Categories: Articles

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #211

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:

Your Life in Weeks – Wait But Why. "As I climb halfway through my life, I’m feeling increasingly creaky and mortal, a fact only reinforced by the knowledge that I’ve already outlived my father. I found this sobering look at the average human lifetime interesting, albeit grim. It’s a good reminder that life is indeed what happens while you’re making other plans." (Alistair for Hugh).
Isolated Drum Tracks From Six of Rock’s Greatest: Bonham, Moon, Peart, Copeland, Grohl & Starr – Open Culture. "Well, that mortality stuff was a bit heavy, so here’s something lighter: the drum tracks from six of the best drummers in the world. As a musician, Mitch, I know you’ll like this one. It’s amazing to hear how, well, musical someone like Stewart Copeland is. Drummers are so often hiding behind the melodies and baselines, and it’s fascinating to listen to their work on familiar tracks and find new things." (Alistair for Mitch).
Partial Disclosure – The New York Review of Books. "New York Review of Books article on NSA spying, Edward Snowden, Glen Greenwald. Chilling overview." (Hugh for Alistair).
Why has Google cast me into oblivion? – BBC. "Hopefully this is one of those situations that will figure itself out, but: the European Court recently found that people have a right to be forgotten… meaning that, if I do a Google search for you, and an article from 2002 about your bad haircut comes up in the results, and you don’t like that, you can get Google to remove that article from their index (though there is no right to have the article itself removed). This sounds like a terrible idea for a zillion reasons. Here’s an example reason: a legitimate BBC blog article about why an ex-CEO of Merrill Lynch got ousted, from 2007, will be expunged from Google’s index. Stay tuned." (Hugh for Mitch).
How a password changed my life – Medium. "The power of intention and writing things down. I was deeply moved by this story, because I have been doing this sort of thing (with a little twist) for a long while. I realized that typing in something that means something to me (as a password) is a very powerful way of constantly reminding myself of something important. I love how human beings think that we’re so complex. On one level, it’s true: emotions, psychology and what becomes the stories that we tell ourselves can be perceived as fairly complex. On the other hand, simply typing in words that have meaning and depth could very well (and very easily) be both a reminder, ritual and call to action. Who knew that you could get this kind of life-lesson from something as inane as a password." (Mitch for Alistair).
Ambient Genius – The New Yorker. "I lose a ton of cool-cred amongst my music business friends when I admit that I’m not a fan of Brian Eno or Lou Reed’s music. There are several other musicians and artists that get me that look of disgust from my peers. I’m fine with that. As Sarah Silverman once beautifully put it, ‘I don’t judge what my earholes like.’ One person’s Bob Dylan is another person’s Ratt. With that, I still have a deep appreciation for the work of many musicians whose final output I’m no fan of. Brian Eno is one of those people. He is super creative and brilliantly adept at bringing out the best work in other musicians. He’s known for this gift. This is a wonderful article about Brian Eno, his Oblique Strategies and the life of a true artist and creative force. If you’re looking for some inspiration this week, look no further (plus, for a special treat, please watch the video below)." (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.