I’m high on Ted Lasso. In the latest episode (S2E05), Roy Kent had the following ‘comments’ to ‘predict’ how a 17-year-old prodigy will play in his debut game.
I told you, I don't know.
All we do is sit around here and guess what a bunch of little pricks are gonna go and do out there, then we come back at halftime, and we complain 'cause they didn't do exactly what we thought they'd do.
We don't know. Of course we don't know.
We're not in the locker rooms with them. We're not on the pitch with them. We can't look 'em in the eyes and encourage them to be better than they ever thought they were capable of being.
We're just-- We're just on the outside looking in. Judging them.
It reminded me of the Man in the Arena by Theodore Roosevelt.
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs; who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
Ted Lasso rates ‘highly recommended’ in my list of TV shows in recent times. Find time, give it a watch. You’re going to love it.
For now, let’s dig in today’s interesting reads.
1.
How to remember anything forever-ish
I had briefly read about Spaced Repetition and Anki app some time back. Somehow, I did not explore it further. This comic/game does a wonderful job of explaining it in a very simple & fun way. I’m still figuring out where I can apply it, but this looks like something worth trying out.
2.
Amusement parks, crowd control, and load-balancing
I’ve been following Disney for inspiration around how to create delightful experiences. A lot is written about them and most of it is worth emulating.
This 6 part series shares a contrarian view on some of Disney’s design & execution efforts. It focuses on efforts around the guest experience, crowd control and load balancing. It is a long read but worth reading if you are open to question some of your beliefs around Disney magic. If nothing else, it is filled with nuggets of wisdom and some classic sarcasm. Give it a read in your free time. Here’s a bit or two to get you started.
“Relieving traffic by widening highways is like losing weight by eating ice-cream — no matter how many calories you burn by lifting the spoon to your mouth, it will never offset the calories in the ice cream.”
“There’s a name for a race where you have to run faster and faster just to stay in one place: the Red Queen’s race.
Red Queen’s races are everywhere. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail, so whatever it is you’re good at, you’ll do more of." As the saying goes, “When you find yourself at the bottom of a hole, stop digging.”
3.
20 ideas for better data visualization
We spend a lot of time creating charts to show information, trends & insights. This medium post shares 20 ideas to become better at this. These are simple inputs. But don't underestimate their effectiveness. The author has used many don’ts and do’s led views to showcase the improvement in storytelling.
My 3 key takeaways:
Focus on legibility. Typography should help in communicating information. It should help users focus on data, rather than distracting from it.
Let data speak for itself. Unnecessary styling can cause misinterpretation of the data and create false impressions.
Avoid confusing the dual-axis. They are hard to read on most occasions.
4.
Some random goodness from the internet:
Youtube: Boston Dynamics keep upping their product demo game every other month now. Check out the latest Parkour gig, if you’ve not yet seen it. While we're at it, the below snippet caught my attention in one of the newsletters I follow. I had to share it here, the joke is on me too.
Youtube: Stop motion videos can be mesmerizing. Watch this 7-minute long video to see mundane objects magically morph into delightful visual treats. Hats off to the creativity!
Longread: This is Cast Away minus Wilson. Story of a man lost at sea for 14 months and finally found ashore 6700 miles away.
Web: The Infinitely zooming image. The way one image gives way to another is amazing. Beware, it gets trippy after a point.
I’m adding a new element to the newsletter from this week onwards. Here’s a snapshot of a tweet worth saving.
That's all for this week, folks!
Last week’s post had a 46% open rate. 110 subscribers will get ‘Stay Curious’ in their email this week.
I write this newsletter to share what I learnt from others. If you learnt something from this today, can you forward it to a couple of your friends to continue this chain?