I spend several hours every week exploring content on technology, business, society, mindfulness, and well-being — and thinking about the connections between ideas and what might be coming next. Every other Saturday, I send out a list of the best material I've found over the previous two weeks and some new ideas from me. These can include articles, podcasts, books, shows, gadgets, quotes, practices, and more.
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Hi friends 👋,
In the past two weeks, on the work side, I’ve been busy launching a new product after a 2+ year-long effort. I also spent some time playing with crypto NFTs and watching a great new show. Here are the highlights.
3 Top Picks
I. 📈 Crypto trend I’m trying to wrap my head around —
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs). They are digital assets - currently mostly built on the Etherum blockchain - that represent a wide range of unique tangible and intangible items, from collectible sports cards to virtual real estate, art, and even digital sneakers. I know, weird, but the total NFT market is now worth $250 million and quickly growing.
💡 Ideas
NFTs are digitally scarce. They are easier to store, sell, authenticate, collateralize, tokenize, value, and have stronger property rights than physical assets.
Marketplaces: OpenSea (digital art, domain names, virtual worlds, collectibles), NBA Top Shot (where limited copies of LeBron James' dunks sell for up to $200,000), Rarible (art, collectibles), and more.
Wallets: tools like MetaMask (2M+ users) allow to store keys for Ethereum-based cryptocurrencies and integrates with most NFT marketplaces to easily send and receive tokens.
DeFi exchanges: unlike centralized exchanges like Binance and Coinbase, exchanges like Uniswap and SushiSwap (a fork of the former with a UI that looks like a menu at a Japanese restaurant) allow traders to swap Ethereum-based tokens with one another without order books, custodianship, or intermediary oversight of any kind, but instead using liquidity pools.
🔗 Links
Trends #0050 — Non-Fungible Tokens (Trends.vc)
NBA Top Shot Collectibles Continues Meteoric Rise With Over $50 Million In Sales In A Week (Forbes)
II. 📺 Show on kindness and compassionate management that I’m enjoying —
Ted Lasso on Apple TV+. A show that at first could seem like a traditional sports comedy turns out to send a message that is antithetical to that genre: the notion that being a decent person and treating other people with respect is more important than who scored the most goals.
Ted Lasso is the Mister Rogers of managers: he sincerely wants to help his team grow and thrive with kindness and relentless positivity and optimism. It’s a lesson in compassionate, egoless management and in practicing forgiveness of others and of ourselves.
If there is one new show that you’ll watch over the next few weeks, give "Ted Lasso" a try, even if it means subscribing to one more streaming service, and let me know what you think!
III. 🧠 Neuroscience podcast I’m learning a lot from —
Huberman Lab by Dr. Andrew Huberman (@hubermanlab). I’m finding this new podcast one of the best ways to learn about neuroscience at a good level of depth, while still being easily digestible and practical for everyone. The topics range from the theory of how the nervous system works to sleep, dreams, mindfulness, memory, and more, with very practical tips along the way.
1 Idea from Me
🌵 New morning habit I’m experimenting with —
For the last two weeks, I’ve been participating in a short silent meditation every morning at 8 am PST on Clubhouse, in a room hosted by Eric and Soren.
My experience so far:
To create a new habit, make it a recurrent routine happening at the same time. Clubhouse seems to work well for this because the room is just two taps away, it’s audio-only, and participation in the chat after the meditation is completely optional.
Practicing with others regularly helps create a sense of accountability which helps reinforce the habit, especially when you look forward to meeting the same people every day.
Social audio is accessible everywhere: last weekend I joined the call from our airstream Airbnb in the middle of the desert in the Joshua Tree area. On vacation, I would have normally skipped the session, but the presence of the group made it easy to stick to the habit. Changing location and being in closer contact with nature made the meditation even more enjoyable.
What does your meditation practice look like? If you don’t have one, are there particular reasons or challenges you’ve faced?
And if you’re looking for something new, I’d love it if you could join us and try this morning session.
Thanks for reading! As always, please let me know your thoughts in the comments below or by replying to the email. I look forward to connecting with you soon.
Be well and be kind,
Matteo