~the-official-medium | Bookmarks (98)

Treat AI like your highly productive assistant who must be aggressively micromanaged

medium.com

On Wednesday, we sent out a newsletter about “two-pizza teams,” a nickname for the supposedly “best”...
On Wednesday, we sent out a newsletter about “two-pizza teams,” a nickname for the supposedly “best” size for highly effective, cooperative groups of people: 4–6, or just enough to consume two pizzas. The term was coined by Jeff Bezos in Amazon’s company’s earliest days, though it doesn’t really matter what industry...

ai ideas work
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Maybe self-control isn’t about willpower, but about who (and what) we trust

medium.com

In the late 1960s, researchers at Stanford conducted what became known as the Marshmallow Test. A...
In the late 1960s, researchers at Stanford conducted what became known as the Marshmallow Test. A preschooler was placed in a room with a marshmallow and given a choice: eat it now, or wait a few minutes and receive two marshmallows instead. Early findings suggested that children who could wait tended to be more suc...

personal development personal-development psychology self control self-control
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The magic of a “two pizza” team

medium.com

The first team I was part of at Medium was our “story matching and reader habits”...
The first team I was part of at Medium was our “story matching and reader habits” team, responsible for (you guessed it…) matching stories with readers and helping them return to the app. We didn’t call it that. We affectionately named it “Matcha” because this was 2017 and matcha (the drink) was newly trendy. The ac...

organizational psychology organizational-psychology teamwork tech
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The power of a “silent walk”

medium.com

For the last three months, I’ve spent most of my days on a college campus in...
For the last three months, I’ve spent most of my days on a college campus in the beautiful state of Vermont. I walk to work past a placid pond, beneath trees that chirp with birds — especially now that the frost is behind us, and the warmer months loom. Do you want to know the one thing that has helped me, a city gi...

mental health mental-health peace silence
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What Pope Francis was really like, as told by someone who worked for him

medium.com

Last month, in issue #293, we mentioned the concept of the “Medium version” — a personal...
Last month, in issue #293, we mentioned the concept of the “Medium version” — a personal perspective on the news, and a story that offers insights from someone who’s lived through an experience most of us have only heard about second- or third-hand. These stories are, in my opinion, the promise of the internet (and ...
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Draft Day 2025: Live blog

medium.com

Image created by Jason CombsIt’s draftin’ time, people! Draft Day comes but once a year, and...
Image created by Jason CombsIt’s draftin’ time, people! Draft Day comes but once a year, and it’s your moment to dust off a story or idea you’ve been sitting on for a while and publish it.I’m your host for Draft Day this year, and we’re going to be live from Draft Day HQ from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. ET over in our Writing...

draft day 2025 draft-day-2025 topic page
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Can you pass this misinformation quiz?

medium.com

The word “misinformation” entered the discourse somewhere at the end of the 2010s (here’s the Google...
The word “misinformation” entered the discourse somewhere at the end of the 2010s (here’s the Google trends chart showing a spike around 2020, probably covid-related). We all vaguely know what it means — false or misleading information — but as with most abstract concepts, applying it to real life is the difficult p...

media media criticism media literacy media-criticism media-literacy
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Keep up to date with Medium writers you love even more easily

medium.com

community email medium product writing
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Science isn’t about certainty. It’s about openness.

medium.com

We like to think science means progress. And most of the time, it does. But as...
We like to think science means progress. And most of the time, it does. But as tech founder and CEO Matthew Gilpin points out in a recent piece, progress doesn’t always mean breakthroughs.Sometimes it means admitting you were wrong. Sometimes it just means saying, “I don’t know.”Gilpin emphasizes that science, when ...

bias consensus science scientific method scientific-method
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The “dark patterns” in your favorite apps that keep you hooked

medium.com

To be a smartphone gamer is to be constantly on the watch for scam apps (or...
To be a smartphone gamer is to be constantly on the watch for scam apps (or “scapps,” a term I just made up). My step-daughter and I have an ongoing conversation about Our Regrettable App Store Downloads, like “free” games are quickly unusable without in-app purchases, or ones that feature leaderboards that say you’...

dark patterns dark ux dark-patterns dark-ux ux
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How to “rewild” your life

medium.com

Today is Earth Day, a holiday first observed on April 22, 1970 in the wake of...
Today is Earth Day, a holiday first observed on April 22, 1970 in the wake of an oil spill. Three million gallons of crude oil oozed into the ocean off the coast of Santa Barbara in 1969, decimating over 10,000 seabirds, dolphins, seals, and sea lions. A 53-year-old senator and former governor of Wisconsin, Gaylord ...

conservation earth day earth-day ecology natural disasters
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How will tariffs affect your dinner?

medium.com

This month, President Trump imposed 10% tariffs on all foreign-made goods, and has been escalating a...
This month, President Trump imposed 10% tariffs on all foreign-made goods, and has been escalating a trade war with China, threatening tariffs up to 150 percent. As these tariffs take hold, it’s impossible not to wonder how higher prices will affect every part of our daily lives. I’ve already begun panic-ordering lo...

budgeting cooking food tariffs
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The myth of “neutral reporting”

medium.com

We’re taught that journalism is meant to be objective. But anyone who’s worked in the field...
We’re taught that journalism is meant to be objective. But anyone who’s worked in the field — or even thought seriously about it — knows that isn’t true. As health and science writer Robert Roy Britt explores in a recent piece, the idea that reporters can fully remove themselves from the story is more about optics t...

bias journalism media literacy media-literacy neutrality
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The tool is not the skill

medium.com

I came across a story on Medium recently that does something all good essays do (I...
I came across a story on Medium recently that does something all good essays do (I think): It says the quiet part out loud. And it concerns a topic we’ve discussed from multiple angles here in the Medium Newsletter: what the advent of AI means for people who make things with words, images, sounds, and ideas.Agustin ...

ai creativity design skills skills development
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Your story matters: Join us on April 25th for Draft Day 2025

medium.com

Image created by Jason CombsEvery person on the planet has wisdom to share. Stories are a...
Image created by Jason CombsEvery person on the planet has wisdom to share. Stories are a way for us to connect with and learn from each other, and everyone has a story, whether or not we always realize it. And by “everyone,” I mean you.On Friday, April 25th, 9 AM to 7 PM ET, we’re hosting our second annual Draft Da...

community draft day 2025 draft-day-2025 medium what i wish i knew
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Space tourism is “the ultimate boutique spiritual experience”

medium.com

On Monday, Katy Perry, Gayle King, and four others flew into space for 11 minutes and...
On Monday, Katy Perry, Gayle King, and four others flew into space for 11 minutes and then promptly came back down to Earth. Perry sang Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” while staring down at all of us. Jeff Bezos and Oprah (King’s best friend) were among the small group of spectators in western Texas watch...

blue origin blue-origin space space exploration space tourism
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“A good story fixes reality in one place”

medium.com

A few weeks ago, in issue #303, we mentioned Jim the AI Whisperer’s perspective on AI-generated...
A few weeks ago, in issue #303, we mentioned Jim the AI Whisperer’s perspective on AI-generated art (particularly the Ghiblifiction of everything) and his vision of a hyperpersonalized future: “Don’t want to see the live-action Snow White?” he wrote, “Reanimate it as Studio Ghibli. Don’t appreciate Rachel Zegler? Wi...

ai storytelling writing
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Yes to a diverse community

medium.com

Over the past several months, I’ve gotten questions from the Medium community asking if we’re planning...
Over the past several months, I’ve gotten questions from the Medium community asking if we’re planning to change our policies in reaction to recent political pressure against diversity, equity, and inclusion. As some companies dismantle their programs and walk back their commitments, we would like to state our stanc...

business diversity diversity and inclusion diversity in tech diversity-and-inclusion
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Most workplaces are optimized for efficiency, not emotional truth

medium.com

One piece of advice for you this week, from the Executive Director of Case Research at...
One piece of advice for you this week, from the Executive Director of Case Research at Harvard, Carin-Isabel Knoop: Bring your emotions to work.In an essay about the unspoken feelings many of us carry into our jobs (and throughout our lives), Isabel-Knoop asks: Is there something you’re carrying alone that you wish ...

emotional intelligence emotional-intelligence work workplace culture workplace-culture
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It happened on Medium: March 2025 round-up

medium.com

Sometimes, I worry that my brain is pickled.In the 18 years since the iPhone launched, I’ve...
Sometimes, I worry that my brain is pickled.In the 18 years since the iPhone launched, I’ve felt like my attention span has cratered, I’ve become much more easily distracted, and I am far more likely to ruminate on something I’ve read online. Taking into account the five years of a global pandemic and the natural ag...

medium writing
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Why now might be the perfect time to try writing under a nom de plume

medium.com

Two of my good friends write under pen names. They do this for many reasons. Some...
Two of my good friends write under pen names. They do this for many reasons. Some are practical: They have relatively high-profile day jobs and want to maintain professional Google search results. Others are spiritual: When they write, they want to feel like someone else. They want to feel free. They don’t want to b...

history society writing
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Why your digital self isn’t really you

medium.com

Brain emulation, or mind uploading, is the idea that your brain could be scanned, simulated, and...
Brain emulation, or mind uploading, is the idea that your brain could be scanned, simulated, and reanimated in code. It’s still speculative, but the idea is gaining traction in both tech and neuroscience circles. Two recent essays explore where it might lead.Rutgers professor Rick Mammone lays out the scientific cas...

brain emulation brain-emulation consciousness mind uploading mind-uploading
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Leadership is a fundamentally creative act

medium.com

“I remember standing in my father’s tofu factory as a child,” writes Microsoft engineering VP John...
“I remember standing in my father’s tofu factory as a child,” writes Microsoft engineering VP John Maeda on Medium, “watching him transform simple ingredients into something nourishing through both labor and artistry.” It’s a memory Maeda has returned to repeatedly throughout his career, particularly in his time as ...

leadership leadership development leadership skills leadership-development leadership-skills
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Your reactions to yesterday’s newsletter on AI-generated imagery

medium.com

Yesterday, I shared a few perspectives from Medium writers on ChatGPT’s new image generation feature —...
Yesterday, I shared a few perspectives from Medium writers on ChatGPT’s new image generation feature — particularly the Studio Ghibli trend — and received a record number of responses. Here are a few of the most thoughtful ones we’ve come across, from all of you…The conversation veered from rejection to openness to ...
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