Podcasts about Penn

Penn recaps his week of cancelled travel, adjusting to performing seated again, and TV star medical treatment. Plus, judging a book by its cover, stories of both Matt Donnelly the Mind Noodler and Bobby Slayton picking the wrong volunteers on stage, Reddi Rich pitches a new sci-fi story to Penn, and lots more.

This week on Laugh Lines, Penn and I not only strip down due to our A/C being out... AGAIN! We also tackle two things I never expected to happen in the same podcast: Becoming an (almost) empty nester and hunting down an estrogen patch like it was contraband due to a recent shortage.We discuss my hormones going on strike, and a voicemail from a mom preparing to send her child to college inspired us to share the biggest lessons we've learned after Lola's first year away. We also revisit "Father of the Bride" through Gen Z eyes (Spoiler: George Banks was making a lot of sense), realize that 1991 was somehow 35 years ago, play a very heated game of The Price Is Right, and give a spirited tribute to the late Bonnie Tyler. Yes, Penn got out the recorder.If you're navigating hormones, parenting grown kids, or simply trying to figure out how we all got this old, come laugh with us. We promise you'll leave feeling a little less alone. We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube. And thanks to our partner, OLLY, for sponsoring this episode!Pre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The hot summer months often mean full immersion in the natural world for those who grow their own food. On today's show, host Douglas Haynes speaks with master gardener and social media star, Toni Farmer, who has made it her life's work to educate people about the joys of gardening and solutions to the broken food system.  Farmer's work is deeply personal, and often her videos take place in her own backyard vegetable garden where she shares tips and tricks and invites viewers to commiserate about daily struggles with pests or the weather. Home gardens were once the norm, but went out fashion post WWII when Americans prioritized convenience. “All the skills of growing food went away in a single generation,” says Farmer.   But people want to regain that knowledge, and Farmer showed up at the right time with the right knowledge to feed that hunger. Her social media accounts went viral in January 2025 when the Trump administration first implemented tariffs. Now, her posts educate people about the immediate and long-impacts of policy decisions like tariffs and the war with Iran. Her recent series “The Plan” has garnered hundreds of thousands of views. In it, Farmer prepares her audience for the looming global food crisis and encourages them to work with their neighbors to build food security.  Farmer says she's alarmed by the possibility of price shocks in the fall and is concerned by a recent social media trend of conflating conventional and organic farming. She also discusses how regenerative agriculture is the antidote to the cruel and extractive aspects of commercial agriculture and how immersion in your home garden is an antidote to the isolation of our digital lives. At the end of the day, it shouldn't be a privilege to eat healthy food, says Farmer.  Toni Farmer is an adjunct professor at both the University of Pennsylvania and Rowan University in the department of Earth and Environmental Science. At Penn, she teaches Regenerative Agriculture and Integrated Pest Management and at Rowan she teaches The Future of Food, a class about the impact of climate change on agriculture. She holds a Masters of Environmental Science from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master Gardener certification from Rutgers. Toni provides the garden video content for SJMagMedia, winning “best of” for 2021. She appears every Tuesday on Fox29 Philadelphia at 3:30pm helping tri-state regional viewers with garden tips. Learning to grow food is a critical tool for healthy food access. You can find her on Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook as ToniFarmersGarden. Featured image of a community garden via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0). Did you enjoy this story? Your funding makes great, local journalism like this possible. Donate hereThe post How a Thriving Garden Can Counteract a World on Fire appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9.

Dorian Glogovac novi je gost Jao Mile podcasta!Svojim sjajnim igrama u Kanadi skrenuo je pažnju javnosti i zaslužio poziv reprezentacije Srbije. Dorian je danas student prestižnog Penn univerziteta (University of Pennsylvania), a u novoj epizodi prolazimo kroz njegov košarkaški i životni put — od kanadskih terena, preko nacionalnog dresa, pa sve do uklapanja vrhunskog sporta i akademske karijere na jednom od najboljih američkih koledža.Ukoliko želite da zasijate na društvenim mrežama Digital Halo je prava adresa za vas! https://digitalhalo.cc/00:00:00 Uvod00:02:40 Iz D3 u Ajvi Ligu00:11:15 Kako si zavoleo košarku?00:14:10 Rol modeli00:16:10 Škola i sport00:20:00 Poziv iz KSSa00:30:10 Razlika između Evrope i USA00:38:40 PENN00:44:30 Prelazak u USA00:50:40 Brza pitanja00:52:00 Savet za mlade00:54:40 Pet najboljih igrača ikada00:56:30 Pitanje za MiletaPratite nas na društvenim mrežama!Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/jaomile_podcast/Facebook https://www.facebook.com/JAOMILEPODCASTTikTokhttps://www.tiktok.com/@jaomile_podcastTwitter https://twitter.com/mileilicGost: Dorian GlogovacDatum:  15. Jul 2026. Autor i domaćin: Mile IlićLokacija: Studio Long MileProdukcija: Jao Mile#jaomilepodcast #dorianglogovac #crvenazvezda #kkpartizan #NikolaJovic #nba  #nikolajokic #abaliga #jokic #bogdanovic #euroleague #doncic #nikolatopic #micic

Our speaker is Michael Kahana who is one of the world's leading experts on memory. He is a former Professor of Psychology at Penn, and he is now the founder of Nia Therapeutics which is a company seeking to bring a medical device to patients that can radically improve memory for individuals with a brain injury, dementia, or Alzheimer's. I want to hear from Michael about how memory function works and how a medical device can improve human memory retrieval to improve cognitive abilities. Get full access to What Happens Next in 6 Minutes with Larry Bernstein at www.whathappensnextin6minutes.com/subscribe

In this 1935th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with mentalist and magician Mysterion the Mind Reader about The Sentimentalists with Steffi Kay, appearing on Penn & Teller: Fool Us, America's Got Talent, and Canada's Got Talent, and going solo. Then, he reads Toronto Mike's mind.A version of this podcast without programmatic ads is available to all Toronto Mike'd Patrons at patreon.com/torontomike.Toronto Mike'd, an award-winning podcast, is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball, Ridley Funeral Home, Nick Ainis, and RecycleMyElectronics.ca.If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please emaail Toronto Mike at mike@torontomike.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On Club Random Classics this month, Bill Maher sits down with Penn Jillette, one half of the legendary magic duo Penn & Teller. Bill tries his best to get the magicians' secrets out of Penn, and they discuss the love of humans vs. animals, the magic trick "Blood from a Stone," libertarians and seat belts, Penn being in the "nut chair" on Politically Incorrect, Bill's opening joke on the Jerry Lewis Telethon that almost got him canceled, the problem with young people's brains, Penn hopping trains as a young man, when Bill was a nanny, and much, much more. This episode first aired on July 7, 2024. Subscribe to the Club Random YouTube channel: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/c/clubrandompodcast?sub_confirmation=1⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Watch episodes ad-free – subscribe to Bill Maher's Substack: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://billmaher.substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Subscribe to the podcast for free wherever you listen: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/ClubRandom⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Buy Club Random Merch: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://clubrandom.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices ABOUT CLUB RANDOM Bill Maher rewrites the rules of podcasting the way he did in television in this series of one on one, hour long conversations with a wide variety of unexpected guests in the undisclosed location called Club Random. There's a whole big world out there that isn't about politics and Bill and his guests—from Bill Burr and Jerry Seinfeld to Jordan Peterson, Quentin Tarantino and Neil DeGrasse Tyson—talk about all of it.  For advertising opportunities please email: PodcastPartnerships@Studio71us.com ABOUT BILL MAHER Bill Maher was the host of “Politically Incorrect” (Comedy Central, ABC) from 1993-2002, and for the last fourteen years on HBO's “Real Time,” Maher's combination of unflinching honesty and big laughs have garnered him 40 Emmy nominations. Maher won his first Emmy in 2014 as executive producer for the HBO series, “VICE.” In October of 2008, this same combination was on display in Maher's uproarious and unprecedented swipe at organized religion, “Religulous.” Maher has written five bestsellers: “True Story,” “Does Anybody Have a Problem with That? Politically Incorrect's Greatest Hits,” “When You Ride Alone, You Ride with Bin Laden,” “New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer,” and most recently, “The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody But Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass.” FOLLOW CLUB RANDOM https://www.clubrandom.com https://www.facebook.com/Club-Random-101776489118185 https://twitter.com/clubrandom_ https://www.instagram.com/clubrandompodcast https://www.tiktok.com/@clubrandompodcast FOLLOW BILL MAHER https://www.billmaher.com https://twitter.com/billmaher https://www.instagram.com/billmaher Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Episode No. 767 features artist Young Joon Kwak and curator Laura Igoe. Kwak is featured in the 2026 Whitney Biennial at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Curated by Drew Sawyer and Marcela Guerrero with assistance from Beatriz Cifuentes and Carina Martinez, it's on view through August 23. Kwak uses sculpture, performance, and collective action to explore bodily transformation, intimacy, and the politics of visibility. Through visually lush, often highly detailed sculptures, Kwak challenges traditional and dominant modes of representation while manifesting ways that trans and queer bodies might be seen. Kwak is the co-founder of Mutant Salon and lead performer in the electronic-dance-noise band Xina Xurner with Marvin Astorga. They have had solo exhibitions at museums such as the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive, University of California, Berkeley; the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, New York; and ARKO Art Center, Seoul. Kwak's work is in the collections of BAMPFA, the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento; the Dallas Museum of Art; the Speed Art Museum, Louisville; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Igoe is the curator of "The Crossing: Picturing the American Revolution" at the Michener Art Museum, Doylestown, Penn. The exhibition looks at how artists have represented Continental Army commander-in-chief George Washington's crossing of the Delaware River on Christmas night, 1776. Upon reaching the New Jersey side of the river, Washington and his troops would attack carousing Hessian mercenary soldiers fighting for the British, earning a pivotal victory for the Patriots. "The Crossing" is particularly interested in how artists have built on and 'refuted' Emanuel Leutze's famed 1851 Washington Crossing the Delaware, which is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The exhibition is on view through January 10, 2027. As discussed on the program: Kwak's Glitter Mani Festo. Igoe was a guest on Episode No. 732, when she discussed her election to the Jenkintown, Penn. school board. Instagram: Young Joon Kwak, Laura Igoe, Tyler Green. Air date: July 16, 2026.

In this episode of Improv and Magic, I sit down with world‑class magician Alan Hudson, one of the UK's most inventive comedy magicians. Alan's blend of sleight‑of‑hand, deadpan humor, and interactive illusions makes him the perfect guest for this show!Alan Hudson is a British comedy magician known for his appearances on Penn & Teller: Fool Us, The Next Great Magician, and stages around the world. He's a member of The Magic Circle, a corporate entertainment favorite, and a performer who mixes dry wit with mind‑bending magic. His signature style blends clever misdirection, interactive comedy, and a charmingly understated delivery that makes every trick feel personal. If you've ever wondered how a magician thinks, how improv affects magic, or what happens when a magician is forced to react in the moment, this episode delivers.To find out more about Alan and his shows, you can visit his website alanhudson.net.Don't forget to subscribe, leave a rating and a review, and share to everyone who enjoys a good podcast. Learn more about LD Madera by visiting ldmadera.com.

Penn hurt his back but it's nothing compared to jumping in high heeled cowboy boots, Matt headlines a comedy show with magic, chandelier girls, Penn goes from Lou Reed to Bob Dylan, Debbie Harry's accidental straightjacket escape, well lit houses, and lots more.

After more than a decade of releasing this show on Mondays, I'm moving it to Wednesdays, and this is the first episode of the new time slot.  On the one hand, this might sound like nothing at all, but it's also a big deal, for you and for me, and in this episode, I explain why I'm making the change, and past guests give some tips on sustainable creativity for the long term. Joanna Penn is an award-winning New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of thrillers, dark fantasy, short stories and travel memoir under J.F. Penn and also writes non-fiction for authors and hosts The Creative Penn Podcast. Why the podcast is moving to Wednesdays (1) Take time out to question what you're doing (2) Learn to pivot if you want to keep going long term(3) Set a sustainable pace, and don't build reader expectations you can't deliver on (4) Don't try to do it all, and try to identify the fear that might be driving your choices (5) Question what still serves you, especially as things continue to change(6) Consider different approaches to creativity. It doesn't have to be every day, or every week(7) Creative humans evolve. Build a body of work for the long term. You can find the backlist episodes at TheCreativePenn.com/podcast, just click into the episode to find the transcript. Why The Podcast Is Moving To Wednesdays, And 7 Tips for Sustainable Creativity Here's my big news! After more than a decade of releasing this show on Mondays, I'm moving it to Wednesdays, and this is the first episode of the new time slot. On the one hand, this might sound like nothing at all, but it's also a big deal, for you and for me! I know many of you have a routine of listening to the show during a certain thing on a Monday, so I'm sorry to have to disrupt that, and I hope I don't lose you along the way — although I guess you could just save the episode for Monday! For me, it's a much bigger deal, because a Monday show has meant I have often recorded the intro and edited and scheduled the episode over the weekend. The main reason is that I need to record in the mornings when I have energy and when the house is less noisy, since Jonathan is often on the phone since he works from home as well. So I would prepare the episode on Fridays, and I type out this intro before reading it, and source the news and my thoughts and all that — and then I'd record it Saturday morning, or Sunday morning if Saturday was busy — and so recently, I have felt like something has to change.  Moving the show to a Wednesday means that I can prep on Monday and Tuesday, which is perfect. Its so funny because I agonised over this, in the same way I agonised over changing the theme tune a few years back. Some of you may remember that — and it also turned out to not be a big deal at all. We build things up in our minds and then sometimes the problem can be solved in a different way. So instead of going to ad hoc episodes, or once every two weeks, I hope that moving to Wednesday makes the show more sustainable again, because let's face it, there's a lot going on, and if I did a show every 2 weeks, I might have to make them longer to get through everything! So, same show, just on Wednesdays from now on. And this change underscores what today's episode is about: sustainable creativity over the long term. How do you keep writing, and publishing, and podcasting — and creating for years — and I am now at two decades — without burning out, and without becoming a slave to the algorithm, or the market, or even your own audience's expectations? The goal is not to just survive this year's release schedule, or to keep feeding the machine until you crumble under the speed of it all. The goal is to still be creating, and still be enjoying it, next month, next year, in five years, in 10 years, in 20, in 30. Who knows how many years we all have left — but for sure, we are NOT machines, we are not AI — and we cannot churn it out – and what is the point of that anyway?  So in today's show, I'll share some thoughts and tips from me and also other authors from the show on this topic, and you can find the full episodes in the backlist, and links as ever in the show notes on TheCreativePenn.com/podcast  (1) Take time out to question what you're doing In early 2024, The Tim Ferriss Show, one of the biggest podcasts in the world, hit its ten-year anniversary with over a billion downloads and over 750 episodes, and Tim decided to take a sabbatical. He paused the show for four months and seriously questioned whether to continue. Not because it was failing, it was hugely profitable and he enjoyed talking to people, but because the landscape had changed.  Podcasting had gone from a wide-open space in 2014 to a saturated market, and his question wasn't “can I keep competing?” It was “is this still the game I want to play?” Just a little note here, I started The Creative Penn Podcast in 2009 when there were even fewer shows so I know a lot about a changing podcast market! After four months, Tim came back from what he called a sabbatical with a blog post on My New Rules for Podcasting — To Keep Things Interesting. He starts with the sheer number of podcasts, saying, “Having a good show is no longer good enough. Having a great show is no longer good enough. If you want to survive in the mindshare of listeners, you need differentiation.” I think this is true for us as authors as well as podcasters, or YouTubers, or social media, or anything. But the good news is that your differentiation can be you. Regular listeners will know that I have questioned ending the show over the years, worried that I was no longer useful, or that my voice no longer mattered when there are so many podcasts on similar topics. But after your wonderful feedback, and the fact that the show still gets a lot of downloads every week, and the growth in my Patreon Community, I don't worry about that anymore. It's unlikely that any of us will have a podcast as big as Tim Ferriss's or sell as many books as The Four Hour Work Week, but that's OK, because we are not Tim. I am Jo Penn and you're here because you find my take on the publishing industry is still useful in some way. When it's not anymore, you will go elsewhere, and I find myself at peace with that. Back to Tim's article — he asks some questions of himself, including:If I get to do this for another decade, or had to do this for another decade, what new rules might I create to keep it interesting? Of course, we all have different ideas of what this means for us. And I have already implemented one of these rules, which is that I interview people on topics I find interesting. I frequently get pitched by more famous authors and bigger names, but most of the time I turn them down, and choose to talk to people who are not famous but are more interested in serving you, my audience, because that is the point of this show. I also have people on that I enjoy talking to, because checking in with my friends while you listen in, can be useful too, since my friends are often authors who've been in the industry a while now. I have to make the interviews time that I find interesting or useful or fulfilling as well. But the point is to stop and take time to consider what might need to change, even if you are really successful. You cannot be a slave to the algorithm, to the media, to your audience, for the long term. You have to put some circuit breakers in sometimes. It's the old adage about the small business. You have to work ON in the business, not just IN the business, which means you need to step away. This does sometimes mean that you have to get away physically. I had this realisation while we were in Bruges in Belgium talking to Jonathan about what changes I could make because I just felt a lack of freedom — and freedom is my highest value, so I really need to honour that. So, the first question for you is: If you feel like you need a change, if your routines are becoming too much, or your workload is too much, or you are eating into time you need for rest and recovery or family or whatever you need, can you schedule time out to have a think about what you need and how things can change? You don't need to burn it all down. You might find the answer is just moving the show from a Monday to a Wednesday! (2) Learn to pivot if you want to keep going long term I love talking to authors who have been doing this career for a long time, and in December 2025 in episode 839, I talked to Jennifer Probst, the New York Times bestselling romance author of more than sixty books, about why some authors build decades-long careers while others vanish after one breakout. Jennifer has been through the indie gold rush, the fallout, traditional deals, Kickstarter, all of it, and I asked her how she thinks about how everything keeps changing, and we start with marketing but it goes much further than that. Writing Free: Romance Author Jennifer Probst On A Long-Term Author Career *** Jo: In terms of how we do marketing, TikTok is still a thing, and we can see maybe generative AI search coming on the horizon and agentic buying. A decade ago it might have been different, more Facebook ads or whatever. Then before that it might have been something else. So there's always things changing along the way. Jennifer: Yes, there definitely is. It is a very oversaturated market. They talk about, I don't know, 2010 to 2016 maybe, as the gold rush, because that was where you could make a lot of money as an indie. Then we saw the total fallout of so many different things. I feel like I've gone through so many ups and downs in the industry. I do love it because the longer you're around, the more you learn how to pivot. If you want this career, you learn how to write differently or do whatever you need to do to keep going, in different aspects, with the changes. To me, that makes the industry exciting. Again, perspective is a big thing. But I have had to take a year to kind of rebuild when I was out of contract with a lot of things. I've had to say, “Okay, what do you see on the horizon now? Where is the new foundation? Where do you wanna restart?” Sometimes it takes a year or two of, “Maybe I won't be making big income and I cut back,” but then you're back in it, because it takes a while to write a few new books, or write under a pen name, or however you want to pivot your way back into the industry. Or, like you were saying, diversifying. I did a lot of non-fiction stuff because that's a big calling for me, so I put that into the primary for a while. I think it's important for authors to maybe not just have one thing. When that one thing goes away, you're scrambling. It's good to have a couple of different things like, “Well, okay, this genre is dead or this thing is dead or this isn't making money. Let me go to this for a little while until I see new things on the horizon.” *** I love that from Jennifer, because there are always new things on the horizon, and we try new things and we pivot, and we bring in other streams of income as some drop off, and we go again and we keep creating. Authors with longevity are authors who pivot over their careers. They may lament the end of one era, but they don't stop, they find a new way forward. (3) Set a sustainable pace, and don't build reader expectations you can't deliver on Kevin J. Anderson is one of the most productive writers alive, with hundreds of books, most of which he writes with dictation while out hiking, and he has been on this show many times. In January 2025, in episode 791, we talked about building a long-term author business, and how authors need to be careful about setting reader expectations around pace of releases. Building A Long Term Author Business, Dictation, Kickstarter, and Short Story Collections With Kevin J Anderson Kevin: Now, again, we get back to the longevity of a career. It is exhausting to write lots of books a year, and most people can't keep doing that for 20 years or 30 years. That's one of the reasons, especially indie authors, where readers expect you to write several books a year. Some indie authors I know are writing a book a month. I couldn't do that for any long period. Well, I couldn't do that probably for a single year. You start building expectations, and when you fail to meet those expectations, they will leave you very quickly. That's why you should have Plan Bs. If you really, really can't stand writing your steampunk vampire romance series after book number 29, well, make sure that you have some other series you're starting and building up. Well, Hugh Howey's got several series that are going. Michael Anderle has all kinds of series, and Craig Martelle has all kinds of series. You don't just put all your eggs in one basket. You need to have Plan B and Plan C, to circle around to what I started with. *** Whatever cadence you choose, for your books, your email newsletters, or or your podcast, or your social media, choose a pace you can still be keeping up in a decade, because this is a long term career, and longevity in the market is one of the most important things. It's better to pace yourself than burn out. (4) Don't try to do it all, and try to identify the fear that might be driving your choices I couldn't do an episode on sustainability without Becca Syme! Becca is an author coach who has worked with thousands of writers, she is the creator of the Better-Faster Academy and the Quit books, and the QuitCast podcast — and In January 2023, in episode 668, at the end of our conversation about intuitive writing and marketing, I asked her what authors who sustain long careers have in common. Intuitive Writing And Book Marketing With Becca Syme *** Joanna: So in terms of sustainability, let's talk about that. You coach writers every day, you see writers on every spectrum of every personality type, and people who write differently and release differently and publish differently. So what do you see as your recommendations or, I guess, commonalities for authors who want this sustainable career as a writer for the long term in order not to burn out? What are you seeing in terms of the best way to be sustainable in a creative career? Becca: Conquering the fear that we have that we're not going to get what we want out of the career, like 100%. Because the fear is the thing that's driving us to burn ourselves out. The fear that if I don't do it this way, I'm not going to make money. If I don't do it this way, I'm not going to have a long career. I'm going to miss out on something if I don't do absolutely everything. And then I think the most important knowledge that we can have is that everyone in this industry who's a nonfiction person, including me, is giving you a perspective on how author life can be done. Every single one of us, not the perspective on how it should be done in order to have success. And if we could just change our expectations of how we look at the people who are helping us who are being good, helpful people who are very sure that their way is the correct way and who should be, again, because like all experts, they've had success doing what they are doing. But the downside is from someone whose job is to sit with authors for 45 minutes at a time, all day, every day, I see the outcome of the people who have tried to “do it all,” in quotes, with capital letters, and who are burned out because they were doing everything out of a fear place. And I think one of the best things that can happen in our — and what burnout often does is it forces us to reckon with the fact that we were doing all of this because we were afraid. My book isn't going to sell, I'm not going to be able to do this, I have this dream that I'm holding on to and what happens if it doesn't manifest itself. Then we make a lot of our decisions about how much to take on based on fear, and we don't know it. Because we don't realize that our brains are wired for survival, and so anytime fear kicks in, your brain is like, well, we have to do that because if you're afraid of it, then that must mean that we need it in order to survive. And we don't. We will survive if our books don't sell. We have to calm that fear and answer the question. Like, what will happen if in five years, I have not sold more than $1,000 on every book that I am writing? Like if each of the individual books that I write have not made more than $1,000. And I have to reckon with what might happen if that happens, because if I don't, that fear is going to drive me to burnout over and over and over and over again. That is why we're making so many of our decisions, including: do I pay for this class or conference? Do I pay for this book? Do I spend money on this advertising? Do I hire this expert consultant? So many of us are making those choices out of fear and we don't realize it. And that's why when we do our public live coaching, and whenever I'm at a conference, I'm always listening for, “but what are you afraid is not going to happen? Or what are you afraid is going to happen?” Because if we don't deconstruct that part of yourself and calm your survival mechanism down, you're going to continue over and over again to make those decisions out of fear. Then you're going to not listen to your intuition because you think it's risky to listen to it. And so I really think, and some of this might include therapy for some of us, I'm just going to acknowledge some of us have trauma around not getting what we want or around not actualizing our desires, and we can't just talk ourselves into letting the fear go. But some of us do just need to consistently confront the fear and make a plan for what happens and then act in spite of that fear because we are not making good decisions when we are in survival mode. *** Becca is very wise, and also pretty hardcore! So if you feel like you are trying to do it all, and you are on the edge of burning out, can you identify the fear beneath it? (5) Question what still serves you, especially as things continue to change Sometimes we keep doing things the same way, even when things have changed. What is lost if we give things up? What is gained? And what kind of game do you want to play? In episode 845, Claire Taylor, humour and mystery author, owner of FFS Media, certified Enneagram coach, talks about how social media has changed and why she gave it up. Leaving Social Media, Writing Iconic Characters, and Building Trust With Claire Taylor *** Joanna: One thing I know will have perked up people's ears is: “I left social media.” Tell us a bit more about that. Claire: This was a move that I could feel coming for a while. I didn't like what social media did to my attention. Even when I wasn't on it, there was almost a hangover from having been on it. My attention didn't feel as sharp and focused as it used to be, back before social media became what it is now. So I started asking myself some questions: What is lost if I leave? What is gained if I leave? And what is social media actually doing for me today? Because sometimes we hold on to what it used to do for us, and we keep trying to squeeze more and more of that out of it. But it has changed so much. There are almost no places with sufficient organic reach anymore. It's all pay-to-play, and the cost of pay-to-play keeps going up. I looked at the numbers for my business. My Kickstarter was a great place to analyse that because they track so many traffic sources so clearly. I could see exactly how much I was getting from social media when I advertised and promoted my projects there. Then I asked: can I let that go in order to get my attention back and make my life feel more settled? And I decided: yes, I can. That's worth more to me. Joanna: There are some things money can't buy. Sometimes it really isn't about the money. I like your question: what is lost and what is gained? You also said it's all pay-to-play and there's no organic reach. I do think there is some organic reach for some people who don't pay, but those people are very good at playing the game of whatever the platform wants. So, TikTok for example—you might not have to pay money yet, but you do have to play their game. You have to pay with your time instead of money. I agree with you. I don't think there's anywhere you can literally just post something and know it will reliably reach the people who follow you. Claire: Right. Exactly. TikTok currently, if you really play the game, will sometimes “pick” you, right? But that “pick me” energy is not really my jam. And we can see the trend—this “organic” thing doesn't last. It's organic for now. You can play the game for now, but TikTok would be crazy not to change things so they make more money. So eventually everything becomes pay-to-play. TikTok is fun, but for me it's addictive. I took it off my phone years ago because I would do the infinite scroll. There's so much candy there. Then I'd wake up the next morning and notice my mood just wasn't where I wanted it to be. My energy was low. I really saw a correlation between how much I scrolled and how flat I felt afterwards. So I realised: I'm not the person to pay-to-play or to play the game here. I'm not even convinced that the pay-to-play on certain social media networks is being tracked in a reliable, accountable way anymore. Who is holding them accountable for those numbers? You can sort of see correlation in your sales, but still, I just became more and more sceptical. In the end, it just wasn't for me. My life is so much better on a daily basis without it. That's definitely a decision I have not regretted for a second. **** To be clear, we're not saying you should give up social media, but it's about questioning how things make you feel, and what you can sustain and how you want to spend your time. I did question once again whether to give up this show entirely, but it is an important part of my creative body of work, and quite frankly, I reach more people with the podcast than I do with my books, and I still love talking to people, and I learn, and it underpins my business. I don't do much social media though. I learn about AI things on X and I do post photos and things on Instagram but I don't do much else. You have to decide what is right for you, but also, what is right for you might change over time. If we have a long term career, or a long term anything, things will change, and we will need to move on sometimes, or at least question whether it is still working in the way it used to. (6) Consider different approaches to creativity. It doesn't have to be every day, or every week.  In April 2026, in episode 858, I talked to Sara Rosett, USA Today bestselling mystery author and co-host of the Wish I'd Known Then podcast, about low-key marketing, and a more seasonal approach, or phased approach to podcasting as well as writing. Special Editions, Seasonal Podcasts, and the Art of Low-Key Book Marketing with Sara Rosett *** Jo: Although I must say I had forgotten about your Mystery Books podcast and going to seasonal. I also had my second podcast, Books and Travel, which is now on a kind of hiatus, but going to a seasonal approach is actually really interesting. Do you find that listeners come back to that podcast? Sara: Yes, and it surprises me because I've always thought you have to be weekly with a podcast to gain any traction at all, which I think is the best way to do it. You can build an audience quickly then, but I just knew I couldn't sustain that. So when I set out, I started with maybe seven to ten episodes and I did them each year — each year has had a season — and I do five to ten episodes. Readers find it, and I have highlighted specific books. I think maybe they're searching for a podcast about the Thursday Murder Club or something like that. They find it that way, and I get downloads, just steady downloads throughout the year, and I don't do much. I do some Pinterest pins for that, and that's about all I do. This is one of those things — it's the kind of low-key marketing that's low threshold, but it does work. I think if your readers are looking for stuff to listen to about the topic you write about, it could be a good way to do some low-cost, long-tail marketing. I love it. I keep doing it because I love it. Jo: That just seems more sustainable to me. I didn't like doing everything every day or every single week. Sara: Me either. I like switching it up, and I do enjoy the different phases of writing. I like the research and then I like doing the — well, I don't like the drafting that much, but once I get a draft done, I like the editing. And then when it comes time to promote it or do a special edition or whatever, I enjoy that part. Finding whatever I'm going to use for the interior photos and stuff — just things like that. I enjoy each phase and I like switching it out. Jo: I think that's really good. Some people think this writer's life is you write new words every single day and you manage your ads every single day. That seems to be what some people do, but that's certainly not us, is it? Sara: No. And that's great if you want to do that. I just don't want to. And I think we've come to the point now where each person can do this as they want. Hopefully people don't feel the pressure to meet these self-imposed deadlines or parameters that don't exist. There's no rules for writing or publishing. You can do whatever you want. *** I am definitely a seasonal creator, I don't write every day. I never have. I binge write when a book emerges, or binge create. As I record this I am working on the treatment and trailer for what is now called Cathedral Zero, a positive futurist sci-fi feature film that I am entering in the FutureVision X Prize in the next week or so, and then I will move to the next project. I also love Kickstarter launches for this reason. They feel much more sustainable because it's such a focused marketing push. My Books and Travel Podcast is still on hiatus, but I may still resurrect that at some point. I still feel the pull of it. And of course, this show remains weekly, but the Wednesday shift will hopefully help keep it this way. I can't see me going seasonal with this, but never say never! The main thing is to consider seasonality, or consider phased approaches to your work, rather than trying to do exactly the same thing week in week out. (7) Creative humans evolve. Build a body of work for the long term. Roz Morris first came on this podcast in 2011, and in March 2026, in episode 853 we talked about her memoir, discovery writing, and slow, sustainable book marketing. Roz is an award-nominated literary author and former bestselling ghostwriter, an editor and I always appreciate her perspective as she has been doing this far longer than I have. **** JOANNA: Do you still actively choose indie for a particular reason? ROZ: I do. I really like building my own body of work, and I'm now experienced enough to know what I do well, what I need advice with, and help with. I mean, we don't do all this completely by ourselves, do we? We bring in experts who will give us the right feedback if we're doing a new genre or a genre that's new to us. I choose indie because I like the control. Because I began in traditional publishing—I was making books for other people—I just learned all the trades and how to do everything to a professional standard. I love being able to apply that to my own work. I also love the way I can decide what I'm going to write next. If I was traditionally published, I would have to do something that fitted with whatever the publisher would want of me, and that isn't necessarily where my muse is taking me or what I've become interested in. I think creative humans evolve throughout their lives. They become interested in different things, different themes, different ways of expressing themselves. I began by thinking I would just write novels, and now I've found myself writing memoirs as well. That shift would have been difficult if someone else was having to make me fit into their marketing plans or what their imprint was known for. But because I've built my own audience, I can just bring them with me and say, “You might like this. It's still me. I'm just doing something different.” **** Inspiring words from Roz there — “It's still me, I'm just doing something different.” And indeed, I am a very different Jo from the new author who started this podcast back in March 2009. I have evolved and this show has evolved and this is not the end, it is a new phase. It's funny because it's just a shift of two days, but it also breaks a habit, for you listening and for me creating. It changes a time slot, and that itself can be a way to change energy, to change direction, to shift what matters and how we do things.  So that's what I want to leave you with today. A question around how shifting something, even something small, might make a big difference to your creative body of work, the quality of time you have for yourself or your family, and I'd love to know what you think about today's episode and what we covered, as well as your thoughts on the Wednesday shift.  Please leave a comment on the show notes, or the YouTube channel, or email me. I will see you next Wednesday, so happy writing and I'll see you next time!The post Why The Podcast Is Moving To Wednesdays, And 7 Tips for Sustainable Creativity first appeared on The Creative Penn.

A river dries up. The soil turns salty. A harvest fails. Farmers across the developing world feel climate change constantly and personally, they rarely blame their government, or demand action.Guy Grossman (University of Pennsylvania) is one of three authors of a new review of the politics of climate change in the developing world. He tells Tim Phillips that almost all of the existing research on this topic is focused on rich countries, even though the developing world faces the worst of the damage,  and has the least capacity to absorb it, because in those countries the link between climate change and political action is more explicit.Political solutions are needed: developing country income losses could run 60% higher than losses in wealthy countries, and climate change could push between 32 and 132 million people into extreme poverty within a decade. Grossman's review turns up a paradox in the public opinion data. Concern runs high even where formal climate literacy is low, because people experience the crisis through a failed harvest or a dried up well, not a scientific chart. This disconnect isn't neutral, because vulnerability isn't simply inherited. It is produced, by decisions about who owns land, whose villages get seawalls, and whose voice counts when climate money is handed out.The research behind this episode:Grossman, Guy, Audrey Sacks, and Alice Xu. 2026. "The Politics of Climate Change in the Developing World." Annual Review of Political Science 29: 101-126.To cite this episode:Phillips, Tim, and Guy Grossman. 2026. "Climate Change Politics in Developing Countries." VoxDev Talks (podcast).About the guestGuy Grossman is the David M. Knott Professor of Global Politics and International Relations in the Department of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. He founded and co-directs Penn's Development Research Initiative (PDRI-DevLab), and his research spans governance, forced displacement, political accountability, and conflict processes across the developing world, with a particular regional focus on Sub-Saharan Africa.Research cited in this episodeExtreme poverty projections. World Bank economists Bramka Arga Jafino, Stephane Hallegatte, Julie Rozenberg, and Brian Walsh estimate that climate change could push between 32 and 132 million people into extreme poverty by 2030; the wide range reflects uncertainty over which emissions and development pathway the world follows. Read the working paper.Afrobarometer. A long running, pan African survey network covering more than 30 countries. Grossman's review draws on it to show that only around four in ten respondents identify human activity as the main cause of climate change, even as concern about its effects runs far higher.The attitudinal and accountability channels. Two frameworks political scientists use to trace how climate exposure might change political behaviour. The attitudinal channel asks whether living through a flood or a drought changes what someone believes about climate change; the accountability channel asks whether it changes their vote. Grossman finds evidence for both, but little that explains when concern turns into political pressure.Maladaptation. The academic term for private adaptation that shifts harm onto someone else, such as a village embankment that protects one community by pushing floodwater into the next. Grossman uses it to illustrate why adaptation without government coordination can widen inequality rather than close it.Ecuador land titling. Mark Buntaine, Stuart Hamilton, and Marco Millones's 2015 study of a titling programme in Morona Santiago found it did almost nothing to slow deforestation, because the state never backed the new titles with enforcement. Grossman cites it as evidence that representation without power tends to fail.Indigenous managed land. Research led by Stephen Garnett finds that Indigenous peoples, roughly 6.2% of the world's population, manage more than a quarter of the planet's land surface, often protecting carbon sinks more effectively than formally designated protected areas.More VoxDev Talks episodesFinancing climate adaptation: what works, what doesn't, and can carbon credits help to bridge the gap? Namrata Kala, Rohini Pande, and Catherine Wolfram pick up where Grossman leaves off, on who pays for adaptation when governments won't.How the urban environment can adapt to climate change. Matthew Kahn and Siqi Zheng discuss how cities in the developing world can adapt their buildings and infrastructure as climate driven migration accelerates.Related reading on VoxDev.orgClimate politics: understanding political inaction on climate change. Allan Hsiao and Nicholas Kuipers show that Indonesian politicians underestimate voter concern about climate and pollution, and that correcting their misperceptions does not, on its own, produce policy action; a real world case of the accountability channel breaking down.Political representation and forest conservation? This finds that transferring formal political power, not just consultation, to India's historically marginalised Scheduled Tribes led to a measurable fall in deforestation.

On the KMOJ Morning Show, Peyton Scott Russell joins Freddie Bell and Chantel Sings to discuss a community mural project made possible through a Minnesota State Arts Board grant that brought together North High School students, emerging artists, and local organizations. He shares how the project began with an artist residency focused on expressive portraiture, encouraging students to explore creativity and self-expression by studying influential artists such as Picasso, Basquiat, and Butler. The second phase paired North High students with members of Russell's advanced SPRAYFiNGER program, creating one-on-one mentorships that culminated in a collaborative public mural. Russell also highlights the many businesses, artists, and community partners whose support demonstrates how public art can inspire young people, strengthen neighborhoods, and bring communities together. He said that there will also be an official unveiling of the mural on Saturday, July 18th on the corner of Penn & Broadway.

What do Blockbuster cards, Duke basketball, and a lifelong dream of writing a novel have in common? Somehow they all end up in this episode! This week, Penn and I are joined by #1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Giffin, whose books have defined the modern "beach read" for millions of readers. (And I love a beach read, y'all.) Her latest book, Love You More, just came out this month.Emily shares the path that took her from practicing law to becoming a beloved novelist, and how she creates the messy, relatable characters we can't stop rooting for. Along the way, Emily joins Penn in encouraging me to write my own novel and we explore why there are no truly original ideas - only original voices.Of course, this wouldn't be Laugh Lines without a healthy dose of Gen X nostalgia. We reminisce about Encyclopedia Brown, Blockbuster late fees, and play a game called "Plot Twist," where Emily turns the most ordinary situations into bestselling novels on the spot. We also answer your Laugh Line questions about pickleball etiquette, marriage with ADHD, and the mottos that have shaped our lives.If you learned something from our conversation with Emily, share it with an aspiring writer or somebody who just has a dream that they have wanted to chase. We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube.Learn more about Emily's new book, Love You MorePre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode is a re-air. For Independence Day, Grettelyn Darkey and Joe Grabowski set conversation aside and let G.K. Chesterton speak. This special gathers a curated series of Chesterton's reflections on America—the idea of the citizen, the creed at the heart of the Declaration of Independence, the nature of true patriotism, the true soldier, and the difference between the right sort of patriot and the wrong sort of politician—woven together with the strains of the nation's great patriotic songs. Drawn largely from What I Saw in America, they reveal a Chesterton who saw the American experiment more clearly than most Americans do. In This Episode: Why G.K. Chesterton called America "the one great state in the world in which many types and races are united by one idea"—the idea of the citizen—and "almost more like a great church than merely a great nation" G.K. Chesterton's case that America is "the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed," one set forth in the Declaration of Independence with "dogmatic and even theological lucidity" What G.K. Chesterton meant by true patriotism, and why he held that "my country, right or wrong" is something "no patriot would think of saying, except in a desperate case" G.K. Chesterton on the true soldier, who "fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him" G.K. Chesterton's account of "Americanization"—the making of "a nation out of exiles"—and why he found the process unlike anything else in the world Resources Mentioned: What I Saw in America by G.K. Chesterton (Special Semiquincentennial Edition) The Society of Gilbert Keith Chesterton Chapters: 00:00: Introduction 00:51: America United by the Idea of the Citizen 01:28: Tradition and the Presence of Penn and Franklin 02:13: Equality, Patriotism, and the Divine Basis of Democracy 03:54: Testing Patriotism Through the Old Songs 04:48: The Only Nation Founded on a Creed 06:24: The True Soldier and the War Ballads 07:35: Americanization—A Nation Made of Exiles 08:51: Fighting the Representatives We Choose 09:38: Liberty and Obedience FOLLOW US Instagram Facebook X SUPPORT Donate Shop Produced by Saint Kolbe Studios

What's the difference between a bundle, a box set, an anthology, and a collection? How can being part of an anthology be creatively interesting and useful for marketing? With Jamie Ferguson In the intro, Amazon Kindle increases the 70% royalty share; audiobook marketing tips (Voices by InAudio); The Builder's Creed [Seth Godin]; Future Vision XPrize; Researching the dark side of travel [Anna Sayburn Lane]; Photos from Bruges @jfpennauthor; Bones of the Deep: A Thriller – J.F. Penn. Today's show is sponsored by Bookfunnel, the essential tool for your author business. Whether it's delivering your reader magnet, sending out advanced copies of your book, handing out ebooks at a conference, or fulfilling your digital sales to readers, BookFunnel does it all. Check it out at bookfunnel.com/thecreativepenn This show is also supported by my Patrons. Join my Community at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn Jamie Ferguson is a fiction and short story author, editor, and publisher, with over 20 anthologies and multiple ebook bundles through her own press. Her latest book for authors is Bundle Up! A Practical Guide to Anthologies and Box Sets That Sell. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes The difference between bundles, box sets, anthologies, and collections Why a multi-author project means lots of people promoting the same book, not just you How to find and pitch for anthology opportunities, and what editors look for in a contributor Contracts, rights, and royalty splits explained for short fiction Why Kickstarter and special print editions are changing the anthology game Inkwren, the publishing management tool Jamie built for backlists and anthologies You can find Jamie at JamieFerguson.com. Transcript of the interview ith Jamie Ferguson Jo: Jamie Ferguson is a fiction and short story author, editor, and publisher, with over 20 anthologies and multiple ebook bundles through her own press. Her latest book for authors is Bundle Up! A Practical Guide to Anthologies and Box Sets That Sell. Just for context too, one of my short stories, “The Dark Queen”, is in the Amazing Monster Tales: Into the Briny Deep anthology. So I'm excited to talk about this today. Welcome to the show, Jamie. Jamie: Thanks for having me, Jo. Jo: Lots to talk about. But first up— Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and self-publishing. Jamie: Well, I wanted to be a writer since I was at least six, maybe before then. So it was just something I always wanted to do, but I always did it on the side. I had a year, many years ago, where I was really busy with work, and I just felt like I didn't write anything the entire year, and I thought, “I'm going to give it up.” Then the next year—that was 2011—I started seeing more about self-publishing, and that really invigorated me and made me feel like, “No, why am I giving up something I've wanted to do since before I went to school?” So I got back into a novel I had worked on years before. I went to a writing workshop with Dean Wesley Smith up in Oregon, back in the day, and then I had my energy back. I've been writing ever since. Still on the side, unfortunately, but someday. Jo: Hopefully! Tell us a bit more about what kind of genres you write. Because balancing your own books with also doing these anthologies and things is quite difficult. Jamie: Yes, it definitely is. I'd say I primarily write contemporary fantasy, but I'll write anything in any genre if I'm really excited about it. I also have a soft spot for Westerns. They take a little more time because I like to research all the facts, but those are really fun to write. Creating anthologies on your own is actually quite a bit of work. One of the things I also do is work with two other authors, DeAnna Knippling and Tami Veldura, and create more anthologies with them. That's really fun because then we can each take a different piece. There's also always somebody to talk to, as opposed to doing it on your own. Jo: Let's start with the terminology, because I definitely struggled with this, and I think people still do. We've got bundles, we've got box sets, we've got anthologies, we've got collections—and are these in ebook, audiobook, or print? Can you start by explaining what all of these words actually mean? Jamie: Yes. In my book I actually use the term “multi-author collection” or “multi-author project”, because there are so many different permutations and it does get confusing. From my perspective, I think of a bundle as a collection. It could be a collection of ebooks. Technically it could be a collection of print books, although people generally use “box set” for that—but then a box set can also be a box set that's all ebooks. An anthology, I usually use for something that's a collection of short stories where there's an editor who's actually edited all the stories. I have had stories in anthologies where somebody didn't edit them, and they would technically be called a curator. So it is definitely confusing. I have not done anything with audio collections, but that certainly is another area that I actually think is pretty interesting. Jo: I also think that a single author… so I've done a short story collection, but an anthology is multiple authors. Is that right? Jamie: Yes. Jo: I think when I came into the indie space, there were a lot more multi-author… we all called them box sets back in the day, when it was just ebooks, right? And now we can actually do boxed sets with boxes through things like BookVault. So it feels like the term “box set” has also gone out of fashion. So if people listening are thinking of doing any of this, you do have to figure out what is the thing you might be signing up for. So let's talk about the multi-author projects, as that's where you specialise. What are the benefits for an author to be involved in a multi-author anthology project? Jamie: The biggest benefit is that you are one of multiple people promoting the same project, whether it's print or ebook or whatever. If I put out a short story collection on my own, I'm the one promoting it, and maybe I can get a couple of other people to write about it, but it's really just me. If I'm part of an anthology with 15 other authors, that's 15 other people who are promoting the same project. That's more newsletters, more Facebook posts, maybe something on their Patreons, whatever it is. You get more synergy, and you get more touch points with potential readers. Then hopefully that translates into sales as well. So that's definitely the biggest part of it—the promotion. Then I also personally really enjoy these types of collections because it's just fun to work with other people. There's a nice energy when everybody's like, “Oh, I put this in my newsletter, and I put this here, and I put this here,” and you feel like you're part of something bigger than just your own piece. Jo: What about the creative benefits? Especially with short stories, often people will write them for a collection or for an anthology project. Jamie: Yes. I've definitely written some stories that I never would have thought I'd write, because somebody I knew asked if I would be interested in being in their collection—whether it's an ebook bundle or a print anthology. So at least for me, that's been really fun. One of the ones that stands out is that I was asked to be in a dinosaur collection once, and I was like, “I don't write dinosaur stories.” And then I did. I set a dinosaur story in London, and it was really fun to write, and I never would have come up with that in a million years. Jo: Let's say we've got 12 authors. They've all written short stories, and now it's in this anthology. But what is the market for these kinds of things? Have you found that there is a readership for short story anthologies that carries over to the author's longer work? Jamie: There is. I like to think of it as: if I have a story in a collection or an anthology—whether it's one I'm editing or somebody else is editing—that's one more place for people to find me. A lot of times anthologies will take reprints as well, like your story. “The Dark Queen”—that was a reprint. We asked if you'd be interested in participating in the Amazing Monster Tales series. And I actually really like printing stories again that have already been published, because there are a lot of stories out there that can be hard to find. Or if it's an older book. I have one author I've known for, like, 30 years. I reprinted one of her stories that was originally published in, I think, 1999, and the anthology it was in was out of print. You couldn't find it, and it was a fantastic story. So it's fun to be able to give new life to those stories and give them more opportunities, and also just have more ways for people to find you. Jo: Yes, I definitely think it's a long game. I don't think appearing in a short story anthology in one particular month is going to mean that your whole back collection just sells, right? Jamie: No, definitely not. It's more about avenues to be found. I know there have been some anthologies that have made quite a bit of money, but in general you're probably not going to make as much money, but you will have those extra places for people to find you. Jo: I always feel like yes, there is maybe a small amount of money, but it is more about almost a marketing thing in itself. So let's say an author is listening and they're like, “Do you know, this sounds like a great idea.” How can they pitch for things like this? How do they find out about opportunities, or get noticed to be asked? And what are the expectations for them? Jamie: The biggest thing is networking. There used to be a couple of opportunities where you could make people aware that you had stories that you were interested in potentially having picked up for something. I'm not aware of anything like that now. When I create a collection, I have a mailing list that I send out, and it includes authors I've published before. It includes a couple of extra people who somehow found my mailing list. And I'll publish, like, “Here's what I'm doing.” There are also authors I've met at writing workshops. I've been able to read some of their work, I'll approach them and say, “Hey, I really liked such and such a story. Would you be interested in writing for this?” Then there are a couple of other websites, like Duotrope, and places that advertise markets and calls for submissions. Jo: Yes, I've found them also on small presses that do these kinds of projects. They often put up one call for submission a month or something, and you can write for their particular thing. In general, the short story markets are the places to keep an eye on. Jamie: Yes, definitely. Jo: If an author wants to pitch to have their story as part of an anthology, do you want to know things like platform, or is it just the story itself? Jamie: I personally look at the author's platform. I do make exceptions—there are actually two authors I've worked with a couple of times who don't have websites. They are people I know personally and they are very, very good writers, so I'll make an exception for things like that. But otherwise, if somebody submitted a story to me and I didn't know that person, I would check out their website, I would check out their social media, I would see what else they had done. Part of what you're doing when you're creating a collection is thinking not just about how you, as the person organising this, will promote the collection, but how the authors who are participating will help promote it as well. If it's somebody who has a lot of fans, even if they're not very active on social media, that can help a lot too. There are a lot of different factors, though. Jo: So then talk us through the project timeline. How long do things take, and what sort of involvement do the authors have along the way? Because it's a lot to juggle. Jamie: Yes, it is a lot to juggle. I can give you an example with the Monster Tales series. We'll come up with an idea, and we also like to try to get the artwork done early on in the process. We don't need it that soon, but it's really great to have that taken care of. We'll contact authors. I think for this one we used my mailing list, but we've also contacted a number of people individually that we know who write the style of stories we like. Then, as the submissions come in, we usually wait until we have a nice chunk of them to start going through, and then we'll pick some right away. Sometimes it'll be like, “Oh my gosh, of course we want this story,” and we'll wait to fill out the other slots. Then we'll negotiate sometimes. Sometimes it's like, “I want this story.” “Well, I want this other story.” And we have to figure out how the word count works. Once we finalise the stories, then usually what happens with that anthology is that DeAnna—who is a very, very good editor—will make the first editing pass, and then I'll make the second. And now Tami's involved, so Tami will make the third, and then we'll iterate. Once all three of us have gone through the first time, then we'll send the story back to the author for edits. So the most the author has to do for most of the process is just wait for us to edit their story, and then work on their edits and get them back. Then, once we get closer to launch, we'll give them information about what we're going to do. For example, we're going to launch the next issue with a Kickstarter. So our authors know that we have a Kickstarter coming, and we'll give them more information as we get closer to the actual launch date. Jo: So how long might an author expect before their work is out there? Jamie: It really varies. I've had some collections published very quickly—let's say a couple of months. Some have taken longer just because somebody ends up having some life issue and things get delayed. So I'd say ideally it would be more like three to nine months. Jo: Yes, I think… depending on the— Jamie: —collection and the complexity. Jo: Yes, exactly. Jo: And you did mention word count there. Just give us a range of what word count you like to get. Jamie: So these days I'm shooting for between 75,000 and 80,000 for the total word count for a collection. That includes the stories, but it also includes the opening, the introduction. For one we're working on now, we're going to have some interstitials, where we have little bits of things we're going to write in between each story. So that's the overall size of the collection. I'll keep track of the word count as the stories come in, and then as we edit the stories, sometimes they grow, sometimes they shrink. Sometimes that's a big enough difference where we're like, “Okay, we need one more story to fill it in.” But that's the target. Jo: And how much for each individual story? Jamie: That varies. I've done a bunch of different things. These days, what I'm advertising is between 3,000 and 8,000 words. I also always tell people: if you're outside this range on either side, just check with me, and if it's something that's really an excellent fit for the book, I'll make an exception. The one that's coming out, I think we have a 1,500- or 2,000-word story that was just amazingly perfect for what we wanted. There was another story, actually I think it was the issue that you were in, that was at least 12,000 words, but it also was a perfect fit for the theme. So I will make exceptions, but within reason. I wouldn't put a novella inside an anthology, because then you'd have a 22,000-word story next to a 3,000-word story, and I personally feel like that's really jarring for the reader. You don't want to go from something super short to something super long. It just doesn't feel like it flows well to me. Jo: No, absolutely. Jo: We'll come back to the making of it because you mentioned some really interesting things there. But just on the contractual side—a lot of indie authors don't necessarily do any publishing contracts for their work, unless it's signing the terms and conditions when uploading on Amazon or Kobo. So tell us a bit about the contract side. What rights are we talking about here? Any red lines in contracts around this kind of thing? Jamie: For contracts, I would recommend people read Kristine Kathryn Rusch's posts on this. She is way more informed about this than I ever will be, so when I have questions, I'll look at her posts. I've asked her a couple of questions. What we're doing for the Amazing Monster Tales… this is the first time that I've actually had authors sign contracts. Prior to this, I've used PubShare, which handles royalty splits and all of that, and that was really great. We want to do direct sales and Kickstarters and have lots of other options. So we did put together a contract this time. I'd have to pull it up, but I think we asked for first worldwide rights in English—I'm getting the terminology wrong here—but that was basically it. Jo: Or, I guess, reprint rights if the story's already been licensed. Jamie: Correct. We have two contract templates, one for original stories and one for reprints. We made sure to make that distinction, because it is definitely a distinction. In the book by Kristine Kathryn Rusch—it's called Closing the Deal… on Your Terms—I highly recommend that for anybody interested in learning more about contracts. Jo: Yes, that's great. And just for people listening: when you said you didn't have contracts before, you just used PubShare. So in that way, the author still retained the rights and you just split the royalties—it was more of a co-writing thing. Jamie: Correct. When you publish stories through PubShare, the author signs an agreement with PubShare, and then I, as the editor or organiser, would also sign a separate agreement. So each of us has an agreement with PubShare. We don't have agreements with each other, if that makes sense. Jo: Yes, so it's very different to move into Kickstarter. So tell us about what you're now moving into. Jamie: Well, Kickstarters are a new world for me personally. I have many friends who have had Kickstarters. I've supported Kickstarters. I watch them. But it's something where I'm very happy to have two partners who have done Kickstarters before. I'm not sure how many Tami's done—I think Tami's done the most at this point. So this is all new to me. But it's very exciting. At this point we have a backlist, so part of the plan, for the Monster series, is to offer issues one through four as part of the rewards when we launch issue number five. That's really exciting, because I never had a backlist like that before. Jo: Yes, and in fact the money is in the backlist, as ever, and those add-ons or bundles as part of Kickstarter are great. So are you going to do special print editions, or is it digital only? Jamie: We are talking about special print editions. You mentioned BookVault earlier—we've been looking at BookVault. Our other anthology series that hasn't come out yet will also launch with a Kickstarter. It's dragon-themed, and Tami actually did the cover work, which is beautiful. BookVault just gives you so many options that we never had before, so I'm very excited about that. Jo: Yes, I think it's a really good idea. I did gorgeous hardbacks for my solo author collection, so I think it's a great idea. So from the publisher side, let's come back to that. You've mentioned you have to write things like an introduction and interstitials, and you're trying to balance the stories. What are some of the other things that people might think about if they want to organise their own anthologies? Jamie: Oh gosh, where to start? There's the basic setting up of the anthology, so you have to define the table of contents. You might get a bunch of stories that are really awesome, and you might have to tell somebody who has a wonderful story—and maybe even who's a good friend of yours—that you're going to pass on it because their story doesn't fit with all the other stories. Every time I have to do that, I feel kind of bad. But being on this side, it's really interesting to see how you can tell which stories fit together and which don't. There's also the editing process, which can be a lot of work. Part of what I like about working with Tami and DeAnna is that DeAnna really loves editing. I feel like I'm a good editor, and I can do it, but for me it's more of a job. For DeAnna, she loves it, so she does the bulk of the editing, which is great. When I do it on my own, I feel like it's a task I have to do. There's lots of cat-herding. Sometimes people take a while to get their edits back. Sometimes they have life events, and you have to delay things because you're waiting on them. There are all the little tiny pieces of organising things—like, if you're reprinting stories, you need to make sure you get the copyright attribution correct. A lot of times I'll have to go and look up where something was originally published. An author might say, “Oh, it was published in this year,” and I'm like, “Okay, actually it was published in this other year, by this other publication first.” So I'm trying to be organised there. henT one of the things that very infrequently—I think it's only happened to me twice—every once in a while, you're in the middle of editing a story and you have to pass on it, even though you've already accepted it, because the editorial vision and the author vision for the story are not the same, and you can't reconcile that. Jo: I think that's really interesting, because so much of what you're talking about there—you mentioned vision—it's almost taste. You're saying which stories fit. It's not just a case of, I don't know, a pirate anthology and then picking 10 stories about pirates, right? You seem to be thinking about this in a more artistic way. So can you talk a bit more about that? How do you decide on a theme, and then how do you know that a story doesn't fit? Jamie: In the beginning, I was not this selective. In the beginning I'd say, for example, “Hey, I'm putting out a collection about fairies. Give me a fairy story,” and that was it. As I've edited the stories, it's become easier to see how things fit. So, for example, if I have 10 stories in an anthology and I have an 11th story, and they have different tones—let's say the 11th story is really funny and all the other stories are very serious—then that would be a fit thing. That's not necessarily taste; it's just that you don't want one funny story if everything else is really dark and scary or serious. As far as picking a theme, the theme could be very broad. With this dragon anthology we're working on, we decided we wanted it to be called A Hoard of Books. So the theme was: has to have dragons, has to have books, and that's pretty much it. And then we were like, “Let's just see what we get.” We were very surprised at what we got. We thought we'd have more serious stories, and it turned out most of them were very light-hearted and really fun. And we're like, “You know what? That actually changes the way we're looking at the whole series,” because we did not expect that. With the monster series, we'll pick a theme. So, for example, the next issue is Monsters in Love, and for those it's more like, let's just see what happens. Sometimes I'll have a more specific theme. The next anthology I'm publishing on my own is called Fairy Bargains, and I wanted people to obviously have fairies, but I wanted there to be something related to the mythology and lore of having a bargain with a fairy—and there's a lot of stuff about that. So for some things like that, when I put out a call, I'll provide information. I might say, “Here's a link to a Wikipedia article. Here's some mythology that might be helpful for you,” just because I want things to stick a little bit more to the theme itself. Whereas with Monsters in Love, there's a very wide range of stories, and that was very fun to work through. Jo: Oh, yes. There's a lot of monster, on the spicy side as well. But were you doing a clean Monsters in Love, as opposed to in lust? Jamie: Yes, this is a clean one. That's pretty funny. But boy, when you give authors the room for these types of things, you get all kinds of stories, and it is super fun to work with those collections. Jo: As you're talking, I definitely want to do more short stories. It's really interesting, because you can actually generally get paid more for a first print—first print rights on a short story—but I often want to just publish it myself. Then I was really happy to be in yours, because it was a reprint anyway. So I was like, well, there's absolutely nothing to lose if it goes in as a reprint. So these things can be really interesting. Talking of the finance from your side of things: you have a small press and you're doing this publishing yourself, but you're paying all these authors and doing a lot of work. So how does it work as the publisher, in terms of these anthologies, financially? Jamie: With the ones we've published so far, because we've gone through PubShare, it's been a royalty split. As the editors, we would take a percentage, and then we pay for the artwork, and of course all of our time. I think what we were doing there was saying 70% of the royalties would be split equally between all of the authors and the stories. So, for example, if I had a story as well, I would get part of the author split—the same percentage as everybody else in the collection—in addition to the editor split. For what we're doing now, we've changed this a little bit, and I believe we said 60% goes to the authors, and then we're going to keep a share of the proceeds for the business because we want to be able to pay for the artwork out of the business account. We want to pay for advertising, whatever we need to do—like setting up our store, or if we wanted to invest in anything, we want to be able to do that as the business, as opposed to it just being us doing this on our own. We're just trying to treat it a little bit differently. Jo: And I know it's so much work—a crazy amount of work. How many anthologies and books do you have to do in a year to make it worthwhile financially? Jamie: Oh, I don't know. I would say, unless you get an opportunity—like, for example, to have an anthology in a story bundle or something like that—you may not break even. But if you're going to do this, do it more for the marketing, do it more because you enjoy it. Now, going forward, I think that will change, because we are looking at Kickstarters, we are looking at direct sales. We're very motivated to try to make this more of a business thing than a fun side project. So, ask me in a year. Jo: Yes, hopefully more. I do think Kickstarter is great for short stories. I actually buy quite a few collections on Kickstarter. I think they're actually really hard to discover through, say, Amazon—it's a place that is quite hard to identify short stories. Whereas I've found I've bought collections on Kickstarter because there's so much more of a sales page—there's so much more rich media that tells me how I'm going to feel about the stuff. I've bought short story anthologies and collections from people I don't know. So I think it's a really good thing to do. There is an audience there. Jamie: Yes, definitely. And it does feel like the anthologies on Amazon don't sell as well—you don't make as much as you used to. I've been doing this for, well, gosh, 10 years now, and I feel like the sales numbers on Amazon in the past year were noticeably lower than they would have been six or eight years ago. So I am very excited about Kickstarter. Plus, Kickstarter just feels really fun. You're not just throwing your book up; you also have all the extra stuff with the page, you have the rewards, and it just feels really exciting. Jo: No, I agree. I really love it. I didn't do it for a long time, and now I just love it. Jo: So, staying with the publisher side of things— Any practical formatting and production tips? Because in these types of projects, all kinds of people just send you different stuff. Jamie: I have a style guide. So whether it's me or it's the group project, once all the edits are complete, I'll do a formatting pass, and I'll make sure I use curly quotes and the same em dash format and everything, just so everything in the book is formatted the same way. Every once in a while there's an author who has something particular that they want, and I can work around that, and that's fine. I also work with a lot of Canadian authors, and I'll let them keep their Canadian spellings. I don't think everybody does that, but I feel like that's their voice in a way, so I don't correct those. I might check some things there. I think the formatting is important—it makes things look better if everything has the same style. Then I use Vellum, which makes things really easy. I love Vellum. Because I publish so many authors at this point, I have a Vellum file where I store their biographies and their links, so when I publish a new anthology I'll just go grab, say, Jo's “about the author” page from that collection and put it into the new file. Then I also track when the last time was that I checked with the author about their biography. If it's been more than a year, I'll check in with them and say, “Hey, do you have an updated biography you want me to use? Here are your links—do you have any different links now?” So that makes it a lot easier from the formatting standpoint. Jo: And you mentioned Vellum—having done box sets on Vellum, you can just drag a whole book in there if you want to do a three-book box set, or three short stories, whatever. It's much easier to just drag things in, and it makes it easier to format. So I would say to people: you don't need to worry too much about that. There are lots of things that can help you. But even with doing the print stuff for the Kickstarter—people have opinions, don't they? So in terms of authors' opinions and managing—you mentioned herding cats—how do you manage all of that side of things? Jamie: I haven't actually had a lot of trouble with that. The authors I've worked with seem to feel like they gave me their story, and then once the edits are out of the way… I haven't had anybody have any issues with the covers. Usually they love the covers, especially for the Monster series. So, no problems there. Jo: Oh, that's good. Well, I would say a tip would be to make sure you're communicating, if you're somebody who's organising. So talk a bit about communication. Jamie: Communication is very important. What I try to do is send regular updates, especially if I'm in the middle of edits or working on something and I'm not ready to launch. I'll send an update email out to the authors and just say, “Here's what's going on, here's what the plan is.” Or if the plan has to change, if the launch date has to change for some reason, I'll let the authors know about that. Actually, with the upcoming Monsters in Love issue, we were originally not going to do a Kickstarter. That was a late decision, so I contacted all the authors and said, “We've changed our plans. We're going to launch this with a Kickstarter. Please confirm that you're okay with this.” One author was not comfortable with the Kickstarter idea, so he pulled his story, and then we found a replacement story for that. But I just feel like the communication piece is really essential. It's really important for the authors to know what's going on. Jo: Yes, absolutely. So, we've talked about how marketing is a good thing, in terms of there being lots of people marketing. How are you effectively marketing these kinds of books, as the premise is quite different to a single author project? Jamie: Right. There's the usual—write a release post, write posts on social. I do additional things, so I'll publish what I call a story spotlight for each story in the anthology. That's just where I talk a little bit about the story, I provide an excerpt, and then I provide the author's bio and links to find them. Those are really great, because they're very quick to put together. The hardest part is getting a short excerpt that shows enough about the story to be engaging. But that really isn't that much time, either. Then those are also nicely evergreen. I've actually searched for authors before, when I'm trying to research them for an interview, and I've found my own spotlight posts and my own interview posts with authors come up at the top of the list, which is kind of funny. I also do interviews with as many of the authors in a collection as are willing to participate. Sometimes people just don't have the time—I don't make this required—but I usually get 80 to 90% of the authors participating. So, for example, this year I'm in a couple of bundles on StoryBundle, and I'm doing interviews for people there. It's also really fun, and you're not paying for advertising—you're just creating something that the authors are excited about and they want to share. So it promotes the collection, but it also promotes the author, which I find really nice. It's a nice networking thing too, and I'm happy if someone wants to interview me. It's like free publicity for each person, in addition to the collection. Jo: I love that you've used the word “fun” quite a lot, which I find amazing. You're obviously a super collaborative person. I've co-written a number of books— I've been part of some collections, and I really think that there are two personalities. One is like me, where we really love the creation stuff and the publishing stuff, but we're hyper-controlling. And then someone like you—you're very collaborative, and you're doing such a great job. To people listening, I would say: if you're more like me, don't organise an anthology. What you want is Jamie, or somebody who actually finds it fun to organise a big group of authors. Jamie: Yes. It is definitely interesting working with other partners in this, because when I publish an anthology on my own, I make all the decisions. I pick the artwork, I pick the theme, I do everything, I decide the table of contents. But when you're working with other people, you do need to negotiate. So we've had a couple of times where it's like, “I want this story.” “Well, I want this other story, I don't like the story that you want.” And so we have to barter, in a way. Aside from that, it is nice, because you get to split up the tasks. I could focus on things like the organising—I do the Vellum files, I do the final cover and everything. For the Kickstarters, actually, Tami's got more expertise, so Tami's going to be working on the Kickstarters for our collections together. If I had to do all this on my own, it's a ton of work. It's a ton of work. So it is nice to split it up. Jo: And of course, one of the things is managing so many moving parts—and you've actually built a tool to manage all this. So tell us a bit about that tool, and how it might be useful for people with big backlists as well as anthologies. Jamie: I built what I think of as a publishing management application. The original idea is that, for years and years, I wanted a software tool that would do catalogue management, because I was managing my own catalogue, and I was also managing—at this point I've published at least 20 anthologies, so that's a lot of authors. Then last summer, I had an author who I'd published a number of times, who was going to, I think, WorldCon, and she asked if I could give her covers for five anthologies she'd been in, so that she could make some promotional material. I was like, “Oh, sure, I can do that.” And then I was like, “Well, wait a second—is this in Notion?”—because I started trying to use Notion last year—”or is it in a spreadsheet?” It turned out her information was in, like, three different places, and I had to work to pull it together. And then I was like, “You know what? That's it. I'm just going to finally write this application.” So Inkwren manages your stories. As an author, I can manage my stories—I can track which are published, which are drafts, which are just ideas. I can track my publications. From the publisher standpoint, it's really helpful, because I can track each anthology I've published and what I'm working on. I can track the edits, I can track the contracts. I can upload contract templates—so we talked earlier about the original and reprint contract templates that I use. I upload those, and they have placeholders in them. When I generate the actual contract, the author's name will replace the placeholder—I'll have the text “author name” in the contract template, and it'll get replaced by, like, “Joanna Penn” or whatever. So that saves a lot of time. Then I also added in task tracking, because I started to feel like, well, now all my stuff is in one place, but my tasks are somewhere else. So now I can associate tasks with a publication. For example, for the book I'm working on right now, I know which tasks I need to do for the cover, and which for the interior, and everything. I have a template of tasks. Then I can also track tasks related to promotions. For example, the story bundle I'm promoting right now, I have a task for each interview I'm doing with the authors, and I have a calendar view. I can see when I'm going to publish them and know that they're all spread out. It saves me so much time, and it's so much easier. Jo: I do think building tools when you actually need the tool yourself is very useful. Just say the name again, and spell it out for people. Jamie: It's Inkwren. My own personal publishing company is Blackbird Publishing, and I wanted something related to birds and writing. So I came up with Inkwren, which is I-N-K-W-R-E-N, and it's just inkwren.com. Jo: And it is available for other people to potentially buy and use? Jamie: Yes, it is. Jo: Well, I think that's super useful, because it's very hard when people are starting out and they think, “Oh, I've only got one book—why would I need any kind of tool to manage it?” But over the years, your backlist grows, especially with short stories. So I love that you've built this, and there's probably more that you can add over time as you expand the business yourself. So much potential. So we are at the end. Where can people find you and your books and everything you do online? Jamie: My author website is JamieFerguson.com. And then, obviously, I mentioned Inkwren earlier. My publishing company is BlackbirdPublishing.com. And then the projects I'm doing with Tami and DeAnna—we have a couple of websites, but the easiest way to find us is our press, which is BorogrovePress.com. Jo: Fantastic. Well, thanks so much for your time, Jamie. That was great. Jamie: Thanks, Joanna.The post Bundles, Box Sets and Anthologies With Jamie Ferguson first appeared on The Creative Penn.

I participated in another Socratic Debate about the Future of "AI" and XR at Augmented World Expo 2026 with Leslie Shannon, Alvin Graylin, and Louis Rosenberg (you can listen to last year's debate in episode #1611). Shannon and Graylin argued for "AI," whilst Rosenberg and I argued against "AI." In my write-up, I wanted to leave some breadcrumbs to more in-depth, skeptical arguments against "AI" that we didn't have space or time to dig into during the debate, but "some breadcrumbs" ended up being over 30k words, and more like an outline for an entire book. Writing a book isn't on my to-do list at the moment, but disseminating the work researchers, journalists, linguists, and critics of "AI" have done is urgent and necessary, so I'm sharing the results of this deep dive here, in bullet list format. My fellow panelists, Alvin Graylin and Louis Rosenberg, indulged me in extending our debate offline after AWE, pushing me to test my ideas further and demonstrating how and why this is an extremely active field of study with polarizing points of view that often come down to philosophical differences. Clearly, it's just getting started. My objections to "AI" is loosely organized by various themes, but some framing may be helpful in approaching it. My objections to "AI" center around the limitations of LLMs, the consolidation of wealth and power from Hyperscaler companies, and threats from automated decision making systems and surveillance capitalism melded with democratically-backsliding authoritarian governments. I'm including a broad range of critiques spanning the domains of philosophy, technology, sociology, politics, economics, culture, and ethics. I'm coming from the orientation of Process Philosophy & Peircean Semiotics that emphasizes the relational and contextual dimensions that the "AI" field tends to de-emphasize or completely collapse. I see process-relational philosophy as a necessary paradigm shift away from the underpinning philosophies of the "AI" community, which tend to be Functionalism, Naturalism, Computational Theory of Mind, Physicalism, & the TESCREAL bundle. Below you'll find my own process philosophical emergency response to "AI embedded within my curation of excerpts and commentary of primary sources that I'm leaning upon. The AI Con: How to Fight Big Tech's Hype and Create the Future We Want (2025) by Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna (also see episode #1563). Bender & Hanna say, "To put it bluntly, 'AI' is a marketing term. It doesn't refer to a coherent set of technologies. Instead, the phrase "artificial intelligence" is deployed when the people building or selling a particular set of technologies will profit from getting others to believe that their technology is similar to humans, able to do things that, in fact, intrinsically require human judgment, perception, or creativity." Emily M. Bender wrote the "Artificial Intelligence" [preprint] (2026, June 25) entry for the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Society. Bender's concluding paragraph gives a great overview of the seven different ways that the idea of "artificial intelligence" operates in the world. She says, "The notion of artificial intelligence is frequently sold as present or near-future and inevitable technology. In fact there is no coherent set of technologies that can serve as the denotation of the phrase, nor do any of the technologies so marketed rise to the fantastical but ill-defined claims of 'AI' is or soon will be. Nonetheless, the idea of artificial intelligence has been extremely impactful in the world. In order to better understand and deal with those impacts, it is helpful to look at artificial intelligence through the varied lenses of how the idea operates in the world: as the name of a research field, as one approach to cognitive science, as a parlor trick, as a an ideology, as a way to hide and devalue human labor, as a way to shift and/or obfuscate accountability, and as a means to centralize power." Inventing Intelligence: On the History of Complex Information Processing and Artificial Intelligence in the United States in the Mid-Twentieth Century [dissertation] (2020, December 14) by Jonnie Penn. Penn says, "The phrase ‘artificial intelligence' was coined by John McCarthy, an American mathematician, in 1955. It has travelled with a noticeably amorphous definition since." "AI" has always had a spotty history of technologists using a "brain is a computer" metaphor while also using "poor citation practices." From page 14, Penn says, "The vocabulary Simon, Rosenblatt, McCarthy and Minsky chose to describe new techniques in major newspapers and scholarly journals informed Americans' still plastic understandings of what was possible, and indeed desirable, in the emerging information age… During the mid to late 1950s, these men turned to clannishness, self-aggrandizement, speculative rhetoric, fluid definitions of key terms and poor citation practices to shore up legitimacy for their controversial new techniques — actions that drew attention toward questions of how to accomplish such aims and away from whether they were well founded." Part II: Remembering the Human Microcosm in the Age of Mechanized Intelligence: Philosophy as Emergency Response (2026, June 9) by Matt Segall. In a multi-part Substack series, process philosopher Matt Segall calls for a philosophical emergency response to "AI." He says, "In each case a new media technology intended to expand the power of thought ended up transforming the very nature of the thinker who invented it. Each new medium furnishes the very terms in which we come to understand ourselves. This is why the philosophical response is always an emergency response: by the time anyone has noticed what is happening, what may be lost and what gained, the mutation has already done half of its work." Segall warns about the computational metaphor of the mind by saying, "The large language model now tempts us to adopt an even stranger self-image: that human minds are no different than machines, our thoughts just the statistical echoes of our training data. The creators of this latest technological upgrade are encouraging us to downgrade our estimate of human consciousness, thus narrowing the distance between ourselves and the machines built to imitate us." "Resisting Dehumanization in the Age of 'AI': The View from the Humanities" [lecture] (2026, February 10) by Emily M. Bender. Here are the lecture slides with a bibliography at the end. Bender does an amazing overview of how the marketing of "AI" uses pernicious dehumanization tactics built on an underlying "brain is a computer metaphor." From page 15 of her talk: "Scientific metaphor used and debated in neuroscience: "THE BRAIN IS A COMPUTER. "PR metaphor used by technologists: "THE COMPUTER IS A BRAIN" Bender cites Baria & Cross' paper titled "The brain is a computer is a brain: neuroscience's internal debate and the social significance of the Computational Metaphor (2021), which says “the Computational Metaphor rests on other well-ingrained ideologies in which a hierarchy of human value is tied to a particular notion of intelligence such that the quality of being emotional is considered inferior to being rational." Bender also cites Dijkstra's 1985 lecture "On anthropomorphism in science": "A more serious byproduct of the tendency to talk about machines in anthropomorphic terms is the companion phenomenon of talking about people in mechanistic terminology." Here are a couple of examples of how "AI" Hyperscaler companies like OpenAI use dehumanizing tactics to sell us on "AI" Hype. Sam Altman will say things like, "A kid born today will never be smarter than AI. Ever." Or another example is when Altman says, "For me, AGI is basically the equivalent of a median human that you could hire as a co-worker... And then Superintelligence is when it's smarter than all of humanity put together." These statements collapse the human experience into one dimension of "intelligence," which amplifies the dual harm of treating machines more like humans and treating humans more like machines. It is also questionable the degree to which this statement is even true given the potential non-computational aspects of "relevance realization." More on this down below. Part IV: Remembering the Human Microcosm in the Age of Mechanized Intelligence: Hegel's Loom and the Difference Reason Makes (2026, June 10) by Matt Segall. Segall brilliantly breaks down the "Brain is a Computer Metaphor" by saying, "Metaphor is not just a shiny paint job on the vehicle of cognition. It is the engine of thought. Its coupling of concepts drives the limits of conceivability, shaping what is thought together and what is not thought at all. The metaphorical imagination is our main means of tuning in to the otherwise invisible effects of new media technologies. Part of the discipline philosophy brings is allowing us to notice an analogy as an analogy before advertising crystalizes it into the unnoticed transparency of common sense. A fact is a fact, but it might also be a fossilized metaphor. The governing analogy of our age is that cognition is computation: the brain an information-processing device, perception its input and behavior its output, memory a form of physical storage, learning the adjustment of weights, and intelligence an algorithm for minimizing error or surprisal. On this view, given enough training data and computational power, consciousness itself will eventually be engineered… The metaphor “the mind is a computer,” for example, tacitly proposes that mind is to brain as software is to hardware… Reiterated in textbooks and earnings calls, in grant applications and policy briefs, the partial comparison congeals into an ontology, until we find ourselves insisting not that the mind is like a computer in some respects but that it simply is one — and,...

Send us Fan MailDr. Radosta is a board-certified veterinary behaviorist and has spent 26 years fighting for the legitimacy of a specialty she loves. This vet career spotlight on Vet Life Reimagined features guest Dr. Lisa Radosta, whose childhood showed her the power of the human-animal bond, and she said the path into veterinary behavior was natural. A graduate of the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine with a residency at U of Penn, Dr. Radosta built Florida Veterinary Behavior Service into a four-location, five-doctor specialty practice over 18 years. She has trained eight residents, co-authored multiple textbooks including From Fearful to Fear Free and Behavior Problems of the Dog and Cat, and appeared on Animal Planet, CNBC, Nat Geo Wild, and more. She is fierce, funny, emotionally intelligent, and completely unapologetic about all of it.This one is vibrant, honest, and deeply entertaining from start to finish.Vet Life Reimagined is hosted by Dr. Megan Sprinkle. Resources:Video Episode on YouTubePodcast club guide + key takeaways: Sprinkle of Wisdom Substack Dr. Lisa Radosta's websiteDr. Radosta's YouTube ChannelVeterinary Behavior Textbook: From Fearful to Fear FreeVeterinary Behavior Textbook: Behavior Problems of the Dog and Cat #VetLifeReimagined #VeterinaryBehavior #VetMed #AnimalBehavior #FearFree #VeterinaryMedicine #BoardCertified #VeterinarySpecialist #SprinkleOfWisdomThe Animal Health, Nutrition, Technology Innovation (AHNTI) conference will be in Boston on Oct 26-28. Registration closes July 12th, so don't wait. Learn more at AHNTI-US.com and use code VETLIFE10 to save 10% on registration.Support the showMore Vet Life Reimagined?

Little Buddy made a request and we deliver as we delve into the various incidents around Hyrule that Penn is digging into for his job at the Lucky Clover Gazette. Join us as we Lore together! Contact us: Instagram: https://instagram.com/loretogether BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/loretogether.bsky.social Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/user/LoreTogetherPod Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LoreTogether Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/LoreTogether We're proudly part of the Boss Rush Games Network! Check them out, and the rest of the podcasts over at https://bossrush.net/ where you can also join our own Lore Together discord channel on their discord server. Music: "Perspectives" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

William Penn returned from Ireland in August 1670, and soon found himself arrested, along with fellow Quaker William Mead, for preaching to a crowd in public in violation of “the common law,” an ambiguity that would play out during their momentous trial. The trial would end in their acquittal, notwithstanding egregious intimidation of the jury by the judge, the Lord Mayor Sir Samuel Starling. Among other exciting moments, Starling threw the principled foreman of the jury, Edward Bushel, in jail. Bushel’s suit for a writ of habeas corpus would lead to a verdict that established an inviolate principle in Anglo-American law, that judges may not intimidate juries. Penn and Mead were acquitted under the glare of remarkable publicity for the day, and the case would establish Penn as a nationally famous advocate for Dissenting religion. After his acquittal, Penn finally made it home to visit his dying father, Sir William Penn, with whom he reconciled in a poignant father-son moment. Subscribe to my Substack! X – @TheHistoryOfTh2 – https://x.com/TheHistoryOfTh2 Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/HistoryOfTheAmericans #212 William Penn Before Pennsylvania 1 #208 What You Need to Know About English Politics in the 1680s 1: The Exclusion Crisis Primary references for this episode (Commission earned for Amazon purchases through the episode notes on our website) Andrew R. Murphy, William Penn: A Life Julius J. Marke, “The Trial of William Penn,” Litigation, Fall 1979. Robert and Marilyn Aitken, “Bushell’s Case,” Litigation, Winter 2010.

Philly takes center stage as Freedom Fuel, the cheap gas stations promoted by President Trump, opened in the city this week. Executive producer Matt Katz and senior producer Abby Fritz also cover how convicted child trafficker Jeffrey Epstein tried to recruit women from the University of Pennsylvania. And they give context on the arson attack on a mosque in the Northeast. City Cast Philly Neighbors get a members-only segment on the hidden gardens of Philly and an upcoming Neighbors event at the historic Wyck Historic House and Garden. Want to join the City Cast Philly team at Wyck? Become a Neighbor and keep an eye out in your inbox for an invitation to sign up for the event.  Our Friday news roundups are powered by great local journalism:  Northeast Philly mosque damaged in arson attack, authorities say Delco man arrested after alleged antisemitic threats on Gov. Josh Shapiro Inside Jeffrey Epstein's attempts to recruit women from Penn Documents show how Jeffrey Epstein tried to court renowned Penn Psychology professor Martin Seligman Who was Jeffrey Epstein? The disgraced financier with powerful associates Trump-promoted Freedom Fuel gas stations are opening around Philly. Here's what we know. ‘Freedom Fuel': White House promotes network selling cheaper gas in Pa.  Delaware County man arrested for allegedly threatening Governor Josh Shapiro The White House's X Feed Freedom Fuel Announcement How young players are getting an All-Star spotlight in Philly The Southeast Asian Market at FDR Park: Philly's Best-Kept Family Food Secret Wyck Historic House and Rose Garden Our newsletter has Philly news & events in your inbox every weekday morning. Call or text us: 215-259-8170 Instagram: @citycastphilly Support our show and get great perks as a City Cast Philly Neighbor. Sign up here.  Advertise on the podcast or in the newsletter: citycast.fm/advertise

What happens when you walk away from a successful career to pursue the thing you can't stop thinking about?In Episode 272 of The Popko Project Podcast, host Popko sits down with singer-songwriter Jonathon Penn to discuss his journey from a career in finance to becoming an independent musician. Jonathon shares the inspiration behind his new album, It Took a Long Time To Get Young, and opens up about creativity, songwriting, self-doubt, family, and what it means to build a life around purpose instead of expectations.The conversation explores the challenges of leaving a stable career, rediscovering your artistic voice, and navigating today's independent music industry. Jonathon also discusses how fatherhood, the loss of his dad, and years spent away from music ultimately shaped the songs on his latest record.If you're interested in indie music, singer-songwriters, songwriting, creativity, career changes, independent artists, Americana, alternative rock, or personal growth, this is a conversation you won't want to miss.In this episode, we discuss:• Why Jonathon Penn left a successful career in finance to pursue music• The making of It Took a Long Time To Get Young• Finding creativity again after years away from songwriting• The realities of being an independent musician in the streaming era• Balancing family, ambition, and artistic fulfillment• Songwriting, inspiration, and trusting your creative instincts• The stories behind "Hawk Circling," "Wildfire," "Gold Rush," and moreListen to Jonathon Penn's music on Spotify, Apple Music, and wherever you stream music.If you enjoy conversations with musicians, artists, creatives, and independent creators, be sure to follow The Popko Project Podcast for new episodes featuring compelling guests and authentic conversations about music, creativity, and life.

On this episode, Doyle got a promotion, Cullen ran away, Ector introduces Chauncey, and Penn needs his swords buffed. The Plot... Thickens!

Penn is busy rehearsing and preparing to travel the UK in a van with Piff & Pop's Magic Shoppe, Penn and Matt have very different experiences with Stephen Colbert, foisting the variety arts on audiences expecting to see a band, Penn's memories of Independence Day (the movie and the holiday), and lots more. Tickets now on sale for Piff & Pop's Magic Shoppe - 11 dates across the UK this fall! https://www.aegpresents.co.uk/event/piff-and-pop/

Join us as we explore the fascinating world of magic with David Parr, a magician known for fooling Penn and Teller and creating innovative performances. Discover his journey, creative process, and insights into the art of magic and mystery.wesiseli.comPatreon.com/wes_iseli

Today I chat with author Nan Fischer about her new domestic suspense thriller, This Is a Lie, written under the pen name Cleo Ballard. The novel follows Penn, a computer science student who creates an AI best friend named Aletheia to protect her from deception after a devastating personal betrayal. The tension quickly escalates as the algorithm begins interpreting protection as total destruction, forcing Penn into a desperate race to stop her own creation. Our conversation explores the eerie realities of AI companionship, the pitfalls of a one-size-fits-all advice culture, and how relying on automated validation can isolate us from genuine human connection. Fischer also opens up about her instinctual writing process and a remarkably varied career that shaped her fast-paced storytelling. Long before writing psychological thrillers, she traveled as a writer for the Ringling Brothers circus, penned a Star Wars trilogy, and co-wrote autobiographies with iconic athletes like Monica Seles and Béla Károlyi. Great chat, great book!Thanks for listening.Kyler---Episode Links:Purchase This Is a LieNan Fischer's Website

Last year, I was the mom crying in the Target parking lot while buying dorm room supplies. This year? Our daughter Lola is back home after her freshman year of college, and apparently... she knows things. So we handed her the microphone.In this episode of Laugh Lines, Lola shares everything she wishes she'd known before moving into her dorm - from making friends in those first overwhelming weeks to building good study habits, surviving finals, handling competitive clubs, and why you definitely do NOT need twenty athletic tops (I would like the record to show I tried to say this while we were packing). We also asked Lola your questions from Instagram about homesickness, roommates, calling your parents, transferring schools, ADHD organization, dorm must-haves, and what actually matters when you're preparing for college.Whether you're sending your first kid to college, heading there yourself, or just wondering how someone can get hit by a car and still make it to a meeting on time (yes, that happened), we hope this conversation makes the whole transition feel a little less scary. If you have more college questions, let us know - we may have to bring Lola back for another round. We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube.Pre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What does it look like when a 35-year-old organization that has never fundraised decides to go all in on individual donors?In this special episode recorded live at GiveCon, I sit down with Penn Street, returning podcast guest, Development & Outreach Director at Aftersight, and host of The Blind Chick podcast. Penn walks us through Aftersight's transformation from a grant-only model to running successful sprint campaigns, including a $20K in 20 Days campaign that exceeded its goal and changed how the entire organization thinks about fundraising. We also dig into something most nonprofits completely overlook: accessibility as a revenue strategy. Penn makes the case that blind and low vision donors have money and want to give it to you, but your fundraising materials, events, and technology are making it impossible. Plus we talk about turning podcast audiences into email subscribers, using past guests as Social Street Team® members, and why your volunteer list might be the most underused donor pipeline in your organization.Topics:How Aftersight went from zero individual fundraising to exceeding its first $20K in 20 Days campaign goalWhy your podcast guests, volunteers, and past event attendees are untapped donor pipelinesUsing lead magnets to move podcast listeners into your email list, and why that matters for campaignsAccessibility as a revenue strategy: what nonprofit events and emails are missing and what it's costing themThe Social Street Team® method is applied to an organization with a national and international audienceLive Q&A: lapsed donor strategy, CRM migration, and alt text for inclusive email storytellingFor a full list of links and resources mentioned in this episode, click here.Bloomerang is the complete donor, volunteer, and fundraising management solution that helps thousands of nonprofits deliver a better giving experience and create sustainable, thriving organizations. Combining robust, easy-to-use technology with people-powered support and training, Bloomerang empowers nonprofits to work efficiently, improve supporter relationships, and grow their donor and volunteer bases. Learn more here. If you've listened to the show and found it valuable, would you leave a review?It helps more nonprofit leaders find the podcast, and I read every one.Thank you for being here for episode 200 and beyond.Resources:Easy Emails For Impact™: The $5K+ Fundraising Campaign SystemPurpose & Profit Club® Fundraising + Marketing Accelerator   The SPRINT Method™: Your shortcut to 10K fundraisers Instagram, LinkedIn, website , weekly newsletter  [FREE] The Brave Fundraiser's Guide: Stop getting ignored. Start raising more. May contain affiliate links

What happens to your creativity when you're in pain or sick, and can you ever get it back? How can you find and sharpen your author voice? J. Daniel Sawyer talks about voice mastery, writing with chronic pain, and building an eclectic author business. In the intro, leaning into your Strengths and deciding what you want to achieve by the end of the year; and Bones of the Deep by J.F. Penn. Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with writing software, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 15% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna This show is also supported by my Patrons. Join my Community at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn J. Daniel Sawyer is the author of over 30 books across science fiction, fantasy, crime, short stories, and nonfiction, as well as being a podcaster and filmmaker. His latest book for authors is The Pitch-Perfect Author: Voice Mastery for Writers. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes Writing fiction through chronic pain and re-emerging into health after surgery How your physical health shapes (and darkens) your fiction Rebooting an author business around a weekly Substack column What author voice really is, and why it's fundamentally about sound The building blocks of voice: functional vocabulary, dialect, and musicality The “crossing the line twice” trick for hearing your own voice objectively You can find Dan at JDsawyer.net or on Substack. Transcript of the interview with J. Daniel Sawyer Jo: J. Daniel Sawyer is the author of over 30 books across science fiction, fantasy, crime, short stories, and nonfiction, as well as being a podcaster and filmmaker. His latest book for authors is The Pitch-Perfect Author: Voice Mastery for Writers. So welcome back to the show, Dan. Dan: Hello, Joanna. It's good to be back. Jo: Goodness me, you have been on the podcast a few times, but actually, the last time was April 2017, which is crazy. It's nine years ago. When I saw your book, I was like, “I can't believe we haven't talked for that long.” For anyone who doesn't know you, tell us a bit more about— What does your creative and author business look like these days? Dan: Oh, well, these days it's in a state of recovery because it basically ground to a halt while I was dying a few years ago. It turned out I had an organ disease from the time I was a kid that I didn't know about, and it just progressively got worse and worse, putting me in more and more pain. I hit a point around about 2020 or so where I was in so much pain that I couldn't write fiction. I continued to write nonfiction, but when you're carrying around a lot of physical pain, there comes a point where so much of your brain's activity goes into coping with it that you actually lose the ability to model other people's emotional states—or at least well enough to write fiction. So I was very frustrated, and I was despairing that I was ever going to be a novelist again. Then suddenly, what I was sick with went acute. I went to the emergency room, and they're like, “Oh, if you don't have surgery in the next 24 hours, you're going to die.” So I went and got surgery, and there was one bed in the whole state. There was a three-hour drive to get to the one that was available in the time window. I get there. They wheel me into the OR. I wake up afterwards, and I realise that I'm not in pain, and that I had never felt that before in my adult life. Jo: Wow. Dan: Just the walls of my whole reality came caving in. Two weeks later, I was back up and working, and since then I've been slowly reacquiring my ability to write fiction. So now I've got four novels going again, like I used to have going all the time, as well as doing a weekly column and all sorts of other stuff. Jo: I think a lot of people will be interested in this. A lot of writers have chronic pain issues or chronic health issues, and yours sounds like it was a sort of down, down, down, down—and then more of a sudden up. Maybe just talk a bit more, because I feel like a lot of the time people are too hard on themselves about, “Oh my goodness, if I can't write fiction, is it the end of everything?” So how did you adapt to that, with the mental health aspect of dealing with that change in circumstance? Dan: Well, it was happening so gradually, and it happened at the same time that a whole bunch of other weirdly stressful things happened, like COVID and a couple of family emergencies that derailed my whole life for a couple of years. I assumed it was just really bad stress that would pass with time. So I had the despairing feeling, because when you write fiction, it tends to occupy a central place in your self-concept. I'd also been through very tough times before, so I was like, “Well, got through that then, maybe I'll get through this now.” I just made sure to keep writing something, because at least you keep the discipline of the words flowing. There was still thought going on, so I would have ideas for novels and write them down. There were good days and bad days. Occasionally I would sit down and be like, “I feel like fiction today,” and I would write a couple thousand words, and then it would be 10 months before I could do that again. When you work with your mind, it is really easy to develop or sink into the delusion that your mind is not your body. Now, if you're paralysed or you're missing limbs, you can still write—but your mind and your body are a single system, and eventually, if something terrible is wrong with your body, it's going to affect your cognition, your emotive abilities, and all the things that we depend on for creativity. That doesn't necessarily mean that if you're sick or injured, or you've got chronic health problems from birth, that you can't write. It just means that it really is one of the factors that goes into shaping your experience of the world, that goes into shaping the way you process things and they come out on paper. When there's a massive change in your health, it's going to show up in your fiction somehow. If your health goes way down, especially if you get into a lot of pain or you have a terminal illness, your fiction's going to get darker. One of the reasons—I discovered this after I got my surgery—one of the reasons is that the sense of impending doom is actually a medical symptom of organ death. Jo: Well, don't say that to a dark writer like me. I have a sense of impending doom the entire time. Dan: Well, there's a cognitive sense of impending doom that you get if you're modelling systems and you see how things can go wrong. But the sense that you feel the claws of demons grasping at your heart all the time—that can be a medical symptom. So pay attention to that. I didn't know that until afterwards, or I'd have gotten looked at a lot sooner. Jo: That is really interesting. You mentioned there you are reacquiring the ability to write fiction, or that's what you've been focusing on. You also talked about having to reboot the business. So what are some of the concrete things you're doing to rebuild? Dan: Well, the first thing I did is I allowed myself to get talked into doing a weekly Substack column a couple of years ago, and that's worked out really well. Pay is pretty decent. I've been posting most everything for free except for some previews of upcoming books, but I'm now learning the art of paywalling, so that also helps. Getting paid for the weekly column is quite nice, and a side effect is that it does drive people occasionally to the fiction, even though I'm writing nonfiction. It more frequently drives people to the nonfiction books, but it gives me a good place to announce new releases, to promote book bundles, Kickstarters, and all that sort of thing. It's a very good place for that because the people who are subscribing there—especially the people who are subscribing and supporting—are interested enough in what I'm saying that they want my email every week. So it's a good filtering mechanism for building the email list as well. Jo: You used to do a lot of audio. That's how we connected way back, like 17 years ago, I think, when we first connected. So are you still doing a lot of audio? Dan: I am not at the moment. It's not because of a decision to drop the audio. It's because I am now building my house, and I don't have a place that's quiet enough to record dependably. I'm living in a little RV at the moment while I build the house. In the deep winter, everything is quiet enough in the forest to record some things, and so I do audiobooks for clients, and I work on audiobooks of my own that are coming out. It's not quiet enough to podcast, and it's not quiet enough to be recording any other time than when the whole world is asleep. Hopefully by next year I will have the recording studio building built, and then I'll be back at it. Because boy, I miss it. Jo: I know. So you mentioned there bundles and Kickstarters and things, and we reconnected because I bought a StoryBundle, and your new book, The Pitch-Perfect Author, was in the StoryBundle, which was part of why I bought it anyway. So let's get into the book and what's useful. Let's start with— What is author voice anyway, and why is it important? Dan: Author voice. Everything about the way that you write is part of your author voice. The themes that you gravitate to, the way that you turn a phrase, the way that you tell a joke, the way that you handle dramatic tension. When all of that combines, it creates in the reader's mind an emotional fingerprint, a gestalt that says, “This is a Joanna Penn book. This is a Dan Sawyer book,” or whoever. When you bring the focus down further, author voice is fundamentally an auditory phenomenon. You can see this if you look at the careers of writers who had major worldview shifts during their career, or who shifted genres. If you read an Isaac Asimov mystery, and you read Asimov's Guide to the Bible, and you read Isaac Asimov's The Robots of Dawn, they're all Asimov. You can hear him talking to you through all of those different venues. So author voice is not a genre thing. It's not dependent on content. It has to do fundamentally with how your brain processes language and how it comes out of your mouth. That, in turn, is based on patterns that were laid down when you were pre-verbal as an infant. You learned language by mapping the music of the conversations around you, and then gradually learning that the sing-song you were hearing corresponded to ideas. That's how the brain bootstraps itself into language. So when you start writing, just like when you start speaking, you wind up imitating a lot—unconsciously—the people you've read and heard, because that's how you develop your voice. There comes a point at which all the various influences on you, and who you are, and how they pass through you, crystallises into something definite. By the time you're a moderately competent writer, and you're finishing novels and short stories well, your author voice is pretty well established. But that doesn't mean it's sharp, because most people don't actually concentrate on learning to hear their author voice, so they can't tell when it's off. This is why new writers who revise a lot tend to revise their voice right out. When they write, they're using language as feels right to them, but when they read, they're reading it like an English teacher, or through the lens of someone who has very definite ideas about how grammar should work in all circumstances. So they tend to smooth the quirkiness out of their voice, and what you get is something flat. It doesn't feel alive. It may convey information, it may tell a good story, but it doesn't feel like you're entering something that's living. Jo: I think this is so difficult, especially for people who are new to writing. Because I remember very much spending the first few years going along to writers' conferences, and there were always sessions on “you must find your writer's voice.” You must find your author's voice, and we publish books because of the voice, and all this. It was very, very confusing to me. As you say, it has to emerge somehow, and yet that emergence seems to be very hard to accept. So what are some of the ways we can perhaps think about voice? You mentioned there some patterns. You talk about music. So what are some of those angles? In the book, you have different chapters on all of these things, but maybe just talk more about some of the elements. Dan: The first and most obvious is functional vocabulary. This is not the number of words that you know. These are the words that you can reach for in the moment. You can expand your functional vocabulary by deliberately using more words—burnish your inner thesaurus. The greater your functional vocabulary is, the more your personality is going to come out through your voice. When you've got more options to do something that's just the way that you want to do it, the closer it's going to be to the way you want to do it. So there's functional vocabulary. There's your native dialect and accent. You, being British, have a different set of preferred terms for everything than I, being a West Coast American, do. One of the great differences that's always visible between an English writer and an American writer is that you guys have a different way of speaking. When you speak of a difference between one thing and another, you talk about how this car is different to that car. And Americans say this car is different from that car. It always marks out a British writer versus an American writer. There are 100 little things like that. They happen not just between major countries, but within regions in every country. You could tell on paper the difference between someone from Yorkshire and someone from London, just as I can tell on paper the difference between someone from the West Coast and someone from Mississippi. Even if they're highly educated, the idiom, the preferred turns of phrase, the preferred imagery—all of that is going to be a little bit different, and it conveys that regionality. There's also the musicality of the language. This is the actual rhythm of the words with which you speak. When you learn to analyse poetry or to write poetry, you learn something called scansion. How a poem scans is—what are the beats of the lines, how are the beats of the lines related to each other, and how does the rhyme move in and out of that? A Shakespearean sonnet, or a sonnet from the Elizabethan era, has a specific metre, a specific number of lines, and a specific rhyme scheme, and the metre is iambic pentameter. An iamb is “bum-bum,” if I remember right. It's the rhythm of the heartbeat. It's “bum-bum, bum-bum, bum-bum.” And you can hear it in the name of the metre, the iamb. The iambic pentameter is where the stressed syllable is the second syllable and the unstressed syllable is the first syllable. All of Shakespeare is written in blank verse, which is unrhymed iambic pentameter. The pentameter is five feet per line, so one iamb is “bum-bum”—that's one foot—and five of those makes one line of Shakespeare. We all have inherent rhythms like that in the way we naturally speak, but we can also tweak those rhythms on purpose to achieve dramatic effect. The iamb has the sound of the heartbeat. It's a very reassuring speech rhythm. The trochaic is a much more rapid one—it mirrors the rhythm of a rapidly beating heart. So you see this a lot in Edgar Allan Poe, especially in his frenetic poems like “The Bells,” how they jingle, jingle, jangle on a hoary moonless night. There's a rushing sound to that metre. You're going to find that you will automatically do a little bit of this, just the way that you'll automatically have picked up the convention of breaking sentences up into shorter lengths during really exciting or suspense-filled parts of your book. Once you know what it is, you can start to use it on purpose. Quite a lot of developing your voice is learning to recognise these latent, existing qualities in the way you communicate, and sharpening them up and making them conscious tools that you can pull in whenever you want. Jo: On the one hand, there are a lot of technical words there that are really interesting, and maybe poets know a lot more of those words than most other writers. The book is really interesting in that way—kind of learning about these different things. I guess I want to reassure people as well that, as you said, some of this can be unconscious. So often when I'm self-editing and I'm reading a sentence to myself, there's something that doesn't feel right about it. So I will rewrite that sentence so that it feels right. Sometimes we do something that might be grammatically less correct, but it sounds better than it did before. So many of these things we almost know instinctively, just from reading so much. Dan: Oh, yes. From reading so much and talking so much, and again, from the way you acquire language. That gives you a template in your head of what sounds right. Language is inherently musical. So if you've ever listened to a song—especially one that wasn't recorded by a professional, but someone singing in a church choir, or your kid practising for a recital, or you practising for a recital—you know that feeling that happens when someone hits a wrong note. There's that little wince down in the core of your being, and then the song carries on and you forget about it, unless there are too many of them, in which case you just sort of cower and ooze out of the room. That feeling of “Ooh, someone just hit a wrong note”—that's exactly the feeling you get when you're reading through to edit your work and something is off in the technical layer of your voice. You should pay attention to that and rewrite so that it feels good, or feels great, which is even better. You've got the opposite of the wince, which is that sense of rapture and joy if you're listening to a professional musician and they go on an amazing guitar solo, or a flautist does an incredible trill that just sends shivers up your spine. That sense of excitement and joy—that's what happens when you're reading and the author does something with the language that makes the whole piece fly. So you want to be paying attention for those too, because those you'll commit without intending to. When you're reading back and you find those, you want to make note of them, because that's you seeing where you are at your strongest with your voice. By learning both where you're making mistakes and where you're being brilliant—just like with anything else—you can start to advance towards being brilliant more often and making fewer mistakes. Jo: Then there's a difficulty around where the line is, especially when you're an early-stage writer. Many people work with editors, and you mentioned the problem of revising your voice away, and that may also happen if you're working with an editor. Like you said, as a Brit, I work with an American editor, Kristen, and she's excellent. She's very, very good at letting my voice be my voice, and then fixing things that make it better. But a lot of people don't feel that way about their editors. So how can people understand where those lines are between being well-edited and becoming a better writer, and then needing to hold the line on their voice? Dan: It really helps if you understand where you are weak. Why are you hiring the editor in the first place? I'm a big believer in the utility of having other eyes on the manuscript, but it's really important to know what you're looking for from them. You and I have both been to the Oregon Coast writing seminars, back when that was a thing. Jo: Mm. Dan: One of the things they would talk about with editors is when you've got a story editor or a beta reader who says, “Hey, something here didn't work in the story for me,” you usually don't want to look at that point. You want to trace back from that point to figure out where you set the wrong expectation. Any editorial feedback is going to have a gap between what they notice and what really needs to be fixed. As a writer, learning to interpret the feedback properly so that you actually elevate the material, instead of interpreting the feedback like you're trying to do customer service for an employer, where you just want to make the customer happy, is a really important skill to develop. That's regardless of whether the feedback has to do with voice or plot or characterisation or whatever. Some editors are really good at back-tracing and actually spotting the real problem. Editors make their money, or get hired, or get picked by you to volunteer, because they're good at being an audience—not because they're good at being a writer. So learning to interpret the editorial feedback is a really important step in that maturation journey. Jo: Yes. I think “maturation journey” is a good way to put it. Personally, I think it was around book five when I really felt, “Okay, now I see what my voice actually is.” Like, it had to be five novels, and then I was like, “Okay, now I know.” I just didn't get it before then, and then finally—I don't know—a penny dropped or something. Maybe I grew into it, grew more confident, that kind of thing. Dan: Yes, and that's actually about right. If you look at writers with a big catalogue, five books in is usually where they start really sounding like them. So that's a pretty normal maturation curve. There is a way to speed it up, which is to read your books aloud—or even better, make audiobooks and then listen to them a thousand times. Listen to them until you are sick of them, and then listen to them until you start to like them again. Jo: That's a lot. Dan: It's a lot, but there's a really specific neurological mechanism at work. You're familiar with the comedy term “crossing the line twice,” right? Jo: Not really. Dan: Okay. Have you seen the Monty Python Spam sketch? Jo: Yes. Dan: Okay. So for those of you who have not seen this—in the Monty Python Spam sketch, there's a couple, they're in a diner, and everything on the menu has spam in it. They say the word “spam” so much that you just want to shoot your television. But they keep it up, and then suddenly, at some point—it's a different point for everybody watching—they keep it going on long enough that everybody gets there. At some point, the word “spam” itself becomes hilarious, and you can't stop laughing, and you don't know why, because it shouldn't work, but goddammit it really does. It's so funny that we named junk email “spam” after this sketch, because it's a whole bunch of stuff that you don't want, but it keeps showing up anyway. That's crossing the line twice. What's going on is that your brain is getting accustomed to a sound. It has extracted all of the meaning it can, and so it's doing what it does with all sensory input. When it thinks it's got it mapped out, it's trying to filter it. Unless you are going to sit and concentrate on it, you can't feel the texture of the fabric of your clothing on the back of your legs, because your brain—despite the fact that it's getting that input all the time—is filtering that out, because it needs you to have your resources free for thinking. When you experience something over and over and over, no matter what it is or how complex it is, the brain habituates like that. But if that signal refuses to be filtered, and the input keeps coming, and it keeps getting more intense, or it stays persistent and it's too complex to filter easily, your brain starts to think, “Oh, maybe I shouldn't be filtering this out.” “Maybe there's meaning here that's important for my survival that I hadn't extracted.” And so suddenly it starts searching for meaning to associate with that sensation—and that's the point at which the joke becomes funny again, or you start to experience your voice as if it's somebody else's. When you begin to experience your author voice as if it's somebody else's, you can hear it as a distinct, objective style, rather than just as an echo of the voices that are in your head. That's why music students practise over and over and over, even on a piece they know cold. They're doing the same trick that I'm advocating with listening to your audiobooks until you're not sick of them anymore. Jo: I mean, I think that's terrifying, because I just don't want to listen to my books over and over again. I think it's very interesting that you think it could shortcut that voice process. Staying on audio—since we last spoke, I have done a lot of my own audiobook narration, mainly for nonfiction, but also my short stories. I haven't done my full-length fiction. What I discovered in doing this is that what read fine to me when I was self-editing my own work on the page—and obviously I'm hearing it in my head—when I perform the audiobook, I actually have to edit things again. So what are some of your tips for how we can bridge that gap? Because that's kind of strange. Dan: So what's happening is that there's a much wider latitude of things that work on the page than what works with voice. The reason is that with voice, all of those rhythmic elements I was talking about before are really pronounced, as well as all the sensual elements. Basically every word and sound has a mouth shape. The mouth shape affects the emotional valence of the sound. Stuff that's unpleasant tends to have a really close-in feel—I'm trying to scrunch my face up—where you would grit your teeth and scrunch up your face if something is unpleasant. And if something is really pleasant, it tends to have a rounded feel, and our language reflects it. In fact, all languages reflect this, because language is a physical thing that's based on the sensuality of the body. So, like, in all cultures “mama” is the word for mother that babies first say, regardless of what it is. It has a round feel, because babies associate their mother with roundness. A lot of language is built up that way, from baseline sensual cues. When you're working just in text, that aspect is not nearly as obvious to you. When you're reading, it's not as obvious to you. It's still at play, but when you go to do something verbally, and you go to read a text, all of those sensual cues come in at the same time. Then the rhythm comes in hard, and you suddenly realise that—hey, that conveys the thought, but it doesn't feel right. So you wind up retooling a bit. There's also occasionally tongue twisters, which you have to work your way around. So that's why that happens. Jo: Then I guess another thing—I hear quite often, people say, “Oh, I don't like my voice.” And they mean, “I don't like speaking out loud. I don't want to be on video. I don't want to be on audio.” I wonder— Does that sort of resistance potentially affect their writing voice? Are there ways people can get over that feeling? Dan: Yes, for sure. There are a few things that go into that. One is basic self-loathing. A lot of people carry it around. Most people learn to make a decent life even though they kind of secretly suspect that they're not worth anything, or they secretly find themselves revolting. That kind of thing you can't really fix with exercises. That's something you fix with — Jo: Therapy. Dan: Psychological work, or spiritual work, or that kind of thing. Jo: Yes. Dan: But the not liking the sound of your own voice—that's easy to fix. Here's why it happens. When you're listening to your voice as you speak, the bones in your head are amplifying the bass signals and attenuating the treble. It's kind of like if you were to shout in another room and your spouse hears you, but they can't make out the consonants. That's because all the consonants are being filtered out by the wall in between, but the bass is being resonated through. The same thing happens in your head. So when you get on a microphone—especially if it's an accurate microphone—you're suddenly hearing what everybody else hears when you speak, and it sounds thin and tinny and unpleasant compared to what you're used to hearing. The really easy way to get around this is to get a microphone that is tuned for singers. The condenser mic that I have isn't made anymore, so I can't really recommend a good condenser mic. If you're on a dynamic mic, the Shure SM58 is the one to use. I podcasted with that for years before I could afford an upgrade. It is tuned for singers to sound as good as possible without any other help from the sound engineer, which means that the baseline sound for that microphone is what you're hearing in your head. If you use the right equipment, you get around that problem really quickly, to the extent that you can technically. Then after that, it's just a matter of crossing the line twice. You listen to yourself enough that you stop hearing, “Oh my God, I'm talking,” and you start hearing, “Oh, that voice is making this sound.” And once you hear, “Oh, it's that voice making this sound,” you don't have that problem anymore, ever again. Jo: Oh, good. Well, hopefully that's fixed it for people. And of course, there are lots of brilliant things in the book, The Pitch-Perfect Author. Before we finish up, I did want to return to your Substack. I was having a look at it, and it includes some really interesting things. Like, you're doing this metalwork, which is really cool. It felt coherent to me, because I know you, and you're a polymath, and you're interested in so many things. So your Substack kind of stood out to me as quite eclectic, compared to, say, other writers who are going on Substack to try and sell specific books. So is this a deliberate marketing choice, or is it just be an interesting person and you will attract people who are interested more generally? Dan: Well, I suppose it kind of winds up being the latter, but basically it's that I get bored easily. If I'm going to be writing every week, I need to stay interested in it. One of the books I wrote when I was really sick—that's not out on the market yet, but it is serialised on Substack—is a guide to self-education. It'll be coming out later this year on the general market. It's called Reclaiming Your Mind: An Autodidact's Bible. I talk in there quite a bit about the illusion of discrete areas of knowledge. There is a level of learning at which the silos of information start to collapse together. Woodworking and writing have a lot to do with each other. A lot of the terminology we use in writing is pulled from the trades—especially woodworking, and metalworking, and gunsmithing. As you begin to spot these connections between different areas of knowledge, it becomes really easy to slide between them for your hobbies, for your writing, for just your personal gratification. As I've gotten older—and also as I've gotten access to a little space that's not contained within a teeny little apartment—I have just gone with it. As I've discovered, “Hey, this thing is tangentially connected to this other thing over here,” I'm like, “Oh, well, I'm going to go over to this other thing and see what's over there.” It's tremendously creatively fertile. Since a lot of the things that our language connects us to have to do with trades and crafts and nature, it gets you out in the open air, which is really good for any writer—because sitting at a desk all day is worse than smoking three packs of cigarettes a day for 40 years. Jo: I love that. Dan: My curiosity is the chief feature of my Substack, and it kind of works for me as a writer, because it's also one of the chief features of my fiction. Jo: Me too, and I was actually quite inspired by your Substack. Because I think this happens when you've been in the writing industry long enough. Substack has become the sort of trendy place to be now. People are going into specific niches, very much like blogging did, and then podcasting had to be on a specific niche, and all this. Of course, we know logically that, marketing a book—you know, if you had just a Substack on voice mastery, then for sure that would be a better marketing vehicle. But, as you say, how boring. Dan: Well, it depends a lot on what you're trying to cultivate as an author. If you're a single-genre author with a very narrow niche, and you're really happy writing that kind of stuff, then a narrow column supporting it is not a bad idea. Especially when you serialise old novels, once you've got 20 or 30 under your belt. That's not a bad idea, because you're trying to attract people who want one thing and want it regularly. If I were to get a reader who wants one thing and wants it regularly, and finds it, say, in my Clarke Lantham mysteries, and then they hop over to my science fiction—oh boy, are they going to be pissed. If they're not there for my voice, and they're just there for the way I write a mystery plot, then not only are they not going to get what they're looking for—but they're going to start to doubt whether they can trust that they're going to get what they're looking for in my next mystery. Whereas if they're coming to me through something where the multiplicity of what I'm doing is on display—whether that's this Substack, or whether that's what I used to do on The Every Day Novelist when I was podcasting that, or whether it's what I did with all the after-shows on my fiction podcast when I was doing that—then they kind of know what they're in for. The people who stick with me are more likely to be people who are in it for the experience of my voice. And for my bibliography, that's what I've got to offer, because I'm all over the place in terms of genre and subject matter. Jo: Yes, which is why I find you interesting. Dan: Oh, why thank you. Jo: So where can people find you and your books online? Dan: Well, you can find pretty much everything at JDsawyer.net. I've got the weekly column at jdanielsawyer.substack.com. At jdsawyer.net there's a page with all of my podcasts on it, and there's also a store with all of my books on it. Of course, everything is also available on Amazon and just about everywhere that the distributors take you. Jo: Brilliant. Well, thanks so much for your time, Dan. That was great. Dan: Thank you, Joanna. It was great to talk to you again.The post Author Voice Mastery, And Rebooting an Author Business With J. Daniel Sawyer first appeared on The Creative Penn.

Northwestern Mutual just announced a record $9.2 billion dividend payout for 2026 — about a billion more than last year, and the largest three-year increase in the company's history. MassMutual is paying a record $2.9 billion, Guardian $1.7 billion, and New York Life $2.78 billion. Four of the five major mutual carriers raised their dividend interest rate again this year. The easy explanation is the one everyone gives you: rates went up, so dividends went up. It's true, and it's lazy. If that were the whole story, this would be a two-minute episode. So we went digging instead. In this one, we crack open the "general account" — the giant reservoir of patient money that sits behind every whole life policy in the country — and walk through what the investment teams are actually doing with your premium dollars. We cover the reinvestment tailwind (think of inheriting a ladder of your grandmother's CDs, where every maturing low-rate bond gets replaced at today's higher rates — slow, boring, and inevitable), why that same inertia is a feature and not a bug, and where the real yield edge comes from: private placements now approaching half of the industry's bond holdings, and the broader private-credit buildout that's become the story of the decade. We also do the thing most people skip. We make the bear case. Private-credit valuations are model-driven and haven't been stress-tested through a real recession. A handful of large carriers hold most of the exposure. Office commercial real estate is still working itself out. And there's an important line we draw on-air: the PE-owned, annuity-heavy carriers driving most of that growth are not the mutual carriers writing participating whole life — Northwestern, MassMutual, New York Life, Guardian, and Penn are a different animal. And two caveats we'll repeat because they matter: the dividend interest rate is not your policy's return — early years are dominated by acquisition costs, and an in-force illustration is the only honest read on an existing policy. And a good environment doesn't change who whole life is for. It's a stable, tax-advantaged, patient-capital sleeve within a broader plan — not a replacement for growth investing, nor a fix for a poorly designed policy. If that role fits what you're trying to do, the setup right now is about as favorable as it's been in fifteen years. Have an existing policy you're not sure about, or wondering whether whole life fits the job you're trying to fill? We're happy to talk it through — no pitch, just a straight conversation. Send us a message or book a 30-minute call.

Broadcast from KSQD, Santa Cruz on 7-02-2026: Dr. Dawn devotes the first half of the show to a nuanced defense of GLP-1 receptor agonists, arguing the polarized debate treats obesity as a moral failure rather than a physiological one. She recounts the "Marilyn Monroe dress" moment that transformed semaglutide from diabetes drug into elite cosmetic tool, and pushes back on the puritanical framing that behavior change must be earned rather than pharmacologically enabled—noting we don't apply this logic to antihypertensives or statins. Dr. Dawn catalogs visceral fat as a genuine endocrine organ producing over 17 hormones, most of which drive self-perpetuating growth: leptin (this satiety hormone at high levels disables it's own brain receptor), IL-6, TNF-alpha (blocks insulin), resistin (increases insulin resistance and inflammation), PAI-2 (blocks clot breakdown, raising cardiovascular risk), retinol-binding protein 4 (impairs muscle glucose uptake), chemerin (recruits macrophages and directs fat to the belly), and visfatin. Only adiponectin declines with rising visceral fat. It improves insulin sensitivity, suppresses hepatic gluconeogenesis, and blocks IL-6 . Dr. Dawn describes GLP-1's neurobiological action: receptors in the hypothalamus, brainstem, hippocampus, and mesolimbic reward system, with the drugs quieting the brain's salience network so food loses its intrusive pull. Taste buds shift, sweet and salty become muted, and reward circuits stop firing on cheat foods—creating a window during which behavioral change becomes possible. Dr. Dawn frames group support through self-determination theory (autonomy, competence, relatedness), arguing GLP-1s create the cognitive bandwidth for behavioral programs to succeed. A Tufts study of patients discontinuing after 10% weight loss found those enrolled in behavioral support programs regained about three times less weight than usual-care controls, outperforming even medically-tailored meal plans. Group engagement doubled the time patients stayed on the medication. A November 2025 Nature study piggybacked on deep brain stimulation research at Penn. Electrodes implanted in the nucleus accumbens of post-bariatric patients recorded low-frequency brain activity surges during food-noise episodes on drug free patients. A third participant who started tirzepatide showed complete silencing of that signature—the first direct electrical confirmation that GLP-1s suppresses compulsive food thoughts in the reward center. RNA sequencing of adipose tissue from 25 obese patients before and after bariatric surgery, compared to 24 lean controls, revealed persistent epigenetic changes even after weight loss. Lipid-associated inflammatory macrophages drop but retain some of their pro-inflammatory epigenetics, explaining the well-known slippery slope back to obesity—and why Dr. Dawn suggests GLP-1s may work best as intermittent tools when behavioral maintenance starts slipping. An emailer asks about long-term smoking versus vaping data. Dr. Dawn notes there is no long-term data yet, but short-term evidence shows e-cigarettes contain nicotine, propylene glycol, reactive oxygen species, and nitrosamines, producing spirometry readings similar to mild COPD in otherwise-healthy vapers. Vaping over a year raises stroke relative risk by 1.62 and nearly doubles MI risk, and combining smoking and vaping produces a multiplicative rather than additive harm. Data on cancer will take decades to emerge. Researchers built a functioning underwater breathing apparatus for cockroaches with electrodes attached to brain and sensory organs allowing remote-controlled direction while preserving natural obstacle-navigation autonomy. The 10mm × 10mm sponge-based oxygen tank uses magnesium dioxide catalyzing hydrogen peroxide breakdown, delivering oxygen through silicone tubes to the roach's spiracles for up to three hours underwater. Deployemenet will improve search-and-rescue in flooded and collapsed structures where dogs cannot reach. A Science Advances paper from Yong Lin Kong's lab at Rice University describes 3D-printing electronic circuits directly onto living tissue. Researchers achieved microwave-focused annealing at sub-200-micrometer resolution. By selectively heating only conductive ink particles (copper, silver, gold) without damaging surrounding tissue, the technique enables printing circuits onto 3D-printed heart valves, tracheas, and ear scaffolds, potentially creating combined graft-and-sensor implants, ingestible diagnostic devices, and perhaps even decorative electronic tattoos. A single-shot reformulation of zanamivir (originally the inhaled flu drug Relenza) provided 76.1% flu protection in a 5,000-participant trial—far exceeding the roughly 40-45% offered by annual flu vaccines. Because zanamivir targets neuraminidase in a way that inactivates it if the virus tries to mutate around the drug, trapping newly-made viral copies inside their host cells, this approach works across all flu strains and could bypass the annual guessing game of trivalent vaccine formulation.

Penn is at his best when things don't go to plan, Matt follows the Penn Jillette school of thought on magic preparation - with results as expected live on stage, some new musicians performing with Bob Dylan lead to an in-depth look at guitar tech with a connection to Penn & Teller: BS!, and lots more.

This week on Laugh Lines, Penn and I cover a lot of ground... from career advice for creative dreamers to one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of our childhood: Whatever happened to the prize inside of box of Cracker Jacks? We discuss the World Cup reactions, answer your questions about public speaking and irrational fears, and explain why I identify as an iPhone with a very questionable battery. We also issue a challenge to our listeners... how long can you watch a TV show without your phone?Plus, Penn debuts a brand-new segment called Gen X Cold Case, and let's just say if you ever earned a Pizza Hut personal pan pizza for reading books or treasured a temporary tattoo from a cereal box, this one's for you. What's the biggest Gen X "cold case" you still wonder about? We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube.Pre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What started as a frustrating battle with my health insurance over a medication that has worked successfully for nearly two years led me to ask a much bigger question: Why are we so comfortable with women's suffering? In this episode, I explore why women's pain is so often treated as "normal"…whether it's menopause, chronic pain, endometriosis, caregiving exhaustion, or countless other experiences that disproportionately affect women. Drawing on current research, personal experience, and Caroline Criado Perez's groundbreaking book Invisible Women, I examine how women's health has historically been under-researched, underfunded, and too often treated as an afterthought. This episode isn't about blaming individual doctors or healthcare providers. It's about understanding how systems evolve and what happens when women's experiences are consistently treated as secondary rather than central. Most importantly, it's about hope. For perhaps the first time in history, women are connecting their experiences at scale. Through research, storytelling, and yes, even social media, women are realizing something profoundly important: It's not just me. When we name what has been invisible, we can finally begin to change it. Explored in this episode: Why my insurance appeal became a much bigger conversation about women's health Why "it's just menopause" may be one of the most harmful phrases we use The surprising lack of menopause education in medical training What current research reveals about reimbursement disparities in healthcare How Invisible Women explains the "gender data gap" Why women's suffering is often normalized rather than solved The role of social media in helping women compare notes, find language, and create change Why naming invisible inequities is the first step toward changing them Resources Mentioned Caroline Criado Perez, Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men Dr. Jocelyn Fitzgerald and colleagues' research on reimbursement disparities in gender-specific surgical procedures. Here is the most recent study: Penn, M., Colley, D., Koirala, P., King, L., & Fitzgerald, J. (2025). Price and prejudice: reimbursement of surgical care on male versus female anatomies. Journal of Women's Health, 34(5), 665-676. R E N É | J A Y

Blanche v. Lau, No. 25-429 (U.S. June 23, 2026)applicant for admission; returning LPR; parole Mullin v. Doe (Miot), No. 25-1083 (U.S. June 25, 2026)TPS; jurisdiction; determination; termination; preliminary relief; equal protection   Mullin v. Al Otro Lado, No. 25-5 (U.S. June 25, 2026)canon against surplusage; presumption against extraterritoriality Garcia Corrales v. Blanche, No. 24-6467 (9th Cir. June 24, 2026)motion to reopen dismissal for untimely appeal; mailing delay; new evidence; motion to reconsider not only way to challenge dismissal Hayles v. U.S. Att'y Gen., No. 24-10516 (11th Cir. June 22, 2026)petition for review CAT; FARO; Riley; frivolous PFR; jurisdiction; brief cannot cure jurisdictional deficient PFR Matter of P-A-C-, 29 I&N Dec. 708 (BIA 2026)discretionary denial of asylum where withholding of removal granted; multiple DUIs; fraud as negative discretionary factor for asylumImmigrants' List Matter of T-A-G-, 29 I&N Dec. 715 (BIA 2026)ACA pretermitting asylum application; collateral relief; pending I-130 Matter of Best, 29 I&N Dec. 723 (BIA 2026)extreme hardship; § 212(h) waiver; discretion; arrests and convictions Matter of C-L-R-, 29 I&N Dec. 726 (BIA 2026)M-A-M- safeguards; qualified representative; refusal to sell drugs; mental health claims in Honduras Matter of G-L-C-, 29 I&N Dec. 717 (BIA 2026)drug delivery and particularly serious crime; N-A-M- element one; nature of the offense; Penn. Cons. Stat. § 780-113(a)(30); transgender women in Jamaica; United Kingdom's Home Office reportsKurzban Kurzban Tetzeli and Pratt P.A.Immigration, serious injury, and business lawyers serving clients in Florida, California, and all over the world for over 40 years.eimmigration"Immigration law software you'll love to use."get.eimmigration.com/IRP Gonzales & Gonzales Immigration BondsP: (833) 409-9200immigrationbond.com Stafi"Remote staffing solutions for businesses of all sizes"Click me!Want to become a patron?Click here to check out our Patreon Page!CONTACT INFORMATION:Email: kgregg@kktplaw.comFacebook: @immigrationreviewInstagram: @immigrationreviewTwitter: @immreviewAbout your hostCase notesRecent criminal-immigration article (p.18)Featured in San Diego VoyagerSupport the show

In episode 275 the Magic Guys welcome Sean Taylor, a British-born magician who has worked in Australia for decades. Sean discusses his creative process, writing original material, building stage persona, and consulting for other magicians. They cover practical advice on transitioning from close-up to stage, scripting, pacing, and prop management, plus stories including working with Penn & Teller and memorable gig mishaps. Sean also shares recommended books and how to contact him for consulting. Support the show and grab some Merch! Leave a voicemail for The Magic Guys Join The Magic Guys Discord!!! Email Us - themagicguysshow@gmail.com The Podcast where Professional Magicians, Josh Norbido, Doug Conn & Nick Kay take on the important questions of life (Mainly from our youtube subscribers) and deliver answers from a Magicians point of view. Come hang out with us while we chat about our lives as Magicians and the ups and downs that go with it. 

The NCAA isn't broken: it's been bought, and Coach Chris Miltenberg is one of the last ones willing to say so out loud.Miltenberg returns to the show fresh off an NCAA Championships in Eugene where the women's 5,000 and men's 10,000 runners were swept nearly clean by international athletes funneled in through university-funded recruiting services. He called it what it is: a paradigm shift, driven by two forces—an age gap that routinely pits 18-year-old Americans against 26- and 27-year-olds, and a recruiting model that has traded relationship-building for transactional delivery. What separates Coach Milt from the noise is that he's not talking about this from the outside—UNC was largely absent from the results in Eugene, too, and he said so plainly. But he's not wringing his hands either. He's choosing to double down: develop elite American talent the long way, backed by institutional alignment and a recruiting pipeline that he and his assistant have quietly rebuilt around the next wave of domestic standouts. He also addressed what this moment means for the American high schooler with D1 dreams —the 4:10 miler, who, five years ago would have been a priority recruit and today might not crack a Power Five roster. His advice was blunt: go where you matter. Find the coach who's invested in your development, not your opening time.Coach Milt also touched on Michaela Page's continued rise, the Penn relay rivalry, Simeon Birnbaum's 1500 in Eugene, and what it feels like every June to watch another senior class walk out the door. Tap into the Coach Milt Special. If you enjoy the podcast, please consider following us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and giving us a five-star review! I would also appreciate it if you share it with your friend who you think will benefit from it.S H O W  N O T E S  -The Run Down By The Running Effect (our new newsletter!): https://tinyurl.com/mr36s9rs-Our Website: https://therunningeffect.run  -THE PODCAST ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClLcLIDAqmJBTHeyWJx_wFQ-My Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/therunningeffect/?hl=en⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠-Take our podcast survey: https://tinyurl.com/3ua62ffzBehind the scenes of The Running Effect: https://youtube.com/@dominicschlueter?si=PM9FjPc92eFUFEZluminarythreads.shop Instagram: @chris.miltenberg

What separates a collection of houses from a place people fight to be part of? For John Hillman, the answer starts before the first stake goes in the ground.In this episode of The Punch List Podcast, Matt Birdwell, Jennifer O'Neal, and Ian MacDonald sit down with John Hillman — the vision behind two of Northeast Florida's most intentionally designed communities: Crane Island, a private gated enclave of custom Lowcountry homes along the Intracoastal Waterway in Fernandina Beach, and The Eleven at Congaree & Penn, eleven ten-acre agrarian homesteads outside Jacksonville where residents don't buy lots — they stake Claims.For custom builders and remodelers, this conversation goes somewhere most project meetings never reach: the philosophy underneath the build. John unpacks what it takes to design communities that compound in value over time — not just financially, but in meaning, identity, and the kind of word-of-mouth that no marketing budget can manufacture.If you're building custom homes or high-end renovations, you're already in the legacy business. This episode asks whether you're thinking about it that way.Mixed & Edited by Next Day Podcastinfo@nextdaypodcast.com

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.comBob is a journalist and the author of many books, including The Moral Animal, Nonzero, The Evolution of God, and Why Buddhism Is True. He's written for countless magazines, including The New Republic, where he co-wrote the TRB column with Mickey Kaus. They also co-founded Bloggingheads TV, and Bob taught in the psych department at Penn and the religion department at Princeton. Today you can find him on Substack at the NonZero Newsletter, and his new book is The God Test: Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning.For two clips of the episode — how AI flatters its users, and the rapidly converging threats from AI — head to our YouTube page.Other topics: Bob's reporting on AI in the early 1980s; Geoffrey Hinton — “the godfather of AI” — warning us about AI; “doomer-in-chief” Eliezer Yudkowsky; Bob's own evolution on AI; the Tree of Knowledge; how AI is a more challenging global issue than nukes; the need for international regulation; the noosphere, our “global brain” — and its author, the visionary Christian, Teilhard de Chardin; neural networks; ChatGPT; Musk and self-driving cars; BF Skinner; philosopher John Searle; olfactory AI; virtual reality; AI designing drugs to induce spirituality; Anthropic's Dario Amodei; Sam Altman calling Trump an NPC; AI stoking conspiracies; Leo's encyclical; cognitive empathy; the Iran War; China vs Taiwan; kids befriending AI agents; Hal in 2001; the movie Her; silicon neurons that evolve; AI threatening the human need to be needed; job losses; scams; electoral risks; populism and tribalism; how is AI a continuation of human evolution; and the many positive potentials of AI.Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy. Coming up: John Gray on Trump's new world, Stephen Grosz on the struggles of love, David Thomson on cinema history, John O'Sullivan on conservatism, Robby George on all our disagreements, and Megan McArdle on pretty much anything. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other comments to dish@andrewsullivan.com.

Matt has some fun ideas to surprise Penn, a brand new opener at the big Penn & Teller Show, Sean Connery went face to glass with an arachnid, Penn hits UK morning talk shows to promote Piff and Pop's Magic Shoppe, and lots more. Use offer code SCOOPS (click the "Unlock" button to enter the code before selecting tickets) to save 35% off tickets to Matt Donnelly The Mind Noodler at The Magician's Room in Las Vegas!

Discoveries are made, therapy accidentally happens, and old friends catch up. Cast:  - Marathon Messenger is played by Penn Van Batavia. She can be found on Twitter at @acquiredchaste and in drag as horror king JOHN on Instagram at @john.is.risen. Penn is an indie TTRPG designer whose most recent work includes SLICE *IT* OUT, a grisly carving RPG about cutting pieces of yourself out to fit in. Check out faer other work at pennharper.itch.io.  - Cassidy Shard is played by Sydney Whittington. She is our wonderful editor. She's also a contributing editor and occasional guest player for the Orpheus Protocol, a cosmic horror espionage actual play podcast. Find her on Twitter at @sydney_whitt.  - Emma Blackwood is played by Cameron Robertson. Find her on Twitter at @midnightmusic13 and on Instagram at @reading_and_dreaming. Cameron is also a player on Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars Edge of the Empire actual play podcast.  - Birdie Foundling is played by Kit Adames. Find her on Twitter at @venusvultures. Kit is also a voice actor and writer on Elevator Pitch Podcast, a queer genre-hopping anthology podcast that can be accessed on Spotify and YouTube.  - Our GM and narrator is Nick Robertson. Find him on Twitter at @alias58. Nick is also the GM for Tabletop Squadron and can also be found as a player on the Orpheus Protocol. Music & Sound Credits:  - This podcast features the musical talents of Dora Violet and Arne Parrott. You can find Dora at facebook.com/doraviolett. You can find Arne at atptunes.com.  - old radio Channel search sound effect by Garuda1982. Link & License.  - Big Water by Sergey Cheremisinov. Link & License.  - Today's Special: Jam Tomorrow by Doctor Turtle. Link & License.  - Which That Is This? (Long Version) by Doctor Turtle. Link & License.  - Love After Midnight (ID 701) by Lobo Loco. Link & License. Art Credits:  - The official artwork for this podcast was created by Rashed AlAkroka, who can be found on Instagram and Artstation @rashedjrs. Find Us Online:  - Our Website  - Twitter  - Join our Patreon  - Join our Discord

[Original air date: November 29, 2022] Conan O'Brien steals the show this week, helping Penn regain control from the normies (Sophie & Nava). He also reminisces about his disastrous first school play and reveals his Gossip Girl standom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jude returns to Juneau to stake his claim. Badger takes Penn to meet his “mother.”Do you want to buy the script? ⁠https://tinyurl.com/sixminutesscript⁠Want to listen to music from the show? ⁠https://tinyurl.com/sixminutestheme⁠Looking for official Six Minutes merch? ⁠https://tinyurl.com/sixminutesmerch⁠For more great shows and to listen early and ad-free, visit ⁠GZMshows.com⁠....SPONSOR SHOUTOUT:Thanks to Wyzant for all their support!Go to wyzant.com and use code Podcast15 to enjoy $15 off your first lesson...See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Laugh Lines, I learned two things about myself: I'm deeply triggered by people yelling at graduation ceremonies and I'm officially old enough to be attacked by Love Island. I also learned that I seriously dislike the phrase "that's the way it is" and feel it needs to be banned immediately.Penn and I cover a lot of important topics from our couch this week, including: Our week without air conditioning, "Gen X revenge" involving a dumpster, and what it's like having a son away in France for 3 weeks. We also spend way more time discussing bidets than any respectable podcast should.Thanks for being here with us... let us know if you're Team Hoot & Holler or Team Follow the Rules, if you're saying yes to more things as you are getting older, and if you unpack immediately or live out of your suitcase. (Also, should we take a shing-cation?)We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube.Pre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If your child has been diagnosed with ADHD (or you suspect they might have it) this episode will change the way you see them. Dr. Lisa Damour and Reena Ninan revisit their candid, funny, and genuinely moving conversation with Penn and Kim Holderness — viral content creators, bestselling authors, podcasters, and authors of “ADHD is Awesome: A Guide to (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD.” Together, they strip away the shame, explain what it really feels like to have ADHD, and give parents a practical, strengths-based roadmap for helping their kids thrive at home and at school.

Episode 4153 │ June 21, 2026 Happy Father's Day! Esau's birthright was stolen by Jacob. In 1948 Esau returned pretending to be Jacob to take it back. Scripture called it. WHAT THIS EPISODE COVERS  Scott Kesterson and Brad Cummings deliver one of the most theologically and historically dense episodes of Digging Into the Word yet — tracing the straight line from William Penn's founding vision of "let's see what love can do" through the first and second Great Awakenings, the Scofield Bible, the Rothschild-backed Balfour Declaration, and the deliberate naming of the 1948 state as Israel rather than Judea — arguing that Christian Zionism is not a biblical position but a 19th century theological construct engineered by oligarchs to co-opt evangelical Christianity into geopolitical service. Brad Cummings unpacks the Jacob and Esau inheritance law, explaining that God's promise to restore Esau's stolen birthright is actually the biblical framework for understanding why the modern state exists — and why God is allowing it — while making clear this has nothing to do with the unconditional chosen-people theology that has captured the American church. The episode closes on the covenant simplicity that Penn embodied and Adams was moved by: there is no way forward for this nation that does not begin with returning to the living God — not as a religious proposition, but as the only king the republic was ever designed to have. KEY QUESTIONS ADDRESSED  What is the biblical case that the modern state of Israel represents Esau's restored birthright — and why does calling it Israel rather than Judea matter theologically and geopolitically? How did the Rothschild-backed Scofield Bible, dispensational theology, and Oxford Press combine to manufacture Christian Zionism as a tool of oligarchic geopolitical design — and who paid the preachers? What did William Penn's founding vision of Pennsylvania as "let's see what love can do" establish as the seed of the American covenant — and how do we return to it from where we are now? ABOUT BARDSFM BardsFM is a daily independent podcast covering faith, liberty, history, and information warfare. Hosted by Scott Kesterson — combat veteran, documentary filmmaker, and rancher. Over 4,100 episodes and 50 million lifetime downloads. New episodes every weekday. bards.fm This episode was researched and produced under the Sentinel Framework — the analytical methodology built by Scott Kesterson — with AI-assisted research synthesis. All analysis, conclusions, and editorial judgments are those of Scott Kesterson. AFFILIATE LINKS Bards Nation Health Store: www.bardsnationhealth.com MYPillow promo code: BARDS >> Go to https://www.mypillow.com/bards and use the promo code BARDS or... Call 1-800-975-2939.  EMPShield protect your vehicles and home. Promo code BARDS: Click here Treadlite Broadforks...best garden tool EVER. Promo code BARDS26: TreadliteBroadforks.com EnviroKlenz Air Purification, promo code BARDS to save 10%: www.enviroklenz.com Morning Intro Music Provided by Brian Kahanek: www.briankahanek.com Founders Bible 20% discount code: BARDS >>> TheFoundersBible.com Windblown Media 20% Discount with promo code BARDS: windblownmedia.com White Oak Pastures Grassfed Meats, Get $20 off any order $150 or more. Promo Code BARDS: www.whiteoakpastures.com/BARDS Mission Darkness Faraday Bags and RF Shielding. Promo code BARDS: Click here DONATIONS: If you wish to support this podcast directly you can donate here... DONATE: Click here MAILING ADDRESS: Xpedition Cafe, LLC Attn. Scott Kesterson 591 E Central Ave, #740 Sutherlin, OR  97479

Penn & Teller hit up Jimmy Fallon in the midst of the Knicks championship run and perform to sold out crowds in Toronto, Bob Dylan on growing older and Penn on the definition of good vs. bad writing, Penn is busy writing new books and plays, Matt at The Magician's Room Las Vegas, and lots more.

This week on Laugh Lines, we're making a strong case that the Running Man may be more powerful than we ever realized. After reading a fascinating study on dancing and brain health, I convinced Penn to join me for one of my dance classes to see if shaking it off could help keep cognitive decline at bay. What followed was a reminder that Gen X may have one competitive advantage over younger generations: We absolutely crush the Running Man. (Why can't Gen Z do this?!)We talk about the surprising importance of community as we get older, and why getting outside your comfort zone never becomes easy, and we share what we learned speaking to a group of lifelong learners. Plus, we dig through some classic Gen X relics from our attic, including a Trapper Keeper, boombox, globes, metal lunch box, and flip phones. Along the way, Penn debuts options for an Alzheimer's jingle, we discuss a meteorite over Martha's Vineyard, and I continue my quest to get more than one-word text messages from our son on a foreign exchange student trip. Dust off your best Running Man, and join us for a conversation about staying curious, connected, and (hopefully) mentally sharp.We love to hear from you! Leave us a message at 323-364-3929 or write the show at podcast@theholdernessfamily.com. You can also watch our podcast on YouTube.Pre-order Get It Done & Have FunVisit Our ShopJoin Our NewsletterFind us on SubstackFollow us on InstagramFollow us on TikTokFollow us on FacebookLaugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness is an evolution of The Holderness Family Podcast, which began in 2018. Kim and Penn Holderness are award-winning online content creators known for their original music, song parodies, comedy sketches, and weekly podcasts. Their videos have resulted in over three billion views and over nine million followers since 2013. Penn and Kim are also authors of the New York Times Bestselling Books, ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide To (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD and All You Can Be With ADHD. They were also winners on The Amazing Race (Season 33) on CBS. Laugh Lines is hosted and executive produced by Kim Holderness and Penn Holderness, with original music by Penn Holderness. Laugh Lines is also written and produced by Ann Marie Taepke, and edited and produced by Sam Allen. It is hosted by Acast. Thanks for listening! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Penn's friend of more than 50 years, Carr Hagerman, shares his deeply personal story of being falsely accused. From the initial allegations and arrest, through a very public reaction and trial, to his acquittal and trying to find a way to move forward with hope and inspiration. Check out Carr's podcast at outofthebluepodcast.com Please note: this episode contains discussion of sexual abuse (child and adult), incarceration, and suicidal ideation.

This week, we're looking back at Rob's 2023 conversation with "YOU" and "Gossip Girl" star Penn Badgley! They discuss their eerie similarities as well as Penn's middle school tribulations, his journey from Gossip Girl to YOU, his meditation practice, and the mysterious TikTok algorithm.  This episode originally aired in March 2023. Make sure to subscribe to the show on YouTube at YouTube.com/@LiterallyWithRobLowe! Got a question for Rob? Call our voicemail at 323-570-4551. Your question could get featured on the show! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.