Sam Liebeskind
@samliebeskind
product partnerships at New_Public; previously community & growth @ Geneva
Sam Liebeskind
Better Questions than “Any Questions?”
grouphug.substack.com
Facilitation, Meeting, & Gathering
What’s one word on your mind right now?
What’s an idea that jumped out at you from what you just heard?
What did this remind you of?
Share one way you might make this better.
On a scale of 1 to 5, how confident/excited/clear are you on what you just heard?
Raise your hand if you felt ____ about this. Raise your hand if you felt _____ about this. (Bonus points: can pick on a person to go deeper after that.)
Turn to someone next to you and share what’s on your mind.
Who did this make you think of in your life, either because it reminded you of them or you’d like to share it with them?
What would you need to start using/trying/applying this tomorrow?
What was your honest first impression when you heard about what we’d be talking about today? How did that change or not?
What questions do you have for [Name of person speaking]?
What’s a wish you have for this work going forward?
Let’s enter a No Dumb Questions zone: what’s a question on your mind that might feel silly or random or obvious?
Offer thanks or gratitude for what you just heard.
Who in your life would be skeptical about this? Why?
What fear is coming up for you right now?
Turn to the person next to you and explain your understanding of what you just heard. Then switch.
I would love to get at least three questions from the group before we break.
What was the most confusing/wild/inspiring/exciting part of what you just heard?
What was missing from what you just heard?
When we seek to intervene in any system created by someone, it’s not enough to view their decisions and choices simply as the consequences of first-order thinking because we can inadvertently create serious problems. Before changing anything, we should wonder whether they were using second-order thinking. Their reasons for making certain choices... See more
fs.blog • Chesterton’s Fence: A Lesson in Second Order Thinking - Farnam Street
Social media is a gnarly coordination problem we need to decompose - A Warm Space
awarm.leaflet.pub
Local journalism, no matter what form it’s in, truly does contribute to the fabric of a community. You’re not going to find too many large market sources of news reporting on your local city council or the high school basketball scores. Things like that might sound silly to a lot of people but truly are important to small communities... Keeps us... See more
Steven Waldman • How high school sports coverage can save democracy - Poynter
In Facebook’s quest to “make the world more open and connected,” it succeeded in empowering individuals, but accidentally eroded the very notion of an authority – not just the notion of an objective truth, but the notion that any established institution could help us to understand truth. We underestimated bad actors, and the ways people would game... See more
Why YourStack failed
ryanhoover.me
Top feeds heavily skew towards English content, although there were five Japanese,
four Portuguese, and a single feed each for Indonesian, Ukrainian, and Spanish. The
relative prominence of Japanese and Portuguese reflects the geographic distribution of
the platform’s users (Duarte, 2025). In terms of topic, identity-focused feeds were most
prominent,... See more
four Portuguese, and a single feed each for Indonesian, Ukrainian, and Spanish. The
relative prominence of Japanese and Portuguese reflects the geographic distribution of
the platform’s users (Duarte, 2025). In terms of topic, identity-focused feeds were most
prominent,... See more
product design and All about social networks
Funnel - getting everyone to do the same thing (e.g. supermarket checkout)
Tube - gets people from where they are to their own goal (e.g. google search)
Space - not-goal driven, more exploratory