfect is helpful when we’re creating something. But it’s also worth noting that perfect is unattainable. What’s on offer...
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...
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11 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...
Seth's Blog
Practical approaches for more effective teamwork Give credit, take responsibility Get aligned on timeframes Insist on a spec, write one, improve it...
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Give credit, take responsibility Get aligned on timeframes Insist on a spec, write one, improve it Agree on a budget Keep a calendar Don’t hold a grudge Speak up clearly and generously Show your work Share your fears Make promises and keep them Do the reading Talk about people...
Open Culture
Behold the First American Board Game, Travellers’ Tour Through the United States (1822) Asked to name a classic American board game, most of us would first think of Monopoly, whose imagery...
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Asked to name a classic American board game, most of us would first think of Monopoly, whose imagery and verbiage — Park Place, Rich Uncle Pennybags, “Do not pass go” — has worked its way deep into the culture since Parker Brothers brought it to market in 1935. Despite that, it...
Seth's Blog
The conspiracy of mediocrity Solo mediocrity is rampant, of course. We know that toasting the bread before making the sandwich...
11 months ago
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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...
Open Culture
Download 1,000+ Digitized Tapes of Sounds from Classic Hollywood Films & TV, Courtesy of the... Watch enough classic movies — especially classic movies from slightly downmarket studios — and...
11 months ago
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Watch enough classic movies — especially classic movies from slightly downmarket studios — and you’ll swear you’ve been hearing the very same sound effects over and over again. That’s because you have been hearing the very same sound effects over and over again: once recorded or...
Seth's Blog
Your audiobook Here’s a useful habit that’s more than a hack… The next time things are going well, when a project...
11 months ago
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11 months ago
Here’s a useful habit that’s more than a hack… The next time things are going well, when a project is about to launch, when a meeting has been successful, when the sun is shining… take your phone and go for a walk. Hit record on an audio app and make a twenty-minute audiobook....
Open Culture
Browse 64 Years of RadioShack Catalogs Free Online … and Revisit the History of American Consumer... “I bet RadioShack was great once,” writes former employee Jon Bois in a much-circulated 2014 piece...
11 months ago
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“I bet RadioShack was great once,” writes former employee Jon Bois in a much-circulated 2014 piece for SB Nation. “I can’t look through their decades-old catalogs and come away with any other impression. They sold giant walnut-wood speakers I’d kill to have today. They sold...
Seth's Blog
Redefining a profession Pharmacists used to mix chemicals by hand to create prescriptions. Opticians used to grind lenses...
12 months ago
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Pharmacists used to mix chemicals by hand to create prescriptions. Opticians used to grind lenses from scratch. Lawyers used to start with an empty page. Graphic designers needed to know how to draw. All of these jobs are still important. None of them are the same as they were...
Handprinted - Blog
Making an Aluminium Plate Etching We recently covered in our blog how to make marks on etching plates using tools and resists. Now...
12 months ago
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12 months ago
We recently covered in our blog how to make marks on etching plates using tools and resists. Now we’re going to put together what we’ve learnt to create a print! This blog is part of a series featuring tips and techniques to get you started with aluminium or zinc plate etching....
Open Culture
Solving a 2,500-Year-Old Puzzle: How a Cambridge Student Cracked an Ancient Sanskrit Code If you find yourself grappling with an intellectual problem that’s gone unsolved for millennia, try...
12 months ago
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If you find yourself grappling with an intellectual problem that’s gone unsolved for millennia, try taking a few months off and spending them on activities like swimming and meditating. That very strategy worked for a Cambridge PhD student named Rishi Rajpopat, who, after a...
Stat Significant
The Fall and Rise of Nicolas Cage: A Statistical Analysis Nicolas Cage: A Data Story
12 months ago
Open Culture
Frank Lloyd Wright Thought About Making the Guggenheim Museum Pink Image via The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives Seen today, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,...
12 months ago
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12 months ago
Image via The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives Seen today, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, seems to occupy several time periods at once, looking both modern and somehow ancient. The latter quality surely has to do with its bright white...
Handprinted - Blog
Separating Your Colour Layers for CMYK Screen Printing CMYK screen printing is a great way of bringing both your photographic and coloured art images to...
12 months ago
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CMYK screen printing is a great way of bringing both your photographic and coloured art images to life through colour separation. This is achieved by layering four colours (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black) on top of each other using only 4 screens. Photoshop plays a key role in...
Seth's Blog
Brighten up a room (just by leaving it) Moving into your kid’s college dorm isn’t going to make the experience better...
12 months ago
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(just by leaving it) Moving into your kid’s college dorm isn’t going to make the experience better for anyone. A smart founder leaves her company in a moment when it actually does better without her. The expectation that secession is failure causes a lot of damage. If you really...
Open Culture
Is Andrew Huberman Ruining Your Morning Coffee Routine? Andrew Huberman–the host of the influential Huberman Lab podcast–has gotten a lot of mileage out of...
12 months ago
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12 months ago
Andrew Huberman–the host of the influential Huberman Lab podcast–has gotten a lot of mileage out of his recommended morning routine. His routine emphasizes the importance of getting sunlight within 30–60 minutes of waking; also engaging in light physical activity; hydrating well;...
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...
12 months ago
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12 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
The 11 Censored Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies Cartoons That Haven’t Been Aired Since 1968 For decades and decades, Warner Bros.’ Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons have served as a...
12 months ago
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For decades and decades, Warner Bros.’ Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons have served as a kind of default children’s entertainment. Originally conceived for theatrical exhibition in the nineteen-thirties, they were animated to a standard that held its own against the...
Seth's Blog
The steep part of the mountain The end of the trail is usually difficult, but without the long and winding approach, there isn’t...
12 months ago
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The end of the trail is usually difficult, but without the long and winding approach, there isn’t much of a mountain. The greatest hits reel and the stunning photographs leave out most of the hard work. There’s a lot to be said for showing up, one foot in front of the other. In...
Open Culture
How Marcel Duchamp Signed a Urinal in 1917 & Redefined Art Marcel Duchamp didn’t sign his name on a urinal for lack of ability to create “real” art. In fact,...
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Marcel Duchamp didn’t sign his name on a urinal for lack of ability to create “real” art. In fact, as explained by gallerist-Youtuber James Payne in the new Great Art Explained video above, Duchamp’s grandfather was an artist, as were three of his siblings; he himself attained...
Seth's Blog
“How can I help?” If you have a series of tasks to do, it’s easier to ignore this question and simply get back to...
12 months ago
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If you have a series of tasks to do, it’s easier to ignore this question and simply get back to work. Doing the tasks is more efficient than coordinating the help. But if your work is a project, a bigger mission that involves making a change happen, it’s much more productive to...
Open Culture
Hear the Evolution of the London Accent Over 660 Years: From 1346 to 2006 Read a novel by Charles Dickens, and you’ll still today feel transported back to the London of the...
a year ago
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a year ago
Read a novel by Charles Dickens, and you’ll still today feel transported back to the London of the eighteen-twenties. Some of that experience owes to his lavishly reportorial descriptive skills, but even more to his way with dialogue. Dickens faithfully captured the vocabulary of...
Seth's Blog
The missing file It contained some of my best writing. Cogent, clear and powerful. I found it. It wasn’t nearly as...
a year ago
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a year ago
It contained some of my best writing. Cogent, clear and powerful. I found it. It wasn’t nearly as good as I remembered. In fact, it was hardly useful. The opposite happens with the things we fear. When they show up, they’re likely to be a lot less fearsome than we imagined.
Open Culture
George Orwell Reviews Mein Kampf: “He Envisages a Horrible Brainless Empire” (1940) Christopher Hitchens once wrote that there were three major issues of the twentieth century —...
a year ago
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a year ago
Christopher Hitchens once wrote that there were three major issues of the twentieth century — imperialism, fascism, and Stalinism — and George Orwell proved to be right about all of them. Orwell displays his remarkable foresight in a fascinating book review, published in March...
Seth's Blog
Knowing your customers In the very small business, the freelancer knows each customer. By name, by volume, by preferences....
a year ago
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a year ago
In the very small business, the freelancer knows each customer. By name, by volume, by preferences. And in the huge business, expensive software, data analysts and relentless margin seeking pushes organizations to increase their yield. But most businesses (and non-profits and...
Open Culture
How the Oldest Company in the World, Japan’s Temple-Builder Kongō Gumi, Has Survived Nearly 1,500... Image from New York Public Library, via Wikimedia Commons If you visit Osaka, you’ll be urged to see...
a year ago
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a year ago
Image from New York Public Library, via Wikimedia Commons If you visit Osaka, you’ll be urged to see two old buildings in particular: Osaka Castle and Shitennō-ji (above), Japan’s first Buddhist temple. In beholding both, you’ll behold the work of construction firm Kongō Gumi...
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...
a year ago
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a year 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
When Samuel Beckett Drove Young André the Giant to School Are your idle moments spent inventing imaginary conversations between strange bedfellows? The sort...
a year ago
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a year ago
Are your idle moments spent inventing imaginary conversations between strange bedfellows? The sort of conversation that might transpire in a pickup truck belonging to Samuel Beckett, say, were the Irish playwright to chauffeur the child André Rene Roussimoff—aka pro wrestler...
Stat Significant
Gender Representation in the Film Industry: A Statistical Analysis Tracking the evolution of gender representation in acting, directing, and producing.
a year ago