Categories: Articles

Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #307

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:

All Prior Art. “If you can’t beat ’em, join em. If you can beat ’em, do it with an algorithm. This software generates pretty much anything you can invent, then publishes it, establishing prior art. ‘The pull tab is attached inside the bag between the two perforated lines and has at least has one loose end extending outside the bag. In certain example embodiments of this invention, the lateral position of the rear drive wheels may be selectively adjusted as desired by the operator.’ I literally can’t tell if this is satire, art, or brilliant obfuscation that makes patent research grind to a halt.” (Alistair for Hugh).
The Post-Productive Economy – The Technium. “The extraordinary Kevin Kelly has come up in our Six Links series four times over the last six years (#44, #64, #100, and #110) and he’s one of my favorite thinkers about technology and society. I checked, because I was sure I’d mentioned his latest book, The Inevitable, already. It’s just so damned good. And it holds hope for those who worry robots will take our jobs: ‘In short, productivity is for robots. Humans excel at wasting time, experimenting, playing, creating, and exploring. None of these fare well under the scrutiny of productivity. That is why science and art are so hard to fund. But they are also the foundation of long-term growth.’ A sobering read that bursts filter bubbles.” (Alistair for Mitch).
Inside The Assassination Complex – The Intercept. “Edward Snowden talks about whistleblowing as political resistance.” (Hugh for Alistair).
Men try to read the most disturbing comments women get online back to them - Upworthy. “In 10 years+ of writing on the web, I can’t recall once when negative comments towards me or my work veered beyond ‘that’s a bit unpleasant/unnecessary.’ I’m lucky. I happen to be male. Women face a whole different universe when they put stuff out on the web… and it ain’t pleasant. This video is pretty hard to watch, but you should.” (Hugh for Mitch).
Unbundled – Chris Saad – Medium. “Everything is coming apart. We’re taking a major piece of software and – literally – unbundling it into several types of services and products and apps. Think about the apps that are out just for writing… or a dictionary… or a thesaurus… or whatever. Features of a word processing software are now a standalone. We’re taking things and breaking them up… unbundling them. This is only happening more and more, in a world of 3D printing and the gig economy. There’s a lot of wisdom in this article. Funny, it smells like both opportunity and sadness in the same long piece.” (Mitch for Alistair).
Creatives Turn Smartphones Into Interactive Books During Facebook Hackathon – AdWeek. “Facebook is rounding up agency talent and showing them what a strong Hackathon can look like (and do). The results from a recent one created a bunch of interesting interactive books for kids.” (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.