Have generative conversations and then make something - Monday Links

Table of Contents

Announcement: I’m Going to Miss You, But I Am Taking a Sabbatical: Jason Kottke’s announcement is personal, but it touches on what allows great people to do great work: to have space to think, to value connections, and to get out of routines and habits that aren’t serving you well. A vacation isn’t enough - sometimes you need to find space with no end date in mind. I feel this - I mean if you want to know why I chose to leave Disney instead of taking a leave of absence, this is basically it in one sentence: “In this NY Times feature, Alexandra Bell said this about how art is made: ‘I need some space to think and live and have generative conversations and do things, and then I’ll make something, but I can’t tell you what it is just yet.’” In a way, my dad’s health may have helped me find that space to get more creative.

Cautionary Tales from Cryptoland: Get ready for a couple of back-to-back links to stuff from Molly White, the creator of Web3 Is Going Just Great. This interview is part of a series from Harvard Business Review on Web3. It’s one of the most thoughtful sketpic posts I’ve seen. Love that she included so many links that go deeper into a broad set of concerns about the Web3 vision.
The (Edited) Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto: The second post from Molly White is her annotations on the NYT feature on Crypto (I linked to it a few weeks ago, too).
A Metaverse Manifesto, Part 8: Do I Need a Metaverse Strategy?: Lest I seem like a blockchain hater, I’m actually not. I just think the hype has leapt ahead of where the technology itself is. If you look at a number of projects out there that are not as shiny as the popular NFT stuff, there’s a lot of interesting work going on. What that means, though, is that if you’re just a regular person out there running a business, it’s likely you don’t need to be doing anything in the blockchain realm. Pay attention, look for opportunities but otherwise, just wait. Katie’s piece offers a common sense framework for when you may want a metaverse strategy.
How One Rogue Exec Thrust Levi’s Into the Culture Wars: What happens when a key executive becomes an active participant in the political conversation around “controversial” topics? Levi’s found out.

How big companies kill ideas — and how to fight back, with Tony Fadell: I started his new book, Build, late last week after listening to this episode of Decoder. That’s how much I enjoyed it. Good interview.
#17: A Lighthouse, But No Captain: I just love the this notion that data is a lighthouse, but it can’t replace the need for a competent captain.

Distributed Identity Projects: An area of interest for me in blockchain tech is in identity, entitlements, and personal data. There a number of interesting projects, these are a few things I’m reading more about:
- ION: Microsoft founded project that builds on top of Bitcoin’s chain using the Sidetree protocol.
- Polygon ID: Built on top of the Iden3 protocol on Ethereum.
- Stych launched Vessel: Saw this announcement from passwordless auth provider Stych about a browser extension that aims to bring regular “web2” auth together with Web3 wallets. Might jog some ideas on a migration path from the old world to the new.