October 2009
27 posts
WatchThe Wire is like Shakespeare. No matter what you’re experiencing, you can find a line or a scene that makes sense of what you’re going through. Obviously the parallels here only extend as far as the first line - ‘I feel old’. But you get where I’m going.
“Strategy needs to be flexible: it needs room to move. You can’t think of every...”
– Kripy
Julieta Venegas
When I was living in Mexico, this was a really big chart album. I first heard it playing on a stereo in a cemetery on the night of the El Día de los Muertos. ‘Lento’ was the first song I’d heard in Spanish where I could instantly make out every word of the chorus.
When you’re learning a new language, there some moments like that, where words just becomes clear.
...
Georges Polti's 36 Dramatic Situations →
This is an exhaustive list of enduring and real human dilemmas.
https://www.getdropbox.com/
From Y Combinator to Sequoia. This looks like the start of a great story.
“In advertising, and also editorial, when people have 2 days, the briefing is...”
– The 99%
“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be...”
– Steve Jobs (via hrrrthrrr)
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.”
– Ghandi (via davemorin) (via tedr) (via mikehudack)
“The messages that received the highest scores had three things in common: they...”
– Jakob Nielsen on user satisfaction with corporate communications via social media.
Vonnegut' 8 rules for writing a short story.
Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.
Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.
Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.
Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action.
Start as close to the end as possible.
Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and...
The Problem With Facebook
I know the story on Facebook has shifted and people are going crazy about time on site, user growth, how it’s the fourth biggest country in the world, it’s revenue spike in the last 12 months etc. etc.
This isn’t to dispute any of the above points.
It’s simply to state that Facebook is no longer useful to me.
My Facebook inbox is full of stuff I don’t want from people I don’t know.
My...
“Uncertain ends, confident means is about as good a general definition of...”
– Caterina
“No one experiment is going to replace what we are now losing with the demise of...”
– Clay Shirky
A Great Example of New News
This article on the Jerkin’ dance craze by Jeff Weiss, accompanied by this documentary.
Crazy. Crazy. Crazy. Obvious.
The process it takes to get new game-changing ideas adopted by the mainstream.
On Long Term Value
While running with my friend and regular advisor Simon Kalinowski recently, he said something really smart.
In any business, the only long-term, irreplaceable skills are:
Leadership.
Management.
Strategy.
Commercial savvy (good business skills he called it) - Having the capability to look at and break apart any business in a structured way.
Everything else - legal, design, accounting is a...
20 Thoughts On The NRL Grand Final
Jarryd Hayne, the world’s best player? How wrong I was. The world’s best player is Greg Inglis. A try, the winning field goal, outstanding defence, dangerous every time he touched the ball. He looked so superior to Hayne or Slater. It was quite stunning.
Hayne was swamped. 3 or 4 men in the tackle every time. His kick returns were average and he never looked threatening, even...
September 2009
8 posts
WatchWow.
