Chicago today (via @micahuetricht)
I beg young people to travel. If you don’t have a passport, get one. Take a summer, get a backpack and go to Delhi, go to Saigon, go to Bangkok, go to Kenya. Have your mind blown. Eat interesting food. Dig some interesting people. Have an adventure. Be careful. Come back and you’re going to see your country differently, you’re going to see your president differently, no matter who it is. Music, culture, food, water. Your showers will become shorter. You’re going to get a sense of what globalization looks like. It’s not what Tom Friedman writes about; I’m sorry. You’re going to see that global climate change is very real. And that for some people, their day consists of walking 12 miles for four buckets of water. And so there are lessons that you can’t get out of a book that are waiting for you at the other end of that flight. A lot of people—Americans and Europeans—come back and go, ohhhhh. And the light bulb goes on.
Hear, Hear.
Things That Scare Lauren Leto: Instagram could have beat Facebook
Instagram could have beat Facebook.
Here’s why.
Reflected in the ubiquity of Apple devices, people value design above anything else. Due to the product’s exaltation of design, Instagram is less geared for overshare than Facebook, relieving the eye rolling which occurs when popping open…
But Zynga and Facebook? They seem more able to be toppled. It seems possible to knock them off of their throne. Two companies, OMGPOP and Instagram, came out of nowhere and became viable competitors. That’s kind of amazing. It’s amazing to me that Instagram got 30 million users in no time at all. It’s crazy that Draw Something can get 50 million downloads in 50 days. It’s mind blowing that Pinterest went from nothing to 10 million users in the blink of an eye. It’s amazing how fragile it all is. Facebook may be the first viable threat to Google, but its own market dominance is by no means assured.
Instagram and the Age of Upsets | Betabeat — News, gossip and intel from Silicon Alley 2.0.
A whole new world. My latest column for Betabeat.
(via rickwebb)
(via soupsoup)
Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their own customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking.
beautiful visualization of where NBA players make their shots from. The author, Kirk Goldsberry, even breaks it down by different player positions, and uses it to analyze specific player tendencies.
Landing.
A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.
MEGALOPOLIS The Eastern Seaboard is seen alight from the International Space Station. (Photo via NASA)
(via npr)
Smart everything: Even lampposts are now connected.
Cool, but bet it’s hackable leading to a potential nightmare.
Whale Shark, New Guinea
Photo: Michael Aw“Suddenly he just jumped in!” says photographer Michael Aw. Sarmin Tangadji, the Papua police officer who escorted the photographic team to where the sharks congregate, “was so excited to see them up close.” Aw shares that excitement when it comes to diving with a dozen whale sharks: “You are sandwiched in, sharks ahead and behind, but you want to be there,” he says. “They make eye contact with you and then charge by. It blows your mind.”
