Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?
My friends: Alistair Croll (Solve for Interesting, Tilt the Windmill, Interesting Bits, HBS, chair of Strata, Startupfest, FWD50, and Scaletechconf; author of Lean Analytics and some other books), Hugh McGuire (Rebus Foundation, PressBooks, LibriVox) and I decided that every week the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person “must see.”
Check out these six links that we’re recommending to one another:
- FreakTakes. “Invention doesn’t happen by accident. This amazing blog has a whole series of posts on innovation with titles like, ‘How did places like Bell Labs know how to ask the right questions?‘ and ‘Tales of Edison’s Lab.’ We spend so much time in innovation theater, glorifying VCs and accelerators, that we forget what the Old Ways were like: Skunkworks, industrialized research, and academics thrust into labs by wartime.” (Alistair for Hugh).
- End The Phone-Based Childhood Now – The Atlantic. “A topic the three of us have discussed at length, tackled head-on by one of my favorite writers and, I would say, one of the most important voices about technology and the human mind. Jonathan Haidt lays it out plainly: We have wrought a huge social experiment, with no control group, on hundreds of millions of unwilling, uninformed, under-aged test subjects, and now we’re paying the price.” (Alistair for Mitch).
- The Coddling Of The American Undergraduate – The Hedgehog Review. “I suppose when your parents are paying $100k/year in tuition, they want their investment to pay off. If that requires coddling, so be it. Still at some point, even future masters of the universe need to become independent adults.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- Why Chatbots Are Not the Future – Amelia Wattenberger. “ChatGPT continues to amaze me with the curious ways it is wonderful, and the strange ways it is terrible. Amelia Wattenberger, a UX designer, who is building LLM interfaces at GitHub, explains why chatbots are not the answer. 100% agree.” (Hugh for Mitch).
- Strategy & Artificial Intelligence – Roger Martin. “I subscribe to a lot of newsletters. I scan everyone. I save some stuff to Pocket. I graze through others. Then… there are a select few that I am genuinely excited for because they challenge me to slow down, read, take notes and allow the thinking to ferment in my noggin. Roger Martin’s weekly articles are the prototype of the ones that I look forward to making a coffee and taking a moment before I start my day. This is a great example of his work (and his most recent article). Roger (who has been a guest on my podcast a few times… here’s this last appearance from 2022: SPOS #826 – Roger Martin On A New Way To Think) tackles the business strategy opportunity (and concern) for artificial intelligence. Large language models will, without question, accelerate the transition of knowledge, but if the output of generative AI is average results that tend to focus more the common outcomes instead of the exceptional ones, this could dilute the quality of solutions. Roger’s answer? We need to develop unique and valuable heuristics to remain relevant (and employable) in a market that is becoming increasingly influenced by artificial intelligence. AI, as we all know, is providing businesses with transformative potential, but there are many current limitations. If we apply AI too broadly and quickly to our business models, we might sacrifice good for great.” (Mitch for Alistair).
- Sam Altman – OpenAI, GPT-5, Sora, Board Saga, Elon Musk, Ilya, Power & AGI – Lex Fridman Podcast #419. “I am a sucker for these conversations. Sam Altman from OpenAI is back on the Lex Fridman Podcast for a two hour long conversation about the state of artificial intelligence… and every nuance within the landscape of this rapidly evolving technology. From Altman: ‘I think compute is going to be the currency of the future. I think it’ll be maybe the most precious commodity in the world. I expect that by the end of this decade, and possibly somewhat sooner than that, we will have quite capable systems that we look at and say, ‘Wow, that’s really remarkable.’ The road to AGI should be a giant power struggle. I expect that to be the case.’ There is so much to think about in this conversation… and it’s not just for people interested in tech. In fact, it’s probably more relevant for your day to day work/life than you might realize…” (Mitch for Hugh).
Feel free to share these links and add your picks on X, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.
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Mitch Joel Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.