Bennett's Five Links #078

Expert thinkers; Sharing important smiles

Bennett Green

Sep 16, 2023

Thinking effectively ..

I loved this read, which hooked me initially on the unmet promise of note-taking apps, slipped into an AI-will-revolutionise-our-workflows riff, but ultimately left me pondering why I’m happier working in single-screen apps than I am when free to roam (heh) vast multi-window workspaces. It’s a journey.

In short: it is probably a mistake, in the end, to ask software to improve our thinking. Even if you can rescue your attention from the acid bath of the internet; even if you can gather the most interesting data and observations into the app of your choosing; even if you revisit that data from time to time — this will not be enough. It might not even be worth trying.

Why Note-taking Apps Don’t Make Us Smarter

The Expert’s Expert ..

I enjoyed this piece both for the excellent xkcd comic, but also this zinger of a conclusion -

I've first noticed this problem in the startup world where you see famous people that sell books, talk at conferences, and tweet advice to founders, but when you take a closer look, they've never done much founding themselves. They're like the "entrepreneurship" professor that never built a business. They're experts in the metagame -- they're polished speakers, engaging writers, and thought-leadering tweeters. The problem, though, is that they're not judged by customers, the market, or nature, instead they're judged by their peers. I call them metapreneurs.
This is an instance of what Nassim Taleb calls "The Expert Problem" -- when other experts and meta-experts judge experts. Eventually the lack of contact with reality will corrupt the field. In the sciences, that lead to the replication crisis and the absurdities of the humanities.
If you find yourself going to a lot of conferences, opining too much on the latest fad in your field, and talking more about doing the thing than doing the job itself, then you, my friend, are getting sucked into the metagame.

Beware the Megagame

(via Readwise Reader)

My time is more important than yours and I love the way I sound ..

I went travelling recently and saw a lot of people using voice notes. I’ve linked to articles about voice notes before. The short version is: I don’t really get it.

So I loved this little short by the very funny Hamish and Andy.

Brave ingenuity ..

This Allen kid really is good at sharing!

Just a super smiley light orchestra ..

I’m officially retiring the stock photos of street art graffiti. I will be replacing them with AI generated images - here is one using the prompt “street art graffiti oil painting”. Please enjoy.

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Bennett

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