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Six Links Worthy of Your Attention #477

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, 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:

The Economist Who Would Fix the American Dream – The Atlantic. “I love how data clarifies things. Raj Chetty has been working with data around upward mobility, and the results are striking: You can’t really get there from here, particularly if you’re a visible minority. But what sets this apart is he isn’t just reporting bleak news—he’s offering actual solutions. As it turns out, where you live and how soon you move there has a dramatic effect on your prospects in life. He has answers; are we willing to act on them?” (Alistair for Hugh).
Fermi Paradox – Mercury – 60fps – Demoscene High Quality Videos – YouTube. “I think I’ve said before that I’m a huge fan of the Demo scene. Back in the days of cracked software for the Apple ][ and IBM PC, hackers created astonishingly good audiovisual introductions to their cracks that ran in a tiny amount of computer memory. Today, that scene continues—with the only constraint being that your code needs to run in 64K. To put that in perspective, if you have an 8MB photograph, you can fit the code for 125,000 of these in it. Have a look at this video and tell me that ain’t magic.” (Alistair for Mitch).
Why We Can’t Fall Asleep – The New Yorker. “The latest research on sleeping, and why we’re doing less of it.” (Hugh for Alistair).
Why Washing Machines Are Learning to Play the Harp – The Atlantic. “Inside the world of appliance jingle composers: ‘We create a holistic experience that brings about better well-being.’” (Hugh for Mitch).
Why speaking to yourself in the third person makes you wiser – Aeon. “I could never appreciate it when people spoke about themselves in the third person. It was the stuff that stand-up comedians made fun of. It was the stuff that you would see football players do in televised interviews, and it made them look (and sound) much stupider (which was – often times – pretty hard to do). Research shows that it may be a much healthier way to live and deal with our issues. Who would have thunk? Mitch Joel would not have thunk.” (Mitch for Alistair).
A Novelist Teaches Herself Physics – Nautilus. “Talk about diving head first into your work. When Nell Freudenberger was writing her recent novel, Lost And Wanted, she had an angle to write about physics. Much like an author would go and live in a foreign country to capture its essence in words, Freudenberger learned physics… and, according to some of the top physicists in the world, she got it right. Dedication to the craft. That’s what I love about the great writers.” (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.