Just for Fun

  • What’s Up With Twitter?

    Everyone knows that Elon Musk was sued by Twitter and 'forced' to buy Twitter for $44B.  Since then, the now-private company has made a lot of confusing decisions. 

    To start, Musk publicly announced that the company was hemorrhaging money.  To try and remedy this, he began by firing approximately half the employees.  Key executives were fired.  Later, many more executives left on their own.  After the massive exodus, Elon supposedly reached out to some former employees asking them to come back.  He also ended remote work for employees. 

    In an attempt to increase the company's profitability, he announced Twitter Blue, a paid subscription service that would give you a checkmark, and push your content to the top of users' feeds. 

    Screen Shot 2022-11-11 at 5.54.04 PMvia twitter

    Unfortunately, users were quick to abuse the new verification system by pretending to be public figures and even public companies.  As a result, there was real tangible damage to stock prices. 

    That-fake-verified-tweet-cost-eli-lilly-billions-v0-txbw9br3edz91
     via Twitter

    Eli Lilly's drop also brought down its competitors.  Other companies got hit, including Lockheed Martin. 

    Do you think those are the most influential 8 dollars ever spent in history?

    As a result of the turmoil, advertisers are leaving Twitter in droves, and Twitter has paused Twitter Blue in America – though it remains up in some different geographies. 

    On the surface, it looks like Twitter is being run into the ground.  It seems like Musk is throwing a lot of darts at the board and seeing what sticks.  He said as much when he promised that Twitter would do many dumb things as part of his strategy to innovate and find smart things to do.

    Are the foibles simply the cost of the innovation needed to revitalize the company … or signs of trouble for Twitter's future?

    Even though I'm prone to bet on Musk, I think it's too early to believe you can predict the outcome.

    What do you think?

  • Here Are Some Links For Your Weekly Reading – October 16th, 2022

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    Here are some of the posts that caught my eye. Hope you find something interesting.

    Lighter Links:

    Trading Links:

  • The Swish Machine

    Rube Goldberg machines impress me more often than not. Here's a 70-step outdoor machine that covers a lot of ground … all to put a basketball in a hoop. It took a month to create, and another month to get working. 

     

    via Creezy

    I love stuff like this because it reminds me of life. Looking backward, you see how all the pieces go together. As you're going through it, it feels random and sometimes like you're moving backward or that your effort isn't directly contributing to your goal.

    Nonetheless, it all comes together in the end.

    Onwards!  

  • Bruce Willis Deepfake: The Smart Decision?

    Bruce Willis is a legend of cinema, and he made many of my favorite movies of the 80s and 90s. He stayed relevant and exciting up until very recently. 

    Then, last year, he started releasing a slew of disappointing "straight-to-DVD" style movies that had him receiving his own award show category in the Razzies (an award show for the worst performances of the year). In 2021, they created the category "worst performance by Bruce Willis in a 2021 movie." 

    Vulture did an interesting interview with the founders of the Razzies where Bruce Willis comes up. 

    Then, it came out that Bruce Willis was diagnosed with Aphasia and was losing his ability to speak. 

    Suddenly, these pieces take on new meaning. They're Bruce getting as much work in as he can before he loses his voice permanently. He's trying to do what he knows how to do to make sure his wife and children are taken care of after he can no longer act. 

    It doesn't make the movies suddenly "great" but it was enough to get the Razzies to rescind their award. 

    I don't believe these last films of his dampen his well-earned legacy. 

    Last year, his digital twin showed up in a Russian telecom ad. 

     

     
    Recently, he's been in the news again for having sold his likeness to a deepfake company. It was reported on the company's website and by The Telegraph, but there are now claims to the contrary as well. 

    While the jury is still out on if his rights have been sold, I think it's likely you'll see more Bruce Willis deepfake content. 

    The question becomes, is it the right decision?

    If his estate still has final approval – and there is quality control – then what's the harm?

    Does the potential ubiquity, or the idea that we can always have another Bruce Willis movie, reduce the value of his movies?

    Does allowing deepfakes in cinema (on TV or in film) take away roles from actors who might become stars?

    We've already seen actors use deepfakes to reprise a role they did when they were younger – like Luke Skywalker or Leia from Star Wars. It's a different idea to build a new series around an actor who isn't actually acting in it. 

    These questions pair well with the discussion around AI-generated art and whether it should be considered art. 

    What do you think? 

  • Insight Into The Past …

    Many people focus on the gap between their ideal goal and their current state.  The result is often painful.  In contrast, focusing on the progress made from where you started often results in a sense of accomplishment, hope, and momentum.

    With that in mind …. Have you ever wondered what it was like to be a housewife in the 1950s? No? 

    Nonetheless,  sometime around the 1950s, Good Housekeeping put out this "helpful" timeline for managing a small servantless house. 

    295d6eef7096a199d1e1599764aa14be--housekeeping-schedule-good-housekeeping

    When do they shower?  

    And how did they accomplish that without modern gadgets and appliances (like coffee makers, microwaves, dishwashers, Roombas, Amazon, Door Dash, home automation, etc.)

    Sometimes it is good to suck less!

  • Living Longer And Healthier

    I am on my way back from Dave Asprey’s BioHacking Conference.

    I enjoy going and being exposed to people and products committed to life extension and regenerative medicine.  

    Here are some of the things I found interesting and useful.

    I own and use every product on the list above. One of my biggest insights from this year’s conference was that I already have great stuff. I have to remember to use it. Some of the stuff is terrific. I know it is. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t sit unused in a room upstairs (or in a box under my stairs). The scary thing is that I know better.  Now I have to do better!

    Each year I get a little bit more focused on what I can be doing to get more out of my time and to increase the quantity of time left.

    Even with a renewed focus on health, it isn’t always easier. As my friend Ben Hardy says, Willpower Doesn’t Work – you have to identify goals that are bigger than yourself, create consequences and rewards for achieving or failing to achieve those goals, and change your environment to make success easy.  

    I don’t just want to be healthier to increase my time on earth, but to better support my family, my business, and to create a positive impact on those around me. 

    When you have a vision of who you want to be, and what you want to accomplish, achieving your goals becomes a lot easier. 

    When the goal is health, there are definitely some decisions that are proven to help. You can click to see the image in full-size. 

    6a00e5502e47b288330240a49a8d6a200d-600wi

    via informationisbeautiful

    On top of the science, here are some of my anecdotal opinions on living longer, healthier, and better:

    • Losing weight is as simple as calories in, calories out. It doesn’t matter if you’re on keto or eating only twinkies if you can keep your calories ingested below your calories burned. An equally simple alternative is to consider whether what you are about to eat, drink, or do is “cleansing” or “clogging”.  We already know better!
    • Getting enough water and sleep are tips echoed so much that they get annoying. Nonetheless, they are true and help significantly. 
    • In life, and in diets, shortcuts end up hurting you long-term more than they help you short-term.  If something is worth doing, it is usually worth doing right.
    • Living “right” doesn’t mean you can’t let loose … it means that it’s the exception instead of the rule. If your lifestyle doesn’t let you have fun with your friends or family, it’s probably not the healthiest lifestyle. Mental health is just as important as physical health.  From my perspective, deprivation or repression are far less effective or sustainable than delayed gratification.

    I’d love to hear your favorite “trick” to living better. Feel free to send me an e-mail. 

    Thanks! Live Long and Prosper!

  • The Average NFL Player (By Position)

    Football season is officially underway!  In honor of that, here's a look at each position's composite "player" (as of 2019).

    As you might expect, different sports have different ratios of ethnicities.  For example, you might expect more Pacific Islanders in Rugby or Asians in Badminton.

    The same is true for various positions on a football team.  Offensive linemen are more likely to be white – while running backs are more likely to be black. 

    Here is a visualization that shows what happens when you average the top players' faces in various positions.

    6a00e5502e47b288330240a4cda5bf200b-250wi

    osmutiar via Reddit

    Composites are interesting.

    While you may be thinking "this player must be unstoppable" … statistically, he's average.

    The "composite" NFL player would be the 848th best player in the league.  He's not a starter, and he plays on an average team.  You probably don't know his name if you don't root for his team. 

    We found the same thing with our trading bots.  The ones that made it through most filters weren't star performers.  They were the average bots that did enough not to fail (but failed to make the list as top performers in any of the categories).  Meaning, the survivors were generalists – not specialists.

    In an ideal world, with no roster limits, you'd want the perfect lineup for each granular situation.  You'd want to evaluate players on how they perform under pressure, on different downs, against other players, and with different schemes. 

    That's what technology lets you do with algorithms.  You can have a library of systems that communicate with each other … and you don't even have to pay their salary (but you will need data scientists, researchers, machines, data, alternative data, electricity, disaster recovery, and a testing platform).

    You won't find exceptional specialists if your focus is on generalized safety.  Generalists are great, but you also have to be able to respond to specific conditions.

    Onwards.

  • Honoring Serena Williams

    Serena Williams officially retired on Friday after a loss in the third round of the US Open to 29-year-old Ajla Tomljanovic. Serena won her first Grand Slam Title 23 years ago in the same stadium. 

    Serena started playing professional tennis in 1995 as a 14-year-old.  Twenty-seven years later, she walks away from the game with 858 tour victories, an 85% win rate, 73 singles titles, an Olympic gold medal, and 319 weeks at No. 1. With her sister, Venus, they won 14 major doubles titles and three Olympic gold medals.

    Recently, I shared this graph that helps put the Williams sisters' dominance into perspective. 

    6a00e5502e47b288330282e158ed0c200b-600wi

    via Yahoo!Sports

    Serena is undoubtedly one of the most dominant athletes – man or woman – in any sport. 

    To be great requires an extraordinary level of grit, determination, and pain tolerance over an extended period of time.  It isn't just what you choose to do from moment to moment – it's about a persistent commitment to who you choose to be!  

    During Serena's final match, an ESPN commentator said something interesting about what makes her (and many famous athletes) great.  For context, Serena was down 5-1 in the final set of the final match, with her opponent having won two sets already.  It's 'game point'.   To get here, Ajla will win a point, then Serena – it goes back and forth like that more than seven times.  Yet, Serena keeps finding a way to keep herself in the match despite everything going against her. 

    While this is going on, the commentator exclaims, "How can she care so much?  How can she keep dancing on the lip of the volcano?" 

    Imagine being in Serena's position.  She's 40, she's announced her retirement, the match has been going on for almost 3 hours, and her chances of coming back are almost nil … she has nothing left to prove … but she keeps finding more in the tank.  She keeps putting herself in a position to turn it around.  After the match, her opponent makes clear that she never once thought that Serena was out of it – that she couldn't turn it around and clinch victory. 

    It was beautiful – and it was a testament to the passion and discipline it takes to be that elite for that long. 

    There's a difference between good and great – but there's also a difference between great and the greatest. 

  • Some Cool “Futuristic” Tech You Might Not Have Seen

    I joke that I have a "tense" problem. I spend a lot of my time thinking about what will be possible in the future. And once I know something is possible, in my head, it has already happened.

    It isn’t a reality distortion engine … it is a reality creation engine.

    For me, this is centered around the way technology is transforming the world and how it affects my business. 

    Sometimes it's nice to take a step back and look at all the "quality of life" improvements. The gadgets that make you say "Wow!" … even though they may not benefit you directly. 

    So, here are a few that caught my eye over the last few weeks. 

    Augmented Reality Running 

    In 2020, Ghost Pacer put together a pair of AR glasses that would give you a virtual running partner. The app would analyze the running route and the wearer's desired goals and set them up against a virtual runner who would push them to their limits. 

    Last year, SNAP and Nike teamed up to create a new AR running experience as well. 

     

    Spectacles via YouTube

    This is a great way to get moving for those (like my wife) who benefit from a structure around their exercise. 

    Magnetic Slime Robot for Healthcare

     

    New Scientist via YouTube

    Watching the video of this slime is somewhat uncanny. Its movements feel almost lifelike. That being said, the potential for this custard-like slime worm is massive. It can navigate narrow passageways, grasp objects, and more. There are already plans to use this to remove foreign objects from people.  

    Functioning Hoverboards 

     

    RIDE via YouTube

    Multiple generations of kids have dreamed of hoverboards after watching Back To The Future. While it's not in homes yet, it is now a reality as seen in this video with Tony Hawk riding one. Unfortunately, since breaking into the scene in 2015 with a successful Kickstarter, I have not seen much from Hendo Hoverboard. 

    Thankfully, they're not the only company in the space anymore. If you're willing to drop almost 15K, you can own a working hoverboard from Arcaboard. 

    I remember when we used to go outside to play or exercise.

    We live in interesting times!  

  • Taylor Swift’s Carbon Footprint?

    I'm writing this from International Falls, MN (someplace I never thought I'd be … ).  Meanwhile, one of the only less likely things, I can think of, is the article's topic.

    Taylor Swift is known for being vocal about climate issues.  She was also just 'outed' for the 170 flights her private jet took last year.  The news came out after another celebrity was chastised for a 20-minute private jet flight.  Taylor claims that most of those flights weren't hers – and that she rents the plane out.  Knowing other people with private jets, that's believable. 

    There are obviously bigger problems in the world today.  Nonetheless, I'm sharing this info anyways because the chart comparing her carbon footprint to the average person's caught my eye. 

    Ezgif.com-gif-maker (8)via Reddit

    I wonder how that would compare to the carbon footprint of non-celebrity private jet owners or manufacturers.