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Six Links Worthy of Your Attention #434

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, HBS, chair of Strata, Startupfest, Pandemonio, and ResolveTO, Author of Lean Analytics and some other books), Hugh McGuire (PressBooks, LibriVox, iambik and co-author of Book: A Futurist’s Manifesto) 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:

Bitcoin Must Die – Slugger O Toole. “My links this week are about technology and ignoring things. I’m just recovering from running ScaleTechConf in Toronto, and Supriya Syal talked about how hard changing minds is. In one of her slides she explained how we dislike a false action over a false inaction — that is, we significantly prefer not doing something we should over doing something we shouldn’t. We are wired for inaction. So, in the first of two, I’m going to talk about how Bitcoin’s power-hungry proof of work is awful. Stopping cryptocurrency mining would *immediately* give us an extra year to meet climate change goals. Ouch.” (Alistair for Hugh).
What’s another way to say ‘we’re f*cked?’ – Rolling Stone. “Hoo, boy. Picture a hurricane where storm surge doesn’t roll back. That’s the grim picture that climate change is painting. Sadly, we don’t look at long-term threats. As we say no to a plastic straw and pat ourselves on the back, the world is flooding.” (Alistair for Mitch).
A Map Of Every Building In America – The New York Times. “Stunning data / article / visualization of every building (!!!!) in the US of A.” (Hugh for Alistair).
Here’s Where the Post-Apocalyptic Water Wars Will Be Fought – Earther. “I try very hard to find non-depressing links for you every week, and every week I fail. Here’s the latest, about hotspots in the world where we’re likely to see major conflict due to water shortages. Good news? Canada looks pretty blue/green. Bad news? We’re next to a country filled with guns, nukes, and a giant parched centre.” (Hugh for Mitch).
5 Tenets That Will Establish Mutual Trust Between Humans and AI – Inc. “I’m not sure this is possible. Right now, machine learning and AI is doing the work that was relegated to humans. It’s also getting better and faster at it than any of us can possibly understand. We tend to think about ‘how’ businesses may be using artificial intelligence today. We don’t focus on who is already doing it, what the results are, and how it’s changing who corporations need to hire (which, ultimately, is ‘less people’). Can’t we all just get along? I think this may be a hard hill for humanity to climb, when AI truly does hit its stride. Which, of course, will happen sooner than any of us are prepared for.” (Mitch for Alistair).
When Things Go Missing – The New Yorker. “In a weird-ish spin on what I usually write, I don’t want to say anything about this article. I just want you to read it. It’s well-written… it’s deep… and there is meaning. I think Rishad Tobaccowala introduced this one to me?” (Mitch for Hugh).

Feel free to share these links and add your picks on Twitter, Facebook, in the comments below or wherever you play.

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.