Monday Dispatch – 2023/10/31
Thought provoking articles, the paradox of self-improvement, and upcoming experiments.
Welcome to Monday Dispatch, a bonus publication for premium subscribers with additional notes, deep dives, reading recommendations, and business updates.
In this installment: three articles that will give you good food for thought, musing on self-improvement, and a sneak peek on what I’ll be up to for the next few months.
Food for thought
On metaverse, but w/o bullshit & hype
I discovered Sebastian Gebski through his honest and opinionated book reviews on GoodReads. I was pleased to see he applies the same critical, dig-beneath-the-surface attitude in his writing about business, tech, and society in No Kill Switch. This essay, published after Apple announced the Vision Pro, challenges the popular definition of metaverse and the road to get there.
New generations of VR are not the metaverse. It is just a new UI for apps. It may have a short-lived wow effect, but in the end - we’re talking just about apps.
As knowledge workers, we operate in a world of pervasive technology. Metaverse and mixed reality will continue to be hot topics for the foreseeable future. Sebastian’s effort to separate signal from the hype here is the kind of nuanced exercise we all should engage in to ensure we operate based on what brings our goals forward, not FOMO.
See also:
Please Stop Having Your Characters Just State the Themes of Your Show or Movie to the Audience, Thanks
If you’ve watched any major movie or TV show production in the past 5 years or so, you’ll know what Freddie deBoer is referring to. If you haven’t (good for you), the post has many examples.
Freddie’s feeling resonated with me:
I find the tendency artistically unfortunate because it removes the inspiration for mental work that abstract and difficult art sometimes achieve; I find it insulting because it seems to presume that I don’t have the capacity to figure anything out without direct coaching.
Non-fiction writers know one crucial thing about their readers: They are smart people. I hope that comes across in my writing. It’s sad that many screenwriters don’t seem to think the same of their audiences.
I previously wrote about the value of savoring over consuming. Cheap art can only be consumed. It’s transactional.
To savor, you need to be involved. The audience, as Freddie put it, takes part in the creative act:
Symbolism and allusion have for so long been such prized tools because they are powerful; they involve the audience in the creation of artistic effects, making us partners in the feelings we feel as a result. Some messages are best delivered via smoke signal, and there are certain kinds of feelings that can only be achieved in art if you trust the audience to make the leap themselves.
“Books without pictures are the best ones,” I often tell my six-year-old, “You get to use the most powerful, immersive picture engine in the universe: your imagination.”
See also:
The Greatness of Simplicity
N.S. Lyons shared part of the Victorian-era American essayist William George Jordan Self Control, Its Kingship and Majesty from 1905.
Simplicity is restful contempt for the non-essentials of life. It is restless hunger for the non-essentials that is the secret of most of the discontent of the world. It is constant striving to outshine others that kills simplicity and happiness.
How modern does this sound? Especially when you consider it was written more than a century ago.
There is a tonic strength, in the hour of sorrow and affliction, in escaping from the world and society and getting back to the simple duties and interests we have slighted and forgotten. Our world grows smaller, but it grows dearer and greater.
Simplicity is never to be associated with weakness and ignorance. It means reducing tons of ore to nuggets of gold.
The best software engineers I know devise simple solutions for complex problems. The writers I admire share nuanced ideas in straightforward language.
In a world of increasing complexity, simplifying things is a winning advantage.
See also:
The Paradox of Self-Improvement
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