Categories: Articles

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #198

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 (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, Solve For Interesting, the author of Complete Web Monitoring, Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks and Lean Analytics), 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:

The Uncomfortable – Facebook. "This set of artifacts, designed by architect, Katerina Kamprani, will drive you bonkers. She takes everyday items, and then changes them to render them completely useless. It’s definitely art. Most of these things could only come from a really twisted, deviant mind. OCD trigger warning." (Alistair for Hugh).
Motivation Wave – BJ Fogg. "As any marketer knows, changing behaviors is hard. Whether you’re trying to improve someone’s health, or convince them to buy your product, changing habits is tough. Stanford‘s BJ Fogg has spent a lot of time researching this in the university’s Persuasive Technology Lab. That ‘persuasive technology’ is a field of study in the first place says a lot about the world in which we live." (Alistair for Mitch).
Demo of Beat It composed using only Michael Jackson’s voice – Rhythm Of The Tide. "I was going to send Alistair an amazing xkcd comic this week (you can look it up on Google: xkcd frequency), but Alistair has probably seen it, and will probably see 22 more amazing xkcd comics this year. Instead, I am sending this, which is more of a one-of-a-kind sort of thing. Michael Jackson, apparently, never truly mastered playing instruments, but he composed and arranged – note for note – in his head. He would record and layer vocals/acapella versions of his songs, using his voice for all the instruments. Here is the amazing vocal arrangement he did for Beat It." (Hugh for Alistair).
A Growing Number of E-Commerce Sites Are Moving Into Print – AdWeek. "You know what technology has great, finely-honed UI and really, really good user engagement? Paper. Here’s a surprising development: web/ecommerce companies starting to put out old fashioned print catalogs." (Hugh for Mitch).
Knowledge transfer between computers: Computers teach each other Pac-Man – Science Daily. "Have they found that plane that’s still missing? I watch CNN relentlessly when I am on the road… and, I was on the road quite a bit this week. I am in no way trying to minimize the fact that this plane must be found (or the tragedy surrounding it for the families), but I’m amazed that the 24-hour news cycle spins a ‘breaking news’ moment of this missing plane with nothing truly ‘breaking’ at all. Instead, stuff like this comes out and you don’t even hear about it. It turns out that computers can actually train each other and teach skills to one another. What? No way! Way." (Mitch for Alistair).
The Wikipedia For Numbers Just Made My Job Easier, But It Needs Your Help To Be Even Better – Business Insider. "Have you ever heard of Meterfy? Me neither. In fact, most people haven’t, so it ain’t as robust as Wikipedia… but it could be. Yes, this is a Wikipedia for numbers. A way for people to post and share anything and everything related to numbers. This is a smart, cool and fun place. I sincerely hope it takes off. A Wikipedia for numbers. Makes sense to me." (Mitch for Hugh).

Now it’s your turn: in the comment section below pick one thing that you saw this week that inspired you and share it.

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.