A stunningly good newsletter in general - but this week, one that hits home, being, as I have been for a good few months, in a constant watchful state about the balance of my own small things/big things/mental health and creative process. This is a beautiful vocalisation of all that.
the enemy of my enemy is not my friend but watching them smack each other in the nuts is still very funny
Job creation, innit?
Jesus CHRIST! FENTON!
Manifesto for the improvement of football Two balls Penalties only All players have had 3 pints except players who don't drink alcohol, who must have had 10 rocket lollies Goal the entire width of the pitch with 4 goalkeepers Half time cryptic crosswords or Guardian quiptics for second division or below Washing up liquid on the pitch so they slip around more Ballet pumps Ball goes honk when kicked
I hardly ever use the notes app on my phone but had cause to do so tonight, and found this, which I have no recollection of writing but wholeheartedly stand by
I don't know who or what it was that reminded me of this 13 year old video but our entire household has been yelling "Fenton! Jesus Christ! FENTON!" at random interval for about a week now, so thank you.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GRS...
View profile for Sergio Visinoni Sergio Visinoni 2nd CTO | Tech Advisor | Mentor | Newsletter Author 5d Follow We keep hearing that AI will soon replace software engineers, but we're forgetting that it can already replace existing jobs... and one in particular. The average Founder CEO. Before you walk away in disbelief, look at what LLMs are already capable of doing today: ↳ They use eloquence as a surrogate for knowledge, and most people, including seasoned investors, fall for it. ↳ They regurgitate material they read somewhere online without really understanding its meaning. ↳ They fabricate numbers that have no ground in reality, but sound aligned with the overall narrative they're trying to sell you.
↳ They are heavily influenced by the last conversations they had. ↳ They contradict themselves, pretending they aren't. ↳ They politely apologize for their mistakes, but don't take any real steps to fix the underlying problem that caused them in the first place. ↳ They tend to forget what they told you last week, or even one hour ago, and do it in a way that makes you doubt your own recall of events. ↳ They are victims of the Dunning–Kruger effect, and they believe they know a lot more about the job of people interacting with them than they actually do. ↳ They can make pretty slides in high volumes. ↳ They're very good at consuming resources, but not as good at turning a profit.
Even linkedin is starting to get it
Happy to provide that content as a service now though, in case you're now worried sick about how things worked out with Jim.
A pile of Annuals from the British teen magazine “Jackie” that I randomly picked up on eBay during lockdown
A picture from a feature entitled “none of these girls are a perfect size 12!” Which seemed to want to prove that with 89s fashion, you can look terrible no matter your body shape!
A couple of panels from a photo story in which a girl is looking puzzled while thought bubbles reveal that she’s trying to work out if there are any good parties she hasn’t been invited to. (Spoiler: there are)
A photo story with around seven panels half visible. The main one is a teenage girl saying “wait Jim, don’t go…” in a speech bubble, while a thought bubble reveals her to be thinking “it’s no use, I’ve ruined everything”. Which is pretty typical for these. However, all dialogue is in all caps, so it all seems a bit shoutier.
This pile of British teen magazine annuals, for example. I can’t remember if I was planning on balking at the diet and dating tips or had an even more complicated plan to revive the lost art of photo stories (probably both?), but still, here they sit, taking up room on my shelf…
I have no desire to mark the fifth anniversary of the start of lockdown, but I *do* think it’s probably time to admit that if I haven’t started on any of those 43 different projects that I bought random shit for that year and then was too depressed to use, it might be time to let them go.
For me it's also the lack of documentation or reflection *at the time*. Like, I will write through most things or create *a project* to process as I go but very few people I know (inc me) were able to start chronicling an event that had no end date. So it's all just one long day in my head.
I love your writing, Wojtek. This is such a great post about two games I knew literally nothing about but am now on my way to download.
Fine. I admit, I looked in a lot of villagers bins without their knowledge and stole what I found in there. It's a fair cop guv'nor.
Wait, maybe I missed something. Is "Youth" now generally classified as under 35? That feels onerous. Am I meant to be now in early adulthood? That feels in some way correct but also I am bored of adulthood so I don't want to be in Early it.
Buying tickets to go see a Chekov play in rep nearby at a big theatre for the family. Discovered, to my surprise, that there were youth tickets. Youth was classified as "under 35". Live theatre here is very fucked.
Rationale, eh? I like your spirit.
But my take on it was that the writing around the app should have as much of the feeling of writing in the app as possible, given that the app itself was part of the conversation
But mostly not my area of circus
There appears to be a TV show called "WAGs to Riches", which is half-arsing it, tbh. I want a show called "WAGs to Witches" in which a group of women who previously were identified only by their sports boyfriends find community, collective strength and communion with nature through their coven.
It's not that I don't *like* snow, I just think it's kind of weird that it's basically tiny solid clumps of air lying around on the floor everywhere and we're all just FINE with it, y'know?
God I miss pubs
Oh no another podcast I will now have to listen to (also: yay! another podcast I will listen to!)
Jim!!
Great I love that guy
Jonny!!
Overheard in San Francisco, a man who walked by talking to his child, who was probably about 5:
"…No, well, you see, it doesn't really MEAN anything. Not really. "Agadoo" isn't even a real word."
[This was post for three people who probably won't even see it because algorithms. Thank you.]
:chefs-kiss:
When Facebook said "It's X's birthday! Say Happy Birthday!" it would make me consider if this was someone I spoke to often or cared about enough to do that. And if they weren't, I'd act accordingly. So what I used Facebook for was mainly unfriending people on their birthday. Anyway I don't miss it.
Also the glass of wine in that illustration looks like boiled piss.
Wait no I do. Because one day this form of alcohol marketing will be gawped at with horror and mocked along with old ads for quaalude predecessors that also promised to placate and mollify women. But no. Here we are. Feeding the narrative that chemical numbness is not only desirable but necessary…
A bottle of wine called “Happy Mommy”, which instead of a grape varietal is just labeled “girls night white”. There’s a silhouette of a woman in an armchair surrounded by children’s toys with a speech bubble that says “It’s ME time”, and honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen something that looked like it was cooked up in a marketing department staffed only by men more than this. No that’s a lie I’ve seen lots of things. This is fucking awful tho
I don’t know where to start with the number of ways I hate this bullshit.
Normalise saying "No is a perfectly acceptable answer" when you invite them somewhere or to do something. The time gained in not having to think up excuses or field polite refusals is lovely.
Soon I may just start sending out scraps of notebook that say "do you want to do this thing: YES/NO"