The opposite of “I don’t know” isn’t “I’m certain.” No, the opposite is, “I’m not sure, but…” “I don’t know” is a conversation ender. It is almost never followed by a useful question. Instead, it’s a form of surrender. Teach me! Show me answer! Don’t make me figure it out. Most o … | Continue reading
Culture is built on the stability of persistence. Pop musicians have farewell tours that last for decades. The local print shop is still there, reliably getting the job done. We want things that last. And yet… When it’s time for a company to raise another round of investment, the … | Continue reading
At the lab, they don’t know the right answer. They are explorers and scientists. If you’re not failing, you’re not trying hard enough. The work at the lab requires mutual support, shared information and a commitment to the process of discovery. At the factory, the answer is known … | Continue reading
We called them this because they used tools. The first proto-humans to clearly do so. The question that we need ask ourselves today, “Are you a tool user or a tool maker?” Everyone uses tools. But only a few people, even with access to AI and systems of leverage, choose to make t … | Continue reading
If you have a phone, you can call anyone you like. The recipient doesn’t have to answer, but the network is an open API, available to anyone. The Bell System began as an actual networked system–many companies, using the same protocol, shared calls with each other. When Bell got g … | Continue reading
We have no idea. Of course, there’s plenty of behavioral data. Say this phrase, or offer that treat, and this particular dog is likely to act in a certain way. But our inclinations about what it’s actually like to be a dog are all inventions, reverse-engineered to give us a clue … | Continue reading
“Why are you taking this class?” That seems like a fair question. After tenth grade or so, it’s a choice, after all. One honest answer is, “I have to get a good grade to get to where I want to go.” That means certification, compliance, regurgitation. It means enrollment in the ou … | Continue reading
Apophenia is the uniquely human tendency to perceive meaningful patterns or connections in random or unrelated data, events, or objects. Humans are story telling machines. And one thing we do is turn co-incident events into more than coincidences. When we see faces and shapes in … | Continue reading
Frederick Taylor taught Henry Ford how to do mass production. Deming brought quality, systems understanding and respect for the worker. And operations research brought insight. If you have a repeated production process, the method for improving it is almost always the same, regar … | Continue reading
The first day of classes, some students slouch in the back row, unprepared and uninterested. Some are up front, eager and ready. But it’s only the morning of the first day–these attitudes aren’t related to the teacher. It’s a pattern, one that is the result of culture, systems an … | Continue reading
Snap, crackle and pop. A set of German-made socket wrenches can turn a bolt in a similar way to a cheaper alternative, but it feels far more rewarding. More than forty years ago, I started using a Mac. The first thing one noticed was hard to put words on–everything about it simpl … | Continue reading
For fifteen or twenty years, this question is relentlessly answered, whether or not we ask it. After we learn fractions, the teacher moves on to decimals. After we read O’Connor, we’re handed Faulkner. In music history, Debussy follows Brahms. Chemistry after biology. It persists … | Continue reading
It’s not up to us to fix the world all by ourselves. But we vote with our attention and our dollars. If we’re attracted to the wrong stuff like moths to a flame, don’t be surprised when folks spend time building new fires. Each of us knows that we’re motivated by positive feedbac … | Continue reading
It might be at school, at work or at home. Hunkering down, hoping we won’t get noticed. A safe spot, worth concealing. The problem with hiding out from responsibility or change is that we’re also hiding from time. But time always finds us. | Continue reading
Three paths are now available: We face this choice daily, but rarely name it or prepare for it. The moment just before shipping is where magic and leverage can dance together. Updates: Live in NY on September 21: I have 55 seats left for the Knot launch event happening in a few w … | Continue reading
That’s pretty new. Letters sent by Thomas Jefferson from France often took months to get a response. No points for shaving a day off a 90-day correspondence lag. The 800 toll-free number shifted the dynamic we expected from marketers. If we call you, we expect you to answer. Now, … | Continue reading
Peter Drucker argued that the purpose of a corporation is to serve the customer. It turns out that organizations that focus on this do well. Milton Friedman argued (mistakenly, in my view) that the corporation doesn’t need to care about customers, unless this helps increase the v … | Continue reading
That’s not only good dieting advice. It works in just about every endeavor we sign up for. The system would like us to be insatiable on its behalf, but that’s not an invitation we’re required to accept. | Continue reading
It’s possible that you were undermined, endangered, cut off or disrespected. But if we begin with that, then the relationship gets shaky. Perhaps the other person simply didn’t understand. It might be that they are focused on their issues, not yours. It could be that they’re deal … | Continue reading
Tic tac toe with a 3 x 3 board is trivial and not much fun. Tic tac toe tic tac (5 in a row) with a 15 x 15 board is endlessly fascinating. Simple doesn’t mean dumb. When we add layers and community and options, it can generate all sorts of possibilities. Connection is always […] | Continue reading
Teaching and learning aren’t always aligned. Sometimes organized teaching is defensive. “Here, take all this down in your notes, it will be on the test.” This gives the teacher deniability, but might not create the conditions for the student to actually learn. The alternative is … | Continue reading
It’s not technically a tax. Taxes produce valuable public benefits, like medical research and parks. This is simply legal theft. Amazon makes nearly a billion dollars in profit from search ads. Every week. Each week, they sell merchants and publishers enough search-distorting ads … | Continue reading
Find a safe critic. Upload your essay, your book, your artwork, your business plan or your resume to Claude. Then, pick a critic. “Write a detailed, specific negative review that might appear on Amazon/in ArtNews/at a Ph.D defense/from a disappointed venture capitalist/from a rec … | Continue reading
Here’s a simple hack/reminder: If you buy something that has a filter or other part that needs replacing, create a recurring event in your calendar. Also mention where you store the extra filters, and include a link on where to buy more of them. Works for monthly dog meds, too. A … | Continue reading
Culture provides scaffolding, and learning happens over time. The result is that we’re each capable of extraordinary feats. People can fly planes, ski down mountains, figure out how to use Photoshop or a solve a crossword puzzle. But… Most people only exhibit this skill when ther … | Continue reading
After doing an autopsy at the morgue, it’s a good idea for doctors to wash their hands before delivering babies. A few hundred years ago, Ignaz Semmelweis proved this now-obvious insight about hygiene. Doctors don’t scrub because it’s fun or convenient, they do it because it’s a … | Continue reading
Is it helping? You wouldn’t stay by passively if someone else was beating you up. Perhaps we shouldn’t accept it when we do it. | Continue reading
The Decware triode amp is the best low-power stereo amp I’ve ever heard. And it’s a bargain. If you have the right speakers, it’s an extraordinary device. And there’s a two-year waitlist. 2000 people, 11 pages long. This approach to timing and production serves all the people tha … | Continue reading
If you win an auction to get a click, you probably overpaid. Every other bidder stopped bidding, that’s why you won. Putting attention up for auction is a good business model—for the seller. | Continue reading
When your project, proposal or resume is rejected, it’s tempting to try to understand why. Scrutinize the rejection letter and turn the short sentence into a paragraph or an essay, then play it over and over in your search for how to do better next time. If you can simply answer … | Continue reading
Keith Jarrett on improvisation. When the artist is creating in real time, in conjunction with the witnesses in the room, “performance” goes away. It’s creation. Improvisation is a privilege, a chance to create without a guarantee. | Continue reading
There’s a village in Luxembourg that’s right outside the main metropolis. A farmer often ties up a donkey to the little bridge leading to town. The juxtaposition of international digital trading and donkeys is a reminder that as fast as the future arrives, the past also sticks ar … | Continue reading
You’re not a crow, neither is your project. To get from a village in rural France to Los Angeles, the trip to London might be a tiny fraction of the distance from London to LA, but it takes more than half the time. It’s easy to imagine that every step in our journey proceeds at [ … | Continue reading
Is this where books go to die? There are about 7500 public libraries in the US, and until recently, more than a third of their transactions were for DVDs. What’s a library for? The media has changed, our needs have changed, but the dynamics of funding, architecture and expectatio … | Continue reading
They’re often out of whack. A Hard Day’s Night took less than 15 hours from idea to finished record. More Than a Feeling, from Tom Scholz and Boston, took five years. Each pleased their audiences. One is not 1,500 times more valuable than the other. Sometimes, work that requires … | Continue reading
People lie. They lie in focus groups, they lie on surveys and they lie to themselves. Culture can be seen as an organized lying function. Be aware of what other people are thinking and make choices about your preferences so you can fit in. Without this effect, we wouldn’t have tr … | Continue reading
It doesn’t have to be well-crafted, historically important or aesthetically unique. It simply needs to be famous. Celebrity art is famous, with a story and thus emotional resonance. It’s a souvenir for our eyes, a chance to have proximity without ownership. It conflates familiari … | Continue reading
“Working in the studio is like building a ship in a bottle. Playing live is like being on a rowboat in the ocean.” Jerry Garcia You probably need some studio time, but you definitely need to play live. | Continue reading
What if they meant it? What if your return felt special to the people behind the counter? What if they knew, without looking it up, or being told–what if they knew that you were here, again, a vote of trust and confidence. Returning home is one of the oldest human desires. It’s a … | Continue reading
We transferred an idea from engineering to culture, but it’s incomplete. If you build a watch that doesn’t tell time, it’s fair to say it doesn’t work. But when a critic says, “that joke didn’t work,” after seeing a comic perform to a raucous audience, what they probably mean is, … | Continue reading
“How few people can we get away with?” That’s a question many bosses think hard about. Automate. Streamline. Improve productivity and take humans out of as many tasks as possible. It’s a time-tested way to create profits and to increase a certain kind of reliability. Claude Code … | Continue reading
We work so hard to have freedom and leverage and choice. And then, as soon as a social network, boss or cultural force instructs us to do something, we fold our tents and go along. Responsibility is scary. Sometimes it’s easier to find someone (or something) to blame. Just becaus … | Continue reading
When new creation technologies arrive, they make the best a little worse and the bad a lot better. Desktop publishing made every local garage sale sign a lot more legible, but can’t quite replace the hand-kerned and tweaked typography of the era before. A smartphone in your pocke … | Continue reading
Organizations thrive on incremental improvement. They find a stable foundation and then build a feedback loop of relentless improvement. This leads to great efficiency, higher productivity and more profits. It enables more throughput and builds market share. Except things change. … | Continue reading
For generations, the rules of Lego were simple: many pieces, all able to connect in many ways, led to many outcomes. That almost drove the company into bankruptcy, though. Lego kits saved the business. Each kit has just one way to do the work, follow the instructions carefully. I … | Continue reading
Built into the concept of “interesting” is the unexplored. The temptation of discovery and the new. And so, by definition, wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, it’s likely that there is something more interesting somewhere else. The people at the next table may be talking abo … | Continue reading
Nailing it in the first take is a sign of preparation and professionalism. No need for two tries if you are clear about what you’re doing and how. The next take is where hope lies. This one was pretty good, but next time, we’ll bring it. And the last take is good enough. That’s w … | Continue reading
One of the best traditional bakeries in New York has a kitchen you can see from the counter. People wait in line for their handmade French baguettes, and the confirmation that they were made right here and right now is reassuring. I noticed that the baker was using a mechanical g … | Continue reading