Sam Liebeskind

We find that people in the U.S. who are surrounded by prompts and reminders to participate in generosity-related activities are more likely to participate in them .

Learning is downstream of doing. The order should rarely be reversed. Most real knowledge, knowledge worth attaining, lives in the hands . It must be cultivated gradually, like a garden. Really, it must be grown. Most real knowledge is the result of doing something deliberately for a long time and steadily making small improvements. It requires a... See more

The prime directive in Japanese society is “thou shalt not discomfit thy neighbor.” Ever. Even on trivial things. Prosocial behavior is a totalizing ideology. People take it seriously. A blanket taboo bans any behavior that might create any inconvenience to people around you, let alone—heaven forbid—open conflict. Kids get this ethos drilled into... See more

Subject line: What brought you here?

Body:​

Hi,

I'm really glad you've decided to try our podcast hosting platform! I'm Justin, one of the co-founders.

I'm curious: what's happening in your world that brought you to Transistor?

(We're a small company, and it's always helpful to hear why people signed up).

Also, how did you hear about us?

Thanks,

Justin... See more

“When you look at the history of the internet,” says Jeremy Morris, associate professor of media and cultural studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, “a lot of the early spaces for communities also became places where people would either trade or barter.”

While Meta’s paid messaging tools brought in about $1 billion last year — peanuts compared to the whopping $132 billion the company earned from ads — paid messaging revenue is growing far faster than ad revenue and has more than doubled since early 2023.

With technologies that can now facilitate discussion and decision-making among groups both big and small, we must ask if we can build new kinds of intermediating digital spaces, ones that provide perspective, attention, and action on shared rather than personal problems, while at the same time accommodating discussion and deliberation at local as... See more