📺What I Watched:
Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood DreamsThis is a 1.15 hour long YouTube video that (not to be dramatic) might change your life.
Professor Pausch was a professor at Carnegie Mellon. At the time of this talk, he knew he was going to die. Diagnosed with terminal cancer, he died less than a year after this. This is his parting wisdom.
My favorite tidbit: “brick walls (or barriers to life) are there for a reason. They’re not there to keep us out. The bricks walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something.”
📖What I Read:
We Can’t Let AI Writing Take Over the Internet by Derek ThompsonThis one’s technically an interview, but I read it on Substack. Derek Thompson (great writer btw) talks with the founder of Pangram, which is an AI detector for writing. I was aware of the AI slopification of TikTok, Instagram, and (the platform that shall not be named) LinkedIn. But I was NOT aware of the AI slop permeating larger organizations like NYT, Washington Post, and the Wall St Journal. AI Slop, just like Thanos, is indeed inevitable.
🎧What I Listened To:
“How to Hold a Cockroach: A Book for Those Who are Free and Don’t Know It”Link: I listened to this on Spotify
This is a VERY short audio book (1-2 hours), but it will sink into your bones. It’s a child-like parable with a simple message: your life is made up of stories you tell yourself. We attach stories and meaning to life’s events as though they are objective reality. But…they’re not. I don’t want to give too much away, but the book ranges from cockroaches to love and even death. Skip the self-help and try out this children’s book lol