Seth Werkheiser

LET THE MAINSTREAM COME TO YOU

I love this from Kel Rakowski, in their announcement of Popular Co.

“Stop trying to reach the mainstream. Let the mainstream come to you. When you’re building something real for a real community, the mainstream eventually has to pay attention.”

I TRUST BOOM

I can’t recommend BOOM enough.

If you do a lot of Zoom calls (I host 3 of them a week for Social Media Escape Club), look good, feel good, right??!

Instead of spending a bunch of money on a fancy camera, 4K converter, and everything else, get the best image from the device you’re using (in my case I use a Logitech Stream Cam).

I love being able to frame my video, and adjust exposure, vibrance, and all the other cool stuff.

UPGRADE YOURSELF

From Patrick Rhone:

“I have come to believe that the best and most cost effective technology upgrade that one can make is to themselves. I’m not talking cyborg implants here. I’m speaking about knowledge. That is, increasing your skill, aptitude, and understanding when it comes to any device, application, or tool.”

Years ago when I used to read all the bicycle magazines, it was hard to miss all the talk about saving weight. How new technology was shaving ounces off of stems, handlebars, seats!

All this shaving cost hundreds of dollars, of course. Lighter bikes and components costs thousands of dollars more than their heavier counterparts.

But I’ll never forget when someone wrote that it was easier and cheaper to lose 10lbs than shave 10lbs from your bike.

MAKING PEACE WITH THE DAY

Walking is so good, from Kate McCusker in The Guardian:

These days, walking is, for me, the exercise equivalent of hiding vegetables in my mashed potatoes: suddenly I’ve covered four miles in one stretch without really noticing. In the evenings, walking 90 minutes home from work is like making peace with the day, however good, bad or unremarkable it might have been.

A 90 minute walk in no joke. (via rebecca toh)

FIRST BIG SNOWFALL

Woke up to a winter wonderland this morning. After clearing off the deck and stairs, had to get out and take some photos.

Once the snow stops, “the boys come out to play” as my neighbor said.

UNPROFITABLE PATHS

A fun question posed to Kareem Rahma, about deciding on a “generally unprofitable path,” to which Kareem replied:

“I waited until I was 33 and had worked a couple of corporate jobs. I knew if I failed I could always go back to corporate life. I also didn’t stop working when I decided to pursue the comedy career. I did both at the same time!”

This came up in two different conversations today, regarding the whole “doing the thing love” versus doing something safer, or which makes better money.

Most people I know who are doing “the cool thing” for a living have are doing it after decades of hard work. I don’t know anyone who started making music or art or whatever and like, two months later they could quit their full time job.

“Consistency is key. You can’t be in the right place at the right time without showing up consistently. You have to fail—and keep failing—until you succeed. People see Keep The Meter Running and SubwayTakes, but they don’t see the ten other failures that helped me get here.”

Kareem Rahma over at Feed Me.

JUST HITTING PUBLISH

I write about writing in ‘PUBLISH OFTEN AND TALK ABOUT YOUR WORK,’ over at my Social Media Escape Club:

Conversations, in varying “live” settings, sharpened my ideas and my ability to express them.

This is how Cory Doctorow can riff about horrible corporations for over an hour and make it look easy.

We can all do this if we stop spending five hours a day on our phones.

We lose in followers, but we gain by honing our craft, finding our unique ways to express the ideas and concepts that will resonate with the right people.

I coulda spent 10 more hours editing and re-writing, but I feel just getting the post out there help me write a clearer post at some point down the road. Maybe that’s next week, or three months from now.

NO SUCH THING AS A ‘NATURAL DISASTER’

Olivia Rafferty briefly met Ilan Kelman, a Professor of Disasters and Health at UCL, after her talk about Pop Music and Geology. They met recently:

When I sat down with Ilan, I asked him: “what is the one thing related to your research that you wish the wider public knew?” and he said, “there is no such thing as a ‘natural disaster.’ There is just nature.”

Listen to Olivia’s music right here:

NO COMMENTS

Someone asked me recently why I don’t have comments enabled on this blog.

It sort of goes back to this post by John Gruber who writes Daring Fireball: https://daringfireball.net/2010/06/whats_fair

And my hero Seth Godin: https://seths.blog/2006/06/why_i_dont_have/

“First, I feel compelled to clarify or to answer every objection or to point out every flaw in reasoning. Second, it takes way too much of my time to even think about them, never mind curate them.”

Getting caught up in some reply threads on Substack Notes is enough.

Then there’s comments on my individual posts on Substack. Not many, but a few.

Then the number of emails I reply to, as well.

I have a Discord, but I’m shutting that down.

So comments on my two blogs? I just don’t want to invite MORE, you know? I’m about at capacity!

I’m going to write more on this soon, how all the time we spend posting on social media leads us to spend more time on social media replying, checking notifications, responding to DMs… like, is there a better use of 2-3 hours per day?

Could spending 2-3 hours a day on writing, or playing guitar, or walking 10 miles a day be a better use of time?