Is there one link, story or idea that stopped you this week… and made you think, “someone else needs to see this”?
My friends: Alistair Croll (Just Evil Enough, 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 made a simple pact years ago. Once a week, each of us would share one link with the others… something we genuinely believed the other two had to see. No trend-hunting… no performance. Just six ideas exchanged with intent. What started as a small ritual between curious friends became Six Links That Make You Think.
These are the six links we passed to one another this week… take your time with them…
- All The Pixels In New York Are Freezing – Jacob Geller – YouTube. “The video game industry is bigger than TV and movies combines, yet somehow the Oscars and Emmys get all the fanfare. I recently played Mixtape, a 4-hour interactive movie about being a teenager for one night in the nineties, and it was undeniably art. And if you know where to look, there are critiques and essays everywhere. This one is about how New York City has been portrayed in games over the years, and it’s fascinating and poetic.” (Alistair for Hugh).
- They Gave Claude $100,000 To Run A Store. It Did Not Go Well – SciencePetr – YouTube. “How autonomous is AI? Andon Labs gave Claude a 3-year lease and put it to work. It chose the inventory, hired the painters, and even recruited an employee. Dystopian? Maybe. Funny? Kinda. Enjoyable? Not really.” (Alistair for Mitch).
- More Than A Hundred “Floating” Plants Form The Front Of This Vietnamese Home – Grace Bernard – Dwell. “I don’t think this is AI, but even if it is i would like to live here. However, I would add some cushions to the couch.” (Hugh for Alistair).
- Even Machine Brains Need Sleep – Katherine Harmon Courage – Nautilus. “Turns out that even your favourite AI model needs a nap once in a while.” (Hugh for Mitch).
- Who Will Actually Thrive In The Hybrid AI-Human Work Force – The New York Times Magazine. “I’m continually thinking deeply about what we are being told about AI and what that means for humans (and the work that we do). How can there not be backlash? Think about it this way: you work as a middle manager with an organization. Your organization is telling you that everything has changed. Every process, every technology is going to change, and that everything must be AI-first. It’s not just the technology you use, but the actual work you do that is being questioned. A corporate system that has told you to follow a process, to follow a process, to hit your OKRs. Now it turns out that AI might be able to not just learn, but be able to handle that work. If you don’t use it, odds are you will be fired. If you do use it, odds are your cognition might slip and your skill and experience might no longer be expanding the way it should. At the same time, you’re also being told AI could be more destructive or potentially more valuable, but mostly to the company and not to you, as an individual within the organization. You’re also being told that your kids are screwed… that entry-level jobs are disappearing… and that what we have understood as knowledge work may not be accessible to them because of this new and profound technology. So… what is the AI promise from the hyperscalers? Who does it help? Who does it serve?Are we actually be surprised at all by the lack of excitement around this? Well, here’s some interesting perspectives… how open to you think our culture is or will be to this future?” (Mitch for Alistair).
- Ziplink Is Now Froggle – The Harris Alterman – Instagram. “I mean… this is hilarious… right?” (Mitch for Hugh).
If one of these sticks with you, pass it on… and let us know what earned your attention this week…
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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.