How David Perell Writes an Essay

My writing is a beacon for new connections, ideas, and opportunities. Almost all my closest friends are people I’ve met on the internet. Reading somebody else’s writing is a great gauge of a person’s mind. It reveals how they think, what inspires them, and what they value.

I try to build up surprise, because surprise and insight and entertainment are all very tightly correlated. Surprise is also the fundamental axiom of Claude Shannon’s information theory. The more surprise in a message, the more information it contains.