Six Links Worthy of Your Attention #485

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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 Californian Ideology – Wikipedia. “Move fast and break things? Huevos and Grits? Surf days beat sick days? No, this is a bit more profound. Is tech—in the Silicon Valley sense—good or bad for society? Turns out that debate is nothing new, and has been raging for at least 25 years. And the Californian Ideology is one of the seminal critiques. It was called ‘a lucid lambasting of right-wing libertarian digerati domination of the Internet,’ and stands up to the test of time. Have fun down this rabbit hole. You can find the full text with a Google.” (Alistair for Hugh).
  • Three Big Things: The Most Important Forces Shaping the World – Collaborative Fund. “Astonishingly, this is probably right. One of the most amazing, profound, and level-headed takes on what shapes the modern world. Forget electric cars or cheap solar or blockchain—these are tectonic shifts. And most of what we consider progress today is a direct outgrowth of World War II. Worth reading several times.” (Alistair for Mitch).
  • Why We’re Drawn Into Darkness – Nautilus. “Nature writer, Robert MacFarlane, talking about his new book about the worlds beneath the ground.” (Hugh for Alistair).
  • Good news: these exoplanets probably have water. Bad news: AHHH SO MUCH WATER. – Popular Science. “Where there is water there is life, is what I always understood – even/especially in space. We’ve found some distant planets with … lots … of water (news to me!). But in the case of TRAPPIST-1, one of these waterworlds with 250 times the amount of water on Earth, the oceans would be so deep that the water would compress into super-ice, and … and something. We don’t know what and… But scientists think this might make it too difficult for life to emerge.” (Hugh for Mitch).
  • The Cheating Scandal Rocking the Poker World – The Ringer. “This is right up your alley, Alistair. Talk about controversy, suspicion and – with all of that – they don’t know how this individual is cheating. They must be cheating. They are cheating. Allegedly. Right? Cheating… but how? What a read…” (Mitch for Alistair).
  • Is Amazon Unstoppable? – The New Yorker. “I usually shy away from mass media features that everyone is passing around. I like the pieces featured here – every week – to be much more ‘deeper.’ With that, here’s a great (and long) read about Amazon and Jeff Bezos. He’s worth over one hundred billion dollars (and growing). Has he mastered capitalism? Is that something that we should celebrate or think about changing? What a long strange trip it has been… and it seems like it’s just getting started. It’s a jungle out there, and that jungle is Amazon. Here’s one of the best (and newest) features on this growing business (concern).” (Mitch for Hugh).

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