articles

LAUGH: Bad Game Show Answers, LOVE: John Scalzi’s Writing Process

Listen now (10 min) | Abstraction & synthesis of the most transformative year of my life

That we manage all our programming projects in Basecamp is perhaps an obvious admission since its our own product. But it's less obvious to some how that's possible, given the apparent lack of affordances to tie todos, messages, or check-ins together with code commits automatically. Some teams who are Basecamp curious can't seem get ov...

I'm always trying to improve my writing. I want my writing to be more meaningful, clearer, more memorable, and shorter. I would also like to write faster.

Insights from Tom Bilyeu's podcast interview with Chuck Palahniuk. This is an in-depth look at Chuck's creative process and crazy life stories that will leave you in awe

In January 1996, Bill Gates published what would go on to become one of the classic essays of the early internet. In it, he describes the very characteristics of the internet that would lay the foundation for the Creator Economy. “One of the exciting things about the internet is that anyone with a PC and a modem can publish whatever content they create,” he writes.

Thiel defines secrets as important truths about the world that other people don’t yet realize.

Supply, Demand, and Memes. Lots of Memes.

Some things go unnoticed when they work. Non-fiction writing enters this category too.

Networking is painful, and I’m suspicious of anyone who claims to enjoy it. Unfortunately for me, networking is effective.

“Our first questions about the value of a book, of a human being, or a musical composition are: Can they walk? Even more, can they dance?”

From the documentary Under Great White Northern Lights. Jack White of the White Stripes talks about inspiration and constrictions to force creativity.

Pricing is one of the most powerful yet under-appreciated levers in business. Good pricing can increase LTV, make businesses thrive, change brand perception.

4 Headline Writing Tips From the Father of Modern Advertising

Your single resource for DAOs, including a directory, reading list, and more.

How do you find time to learn in a busy schedule? Here are four strategies I use to find time between work and family life.

A lesson from photography to the world of note-taking.

Once I overcame a fear of being honest, my content fortunes changed forever Once I overcame a fear of being honest, my content fortunes changed forever

If you sell your time as the measure of the work you do, the work is over when the shift ends. Clock in, clock out. If you sell your output as the measure of the work, your work is over when the in…

The most liberating aspect for me of writing emails rather than tweets is the natural limit on topics I might be tempted to have a take on. When I was primarily writing tweets, I could easily involve myself in a dozen topics in a day. HERE'S A TAKE, THERE'S A TAKE, TAKE THAT! With email, it's a sliver of that. But it goes even deeper t...

A place for uncomfortable, unlikely, and unacceptable ideas.

The Paradox of Reading: The books you read will profoundly change you even though you’ll forget the vast majority of what you read. The Paradox of Writing: Great writing looks effortless. But because the ideas are so clear, casual readers don’t appreciate how much time it took to refine them. The Paradox of Creativity: Your

I read Jurassic Park for the first time a couple of weeks ago. Part of the action felt repetitive, and I had a hard time placing events in space, but aside from that, I’m happy I read it. Michael Crichton, the book’s author, once described the act of writing and the role of the editor in an old interview as follows:

Making something social destroys the truth of it because social groups need consensus to survive—otherwise they fight and can’t get along—and consensus is all about compromise, not truth-seeking. Science—at least the natural sciences—was this unique discipline where you could have an individual truth-seeking on behalf of the rest of society. Other individuals verify that they did, indeed, have the best current model of how reality works, and then that could be spread out through inventions to the rest of society. More

Watch on YouTube   Something that has always fascinated me is the concept of a Polymath or Renaissance Man, or a person who has many talents and knowledge in multiple domains. One of the modern day polymaths I’ve learned the most from is Josh Waitzkin. When it comes to touching excellence in multiple domains Josh... Read More

Don’t confuse the word “marketing” with advertising, announcing, spamming, or giving away branded crap.

Six Spokes Theory shows that we can’t neglect important areas of life if we want to live optimally. This requires making tough choices

On productivity and visual storytelling

"Get Back" shows what the creative process really looks like. Also: Jack leaves Twitter, why good moms are the worst audience members, superhero movies, how doxxing is weird, and more.