Intro / Preface / Extra Words
Sorry so late this morning in sending this out. Had a few finishing touches to put on it, but Miss Avery kept us up for quite awhile last night and that whole "I'll get my day started early" thing went right out the window.
A little light on total number of links this week, but I'll blame that on being the first week back at work after paternity leave. Most of what I read this week was email.
Enjoy.
Current Things
theSkimm's Guide to The Opioid Crisis
Sorry to lead off with a downer of a link, but it is what it is. If you've ever wondered "I wonder what Calvin is like when he's angry" then we can talk about this topic. What pharmaceutical companies and doctors have done in prescribing opioids like they're Tic-Tacs is so incredibly irresponsible that... well. This is where the millennials younger than me say "I can't even." So, that.
Random Things
Quora - What's the Most Reliable Car Brand
A really well-researched answer to this question. I'm constantly car shopping, not because I need one, but because I drive an 18-year-old Honda Accord that I assume will at some point explode without warning. In which case I'd like to have some idea what I'm buying next. Some interesting notes about this answer: Porsche has good reliability scores (I assumed all luxury imports just sat in shops all day); Fiat and MINI are consistently at the bottom of lists; I'm somehow interested in Buick's offerings these days despite not being >55 years old.
Food
The Layman’s Guide to Pairing Beer With Breakfast
I've long been a fan of having a beer at brunch. I've never been a big mimosa guy, mainly because of the acidity, and I recently tried a Bloody Mary and could not for the life of me understand why people consume those. The easiest way to try this out is, as the article suggests, to grab a coffee-inspired brew. Their list at the bottom leaves out a couple of no-brainers, in my opinion. You should be able to get these locally in Memphis: Wiseacre's Gotta Get Up To Get Down (coffee milk stout), Schlafly's Oatmeal Stout, and Founder's Breakfast Stout (an imperial style coffee stout). Thanks to Brian F. for the link.
Business Time
A Huge Collection of Startup Pitch Decks
This is exactly what the title says it is. Tech startups raise piles and piles of money, but usually you just hear about the number. Here's how they convinced the investors to invest.
Work / Productivity
Why “I Don’t Have Enough Time” is a B.S. Excuse
Remember, you have the same amount of time in your day as Beyoncé. But for reals, this post is a great challenge to think about whether or not time is the reason you can't do something. Favorite quote:
A trick that a friend shared with me is to replace “I don’t have enough time” with “that’s just not important enough to me to do right now.”
Try that out a few times to see how you really feel about a task.
Sports (Disc Golf)
Which Kobe Bryant Shot Was the Kobe-est Kobe Shot?
A logical scoring of two Kobe shots that were particularly Kobe. After reading this post and clicking every YouTube link within, I'd like to point out a couple of things that I'm sure you've forgotten (as I had). One, Steph Curry takes some outrageous shots, but he'll never be on Kobe's level because he actually has a chance to make most of those shots. Kobe didn't let "make-ability" influence his shot selection as much as Steph does. Two, Gary Payton was on the Lakers at the same time as Kobe, Shaq, and Karl Malone. They did not win a championship that year.
If you click none of the YouTube links, at least watch this one.
I love technology (and science)
Are Notifications A Dark Pattern?
This one is more "and stuff" than "science" but I put it in this category because it relates to tech. That might not actually make any sense. Anyway, this article is important because more consumers should understand the concept of a dark pattern now before they become so sophisticated that we don't notice them. It's also important because it introduced me to a term that I'll be thinking about a lot now: tech/life balance.
On pseudo-notifications becoming more sophisticated:
This begins to open the door to manipulation not only by fellow humans, but also by faceless algorithms that eventually learn to present each of us only with information that we already want to see — perhaps even only the news stories that are consistent with our present worldview.
Yikes.
Outro
That's it for this week. I'm in need of some recommendations for the Further Reading category, seeing as how I'm actually trying to read a few of the books I've recommended at the moment which means I'm not actively looking for new things. If you have a recommendation, send it my way and write your own description and I'll put it in the newsletter as-is. Channel your inner LeVar Burton.