why you need a project, a phrase I will 100% use, and a great list of the best people in PR
Matt Klein down the child-like awe đđłď¸
ďťżWelcome to the startupy newsletter, a laid back column about very serious ideas.
Also, wait. Whatâs startupy? Startupy is where curious humans curate and interconnect the best of the Internet. We're on a mission to build a more human and nourishing Internet.
Mood
Cool things curated in our universe
_
WHY YOU NEED A SERIOUS PROJECT
Henrik Karlsson explores How MrBeast Learns in this fascinating essay. The gist: you canât just feed your brain information. You also need a serious project.
What we are trying to do influences what becomes salient to us. If you are looking for a friend in a crowd, faces become salient to you, faces that would have otherwise passed you by. If you are making videos, you will notice patterns in the videos you watch. If youâre not, you can watch a thousand videos and have them pass through your head cleanly, without leaving a mark. Your memory will have little use for the information, and so discards it. You canât just feed your brain information if you want to learn effectively; you also need a serious project.
This totally resonates and aligns with our manifesto 2.0 (a work in progress):
_
ON LONG-LIVED INSTITUTIONS
In 1950, the average company on the Fortune 500 list had been around for 61 years. By 2019, that figure had fallen to 18 years. This is a fascinating study on how to build institutions that last.
The biggest surprise? 90% of the companies that are over 200 years old have 300 employees or less; theyâre not mega companies.Â
Lots more related gems in the smallness and long-term thinking collections.
_
A PHRASE I WILL 100% USE GOING FORWARD
A great insight by Lisa Feldman Barrett: When someone expresses anxiety, the first thing you should do is ask: do you want empathy or do you want a solution?
Watch the full clip here and fall down the conversations rabbit hole here.
__
A FASCINATING INTERVIEW
Noah Smith interviews Kevin Kelly in a fascinating interview. Hereâs what I highlighted:
Separate the processes of creating from improving. You canât write and edit, or sculpt and polish, or make and analyze at the same time. If you do, the editor stops the creator. While you write the first draft, donât let the judgy editor get near. At the start, the creator mind must be unleashed from judgment.
To write about something hard to explain, write a detailed letter to a friend about why it is so hard to explain, and then remove the initial âDear Friendâ part and youâll have a great first draft.
The thing to remember when evaluating new technologies is we have to always ask âcompared to what?.â Mercury-based dental fillings statistically caused some harm, but compared to what? Compared to cavities, they were a miracle. We tend to give existing technologies a pass from the degree of scrutiny we give new technologies. Social media can transmit false information at great range at great speed. But compared to what? Social media's influence on elections from transmitting false information was far less than the influence of the existing medias of cable news and talk radio, where false information was rampant.
Since the generative AIs have been trained on the entirety of human work â most of it mediocre â it produces âwisdom of the crowdâ-like results. They may hit the mark but only because they are average.
My generic career advice for young people is that if at all possible, you should aim to work on something that no one has a word for. Spend your energies where we donât have a name for what you are doing, where it takes a while to explain to your mother what it is you do. When you are ahead of language, that means you are in a spot where it is more likely you are working on things that only you can do. It also means you wonât have much competition.
_
ON SUCCESS AND FAILURE
A quote worth pondering, via Falling Upward:
Failure and suffering are the great equalizers and levelers among humans. Success is just the opposite. Communities and commitment can form around suffering much more than around how wonderfully superior we are.
_
A GREAT LIST OF THE BEST PEOPLE IN PR
The competition for attention is too intense. Hereâs a great list of the best people in PR, created by Andy Dunn.
Curator spotlight
MATT KLEIN
Cultural Theorist & Strategist
Head of Global Foresight at Reddit
ZINE.KleinKleinKlein.com
KleinKleinKlein.com
DOWN THE CHILD-LIKE AWE đđłď¸
Why is child-like awe interesting?
Amidst an overwhelming permacrisis, perception of collapse and resulting sense of just nihilistic dread, Iâm fascinated with exploring naive, child-like sensibilities as both a tool for soothing and forward progress. Weâve lost our imagination, practice of play, and innocence. And I think thereâs a lot to be gained from looking back in order to look forward. This has always been the caseâitâs called becoming an adultâbut considering the moment today, this ritual feels increasingly dangerous and unnecessary. Besides sex and sports, what other hobbies are normalized for adults as play for play sake? Why do we feel compelled to call it âadultâ-coloring books? And when was the last time you asked âWhyâ five times? The benefit of thinking like a kid is killed over our lifespan by assumption. We collectively lose our curiosity while âwhat ifâsâ become extinct. But why? This doesnât have to be the caseâŚ
A podcast worth listening to on the topic
ABC Australia has an incredible cultural journalism program called, Schmeitgeist. Earlier this year host Ange Lavoipierre, explored the subject of âAge Regression,â a fringe phenomena of adults who âregressâ to becoming babies and childrenâfrom their dress or speak, to even relationships. Itâs an intense representation of âchild-like embodiment,â but it shines light on the drivers of this behavior and provokes: how do we feel about the extremes of being a kid again?
Something worth reading and watching on the topic
Rob Walkerâs book, The Art of Noticing was incredibly refreshing for me. Itâs an easy readâa simple list of ways to rediscover everyday joy and inspiration throughout life. Thereâs also a great visual presentation and talk on the topic hosted by Walker and The School of Visual Arts.
A project worth following on the topic
If youâre not already onto Recess Therapy, come on! As the launching pad for Corn Kid, Recess Therapy is a YouTube series hosted by Julian Shapiro-Barnum who interviews kids on lifeâs big questions. Itâs become not only my eye-bleach from the day, but inspiration for not taking life so seriously. Itâs a tough pill to swallow, reflecting on how we were all once that honest, safe, entertaining, whimsical and wholesome, but the videos have been nice reminders: weâve got a lot to learn.
Thank you for reading!
Oh, and please pass this email on to any friends you think might enjoy this newsletter. We are trying to build up this corner of the Internet one curious person at a time.
Want to find us elsewhere?
âź Twitter
âź Instagram
âź Spotify
âź Startupy
âź Search the startupy hivemind using AI
STOP - DO NOT INVEST IN SUBSTACK'S BROKEN MODEL!!!
Seriously if they are begging for money and VC bailed it means its a broken model. Think about it, how many regular people are paying per writer $5 to $10 per month? Not enough apparently and the next thing they will introduce is advertising which is 1million times worse. This monetization model is for elites, elite writers and elite readers who can afford to pay to "benefit" from their writing. Its not Twitter but its just as elitist as Twitter and will devolve into the same mess and control mechanism.
Go check out web3. Go check out crypto. Go check out the MVP of my solo hobbiest project "dplatform.me" The next platforms will be web3, crypto, micro-transactions, and governed by decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) or no one
The future is decentralized!
This was an amazing newsletter edition - so much valuable information, thoughts, etc.! Thanks a lot.