May 2013
10 posts
John-Paul Flintoff: The Quantified self →
nancyhd:
“QS is a kind of secular ritual. To be meaningful, it can’t be carried out on our behalf by gadgets. ”
There are many interesting ideas and questions in this fabulous essay on the Quantified Self by John-Paul Flintoff, but my favorite is: If we design perfect monitors that record without any effort, will we lose the mindfulness benefit of the “ritual” of self-tracking? Does the...
““I’m the worst kinda celebrity, because all I do is make music.
All I do is...”
– Kanye (via yancey)
Ronen found the longer version of the Kanye rant that makes it even more awesome. (via msg)
“It’s about moments in life that are great but don’t last. They don’t go on, but...”
– Sofia Coppola on Lost In Translation (via stoweboyd)
“Here’s a current example of the challenge we face,” he writes in the book’s...”
– Jaron Lanier: The Internet destroyed the middle class - Salon.com
I like Jaron Lanier a lot, but this illustration as some sort of evidence of the internet hollowing out the middle class is, forgive me for saying so, idiotic. A child could figure out where those jobs went.
1) Instagram SHOWS the...
“Baumeister suggests many strategies for increasing self-control. One of these...”
– Riffing off psychologist Roy Baumeister’s fantastic book Willpower, Erin Rooney Doland advocates for learning new habits by starting small in an excerpt from the forthcoming 99U anthology Manage Your Day-to-Day.
Also see how to rewire your habit loops. Because, as William James knew, habit is...
“The people we tend to admire most are the ones who live their lives without...”
– No Regrets blog post from Ann Mehl (via oats)
April 2013
16 posts
Build Habits in 1,000 Steps: Our Interview with...
liftworldwide:
“I am very much against the idea of a tiny habit.” ~ Buster Benson
Tony sat down with Buster Benson to debate the best strategies for reaching your goals. Buster spent the last 10 years helping people build good habits as founder of 43 Things, Health Month and 750 Words. Watch the video to learn:
His 1,000 step strategy...
“Cheerfulness, unaffected cheerfulness, a sincere desire to please and be...”
– The art of conversation, 1866 (via explore-blog)
“There is no value in life except what you choose to place upon it and no...”
– Henry David Thoreau (via stoweboyd)
betaworks: Betas Work →
betaworks:
The past few months have been a little extra-busy at betaworks. While our studio companies continue to grow at a fast pace, a handful of builders (hackers in residence) have been heads-down creating a new wave of products.
Now, we’re entering a new stage of building that we’re very excited to…
This is rad.
“Not to be all “Merlin Mann” or anything, but, maybe somebody will find this...”
– kung fu grippe: On Chasing the Right “Zero”
“Embedded in the game is a classic immigrant story. Mario and Luigi are Italians...”
– The Strange Case of the Super Mario Bros. Movie - Grantland (via Jason Goldman)
I have a longstanding fondness for tales of moviemaking disaster (“Hearts of Darkness,” about the torturous production of “Apocalypse Now,” is one of my all-time favorite documentaries), and this article about 1993’s...
“This future is going to happen – and it is too late to debate. However, the...”
– Why Facebook Home bothers me: It destroys any notion of privacy — Tech News and Analysis (via soxiam)
The air of resigned inevitability around invasive new technologies like Facebook Home and Google Glass is getting a bit depressing.
(via buzz)
What is the worst case scenario of a world where all...
“There are nine or so principles to work in a world like this:
1. Resilience...”
– Resiliency, Risk, and a Good Compass: Tools for the Coming Chaos | Wired Business | Wired.com
Notably, Joi talks specifically of applying startup-style thinking to conventional institutions, using landmine remediation efforts as an example. (via anil)
March 2013
20 posts
Three eras of currency
cdixon:
Commodity based, e.g. Gold
Politically based, e.g. Dollar
Math based, e.g. Bitcoin
“I said that the world is absurd, but I was too hasty. This world in itself is...”
– Albert Camus (via fuckyeahexistentialism)
The Fresh Ten Commandments: The Fresh Ten →
thefreshten:
Recent events have made it clear that we are suffering from a broken moral compass. People today could use some general guidance.
Since the original ten commandments seem somewhat narrow and obsolete (too much focus on livestock, servants, and jealous god issues), here is a modest first…
What Really Smart People Worry About At Night →
nevver:
The proliferation of Chinese eugenics. – Geoffrey Miller, evolutionary psychologist.
Black swan events, and the fact that we continue to rely on models that have been proven fraudulent. – Nassem Nicholas Taleb
That we will be unable to defeat viruses by learning to push them beyond the error catastrophe threshold. – William McEwan, molecular biology researcher
That...
“Shaped a little like a loaf of French country bread, our brain is a crowded...”
– Diane Ackerman (from Chapter 8 in Kurzweil’s How to Create a Mind)
“Any data scientist worth their salary will tell you that you should start with a...”
– Jake Porway on how You Can’t Just Hack Your Way to Social Change (via adamlaiacano)
I don’t think this problem is restricted to data hackathons. (via buzz)
February 2013
10 posts
“In science it often happens that scientists say, ‘You know that’s a really good...”
– Carl Sagan (via subatomiconsciousness)
“If a rabbit defined intelligence the way man does, then the most intelligent...”
– Robert Brault (via wordsmith) 