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Episode 41: The Horror Alphabet | S-Z This episode was recorded on September 7, 2024 and posted on November 2, 2024. Content Warning: Light vulgarity. Introduction Welcome to No Bodies Episode 41 Introductions to your Ghosts Hosts with the Most - Lonely of Lonely Horror Club and Projectile Varmint aka Suzie Happy Spooky Season from No Bodies! Introductions to our guest - How Many Films in a Year aka Poppy Today's Topic: The Horror Alphabet Part Four Welcome Back to the 2nd Annual October Special on No Bodies! The Horror Alphabet - our longest watchlist to date, featuring bests, worsts, and deep cuts from every letter of the alphabet! This will be a blind reaction recording - which means none of the hosts are aware of what the others are bringing to the table. The only notes we will have prepared are the ones for our own recommendations. The Horror Alphabet Rules For films that begin with "The," the film will begin with the first letter of the first word following "The." Example: The Awakening would begin with the letter A. For films with multiple words in the title, the film will begin with the first letter of the first full word. Example: I See The TV Glow would begin with the letter I. For films that begin with a number in the title, the film will begin with the first letter of the first word. Example: 28 Days Later will begin with the letter D. We will not be including any films with titles made up of just numbers, like 1922. Media Discussion Worst of S Slender Man (2018) - Lonely & Suzie The Shuttered Room (1967) - Poppy Best of S Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (2019) - Lonely Spring (2014) - Suzie Scream (1996) - Poppy Worst of T There's Something Wrong with the Children (2023) - Lonely They/Them (2022) - Suzie Tarot (2024) - Poppy Best of T The Tall Man (2012) - Lonely Timecrimes (2007) - Suzie Talk to Me (2022) - Poppy Worst of U The Untold Story (1993) - Lonely Unwelcome (2022) - Poppy & Suzie Best of U Under the Shadow (2016) - Lonely Unfriended: Dark Web (2018) - Suzie Urban Legend (1998) - Poppy Worst of V The Vatican Tapes (2015) - Lonely The Veil (2016) - Suzie Viking Wolf (2022) - Poppy Best of V Veronica (2017) - Lonely Violation (2020) - Suzie The Village (2004) - Poppy Worst of W Wish Upon (2017) - Lonely Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey (2023) - Suzie & Poppy Best of W We Are What We Are (2013) - Lonely The Wolf House (2018) - Suzie Wolf Creek (2005) - Poppy Worst of X X (2022) - Lonely & Suzie Xtro (1982) - Poppy Best of X X (2022) - Poppy Worst of Y YellowBrickRoad (2010) - Lonely You Should Have Left (2020) - Poppy Best of Y You're Next (2011) - Lonely & Poppy You'll Never Find Me (2023) - Suzie Worst of Z Zombeavers (2014) - Lonely Zominic the Cannibal Baby (2017) - Suzie Zombies (2016) - Poppy Best of Z Zombieland (2009) - Lonely Zodiac (2007) - Suzie Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979) - Poppy Suzie's Deep Cuts & Surface Wounds This segment highlights lesser known films based on their IMDB ratings. If something has 5k or under reviews on IMDB, we'll call it a Deep Cut. If something has between 6-10k reviews on IMDB, we'll call it a Surface Wound. Deep Cuts: Slaughterhouse (2023), Teke Teke (2009), The Transfiguration (2016), What We Become (2015), Wilkolak Werewolf (2018) Surface Wounds: Sissy (2022), Unwelcome (2023), Velocipastor (2018), Vermines (2023), You Might be the Killer (2018) Closing Thoughts Are there any films we didn't mention for this set of letters that are worth giving a shout out to, for better or worse? Thank you to our guest! Follow Poppy's reviews @howmanyfilmsinayear on Instagram! Keep Up with Your Hosts Check out our instagram antics and drop a follow @nobodieshorrorpodcast. Take part in our new audience engagement challenge - The Coroner's Report! Comment, share, or interact with any Coroner's Report post on our socials to be featured in an upcoming episode. Projectile Varmint - keep up with Suzie's film musings on Instagram @projectile__varmint Lonely - read more from Lonely and keep up with her filmstagram chaos @lonelyhorrorclub on Instagram and www.lonelyhorrorclub.com. Original No Bodies Theme music by Jacob Pini. Need music? Find Jacob on Instagram at @jacob.pini for rates and tell him No Bodies sent you! Leave us a message at (617) 431-4322 and we just might answer you on the show!
Did you know that “proverb” is not a Biblically exclusive term? There are all sorts of proverbs from many different cultures, religions, and people groups. T There are Irish proverbs, Buddhist proverbs, and proverbs from just about every spoken language. The book of Proverbs in the Bible, however, is God breathed and God inspired - making its wisdom divine and set apart. Today we are joined by Karen Ellis for a conversation all about the book of Proverbs - what it is, how to read it, and how its wisdom applies to our life today. Karen Ellis is the Director of the Center for the Study of the Bible & Ethnicity at Reformed Theological Seminary (Atlanta). She holds Master's degrees from Yale University and Westminster Theological Seminary, and is a Ph.D. candidate at Oxford Center for Mission Studies in Oxford, England. Since 2003, she has worked as an advocate for the global persecuted Church, raising awareness and promoting indigenous leadership in countries where Christianity is restricted or repressed. Karen is married to Dr. Carl F. Ellis, Jr., a Professor of Theology and Culture at RTS. This Week's Reading: Proverbs 9 - Proverbs 31 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this week's show, Phil talks to James Malley, the CEO and Co-Founder of Paccurate. He has been working in the logistics tech space since 2009 and has helped create a variety of enterprise shipping technology. He spearheaded the design of an award-winning multi-carrier TMS (Transportation Management Software) and since 2015, he's been evangelizing the use of AI to achieve cost-efficient and environmentally sustainable packing. James talks about the importance of investing in communication to make the innovation process easier. He also discusses the value of optimism and trying to see the best side of every situation. KEY TAKEAWAYS: TOP CAREER TIP When building something new that has no precedent, it's always best to focus more upon communication in the early stages, to make the process easier. WORST CAREER MOMENT During a joint venture with a large company, James's work was not matched by his partner. Through this he learned to be wary of partners and what they can provide in terms of value. CAREER HIGHLIGHT Conversely, a partnership entered into after gaining experience, proved entirely fruitful, especially when it came to sustainability. THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There are always problems to be solved – innovations to be found – even when we think we've come as far as we can. This makes the world of IT perennially exciting and challenging. THE REVEAL What first attracted you to a career in I.T.? – James found his love for IT through design and problem solving. What's the best career advice you received? – Say yes to everything What's the worst career advice you received? – To again, say yes to everything! What would you do if you started your career now? – James would work on problems that other people are dealing with, and not things that nobody is asking for. What are your current career objectives? – Becoming a better CEO, helping others to achieve more and finding better ways to work remotely. What's your number one non-technical skill? – Networking. How do you keep your own career energized? – Making the supply chain more sustainable and less wasteful. What do you do away from technology? – Spending time with his three-year-old son and trying to prevent household accidents! FINAL CAREER TIP Be a micro-pessimist, but a macro-optimist. It's easy to be pessimistic and difficult to see the best in a situation. But the best of the best can see the light in everything. BEST MOMENTS (8:08) – James – “Invest in messaging and communication” (12:05) – James - “You may look around and think every problem has been solved. The truth is that's not the case” (12:37) – James – “Get comfortable with whatever industry you're in. That's where you'll find the most valuable ideas” (18:11)– James – “Focus on solving problems, and you'll find your niche sooner rather than later” ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organizations to design, develop, and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/_PhilBurgess LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Instagram: https://instagram.com/_philburgess Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast's website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST – JAMES MALLEY James Malley is the CEO and Co-Founder of Paccurate. He has been working in the logistics tech space since 2009 and has helped create a variety of enterprise shipping technology. He spearheaded the design of an award-winning multi-carrier TMS (Transportation Management Software) and since 2015, he's been evangelizing the use of AI to achieve cost-efficient and environmentally sustainable packing. CONTACT THE GUEST – JAMES MALLEY Twitter: https://twitter.com/mistermalley LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmalley Website: https://paccurate.io
In this week's show, Phil talks to Chuck Tomasi who has worked in the IT industry for 40 years. His roles have included software developer, systems administrator, project manager and technical consultant to name but a few. He has a particular interest in integrating devices and systems to increase the value of the overall solution. And he likes share what he has learned with the developer community through blogs, videos, live streams, podcasts and books. Chuck talks to Phil about the importance of remembering people skills when growing your career. He also discusses the value of putting yourself out there in order to find opportunities. KEY TAKEAWAYS: TOP CAREER TIP Never forget the value of people in the IT sector. Careers flourish when results are delivered, but also because relationships are nurtured. WORST CAREER MOMENT While preparing for a conference, Chuck was working with volunteers. There was a great need for perfection, but Chuck was let down by two volunteers, which almost threw the project into disarray. CAREER HIGHLIGHT At the most recent conference, Chuck got to MC the event and connected completely with most of the attendees. THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There is a world of opportunity out there in the IT sector, and the chance to create meaningful, impactful products that can change lives for the better. THE REVEAL What first attracted you to a career in I.T.? – After a computer programming course in school What's the best career advice you received? – Trust is the ultimate currency What's the worst career advice you received? – It's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission What would you do if you started your career now? – Find a mentor and coach much sooner! What are your current career objectives? – Creating and maintaining relationships inside and outside of the company What's your number one non-technical skill? – Being able to translate complex information for any audience. How do you keep your own career energized? – Knowing that his work is positively impacting lives. What do you do away from technology? – Podcasting, creating content, travelling and spending time with family FINAL CAREER TIP Even if you consider yourself to be introverted, make an effort to meet and greet people. Career opportunities almost always come from other people. BEST MOMENTS (2:56) – Chuck – “Putting your face out there helps recognition, and helps to build a community” (3:50) – Chuck - “Careers are built on two things – results and relationships” (4:22) – Chuck – “If you really want to be the hero then you need to listen to people and help them achieve their desired outcomes” (13:06)– Chuck – “Computers and programming combine the best of logical thinking and creativity” ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organizations to design, develop, and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/_PhilBurgess LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Instagram: https://instagram.com/_philburgess Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast's website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST – CHUCK TOMASI Chuck Tomasi has worked in the IT industry for 40 years. His roles have included software developer, systems administrator, project manager and technical consultant to name but a few. He has a particular interest in integrating devices and systems to increase the value of the overall solution. And he likes share what he has learned with the developer community through blogs, videos, live streams, podcasts and books. CONTACT THE GUEST – CHUCK TOMASI Twitter: https://twitter.com/ctomasi LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/tomasi Website: https://www.chucktomasi.com/
In this week's show, Phil talks to Adrianus Warmenhoven, a Defensive Strategist and Threat Intelligence Manager at NordVPN. He is responsible for getting the most relevant Indicators of Compromise, malware samples and their indicators and mapping out the threat landscape for the company's customers. He has undertaken security reviews and advised companies on how to deal with active threats and extortion. Adrianus talks about why corporate politics should be avoided in your IT career journey. He also discusses why the basics should be ingrained at the outset of your IT career journey. KEY TAKEAWAYS: TOP CAREER TIP Don't play the game of corporate politics. Focus on the job, what it gives to you in terms of satisfaction, and become the best in your field. WORST CAREER MOMENT There are no singular “worst moments” – only a general string of challenges that all add up to learnings that we can take and move forward with. CAREER HIGHLIGHT A company for which Adrianus was working was expanding into Africa. It was a more primitive time in terms of technology, and Adrianus was asked to head this innovation. It was extraordinarily challenging, but through hard work it was made possible. THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There are countless facets to IT, with so many differing sectors that branch out into all corners of life, embracing so many different pursuits. THE REVEAL What first attracted you to a career in I.T.? – Computers and their possibilities What's the best career advice you received? – Always listen to, and try to understand others. What's the worst career advice you received? – Just to blindly follow the rules. What would you do if you started your career now? – I would do exactly the same! What are your current career objectives? – Having fun and learning more at all times. What's your number one non-technical skill? – Talking and listening. How do you keep your own career energized? – Finding new challenges and following his instincts. What do you do away from technology? – Family time and French polishing FINAL CAREER TIP When you're young, figure out what you want to do and start with the basics. It will serve you well as your career matures. BEST MOMENTS (3:57) – Adrianus – “If you do anything about your career, make sure that it adds value to yourself” (4:51) – Adrianus - “Press every button you see. Try everything out” (5:48) – Adrianus – “You have to learn from your mistakes and own them, and don't be afraid to make them. Otherwise you will not be moving forward at all” (16:08) – Adrianus – “Listen to people and ty to understand other people” ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organizations to design, develop, and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/_PhilBurgess LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Instagram: https://instagram.com/_philburgess Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast's website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST – ADRIANUS WARMERHOVEN Adrianus Warmenhoven is a Defensive Strategist and Threat Intelligence Manager at NordVPN. He is responsible for getting the most relevant Indicators of Compromise, malware samples and their indicators and mapping out the threat landscape for the company's customers. He has undertaken security reviews and advised companies on how to deal with active threats and extortion. CONTACT THE GUEST – ADRIANUS WARMENHOVEN LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrianuswarmenhoven/ Website: https://www.warmenhoven.co/
In this week's show, Phil talks to Mark Angle the Chief Cloud Operations Officer at OneStream, having previously held leadership positions in areas including data centre operations, service desk, enterprise architecture and service delivery. His passions lie at the intersection of technology, science, and nature but he gets his in-office adrenaline rush leading collaboration discussions or presenting to a customer. Mark discusses why we should always go further when it comes to self-development and learning. He also talks about why we should always keep our eyes open to spot new possibilities and opportunities. KEY TAKEAWAYS: TOP CAREER TIP We excel when we push past the boundaries of what we need to learn, and take on more information. This pushes us to grow more and be ready when opportunities arise. WORST CAREER MOMENT While managing a group of engineers, Mark plugged some of the patch cabling in, which wasn't labelled. There was a malfunction, and the result was that a large corporate network across the country was taken offline. CAREER HIGHLIGHT Growing into the position he currently holds at OneStream. It was a journey that involved working hard and ascending the ladder gradually. But the rewards have paid off handsomely. THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There are countless facets to IT, which means that those with a creative mind and the will to apply themselves, will always find a route through their chosen pursuit. THE REVEAL What first attracted you to a career in I.T.? – Through experimentation during youth. What's the best career advice you received? – Always be moving in your career, and stay on the bleeding edge. What's the worst career advice you received? – To stay in a job that will take you nowhere. What would you do if you started your career now? – Mark would start up a new technology company of his own. What are your current career objectives? – Continued rapid growth for OneStream, gaining a foothold in the market, and expansion. What's your number one non-technical skill? – Gaining a broad sense of business knowledge. How do you keep your own career energized? – Training, learning and pushing to develop more. What do you do away from technology? – Outdoor pursuits and flying his own airplane FINAL CAREER TIP Make sure you continue to learn, remain progressive, and keep your eyes open. If opportunities present themselves, take the chance and follow your instincts. BEST MOMENTS (2:57) – Mark – “Learn more than what you need to” (4:56) – Mark - “Technology exists not just for the sake of technology. It exists so that we can enable the business” (13:52) – Mark – “If you want to get into technology, I can't think of a better time to do it” (15:01) – Mark – “Stay on the bleeding edge!' ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organizations to design, develop, and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/_PhilBurgess LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Instagram: https://instagram.com/_philburgess Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast's website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST – MARK ANGLE Mark Angle is the Chief Cloud Operations Officer at OneStream, having previously held leadership positions in areas including data centre operations, service desk, enterprise architecture and service delivery. His passions lie at the intersection of technology, science, and nature but he gets his in-office adrenaline rush leading collaboration discussions or presenting to a customer. CONTACT THE GUEST – MARK ANGLE Twitter: https://twitter.com/lilrkt LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mangle Website: https://onestreamsoftware.com/
Christopher and Eric didn't want to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks with the usual roster of disaster porn, so on this special edition of Christopher & Eric's True Crime TV Club they're serving up THE WOMAN WHO WASN'T THERE, an arresting documentary about the nature of truth, lies and deceit in the shadow of the fallen World Trade Center towers that is so compelling, Eric makes a special request of you.
Byrne Hobart is a chartered financial analyst who loves writing about the intersection between finance and technology. He writes The Diff, one of Silicon Valley's most popular newsletters. In this episode, we dive into how Byrne launched his newsletter, how much he's earning, and how he publishes five times a week!You'll learn why Byrne isn't worried about pirates getting their hands on paid newsletters, and why you should worry about selling hard enough, instead.Byrne talks about how to build recurring revenue, and writing for different types of readers. He also points out an important factor that affects the churn rate of your newsletter!Byrne shares further insights on using free social media to lead people to the channels you monetize, and why he competes for readers' highest-value time, instead of appealing to the lowest common denominator.Links & Resources Jonathan Haidt - Social psychologist - Author - Professor Manhattan Project - Wikipedia Apollo program - Wikipedia Stratechery by Ben Thompson – On the business, strategy, and impact of technology. BitTorrent - Wikipedia Snopes.com - The definitive fact-checking site and reference source for urban legends, folklore, myths, rumors, and misinformation. Byrne Hobart's Links Sign up for The Diff Medium: Byrne Hobart on Medium Twitter: @ByrneHobart LinkedIn: Byrne Hobart Episode TranscriptByrne: [00:00:00] I wasn't really thinking of the paid newsletter as this is going to be the main thing I do. you look at tech companies, they often have multiple lines of revenue, one thing they do is 95% of revenue. And the next thing they do is 2% of revenue, and when companies get more mature, it's sometimes spreads out a little bit, but early on you find one thing that works really well. And that's what you focus on.Nathan: [00:00:25] Today's interview is with Byrne Hobart who writes The Diff. Now Byrne is a chartered financial analyst who loves writing about the intersection between finance and technology. What's really interesting about his writing is that he's read by basically the who's who of Silicon Valley. So it's not just, you know, a larger email list that we're talking about today, but really we're talking about writing the kind of quality content that, You know, billionaires are reading that.Like I first heard about him from Patrick Collison at Stripe. So this is the kind of thing that a lot of really important, really interesting people are paying attention to.So in this episode, we're going to dive into how he launched his paid newsletter, how much he earns. He publishes five days a week.These are long form detailed con detailed articles that Bern is posting basically five days a week, which is, is a crazy consistency. So his writing process, what inspires them and so much more what's that then.Byrne Welcome to the show.Byrne: [00:01:23] Great to be here.Nathan: [00:01:25] So I've been following your newsletter for awhile and I'd love if you just gave a quick intro from your side what you write about and why you find it interesting.Byrne: [00:01:35] Yeah, sure. So the idea is that I like reading history and I found that if you read We contemporary coverage of things that are happening at any given time you do get a lot of the details and then you get a lot of stuff that ends up being totally irrelevant And a lot of really interesting developments just are below the surface or they they matter in retrospect but no one really understood them at the time And so what I'm always trying to do which is a really high bar to reach is to write Right things today from a perspective that will still make sense it'd be relevant in the distant future So it's basically trying to spot the important technology trends trying to spot what mattered what people thought mattered didn't matter how those perceptions changed how how perception and reality have interacted and the way to do that is one to talk about financial markets because financial markets are Aggregating knowledge preferences expectations et cetera from everyone around the world And then the other thing to do is talk about technology particularly technology companies And the nice one of the nice things about those companies is that they have to be somewhat open because they're all constrained by their ability to hire people And one way to hire people if if you're trying to compete with Facebook and Google and Amazon and Microsoft and they can all offer a really generous comp package The way to hire people is to to give them some expectation that this company is going to be totally transformative and amazing So even if the base pay is not quite what you get at Facebook it's still worth doing either to make an impact on the world or to cash in some stock options So a lot of companies have this incentive to actually tell their story in a way that that doesn't happen as much in in other fields But at the same time companies have an incentive to hide their story Because if the story is we're doing X but we're actually going to kill Google And here's how you don't want Google to know that So there's there's always this corporate stress He doesn't where you have to be really appealing and inspiring but you can't tell the whole truth because it's too dangerous So I try to parse thatNathan: [00:03:42] yeah, I think that's fascinating. And I'm spacing on who talks about this a lot is a book that I read fairly recently, but about how, Now, this is going to bother me of who I never, what book it's from, if you'll know it, but how the closer like a startup is going to talk about how they can create a monopoly and they can have all the success.And then the closer they are to actually creating a monopoly, in and succeeding the less they're like, Oh no, no, no. It's not a monopoly at all. No. W like, look at all this competition. We have, everybody has a competitor.Byrne: [00:04:14] One has that, they have this, this like nber line of. Here's like everyone, if you're, if you're an airline, you're like, here's why we're really special. Here's why everyone loves Delta. And the United is like, no, here's why everyone wants United. And then, if you're Google, you're like, well, we're one advertising company among many.And our customers could go to all sorts of different media, but really Google has a, basically a monopoly on search and search is an incredibly lucrative business, but yeah, they, they can't quite talk about that. And there are, there are other companies that have these little monopolies, like sometimes, If you, if you look at the, some of the large us companies that had large research labs in the thirties, forties, fifties, in some cases it seems like part of the point of those labs was to give them somewhere.Somewhere, they could dp their excess profits so that they just didn't look that profitable. So if you're at and T you have this incredibly lucrative business with network effects, you have a technology advantage. And one thing you could do with that is, just run it for maxim profit margins right now.But the other thing you can do with it, if you're worried about. FDR are complaining that you're terrible people is you hire a bunch of scientists. You tell them, please just work on something. It should help us. But, you know, we just, we w it's basically a way for them to defer their profits to some future that's more politically optimal.And, and then you get lots of wonderful side effects. The transistor.Nathan: [00:05:36] Yeah. Oh, there's so much to that. And so, anyway, I think those are just fun. Examples of ideas on what you tend to write about, kind of staying on the topic before we dive into newsletters specifically, saying on the inflection points in business, I'd love to hear like what, or maybe I'll start with what's one or two that you've seen in particular this year, since this year has been a very transformative year.Byrne: [00:06:00] Yeah. So, you can, you can look at the obvious inflection point of, you know, before we were all going to social gatherings and going out to eat and traveling. And now most of us are not doing very much of that at all, but I think one of the inflections there was, this. It results. Some policy argents about the extent to which you can actually solve a recession just by spending a lot of money.So there's always this concern of if we spend a lot of money it's hyperinflationary, but in an economy that's already pretty levered. There's actually, there's a pretty good argent for having somebody stabilize that. Then you can, you could imagine one steady state where we just don't have as much leverage.And so you don't have as many people who, if they lose their job now, they can't pay their rent. So their landlord. Can't pay their mortgage. So the bank has trouble with its finances and it just, just bounces through the rest of the economy. in a less levered economy, that's just less likely, but in an economy where you have this pretty robust financial system, where a lot of people have, fixed obligations, a lot of companies have fixed obligations.As it turns out when there's a huge demand shock to the system, you can actually just spend a ton of money and, and things start to get better. So it's, One of the worst recessions on record, but one of the short-term sessions on record and, it so far has worked well. there is a question of how technocratic we want things to be.There's also a question of, did we. Did we stop a depression in 2020 and get something worse than 2021. So there's still some open questions, but I think it does. It does tell you that some policymakers have, have more power than, than we thought, or it can have, have more powers they can use for good than we thought.But at the same time, you have a lot of people questioning a lot of powerful institutions because they're, if you go back to the, the discourse on COVID in January and February, it was, it was kind of seen as, as sort of extreme and paranoid to worry about it. There's the famous of box piece. Yeah.These people aren't even shaking people aren't even what's wrong with them. It's, it's no worse than the flu, get a grip America, et cetera. So, we've had some institutions where we've had to seriously question their legitimacy and, a lot of these institutions are fighting back by kind of dodging it like, there's, there's been a bit of soul searching and actually, some of the, one of the Vox writers who had covered COVID early, actually talked about how they're, She could have done more.Her name is escaping me right now, but she actually did a fair amount of soul searching and actually wrote a thoughtful piece on, part of it was on just the factual question of when was it clear that this was a crisis and what, what should be done about it? And then part of it was this meditation on the institutional incentives.So. It's it's tough to be early, especially. if you are a journalist at a large publication, you have this surface area problem where, the bigger the publication is the, the more risk they take from any one person saying something crazy. And, the bigger they are, the more newsworthy it is. If any one person says something crazy.So New York times has a lot of writers and it's also a well-known institution, which means that they actually face a ton of risk from their employees going off the reservation. And. What, what I think you see is that a lot of these institutions they're converging on some range of acceptable discourse, and they're just, they're writing off the set of people who.Don't really think that way, but they're very much speaking to the they're preaching to the choir for the people who do agree with them. So you actually end up with a much stronger filter bubbles, as a result of this questioning of legitimacy. So that's, that's an important inflection point. And, I think the other, the other side of that is that we did learn that.Tech companies broadly defined, did a great job. They sent employees home very early. the internet kept running. So the telcos did, an excellent job at, not allowing that whole system to fall apart. a lot of, retailers, for example, and manufacturers were able to adapt quite quickly. So there were toilet paper shortages briefly, but then, We got more toilet paper.there are still shortages in a couple areas, but, stuff like exercise equipment, it's still hard to find. last time I looked podcasting Mike's were still hard to find, but in a lot of cases, the, some parts of the system were exceptionally adaptable. So in many ways, you know, if you, if you didn't like going out that much, if you were already the kind of person who used a lot of, a lot of grub hub and Postmates, Some things haven't changed that much.In some ways, things are actually easier because now, now if you tell someone I don't want to hang out, we should just chat on zoom. It's actually kind of normal. So, you know, for, for introverts and a lot of these companies are, their workforce tends to be more introverted if they're tech companies, it's, it just hasn't been that big, an impact relative to the worldwide impact.Nathan: [00:10:53] Yeah, that makes sense. Is there something that, you know, we've seen these changes happen right now? The, all the things that work from home and everything else that's right in front of us, but what's something that an inflection point that you think has happened, but we haven't noticed the effects of it and we won't.You know, three years from now, we'll look back and be like, Oh, of course, that changed in 2020. But you know, you think people right now would be surprised or, not actually expect to see that change.Byrne: [00:11:22] Interesting. I think, one of the interesting changes is this, this, in the. Hardware business. And specifically in chips, there's been this narrowing of which companies can effectively manufacturer the most cutting edge chips. if you look at the, the nber of semiconductors, your fabs at, at every node of design, as the nodes get more advanced than nber of fabs, that can actually do the nber of companies that own fabs that can do this.Just diminishes and diminishes and diminishes. And now we're at the point where, the most advanced trips can get made in Taiwan or they can get made in, South Korea. And there's really, no one else has caught up to them. And this is something that, that people are aware of, but I don't know how much we've thought through the implications of, One country that has had, had disputes with China here and there.And, it was at war with them at one point, in the fifties. And then you have another country that China says as part of its territory and so very, very serious, very deep-seated disputes there. so. These, these countries are, are both pretty, more geopolitically tenuous than, than other places in the world.And they are the only place where this really essential set of components gets manufactured. So that's, that is a case where the, the world of geopolitics and macroeconomics starts to intersect with the world of technology. Right. And you started asking what it looks like if, the U S no longer has access to tips, or if China no longer has access to tips, because both of these countries are, very close to the U S diplomatically and, they're, they're close to try to geographically, so it's, it makes the world much more interesting and much more high risk.And it's, it's part of a general force and technology that you end up with. These increases only elaborate supply chains, where there are these really narrow slices that are super profitable. And, as, as they get more profitable, they get harder to duplicate. You end up with more monopolies and those monopolies just, as, as an shrinks from, you know, there are, there are dozens of companies that can do this too.There are two that can do this. Then you have to stop thinking of this as a statistical process and start thinking of it as, That's something closer to a narrative where there, there are these very specific entities. There are specific people in charge. They have particular incentives and they think about things in a particular way, and it really matters for the future, how they think and what they decide.Yeah, that's fascinating. I. You know, from the, the nineties and earlier you think of oil as being that, that resource that is worth fighting Wars over. And so that's fascinating that it could turn into chips and it might not go to Wars, but certainly very heavily, you know, a lot, a lot of, geopolitical issues around that.Yeah, there's this The good Lord, didn't see fit to put oil only in places where we'd like to do business, but we go where the oil is. And you can think about that with chips too, where you, if you were designing a, a supply chain for the U S technology sector from scratch, you probably wouldn't put the most strategic components.All right. Next to a country that is trying to build its own supply chain. And that increasingly sees the U as a major rival. You'd probably arrange it a little bit differently maybe, but these, these plants in, I don't know. England, or maybe you put them in America. And the U S is sort of trying to do that.And the semiconductor industry is lobbying very hard for the U S to do that. Taiwan semiconductor has, has plans to open a facility in the U S and, Samsung is expanding some of their manufacturing in the U S so it's, it's slowly edging over that way, but China has. subsidized that business massively, a friend of mine, Jordan Schneider, who writes a China talk, he estimates that it's something like $1.4 trillion that China has, has spent, or is planning to spend on this industry.So that's clearly, clearly they're taking it very seriously.Nathan: [00:15:23] Yeah. Oh, that's fascinating. So I want to transition right now because, and talk more on the newsletter side. Cause this is a taste of the kind of thing you, you write about and the level of detail that you go into. And so this is why, you know, executives and founders at so many top companies are following your stuff.Cause you're watching. These kinds of trends and seeing, okay, what are the implications of this? And so I'd love to go back a little bit in your story and just, focus on three years ago, five years ago, what, what were you doing? And what's the path that led you to this point of kind of being on the cutting edge of, and the narrative of what's going on in the world.Byrne: [00:16:00] Yeah. Sure. So, mostly doing equity research. So I worked for a while at a hedge fund SAC capital, and then, worked for some research providers who work with ones like that. And, that, that work was actually really fun because the equity research it's, It promotes some really healthy mental habits, because if you were trying to decide if a stock is a buy or a sell, you do want to have your thesis, but you actually want to pay very close attention to who you're arguing with and what their thesis is.Because the most valuable things you learn are from the people who disagree with you. And if you tune out the other side of the argent, then you are necessarily the db bunny. So you can get lucky. You can still make money and that's happened to me, but, You it's, it's a lot smarter to know exactly what these guys are betting against and why you think it's wrong.So that's, and that's. Normally in argents, that's the healthiest way to approach things is you figure out how to reproduce the other person's argent and then you figure out what they're missing or, or you just figure out what fundamental disagreements you have. So a lot of political argents, you think that it's an argent over, over policy outcomes, but it's actually an argent over, what is what's practical to implement?And, there's a Jonathan Haidt has a lot of research on that. Or hight has a lot of research on. And this idea of moral foundations where different people just have different things that they care about or different things that are willing to treat as morally significant. And you can, you can have an argent with someone where it seems like the other person is just, Just promoting something totally inhan and evil, because they have a different set of priorities that they're willing to give credence to.And if they, if they only, if you only cared about the, the care versus harm moral foundation, so it, it, does it hurt people or does it help them? You get one set of conclusions, but if you care about that, but you also care about things like. Respect for, respect for authority and respect for these symbolic things that, that don't have real world value, but do matter, in the abstract, then you get to a different set of policies.And, it's what hight claims is that when people with different moral foundations try to model one another's beliefs, they just tend to asse that if someone waits care versus harm differently, it just means they want to hurt people. Whereas what it actually means is they're balancing a different set of priorities.with finance, you don't really have to worry about moral foundations that much because everyone wants to make money. you can sort of have moral foundations with things like, investing in tobacco stocks, but that's a very quick argent. One person says. This company is a very profitable, and we don't think that they're going to shrink as fast as the market thinks.And then someone else says, yeah, but they cost cancer. So I'm not going to invest in that. So that's a very quick argent. It's not like they have any disputes about fundamentals. They just quickly get to what the substance of the dispute is. And then. When people debate companies like, like Netflix and there, you know, you have one side saying original content is this bottomless money pit.And they have to keep spending more and more and more just to, just to keep up with the other streaming companies. And then someone else says that that's theoretically true, but they actually get economies of scale and they get economies of scale on acquiring users. And so you're, as long as you're amortizing content over a larger and larger user base over time.And as long as you have a lot of pricing power, It doesn't really matter that it's expensive to have this original content. And maybe it's actually good because it means that eventually other companies get scared out of competing in the first place. So you at least figure out what the questions are, what the uncertainties are, and then you start modeling.You start trying to figure out what does it look like if you scale the, the Netflix movie production function up to X or up five X. And then what does it look like when Netflix raises prices in a country like the U S versus what a, what pricing power do they have in. a much poorer country, for example, so that that's a really healthy habit where you're, you're trying to figure out what you actually disagree with people on, and then you want to resolve that disagreement and, and get it right.And. Because prices are set by people who are trading. There's actually an incentive for people to share what they figured out out. If they've figured out something novel and insightful, and they've already made the trade. So a lot of people, well exchange ideas, they debate very vigorously and they're in some sense in some totally cynical utility maximizing, since they're still trying to get at the truth in, in just that narrow domain, but you take the habits from that domain and then you apply them to other areas and it's generally useful.Nathan: [00:20:38] Yeah, that makes sense. Before we get to newsletters, I'm realizing I have one more question. what's something surprising that shaped your view of the world. You have a very unique take. And so I'd love to hear what, you know, what's something that people wouldn't expect that plays into that.Byrne: [00:20:52] Yeah. So I, Very rationalist view of the world. And I'm sure I still, I still try to, I still tend to take a more, more linear left-brained view of things, but, I do think that there's, there are important coordinator functions that are served by these irrational, irrational behaviors.So there. So things like financial bubbles, you can look at a financial bubble as just people being bad at math and paying too much for stuff, investing too much and stuff working too hard on, on, on endeavors that are just not going to have any kind of meaningful payoff, but you can also view a bubble as this coordinating function, where for a lot of complicated technologies, you need a lot of things to go right at once.So you can look at the internet bubble as being this combination of a bubble in, And ISP and telecommunications, but also a bubble in creating content online and also a bubble in selling goods online. If those didn't happen all at the same time, none of them would have been possible. So if you build amazon.com and nobody has internet access, then it's worthless.If you, if you build PayPal and nobody's buying anything online, worthless, but if all of these things are happening at once, then collectively, they are actually worth a lot. It it's still very uncertain. And, a lot of people got burned, including anyone who bought Amazon at the peak. It was a very long time before they got back to breakeven, but it did coordinate all of these developments and build something that was hard to replace.And, I, I think there's a parallel between that and. What happens with successful mega-projects from governments. So, if you look at something like the Manhattan project or the Apollo program, there are all these discrete components that have to be built for the project to work. And if you build one of them and the other one doesn't get built, it's worthless.So you have one group of people designing a bomb, and you have another group of people purifying, vast amounts of the correct urani isotopes to build a bomb. If you purify a bunch of the right isotope, but there's no design for a bomb, then you've wasted a ton of money. And I believe by the end of the war, the investment in that urani project was actually larger than the total investment in the automobile industry at that time.So you would huge project could have been worthless. they did a lot of these things in parallel, so they didn't actually know if the final design would work, but. it's very much like a bubble. You're doing this thing that is irrational at one level, but if everyone's irrational in exactly the same way and you all give up what tasks have to get done, then you end up building something that you could not build on your own.You couldn't build it any scale lower than that.Nathan: [00:23:29] Right. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. So you're going from the world of finance and, then, just this year, right. You made the switch or was it last year? You made the switch to the newsletter.Byrne: [00:23:40] Yeah. So I, messed around for a while, did a little bit of just freelance writing in a couple of different places and did some consulting. And then I, I started the newsletter, mostly promote other writing. So I've been doing that for about 10 years, just very intermittently.And, I started writing the newsletter more regularly and then charging for it in February of this year.Nathan: [00:24:08] I'm realizing we're gonna publish this in 2021. So I should do it throw a year in there. so let's see. Yeah. I mean, going back through your stuff, you've been writing for a very long time, but publish on medi. Well, before you got started on Substack. Yeah. But to what I'd love to hear what some of the things that you were looking at when it was like, okay, let's change it from, you know, we've been newsletter as a way to.Send my writing to people, right. At that point, it's just a push mechanism. And then that transition to the newsletter as a business. Now, maybe two things, one, what were some of the people you're looking to for inspiration there, who sort of charted that path for you? And then, what were the, the markers that you were looking for for like, Oh, I should actually do this.Byrne: [00:24:55] Yeah, I think so there's There's what you work on and then there's how you monetize it and these can be very different. So Nike, for example, in one sense, they are an ad company. They just found a way to monetize by selling shoes. And they're really good at it. And you can look at a lot of other companies that way that they.They do one thing and then they monetize it through something else. So I, I wasn't really thinking of the paid newsletter as this is going to be the main thing I do. I was thinking of it as I have these different channels andI'm in one channel, someone else owns the platform and I, I I really like working with them and I still write for them.but it's, it's, it's not recurring revenue. And so I wanted to have something that's recurring revenue, what I thought. And I actually, I built this little financial model. Which immediately became obsolete. And I was, I was looking at different income sources, different things I'm working on. And, I thought the newsletter, you know, they could end up being a third of my income.And so I'd have this diversified set of, of different activities I do. And there's one that's recurring, so that's really safe, but it won't be that big, cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But, what I should have been thinking was when you look at any. If if you look at tech companies, they often have multiple lines of revenue.And it's like, one thing they do is 95% of revenue. And the next thing they do is 2% of revenue, but they break even doing that. And then the next thing they do is Piney Teddy's revenue. So, I think, and when they, when companies get more mature, it sometimes spreads out a little bit, but early on you find one thing that works really well.And that that's what you focus on. that's, that's roughly how it happened with the newsletter. I got a couple of people to sign up. It started growing and it just, it grew pretty steadily. Like when I look at the chart, there are these bps, mostly from people recommending it publicly. it's and those, those have happened just periodically pretty much since I started.But a lot of it is just this gradual process of. You send an email and a bunch of people read it and some of them send it to someone else and that person reads it, likes it wants to read more. And I have another subscriber. the, the social proof of you got this paid email from some, you got this email, that's a paid subscription product.And, so the person who's sending it to, you knows you and they know you're interested and they're implicitly endorsing paying for it. That's, that's really powerful. So a lot of it is compounding from that. What that means though, is that posting frequently, as long as you have something to say is really powerful.So if you have. Five opportunities a week to do that instead of two, then the compounding process should happen lot faster and there is a balance to strike, but in general, there's a huge amount of information out there. you can, you can always think of just how much competition there is for people's attention, but a lot of it is for attention that people are implicitly putting zero value on.So a lot of, a lot of us, myself included have this just muscle memory for. I'm bored or I'm waiting for something to happen. I'm going to open a new tab and I'm going to go to hacker news or Reddit or Twitter or something. And that time is not the time I'm competing for. I try to compete for time.That's very, fairly valuable. That's why, the newsletter is an appropriate form factor because it's going into the same inbox as a lot of pretty important stuff. I know some people will filter and sort, but. A lot of people have this default approach of I'm going to get a ton of inbound email and I'm going to manually filter through it and decide what's important.So I'm generally competing for people's attention, against pressing business matters. And that's, that sets a really high bar, but it also, again, adds some social proof where if this is worth the time of a busy person, then it's worth it. to read Nathan: [00:28:42] I think that's something with paid newsletters that people worry about, right. Is that I've put this out there and obviously it's only available to paid subscribers, but are they, everyone has it in their inbox. There's no lock on the version in the inbox. So I can just forward that on people say like, But, you know, what's to prevent someone from just giving it away.And what I hear you saying is nothing. And that's the beauty of it, because worst case I'm not going to forward it to dozens or hundreds of people, I'm going to be like, know, I'm going to send it to my friend, Ryan, Hey, Ryan, you've got to read this. And then that's exactly what you're saying of like, Oh, well, if this is $20 a month, I'm reading it.This was good. Nathan pays for it. So he must think that it's worth paying for every month. So like, you know, the other four articles a week are really good, so sure. I'll subscribe and check it out. And you're right. That's really high. It's social.Byrne: [00:29:32] I would say piracy at some point I'm sure it will be a risk I'm sure it will be a risk and I'm it probably exists in private chat groups that there's some roster of. Here's the pirated Stratechery feed here's the pirated sinuses and feed, etc like that stuff happens, but it's just. Part of what you can take advantage of is it's incredibly embarrassing to ask and it's excruciating to ask multiple times, like, I, I signed up for the information because I was midway through sending someone a text message being like, Hey, I saw another headline from the information.I really want to read this article. And I was just imagining him getting this periodic reminder that I'm cheap and just dismissing it. I know people will pirate it some people will pirate stuff at scale, but they're not really, they're not a huge audience. A lot of people just don't behave that way.And in a lot of cases, what we saw in music and movies was that piracy was about usability. That if, if Netflix and Spotify are more convenient than BitTorrent than BitTorrent, it's still a factor, but it's not a huge factor. And a lot of people graduate, they, they torrent the first alb but they eventually get on Spotify and then it's just too easy.They never stop. And, the, since the economics are a lot better for paid newsletters than for piracy, like, look at the ads that, the torrent sites have to run. Clearly, they are not actually hitting a super high-monetization ultra-desirable audience. So I would expect that as piracy becomes a bigger deal, a the, the newsletter technology companies, the platforms are going to notice it before the individual users do.Users, some users might notice and complain. You know, if they see this reader opened the newsletter 500 times and clicked 2000 times on different links, like, okay, that's something something's going on there. But the people who will notice it at scale and actually start detecting it and perhaps come up with countermeasures perhaps just say going to happen, but it's not economically a huge deal for you.that's, that's probably going to be platform-side Nathan: [00:31:31] Well, I think what's most interesting about it is, is not just that it's a small, like piracy being a small issue, as far as the overall monetary side, like, you know, whatever those people were going to pay you, but also that it may be a benefit of, of exposing new people to it. You know, like your friend who sends you, the information says, Hey, you got to read this article.And then later you're texting him, like, can I read that article as well? You know, he introduced you or she introduced you to that quality of reporting and then kind of got you hooked. And so, you know, it's interesting to think about it being potentially a goodByrne: [00:32:04] Yeah, I, I think Piracy is not just, you get an email that you paid for and you send it to someone like piracy is you, you do that systematically, or like you have a special Gmail that a lot of people log into and maybe, maybe they're paying you like $10 in Bitcoin every year to get access to the giant email list.that's that is, there are definitely, there's like a pretty discreet gap and yeah. It's it's kind of, like you can, there's always the continu of how monetizeable a given media, given the physical instantiation of media can be. if you look at the music industry, you could, you could monetize by selling physical albs.You can monetize through radio, you can monetize through touring. You can monetize through merch there's, there's a whole spectrum of price discrimination and you, you generally want to have some aspects of it that monetize very poorly because they have low frictional cost of sharing. In fact, that's a, there's an interesting dynamic across different media sites where sometimes there is a low-monetization low-friction site.And then there's a high-monetization high-friction site that has the same kind of content. But the, there are people who use both of them and they use one to get followers for the other one. And so you can, there are people who will use TikTok to promote their YouTube channel. They know that YouTube subscribers are stickier, they can get advertising on YouTube.A lot of people including me, will use Twitter to monetize Substack So Twitter by design is supposed to be this ultra-seamless process for sharing stuff and having it go extremely viral. Substack is just not going to be extremely viral. There, there are examples of viral emails, but they're all in the distant past.And it's It's viral. But if you look at the, the forward line, it's like 150 people read about it. And then someone posted it, to Snopes.com or something.Nathan: [00:33:58] Right. So let's dive into that on the growth side. I think Twitter is a very common path for growing a newsletter. They, it just has distribution in a way that. You know, email doesn't have built in, or I should say discovery, as discovery built in, in such a good way, what's worked for you on, on Twitter and maybe a couple of examples of either threads or individual tweets or articles that have been right.Byrne: [00:34:22] No, I have, I don't have a good one sense of what actually works in terms of getting a payoff in subscribers, because it seems to happen. So asynchronously that it's more like. If you, if you tweet and people like it, they will follow you on Twitter. Eventually, if you occasionally tweet links or as I do shamelessly tweet links to your newsletter, eventually some of them will subscribe on the free list if they get enough free issues, some of the most apart from the paid list.So the conversion funnel is really gradual and, because. You don't have, you don't have a good way to track the, the user, path from, they saw someone retweet you, but didn't interact too. They saw a tweet. They followed you all the way down to, they paid you money. it's, it's tough to see them through that entire funnel, unless, well, sub-sect dismissed the rors that Twitter was going to buy them.So that will happen. Probably probably for the better anyway. so it's, it's really tough to say other than just, if you can be the, the Twitter ISE 280 character version of what you are in long form on, on a newsletter, then you will, you'll give people a pretty, pretty close approximation. So I'd say that my Twitter.My Twitter feed. I will sometimes tweet general observations. Sometimes I'll tweet something about a story that I end up writing in more detail for the newsletter. Sometimes I'll ask people questions on Twitter. Like if there's just something where I have an open question, I haven't found a good answer from Googling, and I know there's a good answer out there.I'll ask people. I, I do occasional Twitter things that are just things that have to be that day and it, It feels not, not like a good deal at all for someone to put the email newsletter on their expense account and then get a story about a toddler. So, that does not make it into sub stack, but that's just because a lot of my friends follow me on Twitter.So it's a way of keeping in touch with people. I, one of the things I do on Twitter pretty regularly is when I write a post that is paywall, I will generally tweet out a link to it. And I will often tweet out a screen cap of something I said in that post, the only annoying thing there is that I want the screencap to be interesting, but I don't like to post spoilers.Is one of my rules. So I will, I will often screencap a tangent or a footnote or something else in the piece that just gives you a sense of what I'm writing about, but doesn't give away the whole thing for free. And I don't know, I don't know what percentage of the content ends up being given away for free versus, charged for in theory, I, I tell people I'm going to post three times a week.I generally post five times a week. one of those posts is free and the other one's okay. Walled usually, but I will occasionally take something out behind the paywall. So, I had a piece on Palentier that I wrote after the S one was filed and I was just really proud of it. And, I was also kind of disappointed in the overall media coverage of Palentier, which is some combination of this is the evil empire and this company is fantastically overpriced.But when I looked through the S one, it was clear to me that. There's, it's not logically impossible that they're evil, but if you actually look at what they're saying, and you look at what they're doing, they, they make a pretty coherent case that they are fighting for. Good. And. Later on. There was more commentary on them, some interviews with, with the founders.And it did actually seem like they thought through all of these objections. Like if you're, if you're smart people, if you're, the founders are people who majored in philosophy, like they're, they're these used to thinking about moral issues. obviously majoring, yeah. Philosophy doesn't make you a good person.It makes you a person with a better vocabulary for explaining why you're going to do what you want to do. But at least it means that they, they do have this whole, This whole toolkit for, for wrestling, with these issues. And, almost a lack of plausible deniability. Like you, if you know what, what the great thinkers in history have said about things like, is it moral to help, Bad government do something that is going to cause less harm than if you didn't help them, but they're still doing something bad and maybe you're enabling them to do more.And maybe the more that they do will be worse. Like that's, that's stuff people have been thinking about for a couple thousand years now. So, they had been thinking about that and, I was actually really happy with the feedback on the volunteer piece because a lot of people said this. this explains what this at least gives like this counter view to the view that they're evil.But I also had people ping me privately say, yeah, I worked there and this is, this is actually right. Like we, we do believe we're fighting the good fight. that there's a lot that they can't say publicly, in part, because they're working with the government and like a lot of that stuff should not be publicly disclosed, but, that, that was a piece that I made public.More because I thought that it actually contributed to the overall discourse, but a lot of the, a lot of the stuff stays paywalls and, that's, that's something that if people want to pay for it, they should. And in a lot of cases, like the vast majority of people do not, they sign up for the free version.They don't sign up for the paid version. That's fine. And, I'm happy to write for a large audience and get interesting feedback and be an interesting people. even if there's no monetary component whatsoever to that,Nathan: [00:39:39] On the ratio of free to paid and then also the price. So you went with $20 a month or $220 a year. I'd love to hear. You know, is everyone's so many people are like $5 a month and I'm like, no, no, no. Or more like, raise the price for newsletter. It's not, it's not cite there. but what went into choosing the price that youByrne: [00:40:00] So I originally kind of newsy high quality publications that were at 10. And I saw sinus ism was at 15 and Sinocism struck me as very close to what I'm trying to do, which is provide a lot of depth. and be something that you, you could read on your own, but you could also expense at work.either one would make sense. So I basically just said, I'm going to let these people do their, do my research for me. And since cynicism was near the top of the, the meter board, I just went with that. And then, I decided just to see what would happen if I raised the price of it. So raise the price from 15 to 20, I made a big production about it.So I told people two weeks in advance and then when we can advance them the day of, I was like, you need to subscribe by 11:59 PM Eastern time, or it will permanently be. And then, you know, told them. How much they're saving, if they subscribe now, sub-sect does grandfather people in, which is a huge relief to me because I remembered hearing that somewhere and I wrote it in the newsletter.I was like, if you're a subscriber, don't worry, your grandfather did. And you have nothing, nothing you'd have to do. And then I tried to find where on the substantive website, it actually said that, and I couldn't find it. And I was like, I'm going to be Venmo showing hundreds of people $5 a month every month until everyone turns out.And then I found it in that help page somewhere. So that was a huge relief. Anyway, I did that. I sent the, my one actual sales letter to just the free subscribers and it was fun to write. I used to be a copywriter a long, long time ago, and I always liked these bombastic sales letters. And, I occasionally like reading them, like, I like reading Ramit and his sales letters on money and personal finance and career and stuff.And I know I'm being sold to, but it's actually enjoyable and he's really good at it. So I learned a lot from that. I did the sales letter, many thousands of people opened it and plenty of them converted exactly. One person unsubscribed and said, I didn't like this. It was really salesy, but he wasn't even mean about it.He was just like, this isn't really what I wanted. And I was like, that's fine. So, that works out there's there are these, Metta maltheisms. So. Malthus talked about how, when the population grows, you end up with too many people for your food supply. So it always stabilizes at near starvation. And there are a lot of other phenomenon life like that, where if you're not experiencing problems, you could be going further.So, the, the Peter teal quote is if you've never missed a flight that took your life in airports. And I think with newsletters, it's, if you've never gotten a nasty email or even a slightly peeved email from someone saying you're really selling this too hard, You've never gotten that you are not selling nearly hard enough.And I also think there's, there's this, near-moral obligation to sell your stuff. Well, if you think it's good. And I think that part of why people are reluctant to sell is imposter syndrome or maybe some form of cowardice. It certainly is a reason that I'm sometimes reluctant to sell or has happened in the past.And, I it's, it's a way to signal that you actually believe in what you're doing. If you're willing to slightly embarrass yourself with a sales letter and with a sales pitch, and you were willing to pull all the little copywriter tricks, you know, the bullet points and the endorsements from, from celebrities or e-celebrities all of that stuff.Here's what you're getting. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, all that stuff. I think there, there are people who can't get away with it and there are people who can get away with it, but don't try it.Nathan: [00:43:31] I think that's a really good point that, that, that you need to be pushing it to the point where at least some nber of people are complaining. If no one is complaining at all, then you're, you're not charging enough. You're not, you know, something like, you're not confident enough in your own value. Because, yeah, there's always someone to complain on the internet.It's if you've managed to find this perfect community, then, then yet you're selling yourself short. now I want to get into your writing process because five newsletters a week, and you're officially promising three, which is good. Right. We're under promising and over-delivering, I think there's something.You know, you could, take from that, but like Tyler, Cowen has this thing that talks about like, what's the Tyler Cowen production function. Like how does he, he's one of just an incredibly prolific, creator, like what makes him tick? What, like, how does all the work that he does happen? That's the question that I have, you know, just watching all of your stuff.Like what, what is your process? And then, you know, starting from. What sparks the inspiration to all the way through to being able to publish, you know, a detailed well-researched article, every Workday.Byrne: [00:44:43] I've always read a lot and I've gotten more systematic about it now that I have the defacto daily deadline. So I have lots of RSS feeds, probably a hundred. I don't really keep track as a lot of them. It's someone who publishes once a month, but it's always good. And then for some of them, it's, this site publishes 50 or a hundred articles a day.Most of them, you read halfway through the headline and it's garbage, but occasionally you'll see something interesting. In terms of what I read of, I try to read one major business publications business section from each of the 10 largest GDPs, the countries with the 10 largest GDPs. I think there's one or two that I'm missing, but I just try to get this cross section of business stories that are going to be local to one place today, and then they'll get big tomorrow or next week.a lot of blogs, I read, the major tech blogs, and then there's this long tail of things like, Industry specific sites. So someone like a semiconductor digest or ad exchanger, finance sites like pension investment online, a lot of these more niche ones where I'm done, probably not reading every single thing that they post, but, I'm looking at the headlines and I'll often find something worth diving into, when I come up with article topics, the structure of the newsletter by the way is, It's one long form piece, only around a thousand words, but it varies a bit.And then, maybe half a dozen short links with commentary. So. A lot of the things that I read, they end up going into that is short links with commentary thing. And that's what I definitely not trying to do is be one of the morning news dp emails, like the deal email. Cause those are, those are really valuable for knowing everything that's going on.And I try to write for someone who either a. Already gets deal books. So they don't need one more of those emails and there are dozens and dozens of them, or be someone who actually doesn't care what's going on. They care about what's. What's interesting. So it's either, and this is why it's called the diff it's from the, the, the Unix function.So I'm, I'm dipping against, like I'm trying to diff out the, the, the interesting stuff and the inflections from just the general flow of news. So I try to, I try to extract that stuff and, be your value added for people who are already immersed in this stuff all the time, which is like a lot of the finance people who read it or to be what interesting thing happened today to someone who's not reading the daily news, for the longer form pieces, there, there are a lot of ideas that sort of vaguely linger in my head for a while.And then. I eventually write something about them or there'll be a pattern where I noticed that I've, I've seen five different instances of this same kind of thing happening. And so I should write a full story about it. So, one example of that from fairly recently was I noticed that retailers and brick and mortar retailers keep launching some kind of ad business that is adjacent to their e-commerce business.And I was wondering why that was, and I realized that. Amazon did it and did it really well because they have all this first party purchase data. So if you are selling anything, Amazon probably knows everyone, almost everyone in the country who has purchased something like that, or who's statistically likely to purchase that.So they should be really good at targeting ads. If you look at someone like, target or CVS or Walgreens or someone like that, they actually have a lot of this offline purchase data that's tied to individuals and their e-commerce position is relatively weaker, which means that their ratio of. First party purchase data to e-commerce data or to e-commerce revenue is really high.So it actually makes sense for them to monetize some of that through ads rather than through selling products directly. so that's, that was one, one case where there was just this ongoing pattern. Another pretty frequent source of things to write about is companies that are just going public. That's often the first time that you get this look into the unit economics of a company that people have known about for a long time.And, there's this tradition where. Company files their to go public and it gets posted to hacker news. And someone pulls out a line from the risk factors saying this company has never reported an accounting profit, and doesn't expect to necessarily the future and is like, this is a disaster it's worth zero.And someone has to chime in and be like, well, if you look at their free cash flow, they've actually been making more money than they spent for a long time. They just have to appreciation or whatever. But basically having, having a cogent answer to the question of why is this not worthless when the company's not reporting an accounting profit, or if it's really profitable, why is this interesting?So, that's, that's another source. And then sometimes there are just general trends that I might not have written about or general patterns I might not have written about where I think it's worth a long treatment. And, that can be, that can be anything from just an economic phenomenon that I know of that, That isn't talked about that often.So one of my early pieces that I was really happy with was about, this economic law for determining the optimal amount of a resource of a finite resource to extract where the paper was. They went through a bunch of complicated math and the basic argent was your, all you're doing is saying. Do I want money now or money in a year.And, like, do I want to drill for oil now and have money now or drill oil in a year and a half the money then? And that, that depletion rate is determined by how much you expect the price to go up. So it ultimately comes back to interest rates, but. If you, if you actually try to operationalize that the interest rate that you should think about is not just what does a treasury bond yield it's actually like, what, how much do you value money right now versus in the future?And what that means is that in a lot of really unstable countries, it actually makes sense to drill way more or drill for way more oil than you otherwise would because. If you are, I don't know the dictator of Venezuela, you don't actually expect to be in power in 20 years. So even if you think oil is gonna go way up 20 years from now, you actually want to drill for it now and spend the money on tanks.Venezuela is a special case because they also are not currently able to drill for oil at all. And, so there's, there's another way the model breaks down, but I thought it was an interesting model to explore because it's. It's useful directionally. And it's actually a really elegant approach for thinking about the question of depleting a finite resource, and it's always wrong.It never actually describes reality, but the, the gap between the model and reality is actually instructive. And I think that's, that's one of my meta themes is that there are all these interesting theoretical models or interesting analogies that are imperfect, but the ways that they're imperfect actually tell interesting about the world.Nathan: [00:51:30] Yeah, that makes sense. So then, so you're doing all of this research and finding those, those trends. what does it look like when you're actually sitting down to write? Is that, are you dedicating, you know, an hour, three hours, five hours a day to writing what's what'sByrne: [00:51:45] I don't keep great I, I will spend a lot of my day reading, reading books, reading news articles, reading sec filings and academic papers and things. And then at some point I realized that I should actually start writing. And so I started writing, but I kinda zone out and I'm always surprised when I look at the clock, when I'm done writing the newsletter with how late it's gotten.So, it, it is a couple hours of writing, but. I think some of it is like trying to get in the zone and that's just, struggle with distraction and then eventually to start writing. And that just happens pretty smoothly until I'm too tired to go on.Nathan: [00:52:24] Yeah, it sounds like you're, I mean, you're doing the research and reading until the article becomes really clear what you want to write becomes clear. And then, then it's the transition to getting into a focused mode to write that.Byrne: [00:52:38] I used to, before I was writing all the time, I did have a backlog of ideas and I slowly worked through the backlog. And for a while, I was at the point where I never knew what I was going to write next. at this point I do sort of have a backlog, but it's more like, So I would have this list of just here are things I want to write about.And then periodically I'd write about one of them off the list. And what naturally happens is you write about the stuff that you can actually get done. And then you don't read about the stuff that's going to take you. So, the list just keeps getting more ambitious on average because it's always like more and more research is required or you've got to somehow find this dataset and do the statistical model, or like, I had a conversation with a commenter who was asking, he was talking about how, There was this big trend towards business articles about, what American can learn from Japan in the seventies and especially eighties.so it looks like Japan is nber one. Like what, what are they doing differently? Why are these companies just, just annihilating the U S auto industry? What can we learn from them? But there haven't been a lot of books like that about China, even though a lot of the, a lot of Chinese companies are competing really effectively.And, in, in cases like conser internet, they, they seem to be well ahead of the U S companies. And, so we were, what, what ended up coming up was the question of in the 1930s and forties, were people writing these like management secrets of Joseph Stalin pieces on like, how can we compete with Russia there?They had, they were this agrarian nation, and now they're making all this steel and mining all this coal. So, I, I Googled around, I actually couldn't find anything good on that, but I realized that you could actually write something interesting about just. What was Soviet economic policy like, because the country did industrialize at that absolutely enormous han cost, but they did industrialize, it didn't hit first world status, but, well, I guess they were second world by that, that taxonomy.But anyway, they, they were a lot richer, afterwards, and then they went through this long stagnation and decline. So I think learning about what. What the Soviets did. And then what was wrong with it is, is something pretty fun. But the sources that I looked into are pretty extensive. So there's going to be a lot of reading.That's gonna be one of the, the very low ROI posts where it's like, I'm going to read three books and write a thousand words in smary, but I'll probably learn a lot in Bali. Find some useful lessons that can apply somewhere else.Nathan: [00:54:59] It'll turn into more than one post over the next period of time. It may not be a series back to back, but over the course of a year or two, you'll pull in trends from that kind of thing. so there's a huge amount of work that goes into all of this, obviously in the end, the, the effort you think there's, do you think it matters for say the economics of your business, right.To be publishing five times a week versus say two.Byrne: [00:55:25] I'm sure it matters. I think there's, there's definitely room to, to adjust the publishing frequency and there's actually room to adjust the schedule. Like when one of the things I pay really close attention to is why people unsubscribe and there's a field that there's a form they can fill out so they can tell me.And they often do. one of the common things people say is there's too much for them to read. And especially that it's too hard to work through the back catalog. If they haven't been reading it for awhile. And I think that is, that is not really about too much content total. It's about email being a really good form factor for sending high value content that someone's gonna read that day.But it's, it's really tough to work through an archive of email newsletters. That's in your inbox, you might have to do some kind of special search, or you might just be scrolling through your inbox. So you're getting this random assortment of here's you know, an invite to a zoom meetup that I didn't go to.Here's an Amazon receipt. here is an essay and then here's another Amazon receipt and another essay. It's just a weird change in context. So. one of the things I've been thinking very hard about is switching some of the things I write to a longer delivery cadence, I'm basically working on a book and then having the giving the subscribers access to that book and probably doing four posts a week instead of five and spending one day a week.Working just on the book. probably a good trade. It's going to be the same level of output, but, I think the final product is going to be something you can actually binge-conse easily. And I think writing, writing for, habitual snackers and writing for bingers is useful because different people have very different approaches to consing information.I do too. Like I, I will have, have times where I'm going back and forth between a lot of different things and reading. Reading little bits of information here and there when I have time and then periods where I'm just going to sit somewhere forfour hourswith a book Nathan: [00:57:18] Right. I think that's really interesting. Kind of what you're getting at is what's the highest leverage, application of your writing. And so if you're, if you're looking to reach new people and this is probably why people like Tyler Cowen have done really well, right? There's a lot of that is going into another book, you know, or Seth Godin, right.We're into the 22nd book or something, right. That he's put out because he's realized it's the same writing that goes into the newsletter or the blog, or, you know, this idea is just flushed out in longer form, but it's higher leverage and that it's going to reach more people. And so, you know, if you keep a hundred percent of your writing for the newsletter, that's going to have one amount of leverage, which is actually pretty significant leverage, which is why we're all here talking about newsletters because they have great leverage and they're amazing.but if you peel some of that off and say, okay, but this is going into. A book that, you know, then you can reach so many more like CNBC is not going to necessarily have you on to talk about the newsletter. But if the book comes out, then they're like happy to have you on, because that is a format of, you know, authors going on TV tours to promote their book is a well-known thing.And so that would get you a level of exposure that the newsletter wouldn't.Byrne: [00:58:28] Yep. Yeah, that's exactly right. That you, you can, you can package content in different sizes, but it's, in some ways there is just a mental difference between what you're doing when you write. An essay versus a tweet versus a book that with an essay, you can have this more unstructured approach where you're, you're watching stories go by and you're just grabbing something that looks good and turning it into, a quick story or a not so quick story.But then with the book you actually want to come up with, you have to find that idea that's actually worth a books or the material. And then there's a lot of research. So, I am working on a book with a friend and, there's. It's like, I'm working on one chapter and stack of books is about this high that we're going to convert into a chapter in a book and it's going to be great.Cause there's going to be a lot that I'm gonna learn. And it's a, it's a fun topic. The chapter has a fun time. So I'm, I'm excited about it, but that, that is a really different process because. And part of what you're doing is, it's like the newsletter process of there are these themes to talk about and you find different iterations on the theme.So they're always reading a story through a bunch of different lenses and trying to see if there's, if there's some broader trend that this story speaks to or contradicts, but wit
Phil’s guest on this episode of the IT Career Energizer podcast is Roberta Matuson. She has helped leaders in Fortune 500 companies, as well as small to medium-sized businesses, achieve dramatic growth and market leadership through the maximization of talent. Roberta is a leading authority on leadership and the skills and strategies required to earn employee commitment and client loyalty. She is also the author of several books including the recently released “Evergreen Talent”. In this episode, Phil and Roberta Matuson discuss the importance of building strong interpersonal and people management skills. They talk about why, instead of waiting until you have acquired every skill asked for in a job advert, you should just apply. Roberta also explains how the IT job market is changing and how job hunters can adapt and benefit from the changes. KEY TAKEAWAYS: (4.16) WORST CAREER MOMENT Losing a great job, mainly because she had failed to build a good relationship with her boss and other members of higher management. As a result, when the firm let people go, there was nobody there to advocate for her so she could keep her job. That experience taught her not to just focus on managing down. She now actively works on and cultivates her relationships with her bosses. (5.36) CAREER HIGHLIGHT Landing her first executive role and starting her consultancy firm have both been career highlights for Roberta. (7.42) TOP CAREER TIP Take courses to help you to improve your interpersonal skills and your ability to communicate with non-technical people. It is also a good idea to acquire the skillset to manage your relationship with your boss. These softer skills will help you in many different ways, during your career. (9.43) THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There are not enough talented people out there. As a result, job applicants are in the driver´s seat. Unfortunately, some employers have still not woken up to that fact. At the same time, the recruitment process is becoming increasingly automated. It is now all about eliminating candidates from the list rather than searching out and nurturing talent. Applicants need to be aware of and adapt to the new reality. (10.50) THE REVEAL What’s the best career advice you received? – Just go for it. Don´t wait until you tick every box. If you meet about 70% of the criteria apply anyway. What’s the worst career advice you received? – Don´t worry that you are underpaid, be happy with what you get. What would you do if you started your career now? – Roberta says she would probably follow the same path. What are your current career objectives? – Roberta is focusing on working exclusively as an executive coach and a trusted advisor. What’s your number one non-technical skill? – Being able to quickly build strong relationships. Business is all about relationships. How do you keep your own career energized? – Roberta stays energized by learning new skills and constantly reinventing herself. What do you do away from technology? – Roberta likes to cook, play tennis, be outside and socialize with friends. (15.40) CAN YOU TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR NEW BOOK AND HOW IT CAME ABOUT? Roberta´s new book shows leaders how to seed, grow and cultivate their workforce. For the majority, hiring enough talented workers is difficult. So, they have to know how to make the most of their own talents and of the ones their employees have. The book provides employees with an insight into the way their managers' minds work. It is also an excellent resource for anyone who wants to take on a management role. (17.59) FINAL CAREER TIP If you see an opportunity, don´t be afraid, just go for it. You won´t get a second chance. BEST MOMENTS (4.00) – Roberta - “You always have to be learning, reinventing yourself and staying current.” (4.41) – Roberta - “Learn to manage your relationship with your boss. If you don´t, when redundancies happen you will get laid-off.” (11.44) – Roberta - “If you´ve got 70% of what´s on the job posting, apply. The worst that can happen is that they say no.” (14.28) – Roberta - “Learn to quickly build strong relationships. After all, business is all about relationships.” (18.00) – Roberta - “When you see an opportunity, don´t be afraid, go for it. You won´t get a second chance.” ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organizations to design, develop and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/philtechcareer LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Facebook: https://facebook.com/philtechcareer Instagram: https://instagram.com/philtechcareer Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast’s website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST – ROBERTA MATUSON Roberta Matuson has helped leaders in Fortune 500 companies, as well as small to medium-sized businesses, achieve dramatic growth and market leadership through the maximization of talent. Roberta is a leading authority on leadership and the skills and strategies required to earn employee commitment and client loyalty. She is also the author of several books including the recently released “Evergreen Talent”. CONTACT THE GUEST – ROBERTA MATUSON Roberta Matuson can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/matuson LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roberta-matuson/ Website: https://matusonconsulting.com/
Join us this week as we pull back the loincloth on this classic tale of swindling and subservience. Learn why our big human brains make us susceptible to delusion, why children always say the darndest things, and how to make sustainable clothes! In the studio this week: psychology researcher Holly Blunden and fabrics enthusiast Stephanie Terwindt.Recorded by Sarah-Jayne Robinson and Tim Newport at CPAS Podcast Studio.Edited and transcribed by Tim Newport.Intro music sampled from "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 Licensehttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/--TranscriptSJ: Many years ago, there was an Emperor so exceedingly fond of new clothes that he spent all his money on being well dressed.[Intro Music]S: Hi , everyone . My name's SJT: And my name is Tee.SJ: And we're Crumbs of science. And this week, if you couldn't tell, we're talking about the Hans Christian Andersen tale the Emperor's New Clothes. This is one that you've probably heard about before in school and it's really quite a simple tale, very easy to tell the morals in this one.T: There's no Disney version of the Emperor's New Clothes, although there is the Emperor's New Groove, which has similar morals?S: You've got an emperor who is not that nice .T: Yeah , quite vain . And he learns to -- I don't know if this one learns anything.S: He does! He's learned something at the end. The tale goes that the Emperor didn't care anything about caring for the kingdom or making sure that he was being a good ruler. The only thing he cared about was making sure that he had a good looking outfit on. They had a lovely saying, which was "The king's in council, the Emperor's in his dressing room.” He lived in a place where everything was good, so it's all right that he was a bit of a sucky ruler because life was going okay for them. One day there came to town two swindlers who said that they were weavers, and that they could weave the most magnificent fabrics imaginable. And there was something very special about these clothes: Not only were their colours and patterns uncommonly fine, but clothes made of this cloth had a wonderful way of becoming invisible to anyone who was unfit for his office or who was unusually stupid.T: “Those will be just the clothes for me,” thought the Emperor. “If I wore them, will be able to discover which men in my empire are unfit for their posts! And I could tell the wise man from the fools! Yes, I must certainly get some of the stuff woven for me right away.” So he forks over a large sum of money to start work immediately.S: And the swindlers, they've got him, hooked him in. They set up their looms, which is what they used to use in olden times to weave and they put nothing on there. They demanded all the exciting materials to make this cloth, so fine silk and gems, gold. But they put all that into their bags and still just set up on this empty loom. Clickity clack going ahead, weaving nothing, which really is a great deception, it seems.T: And so the emperor thought I'd like to know how those weavers are getting on with their cloth, but felt slightly uncomfortable because he remembered that those who were unfit for their position, would not be able to see the fabric. Now it couldn't be that he doubted himself. Yet he thought he'd rather send someone else to see how things were going. The whole town knew about the cloth's particular power now, and they're all impatient to find out how stupid their neighbours were.S: So the first person that the emperor decides to send is his minister because he thinks he's very smart, fit for his job. Minister turns up, can't see anything. But the swindlers, because seems like they were pretty good actors, described the cloth to him, saying it about the excellent pattern and the beautiful colours. However, this poor old minister still couldn't see anything, but he didn't want anyone to know that he was a fool, so he just pretended that he could see it. So he said, it's beautiful, it's enchanting, such a pattern, what colours! I'll be sure to tell the emperor how delighted I am with it.” The minister went back to the emperor and pretended that he saw the fabric, and described to him how amazing and wonderful it truly was.T: The swindlers, of course, merely asked for more money, more silk, more gold threads so they could make more of the clothes. But all of it went straight into their pockets--never a thread went onto the looms, though they worked their “weaving” (in scare quotes) as hard as ever. The emperor then thought I'll send another trustworthy official to see how it's going. That official? The same thing happened as to the minister: He looked and he looked, but as was nothing on the looms, he couldn't see anything. The swindlers went “Isn't it a beautiful piece of goods?” and they displayed and described their imaginary pattern, and this other official thought, “I'm not stupid, so it must be that I’m unworthy. Hmm, I mustn't let anyone know.” So he praised the material he didn't see, he said he was delighted, and to the emperor, he said: “It held me spellbound.”S: So finally the emperor decides that he's got to go see this cloth. So he goes along with a band of people--two of them the ministers who had already gone to see the fabric--and he couldn't see anything. He didn't want anyone to realise that he was unintelligent and unfit to be emperor, so he pretended that he could see it as well and said “Oh, it's very pretty. It has my highest approval.” The whole team he brought with him stared. But not wanting the emperor to think that they were foolish, they continued to compliment the clothes and say how wonderful they were. The emperor even gave the swindlers a cross to wear in their buttonhole and the title of “Sir Weaver.”T: All the Emperor's advisers advised him “You need to wear these amazing clothes in your procession that you were going to do tomorrow.” And so before the procession, the swindlers stayed up all night and burned more than six candles to show just how busy they were finishing the Emperor's New Clothes. They pretended to take the cloth off the loom. There had cuts in the air with huge scissors. And at last, they said, “Now the Emperor's New Clothes are ready for him.” Then the emperor himself came with his noblest nobleman and the swindlers raised up their arms is if they were holding something, saying “here are the trousers, here is the coat, here's the mantle. All of them are as light as a spider web, and one might always think that he had nothing on, but that's what makes them so fine.” “Exactly,” all the noblemen agreed, though they could see nothing, because there was nothing to see.S: So everyone complimented him. He assumed that he was ready, assumed that he looked fantastic, went outside and everyone who was to carry his long train behind him-- Because, of course, that was the height of fashion at the time--they reached down to the floor and pretended to pick it up. And so the emperor went off in his procession under his splendid canopy, and all of his subjects were in the streets and saying to each other, “Oh, how fine are the Emperor's New Clothes? “Don't they fit him to perfection? And see his long train?” Although no one could see anything, no one would admit this because they didn't want to be seen as unfit for their positions or a fool.T: But then the tiny voice of a child was heard through the clamour in the crowd, saying “But he hasn't got anything on.” “He hasn't got anything on?” “A child, says he hasn't got anything on!” “But he hasn't got anything on!” the whole town cried out at last, and the emperor shivered because he suspected they were right. But he thought “this procession has got to go on. So walked more proudly than ever, as all his nobleman held the train that wasn't there at all.S: A very simple tale of morals. I think of honesty, vanity, don't trust swindlers. So this is a Hans Christian Andersen tale, as we said it was first published on the seventh of April in 1837 was part of his third and final instalment of his Andersen's Fairy Tales Told for Children. The original version of this story was published in 1335 in the book “Libro de los ejemplos”, which is book of the examples by Count Lucanor or Juan Manuel, who was the Prince of Villena and this version of the story was “the king and the three impostors”, and it's very similar in terms of the king is presented with a cloth, but the people who can't see the cloth in that version are actually people who are off illegitimate birth so everyone says that they can see it, especially the king, because he doesn't want to think that he's a bastard and therefore would not be fit for his position. And at the time being of illegitimate birth was considered quite a controversy, So everyone pretends that they can see it until finally, it's not actually a child who steps forward, but it is a black person who at the time was considered to not have anything to lose by admitting that they couldn't see anything. And then suddenly the whole the same thing happens: The whole crowd swells, and everyone realises that the king is actually wearing no clothes. And Anderson didn't see this the original Spanish version, but he did see a German translation of it, which I had to Google. Translate this, because I do not speak any German, but the translation was “That's the Way of the World. When Andersen wrote it, he originally gave it a different ending: He originally had that the emperor's subjects just admired the clothes, and everyone in the town pretended to lie and continued on with it, and the manuscript was actually already at the printers when Andersen went up and said that he wanted to change the ending Historians think that there's a couple of reasons why he might have wanted to change it such as when Andersen himself met the King when he was a young child and he met King Frederick the sixth, and Andersen supposedly said afterwards “Oh he's nothing more than a human being.” There's also the idea that Andersen presented himself to the Danish bourgeoisie as a naive and precocious child, and the Emperor's New Clothes was his expose of the hypocrisy and snobbery that he found within the Danish bourgeoisie. There was also a lovely anecdote that said that after he had written this tale, the king then presented him with some gifts of rubies and diamonds. Because in the Emperor's New Clothes and another of Andersen's tales, the Swineherd, he actually voices a satirical disrespect for the court. So the king was trying to pay him off so that he stopped writing tales of political satire and instead wrote lovely storeys like The Ugly Duckling, which is actually one that he made up entirely by himself and didn't come from previous stories.T: What happens in the Emperor's New Clothes is basically an almost textbook case of mass hysteria. In this case, it's mainly motivated by trying to please the royals. Everyone's trying, to, you know, not get fired, which happens in workplaces a lot. But historically, there have been many cases off large groups of people, all behaving in a strange manner all at the same time. We've actually spoken about this on the podcast before we spoke about the dancing plagues of 1518 in StrasbourgS: in relation to , the pied piper of Hamlin .T: The main mechanism through which they work is still largely unknown. What happens is basically people transmit illusions of threats or rumours, and that influences the behaviour and especially in the small, tight-knit communities. This can happen quite fast. There's an example of this recording 1844 medical textbook, speaking about something that happened in sometime in the 1400s, where a nun in a French convent began meowing and all the other nuns also began meowing, eventually, all the other nuns began meowing together at the same time every day, and that this meowing and didn't stop until the police threatened to whip the nuns for disturbing the community. Other examples include one of most famous ones, The Salem Witch trials, which often gets carted out as the dangers of false accusation, dangers of isolationism and the dangers of mass hysteria. This resulted in the execution of 20 citizens accused of practising witchcraft. Going further forward in 1938 we had the Halifax slasher in the town of Halifax in England, two women who claim to be attacked by a mysterious man with a mallet and bright buckles on his shoes. And then further reports of a man wielding a knife and a razor came in, and the situation became so serious that Scotland Yard was called in to assist the Halifax police to catch this Halifax Slasher. But then one of the victims admitted that he'd actually inflicted the damage upon himself just for attention. Soon after that admission, other people came through, and eventually, they determined that none of the attacks has been real. But everyone in the town had been whipped into a furore because of this fear of this attacker.S: So we've been talking about the psychology of mass delusions, which are pretty relevant to the Emporer's New Clothes, and we decided to get on an expert. So we asked our friend Holly, who has an Honours in psychology and then has spent the last five years working in population health research. So thank you so much for coming on our show, Holly.Holly: Thank you for having me, it's lovely to be here.S: So we have a couple of questions for you in relation to the Emperor's New Clothes. Holly, how does mass delusion work?H: Such a cop-out way to start an answer, but that is a really good question. And I think that’s the-- sort of like group psychology and anything to do with this, sort of, thinking of lots of different individual people is something that's really interesting. I think these stories , like the Emperor's New Clothes, remind us of some of the really dark aspects of humanity and what it means to be ah, part of a species that's this intelligent but also this, sort of, social and so dependent on the impacts and the outcomes of these sort of social hierarchies and the way that we interact with one another. It's hard not to see parallels with those real-life examples when you talk about things like you know, the Heaven's Gate cult and things like that, where there are these otherwise sort of educated, functional members of society committed a mass suicide, in order to like ‘graduate’ --quote unquote-- from their human form and transcend their consciousness as an alien spaceship was passing by the Earth .S: So I haven't heard of the Heaven's Gate cult before. How many people was that they were part of that mass suicide?H: Well, it was actually 39 people who all at this one moment in time, it's very much that kind of Jonestown punch sort of approach, where there was this ‘Hale-Bop’ comet, I think it was called, that was like meant to be passing overhead at this specific time. And the members of this cult believed that they needed to sort of transcend their physical forms at the time that this comet was passing over the Earth in order to transcend, I suppose, and become one with this, like, greater existence. And like it's really interesting as well because as we talk about delusions, I think it's important to kind of differentiate between like like mass delusions and mass hysteria. And like, there's something else, that they called like mass psychogenic illness. So there have been these cases where otherwise healthy people have come down with these sort of like physical ailments of different kinds, so whether it's like twitching or fainting or weird physical behaviours, or like different types of pain and things like that, that could just spread through a community with no attributable physical cause. But a delusion is a bit different, it's more an idiosyncratic belief or impression that you maintain, despite contradicting evidence. This is a delusion because --and this is what made me think that we needed to sort of differentiate-- some of the members of this court were actually returning their telescopes, and things like that, because they bought telescopes to see this comet coming and its trajectory, couldn't find it, and so they've then returned their telescopes because they've rationalised this as the telescopes need to be faulty, because the comet is there. So it's the maintenance of that belief despite contradiction, sort of, evidence or reality.T: Are there any factors that lead to the sort of mass delusion? Like any common factors?H: I think this is one of the reasons that these sort of things are so interesting to people because there's a lot of debate about, like, what the possible reasons for this actually are, because obviously whether it's the psychogenic illness or the mass delusion, like, just the logistics of how this actually happens is really complex. Because you can sort of you can understand how one person's thinking can become, like, disordered or deluded, based on their experiences, or like mental illness… Brains are complicated, and if different things go wrong, like, we can see how that can manifest in lots of different ways. What's really hard to explain about these sort of mass delusions is how does how does a whole group of people go down this same idiosyncratic path of thinking? And how do they all sort of not respond to the evidence and things like that? So there's --I don't know if you've heard of it-- something called Folie à deux, which is like ‘dual madness,’ and so it's this idea, and it's often between people who are in, like, romantic partnerships, or like these very close, sort of like one on one relationships, where they will have these sort of shared dual kind of delusions. And there's this really quite an active debate as to whether this is a real concept, whether it's actually possible for two people to be deluded in the same way, or whether there's like one person who's like fully in the delusion and another person who either, like, sort of you wants to believe, or is kind of enabling those beliefs--T: --acquiescing to those beliefs.H: Acquiescing is a very interesting word choice, and I think I think there is a really core question there, which is is a mass delusion something that can exist? Or does it have to be something that's got a bit more to do with that acquiescence and that natural tendency for people to sort of want to fit into a group and have that sort of sense of place and social cohesion?S: We wanted to ask you about the psychology of acquiescence because from the sound of it, a bit more into acquiescing rather than [delusions].H: It's hard to really tease it apart because obviously like, you know, 39 people isn’t everyone in the world sort of thing. So there are limitations to how kind of compelling this sort of acquiescence or delusion can be. So I think, like, you could put forward a solid argument. Humans are really social species, and our societies often tend to gravitate towards hierarchies. In evolutionary psychology, there's an argument that we actually feel social rejection in a similar way that we would feel physical pain. So because of that, we go to great lengths to avoid feeling rejected by social groups. It is important to acknowledge that evolutionary psychology, while it gives us some really compelling kind of ideas, doesn't lend itself to the kind of falsifiable hypotheses that we do really love in a lot of science. So that's difficult one. But we do have a lot of-- there is a lot of research on acquiescence and how humans will respond in these kinds of social situations. And one really famous example is the “Ash Line” studies from the 1950s-- really straightforward, really powerful kind of social psychology experiments. So they put people in this kind of like classroom environment and, you you'd be like one participant in this class full of other people. The experiment was that, other than the one participant in the room, everyone else in the classroom was in on the experiment. And so they'd hold up two lines that were like, really, really obviously very different lengths. And every single other person in the classroom would be like, oh, they're the same. And so what they found --and I'm sure you know where I'm going with this-- is that most people would actually acquiesce and would be like yep, no, they're the same length, even like knowing that it's wrong. Like there's nothing ambiguous about this situation's very much, I think, comparable to that sort of Emperor's New Clothes situation. It's just being directly confronted with, like, just wrongness. And one of the things as well is that people often tend to have a bit of that, kind of, like self-doubt. So we often look to other people in our social group for answers when we're not sure of the situation. So in something like this you might start off pretty sure. But when everyone else is like convinced that these lines of the same length (or so you think) there's a natural kind of tendency to assume that maybe we've got something wrong and to sort of check yourself. And like often people will go with the group answer, especially if there's someone else that they perceive as like an authority or an expert in that group, because they'll second guess themselves. But they'll trust the group, and it sort of again, like, leads back to that whole, sort of, humans are pretty much useless on our own. But we have very good once we're in a society and we're all sort of working together. But that does come with some pretty interesting drawbacks, which I think you know. What's really highlighted by this Emperor's New Clothes story is that sometimes it's so damaging, and the consequences are so high, of violating these norms or disrupting these hierarchies that exist in the societies that we exist in, that it's easier to either just like acquiesce and agree with what's being said, or potentially to convince yourself that you are wrong and they're seeing something that you know you're just missing, because clearly you're an idiot, and everyone else can see that the lines are the same, that the Emperor is wearing fantastic clothes, and you must be the one who's like screwed something up. Unless you want to end up off on your own.S: so there is one person who in our story doesn't really fall into this power of acquiescing. And that is the child, who instead, even though everyone around him is saying that the Emperor's wearing his delightful suit, says no, he doesn't actually have anything on. So we thought that we would ask you about children and how they don't particularly fit into that power of acquiescing...H: Well, right off the bat, I think there's a definite truthiness to that, isn't it? I'm sure we've all been asked a question or heard a child ask a question every now and then, where we'll be like, hoo, you did not think about the effect it would have on that person to ask that question, did you? Well, first of all, it is pretty demonstrable that it takes a little while to become an adult. There's a lot of processes and brain development and things we need to learn, and neural pathways that need to be consolidated as a function of that learning.S: It takes until you're 25 before your brain is fully developed.H: Absolutely right. And so the last part of your brain to develop, because it sort of happens in stages, are your cortical areas, which are the outside bits that do all the human stuff. These are the sort of structures that have evolved later in development, but they also develop later in your life, so it tends to start from the back and move forward. So things like motor function and things like that will be refined a lot more quickly than some of these more complex social processes. So you see, you know, like a 12 year old or something, and physically in a lot of ways, like they could do most of the stuff that adults could do, especially if they practise a specific skill set and things like that. But emotionally, cognitively, there's still a lot more development to happen. So a lot of things obviously happen during puberty, a lot of emotional kind of attachment and regulation and reward systems and things like that. But this processing of, like, the sort of longer term, higher-order, more abstract connections and consequences of your actions is one of the last things to develop. So that's one of the ones that actually comes in right around that 25 mark, so kids don't have that same kind of like a reason to take pause and sort of consider, like, what are all the things that could happen. And, like biologically and experientially, I don't know about you, but I feel like a lot of people have a real crash course in social politics and hierarchies, and the potential unintended consequences of small things that people say when they go through high school. And by the time you come out of that, you sort of, you know, you're not prepared for a lot of situations that you’ll have at work, but you kind of get this mental map of like, these are the potential consequences that these actions can have.S: If someone turns up naked, you can't tell them that they're naked!H: It's not what people do! It's just it's not the done thing.S: Thank you so much for coming on and having a chat to us, Holly, We really appreciate it.H: Thank you for letting me!S: So the tale of the Emperor's New Clothes, It is about mass delusions, but I also think it's a lot about and I suppose the inventiveness of creativity of these tailors. And at the time, making a fabric that was invisible to some people but visible to others wasn't particularly possible, but nowadays we're almost on the verge of making it be able to make something like that happen. So we decided to speak to Stephanie Terwindt about her passion project, which is making clothes.[phone rings]S: Hi, how's it going?Stephanie: Yeah, not bad.S: Steph, I've known you for a number of years now, and you're a bit of talent at making your own costumes.ST: I am , although don't just do costume, so I also do daywear, and arts and crafts--bit of everything, really.S: And as someone who uses a lot of different fabrics, we thought we might talk to you about some of the current innovations in fabrics and how people make fabric. So I’ve just been doing a bit of research and there have been some amazing innovations. We've come very far from the original using flax fibres to dye clothes. Do you have a favourite fabric that you like working with?ST: Well, see this is a hard one. Because I have fabrics that I like to wear and that I like in clothing, but they're actually probably some of the most horrible fabrics to work with as a seamstress. So, for example, I really, really love chiffon as a fabric. It drapes beautifully. It looks glorious when you're making skirts or dresses and it just has a really nice wow factor. But it is so slippery and so hard. to pin together and to keep in place while you're sewing it, that it’s actually the worst and probably my most hated fabric to use in sewing, even though I love it as a garment.S: So usually worth it in the end, but while you're making it, sort of hating the whole thing.ST: Absolute agony.S: At the moment, personally, I'm trying when I'm looking for clothes, looking to buy clothes, I try and go for ones that are made sustainably, because the actual process of making fabrics can be really harmful to the environment. Do you have any knowledge of current sustainable methods of making clothes, and how that might differ from traditional methods?ST: Definitely. So I guess there's a couple of elements here, and if we think to really more traditional clothes in the modern sense, you're thinking of natural fibres like cotton or linen or silk. They aren't always produced in the most sustainable way, particularly a fibre like cotton. It's a highly water-intense crop to grow, and traditional cotton farming actually uses a lot of chemicals and pesticides in its production, so there's that whole element of producing the cotton. But there's also the aspect of how the fabrics are produced, once you have your thread elements, I guess you could say. So that's the more traditional side of things, and then you get into the synthetic world. Then we're into the area of, you know, single-use plastics almost, and your clothing can almost be regarded that way because as much as you use clothing over, you know, the period of a couple months or a couple of years, depending on your taste and your preferences, once a garment is used, it's very hard to recover those plastic fibres that have gone into making the polyester or lycra that is making up your garment. So there's a big issue around re-using the plastic fibres as well, what we are starting to see. There is a lot of businesses that are looking to alternative natural fibres, though. There's a fibre called TENCEL which was actually developed in Australia, which is made from eucalyptus tree pulp, I believe. And they used that to make the threads which they will then weave into the fabric. And it's a much more sustainable crop then something like cotton, while still being a natural fibre.S: What you're also saying is companies trying to reduce waste the way they make the garments.ST: Traditionally, when you are making garments, you have a large piece of fabric. You cut pattern pieces out of it, and you connect all the pattern pieces together to make your shirt or your dress or your pants. What some companies are doing is weaving fabric or knitting fabric specifically to the pattern pieces so that they don't have to cut the pattern out, and they also won't have any excess fabric as waste. So they're really able to cut to make all of their garments and also reduced the waste in the manufacturing process.S: So I know that people are also making fabrics from a lot of really, really you'd almost say bizarre things nowadays. So one of my favourite brands, Allbirds, which makes shoes from merino wool first. But then they've also started making shoes from tree fibres, and most recently, I think, from sugar plants, they started making flip flops, I think. There's also some companies that will make clothes out of plastic bottles.ST: Funnily enough, a friend of mine has started her own swimwear label, and all of the bikinis in her swimwear range are made of Lycra that is produced from recycled plastic like plastic bottles or fishing line stuff like that. And it's actually becoming increasingly common in particularly swimwear, I think is that connection to the ocean, and people are talking a lot about, you know, cleaning the oceans and removing the plastic from our oceans, and so they’re moved to take that plastic, repurpose it into fabric and then make swimwear out of it, which is fantastic.S: I realise that we can't predict what's gonna happen in the future. But if you were to try and predict what will happen in terms of fabrics, where could you see it going?ST: Ooh, this is a hard one! Because I think there's a lot of work that already underway or that people are already starting to test that I think in the very near future we’ll see and it will be a reality. So I think we're going to continue saying this push towards recycling fabrics I know that H&M has actually been testing recycling garment fabric, pulling apart old garments, re-using the threads from that and creating new fabric from scratch. So I think we're going to see more of that. We're going to see more reusing other natural fibre sources or plastic or whatever to create your fabrics. I think we're also going to start testing or playing with other ways of making fabrics there, not just weaving in a traditional sense, but 3D-printing or a mix of 3D-printing and weaving, and we are also starting to see that happen.S: Thanks so much for chatting to us about that, So the history of clothing is a very, very long one, and people have said that people have been wearing clothes for between 500,000 to 100,000 years ago, and of course, it's evolved a fair bit since then. About 30,000 years ago, people made needles, when people used to make fabrics, and this is how they would have done at the time of the Emperor's New Clothes. You would harvest and clean your fibre and wool, then you'd cart it and spin it into threads, weave the threads into the cloth and then finally fashion and sew the cloth into different clothes. And this sort of technology, people have said that you can find it from about 30,000 years ago, but it's pretty hard to find a lot of history about fabrics because , of course they rot. People have mainly guessed this based on the tools that they found and imprints that they found about things. Nowadays, there's actually-- I went down such a rabbit hole when I was looking at this, and Tee has seen the amount of pages of notes that I have. I found a whole bunch of odd things that I'd never would have suspected that you could use to make fabrics such as orange fibre, which is this company in Italy who's trying to find a way to use the 700,000 tonnes of orange peel discarded yearly in order to create juice. And they make a material similar to viscose blended with silk and cotton and, if you know anything about brand name Salvatore Ferragamo, who makes beautiful, amazing high-end clothes, actually used this fabric to create a capsule collection. There are also companies making bioplastics from potato waste, which is this company Chip[s] Board, which makes a fabric Parblex, and they are working with the potato company McCain's in order to use their potato waste from their wedges and, so on, all their other potato products. And the company has a zero-waste production system because even the offcuts of their material production is incorporated back into the system. There are legitimately so many weird ones out there. I found ones using grape marc to make leathers to make vegan leathers. There are lots and lots of different types of ones, you can make them from pineapple skin. There are hemp fibres --now have turned out to be a very fantastic material because they're antibacterial, durable, resilient. However, there are a few problems with using hemp fibres because the growth is often limited, as people are a little bit worried about that whole connection to cannabis. There are clothes made out of coffee ground fibres, so just think the next time you have your coffee that the grounds could also actually be used by a Taiwanese company to turn into a different type of yarn. And that company, Singtex, is working with Starbucks to take the coffee grounds and use them to make fabrics. Banana fibres, lotus fibres is a super high tech one, and also supposedly makes really high-end ones. And then there's even just new companies that are making different types of fabric, like Stone Island, which is working with reflective glass microbeads and temperature-sensitive outerwear.S: So we've come a pretty long way since the Emperor's time, and though we might not have invisible fabric just yet, there are some really cool options,S: Alright, so hopefully you've learned a little bit about the Emperor's New Clothes. How to avoid being caught up in a mass delusion. And also if anyone tells you that the fabric you're wearing looks fantastic, but you can't see it, do not trust them because it is most likely that they are lying.T: This is actually the final episode of Crumbs of Science. We hope you've much fun listening to this is we have had recording it, and we just like to thank the ANU Centre for the Public awareness of Science for the use of the recording facilities, we’d like to thank Will Grant for getting us set up in the space.S: To all our guests that came along and gave interviews and answered such bizarre questions.T: We hope we didn't get anyone fired. Yeah, that's it from Crumbs of science.S: If you have any questions in the future, please feel free to email us at crumbsofscience@gmail.com.T: Until next time we hope you have--T&S: a happily ever after.[Outro music]
Phil’s guest on this episode of the IT Career Energizer podcast is James Ward. He is a software developer who shares what he learns with others through presentations, blogs, demos and code. He is a self-proclaimed Typed Pure Functional Programming zealot but often compromises on his ideals to just get things done. And as well as being the co-author of “First Steps in Flex” and the creator of the first Java hosting service back in 1997, he helped to launch the Reactive Manifesto. In this episode, Phil and James Ward talk, at length, about the best ways to get involved in the IT community, help others and grow your reputation within the industry. They also discuss how to be effective at influencing decision-makers. James also talks about how to go back to basics when explaining things to beginners. A skill you need when building a team. KEY TAKEAWAYS: (4.26) TOP CAREER TIP Find a community you want to be a part of and work to improve it. Everyone benefits when you do that, including you. In time, you become well known and people start to recognise your efforts and what you have to offer. You can contribute in all kinds of ways. Write blog posts, put together documentation, provide code samples and more besides. Use forum and social media to uncover what people are struggling with, and then provide something to help them to meet those challenges. (7.10) WORST CAREER MOMENT James worked at Adobe, in particular on Flex. When HTML, CSS and the web started growing, he realised that it would have a significant impact on how relevant Adobe Flex was. At that stage, James wanted to develop Flex in a way that enabled people to port their applications easily to the web. Unfortunately, he was unable to convince the management of the need to do this. It led to him leaving a job he loved because he knew the tech he was working on was going downhill. The experience taught James that he needed to work on his influencing skills. (11.34) CAREER HIGHLIGHT James’ career highlight was TypeSafe the company behind Scala. He enjoyed being able to simplify things to the point where people could actually get started with using the tech. First, they created activator which made everything easier to install and provided templates. Later, they provided hundreds of pieces of sample code, which made things even easier. (15.46) THE FUTURE OF CAREERS IN I.T There is so much happening right now. It is almost overwhelming. But, this is a good thing because it means that the possibilities are endless. James has a lot of fun learning the new technologies and playing around with the latest tech gadgets. He shares details of his rocket related project with the audience. (17.29) THE REVEAL What first attracted you to a career in I.T.? – James describes himself as being a nerd, even as a young kid, so for him taking up a career in I.T was a natural step. What’s the best career advice you received? – You need to work on your dependability. In the podcast, James explains how he overcame his own flakiness. What’s the worst career advice you received? – James has been lucky with his advisors, so did not have a worst piece of career advice to share. What would you do if you started your career now? – Get involved in machine learning, AI and data dynamics. What are your current career objectives? – James really wants to improve developer journeys and experiences. Right now, he is focused on using Java Spring in Google Cloud to do this. What’s your number one non-technical skill? – His desire to learn. At this stage he talks about a couple of his side projects he is involved in, including WebJars. What do you do away from technology? – James loves spending time in the mountains in Colorado. He is a keen hiker, biker and skier. (25.21) FINAL CAREER TIP Share what you know. Everyone has something unique to share with their community, so make sure you do. You never know how many people you can end up helping by doing so. BEST MOMENTS (4.29) –James - “Find a community you like and participate. Working to make that community better will get you known.” (11.20) –James - “Take people on a journey when trying to influence them. Build your arguments slowly over time.” (18.22) –James - “Be dependable. When you say you will deliver something, make sure that you actually do.” (19.33) –James - “Learn not to over commit. If you are a people pleaser, learn to say no a little more.” (25.22) –James - “Share what you know with your community. Everyone has something unique to share.” ABOUT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil Burgess is an independent IT consultant who has spent the last 20 years helping organisations to design, develop and implement software solutions. Phil has always had an interest in helping others to develop and advance their careers. And in 2017 Phil started the I.T. Career Energizer podcast to try to help as many people as possible to learn from the career advice and experiences of those that have been, and still are, on that same career journey. CONTACT THE HOST – PHIL BURGESS Phil can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/philtechcareer LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/philburgess Facebook: https://facebook.com/philtechcareer Instagram: https://instagram.com/philtechcareer Website: https://itcareerenergizer.com/contact Phil is also reachable by email at phil@itcareerenergizer.com and via the podcast’s website, https://itcareerenergizer.com Join the I.T. Career Energizer Community on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/ITCareerEnergizer ABOUT THE GUEST –James Ward James Ward is a software developer who shares what he learns with others through presentations, blogs, demos and code. He is a self-proclaimed Typed Pure Functional Programming zealot but often compromises on his ideals to just get things done. And as well as being the co-author of “First Steps in Flex” and the creator of the first Java hosting service back in 1997, he helped to launch the Reactive Manifesto CONTACT THE GUEST –James Ward James Ward can be contacted through the following Social Media platforms: Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/_JamesWard LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesward/ Website: https://www.jamesward.com/
Welcome to Sesh Cast, a cannabis podcast for cannabis sessions. Today we talk with Tweedledoob! This is the first interview to air on Sesh Cast and with firsts comes some unforeseen issues. This time it's some low quality audio. Because of that, I'm putting a full transcript of the interview in the notes here! Without further ado: here's the thing! GLDLX: Alright guys so welcome back to Sesh Cast. My name is GLDLX and today I am sitting down with someone you may just know from Instagram, you may just know from the cannabis related internet, Tweedledoob how are you? Tweedledoob: I'm awesome thanks for having me on. G: Yeah of course thanks for taking some time to sit down with me I really appreciate it! T: Yeah no problem. G: So for anyone who may not have heard of you before or may not really know who you are, can you give me a brief run down on what you're about and how you gained traction in the cannabis community? T: For sure. So mostly I do cannabis photography and social media promotion kind of stuff. I've had my Instagram going for just over three years now; I started it while I was working at a cannabis lounge during university. So in Toronto there are these amazing places you can go, you just bring your own weed, pay five bucks and just hang out basically. So I kind of like supervised stoners for like four and a half years and that kind of really got me in to the industry. [I made] a lot of connections and kind of figured out that I don't know exactly what I want to do, but the cannabis space is definitely the place for me. So it kind of gave me some direction and then my Instagram I just kind of started for fun. I never expected that it would turn in to my full time gig but yeah I mean pretty crazy. G: So you said a couple words that, I'm based out of America and I think a lot of people also based out of America may have no earthly idea what you just said. So a cannabis lounge! That's something cool that we definitely don't have a lot of here. Can you explain a little bit more about what it was like to babysit stoners for four years? T: For sure it was amazing. It's a really fascinating place I think people have this idea of who stoners are but when you open up a space like that you see that it really, it's really hard to define. So like everyone from 18 to 80, if you don't have a place to consume cannabis at home, or people don't know that you consume cannabis or whatever the case may be, it's kind of just a safe space where you can go and use your cannabis. So in Toronto here currently its actually not fully legal or regulated but there have been lounges in the city for about 20 years now. So it's when you walk in they all kind of have their own vibe but its essentially like a cafe or a bar type of feeling, but there's no alcohol, no tobacco just cannabis. G: Man that's super cool. So how many of these would you say there are in Toronto like how popular is that? T: Right now I think there are five in the city. There have been other ones over the years that have kind of come and gone, but there's, yeah I think there's five right now. G: Cool very cool. It looks like you've got a joint rolled up. I have one too so I'm going to take a second to spark up so yeah we'll put it on pause for a second cheers! So you were smoking on something I'd never heard of, what was that? T: It's called honey rock. I've never heard of it either to be honest, this is my first puff we're just testing it out. What are you smoking? G: I have I think the very end of my gdp. I just picked up yesterday and I got gorilla glue #4 and jack herer so this is the end of my very last buy from almost a month ago when I stalked up for 420. So the other thing that you said that I think is very foreign to anybody here in America is just the use of the word university. So for anybody who doesn't know that's going to college because that's not a phrase that we use here in a America, but one thing that I think is really interesting is that in your Instagram bio you have your majors from your college experience which means it must've been somewhat important to you and is still somewhat important to you. So can you talk to me a little about that? T: For sure interesting question, so yeah it is kind of an easy way to just tell a little bit about myself in the bio. I feel like people coming to your page don't really, we make judgments so quickly, right, on Instagram it's like you go to someone's new page five seconds later you're like 'nope not for me' right, so I thought kind of putting that in my bio kind of tells a little bit more about me than my first few pictures or whatever you might see and if people are interested in philosophy or Buddhist philosophy they might take another second to stick around. I also think it's something that's kind of different. There's really not that many people studying philosophy or Buddhist philosophy these days so yeah just a point of differentiation I guess. G: Yeah and I think philosophy is really interesting because the more that you end up as a stoner the more in to open thought and philosophizing you become. So how has your interest in philosophy and specifically Buddhist philosophy carried over into your experiences in the cannabis community or how has your cannabis experience meshed with the way you've studied or experienced philosophy or Buddhist philosophy? T: So to the first part of that question, while I was going to university I was spending a lot of time studying in vapor lounges and places where people just naturally end up having philosophical conversations. Even though they may not have the formal academic language to talk about it I think these things, people get high and think about big ideas very often so I think just spending time in those places around people who are open to having interesting conversations or talking about things they don't understand really helped me develop my thought process and the ability to take an academic idea and be able to talk about it with people who don't have that same kind of formal education. Not to say that they don't have valid opinions or ideas it's just, yeah, philosophy and Buddhist philosophy, these ideas aren't things that we really talk about all the time in our daily lives but I think some people are quite interested in it so it's an interesting cross over I think. G: Yeah did you ever meet anybody in a lounge that really hit you in a way that you'd never thought about something or sort of turned something around on you that made you think you were possibly sitting down with another modern day stoned philosopher ? T: You know the first thing that came to mind, the first person that popped in to my head, I had a few people come in when I was working at the lounge who had been having conversations, philosophical type conversations with friends and were kind of at a lost point and didn't know like you can really think yourself in to a corner sometimes in philosophy which is why I think people tend to avoid it or avoid big ideas that they don't understand. If there's no clear answer sometimes its better just not to think about it right? So I've gotten in to some very interesting discussions where people are coming at from a very personal way and are just trying to work through like [other] concepts and its definitely changed my perspective on some things where you can have kind of what, you know, what you read in a book, but when somebody challenges you with their own ideas you have to really be able to like work through a concept and not just go by what the book says. I don't know if that makes sense. G: Yeah that makes total sense T: Personal philosophical conversations with people at lounges, which I think is like one of my favorite things. G: That's awesome. Is that something that still happens now even though you don't work at a lounge? T: Maybe not so much, but I get some interesting dms I'll tell you. G: Really? T: I mean of all sorts. Not to many philosophical conversations, not regularly, but people definitely, I don't know what it is but people message me about their personal problems or their big questions they have in their lives that they're feeling lost or whatever. I don't know what it is, but I guess people feel like they can relate to me or that I may have some kind of, some kind of perspective on whatever issue they're having. So I do get in to intense conversations with strangers in my dms now. G: Interesting that's super cool and I think that that kind of bleeds back into the way you have become a cannabis influencer on Instagram. Actually I was reading your blog a little bit earlier, if anyone is interested in following up a little bit more with Tweedledoob you can find a lot more stuff at Tweedledoob.com off Instagram, and I was reading your blog a little bit earlier and one of the things I saw that you talked about was going from just being in the cannabis space and being a cannabis photographer, to actually starting your Instagram to actually putting yourself on your Instagram as a person as opposed to just your photography and your content from the cannabis space. So how has the transition been, for anyone who is listening who is interested in being a digital influencer of some sort or wants to know a little bit more about what it's like to be a digital influencer or a digital content creator. How have you sort of swung your life and what sort of changes have you come in to and experiences have you come into by becoming a digital influencer with a face and a persona online as opposed to just a handle and some photos? T: Yeah great question. It's been about two years since I started putting more of myself online and it was a big deal kind of for me. For the first year I had Instagram I felt super weird about it. I felt like I'm not Tweedledoob, like Tweedledoob is like my Instagram account and just my photos and I was really hesitant to put more of myself out there for a variety of reasons. And really the content creation and like influencer thing didn't really come until I was starting to put myself out there more and I think part of the reason why is because like even just kind of straight up looking as peoples accounts as accounts you don't think of them as real people a lot of the time. If you don't know what [someone looks like]you have a certain appreciation for it but you think of it like an account right? But that's like somebody that just like wakes up and eats and sleeps and does [everyday] things right? So I think my kind of traction started to come when I started to put my, let my life on there. And so part of that was because I was working at the lounge at the time so I had an [interesting new] day to day experience even though it was my kind of like 9-5. I was just like going to work and smoking weed and I think that kind of fascinated a certain group of people, but I think what the main thing that's kind of given me the most amount of traction and it came from putting more of myself out there is the connections with other people other people in the cannabis space other photographers you know you can learn more skills you can really connect with people human to human when you're actually putting yourself in the line, putting more of your personality. And I think a huge part of that was video as well. Videos I think really changed the way you can interact with other people online yeah I don't know let me think about that. G: Yeah I think that's really interesting. You become in such an interesting situation when you start to put yourself on line as opposed to just your content to a point where you become your own content and I think that once you hit that point of becoming your own content it's a really interesting ship to navigate, or excuse me a really interesting sea to navigate. Of how much of myself do I put online, what sort of online persona do I have, who have I become to people that they want me to keep up with? T: That part I'm not so in to. That for me, the stuff that I put out I have to feel totally comfortable putting video out or putting content out that I know this wide variety of people will see like all of my family and my boyfriend's family will see it including like grandparents right all the way down to like friends and strangers and like fifty percent of my audience is outside of north America like people that don't even speak the same language as me. So I think if I tried to cater [to] these certain groups I think it would get really confusing and overwhelming and so I have to just like be myself enough and feel comfortable and confident to just like a hundred percent be me to all these groups of people. I'm ok with them seeing it because it's me it's not like I'm trying to be this one thing for somebody or trying to like get likes from this one certain group. I just kind of have to be me and that's the only way I can be comfortable doing videos or putting myself out there. G: And that's such a cool way to look at things and I think almost an old school way of being a content creator. I know that were of the age where the birth of YouTube is something I remember very well I don't know how interested in YouTube or anything you are. But I remember when YouTube went from just a place that there were videos on the internet to something you could make as a career T: Totally G: and back at the very beginning it seemed like people were just putting things out that they wanted to put out. And today it seems so analytically based and so fit in to the algorithm and that's true with Instagram as well. Like how can I do everything I can to make sure the most people see what I want [them to] see and it almost warps your content in to something you don't really want to create. So I think it's really interesting and super commendable to hear someone say 'I want to put out stuff that I'm super comfortable with and something that isn't catered to get clicks from a certain group of people' so that's really cool and I really appreciate that! T: Thanks man yeah same. Great question too it really got me thinking too. It's taken a lot to come to that really, like I wouldn't have been able to give you that answer a year ago. Or it's, this whole thing is just so quickly evolving. Even just Instagram, like the algorithm change earlier this year has totally changed the way that I'm using Instagram and the features and how I'm using them it's just this constantly evolving thing. So yeah it kind of makes it interesting or sort of challenging to navigate but yeah that said I think in one way I almost have to go back on something I said, I was thinking while you were talking, I can't say that I a hundred percent don't think of what people want to see or don't think of. I do have this like, there's kind of a separation between the things that I post about my life and about myself and like I am still creating content for myself and for other people and in creating content it like, you're right, do you know Gary Vee? G: The name is very familiar, but could you tell me who it is? T: Yeah he's kind of hard to describe. He's like a business mogul. Like he's kind of like really gotten popular in the last three years through his social media stuff and he's really, he gives a lot of business advice. He's kind of like motivational speakerish, he's got a podcast, he's kind of everywhere right now. But one of the things he was talking about over the last year kind of social media wise is the difference between creating and documenting. So a lot of people are like just on the content creation side of things and it's like you can have a very curated account and its very like almost clinical like for a business or whatever. Like you see some people like that too where they only have like super ultra posed photos of themselves and you don't really know who that person is ya know? It's just this image they've kind of created of themselves and the other side of that what Gary Vee has talked a lot about and sort of the upside of doing this is just straight documenting. Like people do want to see kind of behind the scenes and get to know who you really are I don't know why really but humans, we're so fascinated with each other and other peoples stories and that's almost the easier content to create, just like documenting your life. But like I'm trying to kind of have a balance between the two. I don't want to exclusively do one or the other so in content creation I kind of do, this is why I started talking about this, I kind of do try to cater to like what the stoners like or like what's the popular thing and what's the aesthetic that might get more traction. So in that kind of sense I am, like I do think more about that. But then on the documenting side I try to be like as authentic as possible and not really thinking about what people want to see if that makes sense? G: Yeah absolutely and that's again really interesting I think because it's almost the difference between putting out super curated, curated might be the wrong word, but super targeted and insincere content, versus putting out quality, yes this is targeted to what will perform well but I'm not putting it out there because it is what will perform well, I'm putting it out because it's the best performing version of what I want to post if I'm understanding you correctly. T: Yes that's exactly it G: So how much, I guess for people who aren't familiar with you and your career and your photography, how much of your full time career or part time career exists on Instagram and digitally? T: A very large part of it and increasingly so. I stopped working at vape on the lake last July, at the vapor lounge, the cannabis lounge. So it's been almost a year since I've been doing full time free lance. At the beginning of that it was, I was doing a lot more photography than the social media stuff. So I do photography for some of the local cannabis brands, so I do product photography and also event photography, and over the last year I've really kind of shifted towards documenting and doing more Instagram and I started my website and my retail stuff. I [have] kind of been focusing on building out a brand and not just being focused on being photographer. It's an important skill and it's a part of what I do and I think it always will be, but like I kind of realized there's like more, I think there's more of an opportunity for me to do more than market myself as just a photographer. But it's my full time it's my life. G: Yeah absolutely. Let's talk then a little bit about the photography side. Because I see cannabis photography on the internet and that's about the extent that I know of it is like 'wow that's weed and that weed looks super pretty.' So tell me a little bit about what that space is like and how it is being a cannabis photographer in a world that is very quickly turning its eyes more and more on to cannabis? T: Yeah for sure it's definitely a really interesting time and even the fact that a cannabis photographer is like a thing is really cool. For myself, I've really just been getting more serious about photography for about three years, so there's a lot of people in the industry who have a long standing career in photography and are just getting in to cannabis now, where as I feel like I still have a lot to learn photography wise but I have the cannabis thing down. I mean Instagram and social media are such a [huge open space] and so in one way you don't really have to be a professional photographer or professional cannabis photographer to get your cannabis photography online. If you have weed and have a camera you can kind of just get out there. So it's kind of an equal playing field in one sense where it's pretty open but it's really interesting because the internet is, there's people from everywhere consuming my content but the rules are different everywhere so what is legal for me not be legal for other people. Yeah I think that there's still a lot of [changes] to be had for the cannabis industry. Right now Canada is coming in to a legal recreational market across the country [relatively soon] so there will be some like, ya know, really official, legal, on-the-book cannabis photography for the first time like ever which is pretty cool. G: Yeah so I think its super interesting to hear you bring up the 'what might be legal for you might not be legal for everyone or somewhere else.' Something that we've talked about a lot on this podcast and that's really influenced not only me and my experience as a content creator, but for a lot of my friends and my followers as well, is the way that YouTube has removed a lot of cannabis related accounts in the last couple months. I don't know how much of that you're aware of? T: Yeah I mean almost every day on Instagram for a while I was seeing people saying like huge accounts are getting taken down. Like Coral Reefer she's been on YouTube for like nine years and all of her content just got taken down. It's pretty crazy. G: So what is it like working under that stress of 'what I'm doing is completely legal but somewhere else it might not be legal' and what has it been like working not only under that stress and that restraint, but seeing some of this other cannabis content face those repercussions and be removed. How has that experience been particularly for you? T: I guess this has to be prefaced with like, that I am a legal patient and it kind of gives me the confidence to just kind of do my own thing. So personally I don't feel like, I don't have that fear, the legitimate real life fear that a lot of people have as far as like posting content or whatever, whether its legal or illegal. But I mean yeah I think as far as we've come we have a long way to go right? I feel like federal changes in the US might be the one thing which actually makes YouTube or Instagram really; but I think YouTube has just recently come out and said that they're not, sorry it was Instagram, Instagram's community guidelines used to say that the promotion and sales of drugs were like, that was just something you couldn't do, but now apparently its more just to do with sales, the direct promotions of sales, but just like promotion of cannabis apparently they're not going to be like, if you're a medical patient just doing your thing and you're not actually promoting drug sales you couldn't lose your, [they won't] delete your account. I don't know why YouTube, I'm curious to know what YouTube's thing is, to see why they're just starting to [be] so hard on all of these cannabis accounts. Even like legal accounts that are just like educational got taken down. I think we just have more fighting to do right? Like cannabis is becoming more mainstream and there are so many changes happening all the time that it kind of feels like we're making progress but I don't think for lots of [folks] from the other side, when there's other people who are like[staunchly] against it, those people are going to have something to say and try to like make sure potheads don't take over. There are people who have vested interest in not having cannabis be legal and we still have some fighting to do for sure. G: Yeah that's really interesting and also super good to hear, that there's still a real confidence in being able to promote what is legal where you are, because I think one of the biggest things that the cannabis industry as a whole, and not even just the industry but people who smoke regularly need as a whole, are people to advocate for the normalcy of cannabis. And for people to really put out and prove that there's nothing about smoking weed that makes you lazy or a distress to society or anything like that. There are careers, there's an industry, there are functioning people and very motivated and driven people in the community, and without the confidence to post content that you've created that you feel good about and that is legal, without that confidence it's a real detriment to I think the community. So that's really positive and uplifting to hear as well. T: There are so many driven and motivated and very productive members of society that support cannabis to varying degrees, so I think over the next five years or so like that kind of image of cannabis user is going to become more prevalent. Because there are still so many people with an old school mentality that aren't really willing to see or change their perspectives, but it's happening. In Canada we're definitely seeing it with legalization coming this year. There's stories about cannabis in the news like on the main news channels, literally almost every day so it's coming. It's coming. G: To sort of wrap here, if people are interested in finding you, or learning more about you, or following more of your content and your life, where are the best places for them to go to find you? T: My main thing is for sure Instagram, you can find me @Tweedledoob. I also have a website tweedledoob.com. So I have like, I'll go to an event and take hundreds of pictures and then I might post one or two on Instagram, so I felt like I needed a place to post more of my photos. I have a bunch of albums on my website of different events and different places I've been, and I've also got my shop so, I don't know if you've seen my jolly joint image it's like a happy little joint. Have you seen that? G: Yeah, its great I love it! T: Yeah I've got all the merch on there and I'm going to be adding a bunch of new things in my shop really soon which I'm really excited about. Some stuff, some new art that's not Tweedledoob branded but my friend Champ Stiles is going to be making some cool, like he's a wood burner and he like does wood carving and wood burning things, so I'm going to have some weedy stuff of his on my site soon. And yeah I would say those are, through my website you can also email me Tweedledoob@gmail.com but there is a form on my site if anybody wants to reach out I'm always happy to chat.
节目名称：Screen Age 节目主题：West WorldD: Hello, everyone, I'm Didi, welcome to the Screen Age from May 11th, 2018Sh: On today's show we are gonna talk about West World. This is Sarah, your old friend. And Cynthia, Lucifer and Sara in Today's program(C: hello, L: hello, S: hello~) , and our new family members, Timothy and Vivian.( T: Hi, what's going on? V: hey, guys, new to the Screen Age. What's up?)D: So it's actually been a while since we have talked about TV series in our program. Do you remember when was it? Sh: To be honest, We haven't discussed any kind of TV drama since we joined the Screen Age.D: Umm, well, that doesn't matter! What's kick off today's show---West World is an American Sci-Fi TV drama, so our broadcast is full of splendid today. XX, have you ever thought about in the future world, all the people here are human-like robots, and you can do anything you like without punishment?Sh: Wow, that's what I always dream of. I would be a king. D: Haha, That's what this TV series is about. You must feel excited. Now, let's start!T: Hey, do you know "The West World" has been in its second season?D: I don't know, I haven't seen the show's first season yet. But I've heard of it. How is it?T: Dude, you haven't seen it yet? It's fabulous! You should go to see it!D: Okay, I would like to know what the show is about?T: It's a science fiction show which told a story about humans and robots. People built a park full of robots, and the robots here were designed to satisfy humans' desires such as the desire to kill.D: Wow! Sounds great! I'm kind of interested. So the robots don't know they are robots, right? T: Right, they treated people like tourists and friends.D: What's next? Did the robots resist?T: Yes, they did. The robots were wake up, and started to realize what humans done to them.D: I must say, it's very attractive to me. I like science fiction movies and teleplays a lot, especially those about robots. I can't wait to see it!T: There were three turning points in the first season which made the show a masterpiece.D: Awesome! What about season two?T: See it by yourself !V:Well,you know many people are crazy fans of the Westworld including me.So we are all looking forward to the second seasonS:Me too.I will follow it as soon as it updates. And have you ever predicted the plot of the it after watching the first season?V:Of course.When I saw the first season,I really felt pitiful about the fate of the robots,that human care nothing about the life of them and their life even the way of death are designed by others .So I guess that more and more robots will know the truth about the west world , they will control their own fate and begin to revolt in the second season.S:Wow,sounds cool.Actually if the robots have their own thoughts,they are no difference from human,they have life,have love and hate and also the long for fair.V:I agree with you.And I think one of reasons why the west world is so popular is it can arouse people's thinking about the human nature.S:You mean most of the human become demons, and without the bondage of the human world, they release their desires and enjoy the feeling of killing them.V:Yes,it is really terrifiedS: "Western world" based on a science fiction writer Michael's movie, HBO version of the "western world"use the concept of theme park in the novel, the plot is by Jonathan Nolan and his wife , joey.V: "Western world" is a big capital of HBO series, only ten plays'production costs up to $100 million (672 million yuan), and the first play's production is $25 million (168 million yuan) with propaganda cost more than 40 million.S: It's certainly not disappointing, with 12 million views on all platforms, and it is the most watched TV series of first season in 2016.V: The first play of "westworld" won the story with a new, thoughtful and in-depth review.S: "Westworld", the new series of HBO in 2016 has the potential to become a national concern. L: You know the Westworld is produced by HBO, Home Box Office. That's a big company with a history of more than forty years. It not only distributes TV series, but also movies, boxing and shows for kids. T: yep , of a wide range. But the series part is the most striking. Despite Westworld, there is still a lot of good works, like Sex and the City, Boardwalk Empire, and, of course Game of Thrones. L: you got me. Game of Thrones is my favorite show. From 2011 to now, it has already broadcast seven seasons, still remained a heated topic. T: The new season will be released in 2019, and it is said that some important roles will die. Just hope you're prepared. L: that's awful. But an attribute of American series is that they are not afraid to say anything. They go deep into humanity, deep into society ，raise tv series to an artistic height. T: It is worth noting that, there are no advertisements in HBO, which maybe means lower income. But it gives a more liberal creation environment to the directors and that always helps to become a high quality series. C: Do you know the director of West World?L: I just know him a little, but not very much. Would you like to tell something about him?C: Of course.Jonathan Nolan is a well-known name. He is the brother of famous director Christopher Nolan. As an editor and brother, he co-authored classic movies such as memory fragments, deadly Magic and Batman: the Dark Knight. He has always been a good writer of science fiction.L: Based on your introduction, I believe he is a really good director. Then, how about his action in Western World?C: Western World is an exciting work. Under the guidance of Nolan, who is good at telling stories, the series is logical and organized. Many flashes of detail need to be savoured. Like a fly that appears more than once in the play.L: The director made a great difference on it. It's highly expected that he will creat more exciting works.D: How cool this TV play is! It seems that human have been not content with online game but started to create the high-tech adult park. Meanwhile, the experience will be more exciting and more real.Sh: Yes. And, in this TV series, the robots also become different from the imagination in our traditional minds.D: In a word, it is so amazing! Although I haven't seen it, I seem to be the fan of it.Sh: Right. It deserves to recommend to our audiences.D: Sure. We can see it together and have a further discussion.Sh: OK. Now, It's time to say goodbye to our dear audiences. See you next week.D: See you. 感谢制作刘栢霖!
The weather may be a tease, but this week’s episode is sure to deliver! It’s Wednesday, which means it’s A NEW EPISODE OF RELATIONSH!T. Join the Critelli’s as they gear up for a tremendous amount of (upcoming) travel and celebrate a 75 year old marriage and a college graduation! (Get to the) GOOD SH!T: The couple that works together ... WERKS together! This week’s #GayRelstionshipGoals is the small screen duo: @kitwilliamson and @johnhalbach. Aside from working together on their Netflix series, Eastsiders, this couple models for @mrturk and shows genuine love for one another in a way that has our heart smiling. If you have a moment, go follow the guys on IG and tell them the Critelli’s sent you! (We just) TALKING SH!T: There is a huge difference between hearing what what your partner is saying and listening to what they mean. This week, the fellas break down this concept and the fundamental difference between the two ideas. Do you agree with their definition? Chat with us on Twitter (@podrelationshit) and let us know what you think. Later in the episode, Marko and Tony are joined by @shawn_gooden (@shawngooden_) and @styl.er (@styl.ur), where the couples further discuss the concept of hearing vs. listening and rate each other’s ability to do so. After a lot of laughs (and even more wine) the couples try to figure out the meaning of life, in less than an hour. (Don’t step in) YOUR SH!T: Um ... The guy I'm dating is way to vocal during sex, and it kinda icks me out. Should I continue to bone? Or should he turn down the moan? Also, what should you do when you're in a long-term relationship and your you crazy shows (more often than you'd like it to), when you're missing him a little extra that normal. Am I showing to much crazy, and if so ... how do I get myself together? - - - - - Relationship problems? EMAIL US: relationshitquestions@gmail.com We will answer your questions on the show. - - - - - RATE US: Go to your favorite podcast directory and give Relationsh!t a 5-Star rating, and fantastic review! It sounds like a big ask, but it helps us out tremendously. If you have 5-minutes, help us out! - - - - - FOLLOW US: Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook @podrelationshit - - - - - SPECIAL THANKS: @steveedesigns (Instagram) for our logo! @mdotcot (Instagram, Twitter) for our editing! and (last but not least) ... @tinman_tc (Instagram) ... and, Antonio Carter for our musicSupport the show (http://www.patreon.com/podrelationshit)
An intense travel schedule and even more intense exhaustion bring the guys of Relationsh!t back for another Wednesday full of laughter and relationship insight. Marko and Tony chit chat about their upcoming plans and whether or not Marko should visit his doctor for the chronic fatigue. Either way, there is A NEW EPISODE OF RELATIONSH!T, and that cures any ailment. (Get to the) GOOD SH!T: This week's #GayRelationshipGoals is none other than the ridiculously talented (and insanely muscular) couple, @ptjoshb and @joeputignano. When they're not busy performing with Cirque du Soleil, writing books, or bench pressing semi trucks, Joe and Josh are busy inspiring all of us to love unconditionally and encourage one another, passionately. A very special treat for the show, and a definite favorite of the guys - follow Joe and Josh on IG, and fall in love ... just like we did. (We just) TALKING SH!T: There is nothing worse than losing yourself to a relationship. We all have had that friend that gets in a relationship and become an entirely different person; a person you don't recognize. Is that healthy? Marko and Tony share stories of the beginning of their relationship and the fears of losing oneself that plagued their initial joy. Later, Marko and Tony are joined by friends of the show: @steeeeevn and @_erikadoesbeauty_ for a new show segment called WE AIN'T SHIT. This foursome talks about what it means to be in a relationship with them and the things that make them happy - even if it doesn't make their partner happy. A little too much wine makes for a laugh-fest complete with insight and Relationshit's brand of fun! (Don’t step in) YOUR SH!T: My boyfriend likes to argue all the time, argue all the time, argue ALL THE TIIIIIIIIIIIIME. This can't be healthy, right? And, with so many gay men on tv, film, and in really life ... who do you admire (if anyone)? Join the fellas for yet another edition of Listener Sh!tuations and gather their thoughts. - - - - - Relationship problems? EMAIL US: relationshitquestions@gmail.com We will answer your questions on the show. - - - - - RATE US: Go to your favorite podcast directory and give Relationsh!t a 5-Star rating, and fantastic review! It sounds like a big ask, but it helps us out tremendously. If you have 5-minutes, help us out! - - - - - FOLLOW US: Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook @podrelationshit - - - - - SPECIAL THANKS: @steveedesigns (Instagram) for our logo! @mdotcot (Instagram, Twitter) for our editing! and (last but not least) ... @tinman_tc (Instagram) ... and, Antonio Carter for our musicSupport the show (http://www.patreon.com/podrelationshit)
The other day, I finally had a chance to sit down with Tony Workman, owner of the in Parkersburg, WV for our very first on-site interview. Listen in!! This is a transcript of the conversation, cleaned up for your reading pleasure! Rem: We’re here today with Tony Workman, owner and operator of the Classic Plastics Toy Store located in downtown Parkersburg, WV and progenitor of the Classic Plastics Toy and Comic Expo which is quickly approaching on March 4th and 5th at the Parkersburg Art Center. Tony, how are you doing? Tony: Pretty good. R: You ready for take two? T: Definitely! Both: *shared laughter* R: So I may or may not have screwed up the last recording, and I really won't know until I get it into the computer to find out. So we're going to do it again and I'm going to make Tony suffer through it because he's awesome like that! Tony, what got you started in selling toys? T: Pretty much my love of them. I've always had toys and I never really grew out of it, so I wanted to keep that going and so I turned a hobby into a business. R; You started off by having a shop in a local flea market, what drove you to make the jump to having a retail space? T: It came down to availability — with the flea market being [open] three days and me growing out of the space I was in. I kept getting a bigger and bigger space, and I just figured it was time to get a building. R: Gotchya. What kind of toys and other items do you carry? T: There is a little bit of everything. We started at the flea market with vintage used toys that people would bring in to us, and then when I moved here, I started getting into new toys from NECA and Funko — stuff like that. R: So do you have any primo stuff for the fine dining toy collector? T: Every now and then we'll get stuff from collectors that we'll bring in, like packages Ninja Turtles from the 80's or stuff from NECA that is really highly detailed or articulated. Stuff that might be pricier, but worth the money. R: I notice you also have vintage functional arcade machines. What inspired the decision to include those in your space? T: I always loved going to the arcade when I was a kid. There was a movie theater that my parents would take my brothers and I to; and before every movie, we would sit there and play arcade games until it was time to go in and watch it. I've watched them all shut down all over the place, and I just wanted to try and bring that back. R: Gotchya. Do you host any special extended hour events like arcade or Collectible Card Game tournaments? T: We do with the arcade games. We have free arcade day once a month that we try to do toward the end of the month. It's what it sounds like: just come in and play free arcades all day. () R: Awesome! So, as I said, you are the progenitor of the Classic Plastics Toy and Comic Expo coming up again March 4th and 5th. This will be the fourth year you’ve hosted the CPT&CE, the third year it will be taking place at the Parkersburg Art Center. What sparked the truly daunting task of organizing an expo? T: My buddy, Todd Wines works for The Red Cross and they were looking for a fundraiser that would be in different age groups with different types of people that they don't normally get any kind of support from, so he came to me and asked "Do you want to do a toy and comics expo?" – with him being a huge comic nerd - and of course, I said yes. *laughter* R: Is it just you pulling the strings, or do you have a crew helping to get all the gears moving? T: For the most part, it's just me. Todd does help when he can, but with his job being in disaster relief, it's just a matter of if there's going to be a flood or something. So if that happens, he really has to focus on that which leaves me to be the only one. But I do have employees that I can pay to help me out as well. R: This year you’re featuring nearly 100 vendors and guests. How well has the attendance grown over the past four years? T: The first year was in a church on South Side [Parkersburg], and it had 300 people. Last year - our 3rd year - we had 1200 people. We're hoping to get over 2000 people with it being the first two-day show, but it is just a kind of wait-and-see. R: And as you said, this is the first multi-day event. Why was the decision made to extend the expo? T: Last year there were so many people. The Art Center is a pretty decent-sized building, but there were so many people on the floor that it was hard to get through the aisles and see all the inventory and enjoy the show as much as people wanted. So we thought spreading it out over the two days would give people the opportunity to choose when and what day they wanted to come. R: Awesome! Who can we expect to see this year, then? T: This year we have Steve Cardenas, the second red ranger from Power Rangers — Rocky, the red ranger if anyone watches the show. Along with Tim Clark, an 80's toy designer. He did stuff like Boglins and Sectaurs. He worked a little bit on Fraggle Rock. And then the local legend, Jordan Patton is back again this year from SyFy's Face Off and does the show Deadnecks. R: We have the expo, and then we have some external events that are happening as well. What are some of the events that are happening at the expo and outside of it that will really make for the first weekend of March to be a truly grand adventure for anyone coming to downtown Parkersburg? T: Starting with the outside stuff first: It's being done by Downtown PKB again. They did an event last year that they got really good reception from - Savor Saturday - that they're going to be doing again this year. It's going to include 12 different restaurants [in the downtown area] that you can walk around and get dollar samples from. So if you haven't eaten at any of the downtown restaurants, it gives you a really good chance to try out some of what's on their menu. There's also going to be this guy, - I don't even know his name - he came into the store one time and said "You let me into the show one day for free, and I'll go around all the PokeStops downtown and put lures on them." So that is going to be at noon — the same time as people are walking around for Savory Saturday. You can take advantage of a whole bunch of lures and sample a whole bunch of restaurants down here. Inside, the Vienna Library is doing events like Lego Building and Story Time on Sunday. J&M Bookstore on South Side is doing board games and tabletop events both Saturday and Sunday; along with Rare Drops from Huntington doing video game tournaments. Both of these will be in the basement of the Art Center. Then there will be a cosplay contest and I'm probably forgetting something else. *laughter* R: *laughter* It is hard to keep track of all of it, isn't it? T: It is! R: So finally, do you have anything you’d like to add that I may have forgotten to cover? T: I can't remember if it was mentioned, but proceeds to the show go towards Downtown PKB and the Arts Center — they'll be split in half. I do not get any profit from this. This is something that is done for the community and as a promotion for my store. In the past, it was done for the Red Cross, but we changed to Downtown PKB this year. So if you guys are really wanting to support your local area and your local businesses, coming to the expo is going to be really important. Rem: Awesome! You can join us in the fun at the Classic Plastics Toy & Comic Expo, March 4th and 5th at the Parkersburg Art Center, located at 725 Market Street in Parkersburg West Virginia. Admission is $5 per person each day, or $8 for a two-day pass. Children 10 and under are free with paid adult admission. All proceeds go to the and . More information about the expo can be found at , link in the notes; or you can search on Facebook for real-time updates on the event. Don’t forget to come down to the as well – , located at 406 Market Street in Parkersburg, West Virginia – and give Tony all the love and support you can! Thanks again, Tony, for having me down and wasting time with me! I really appreciate it! Tony: Thanks for having me! Links: https://www.classicplasticstoystore.com/ https://www.facebook.com/ClassicPlasticsToyandComicExpo/ https://www.facebook.com/ClassicPlasticsToyStore/ https://www.facebook.com/downtownpkb/ https://www.facebook.com/parkersburgartcenter/ https://www.facebook.com/events/614611755413106/
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