Thought provoking

“A society made up of human beings who have turned themselves into small businesses is basically the logical endpoint of free market capitalism, anyway. To achieve the current iteration of the American dream, you’ve got to shout into the digital void and tell everyone how great you are. All that matters is how many people believe you.” – Kai

In a completely ultra-poptimist world, there would be no available incentives to create novel, complex, or ambiguous works of art. We would have to rely on artist altruism or insanity.

Russians understand Americans’ single color “blue” as two distinct shades – light blue and dark blue.

Artists are agents of invention who attempt to change the dominant conventions (although many individuals operating under the rubric of "artist" have much more pedestrian and commercial goals.)

1.9.1 The avant-garde exposes, devalues, and alters existing conventions in search of new cultural arrangements that could provide new aesthetic experiences... See more

I often think of the Noah Smith quote: “Fifteen years ago, the internet was an escape from the real world. Now, the real world is an escape from the internet.”

This quote from Tony Hsieh contains so much truth: “Happiness is really just about four things: perceived control, perceived progress, connectedness (number and depth of your relationships), and vision/meaning (being part of something bigger than yourself).”

People will, if given the opportunity, read a 5,000-word essay on their phone. And they’ll do it right there, with their head still on the pillow. In those cases, it’s not terrible; it’s wonderful. And if you can capture that, if you can direct that attention to things worth attending to, it’s incredibly powerful. So if you’re a writer, why not go

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