10 things I consumed this week...
Announcing the launch of "Grimace-zempic", the McD's branded version of Ozempic
Another week, another set of new things to learn.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the adage “what got you here won’t get you there” and situations where it feels especially true. One such situation is going from year 2 of your PhD to year 3 — years 1&2 are all about doing well in class, and years 3 onwards are about doing good research. Very different modalities! I think founders of growing companies face this all the time. In phase one, you might win by saying “yes” to almost everything thrown at you in hopes of finding some diamond in the rough. In the very next stage, you win via discernment, saying “yes” very rarely. I really liked this tweet on the topic:
I used to work for a founder that lionized what is popular — he thought that popularity contained a secret mystery and was very worthy of admiration. This manifested as the company hiring many people who were viral on Twitter, only to realize that the skill was completely orthogonal from the work we actually needed them to do. Many of those tweeters or famous bloggers turned out to be revoltingly cringe and mundane when asked to produce great ideas in a new environment. The switch in medium aside, it is very true that “what is popular” is not always the same as “what is actually good taste.” My thinking on this was sparked by a recently popular Tiktok criticizing Issey Miyake’s designs that were trying to bring couture to the masses. It’s truly not worth watching, instead I’d recommend reading this essay on Good Taste from Paul Graham.
I actually like Matthew Lynley’s substack if you’re looking to read about “what’s going on in AI.” I think it’s especially good because 1) he actually studied mathematics during university 2) he is a real journalist. The combo suggests someone who can write and actually understand the new concepts (math major as indicator of “this person is smart and analytical”.)
I also love Benn Stancil’s substack quite a bit. He’s clearly a thoughtful expert on data startups specifically and knows things about startups in general. He’s just consistently good at bringing up the things that you never talk about — read this post on the “emotionally informed company” about trusting intuition at startups.
Nikhil Krishnan — the best digital health analyst out there, I think — on the GLP-1 drugs. The UI of his site is REVOLTING, but I like the critique. Based on Nikhil’s analysis, a free company idea for all of you is to start a company like Hims that allows companies like LA Fitness and McDonalds to launch self-branded GLP-1s. Would you buy Mickey D’s Ozempic? Grimacezempic?
How are we going to cite AI amidst this plagiarism crisis? I don’t want to comment on the whole higher ed plagiarism crisis at all, but I do think citing AI is interesting. One trend/norm that I adore is the citation of the *prompt* used to generate an image in the caption of the image. It has helped me learn a lot about how to use the tools. Is AI generated text going to be considered “someone else’s words” or can I use them in a paper?
How to come out to your children about *not* being polyamorous. I snorted with laughter.
The Pitchfork shenanigans this week made me think of my favorite Pitchfork article, which is this one on Sky Ferriera. It’s the story of how psychological demons can destroy the creativity of even the brightest stars. The creative impulse — the drive to make things! — cannot be taught, but it can be stifled. The piece is haunting.
Lead! How do we get rid of lead in India, so that children’s’ IQ isn’t stifled? 50% of India’s children experience lead poisoning. I loved reading about the turmeric initiative from Bangladesh, but I think India’s problem is much more insidious. It was a big topic at Davos thanks to Samantha Power, but I’d be curious to see what comes of it.