Aug 15
MC#015: Brains Are Weird —
🎼 Patterns of Creatives + 👯♂️ Sibling Author Rivalry + 💉 Placebos Are Wild
Aug 08
MC#014: Our Spreadsheet Overlords —
⏱ 1. How 60 minutes could change your life + 2. 🧮 Spreadsheets Rule the World + 3. 👨👩👧👦 Feeling Kinship in the Era of Technocapitalism
Aug 01
MC#013: Breaking Rules, Breaking Stereotypes —
♨️ Complexity and Product Lines
🎭 How Stereotype Shape Our Performance
🚫 Who Gets to Break the Rules?
Jul 25
MC#012: The Humor Edition —
🌗 Coping with dark humor + 👨🏾🏫 Funny teachers + 🎭 Sarah Cooper's comedic training + 😅 Are YOU funny? (quiz)
Jul 18
MC#011: The Gymnastics Edition —
🐥 Why gymnasts are young + 🎬 Athlete A + 👩🏾🏫 Simone's Masterclass
Jul 11
MC#010: Seeking a Benign Violator —
😅The Pleasure of Rule Breaking + 📋 Making it Easier to Send + 🎮 Gaming = Fun Work
Jul 04
MC#009: Decade of Insights —
20 books 📚 that made a difference for me in the last 🔟 years
Jun 29
How Tech Workers are Finding Their Footing in a Pandemic —
This piece first appeared in Fast Company
[https://www.fastcompany.com/90515519/tech-workers-are-showing-the-effects-of-covid-19-related-burnout]
The start of 2020 should have been an energizing time for me, personally and
professionally. I had just returned from a long-awaited holiday honeymoon and
closed a new round of funding for my startup. But I found
Jun 27
MC#008: Not So Secret Memo —
🧮 Advertising: Profitable (and therefore Taxable?) + 🚜 The Resilience and Fragility of Rubber + 🪐 Ring Strength
Jun 20
MC#007: The Infant Mindset —
How Rejection Works + Thinking Like a Baby + Making Mistakes
Jun 20
My Pandemic Burnout Piece in Fast Company —
Double header this weekend! Back to your regularly scheduled Making Connections
newsletter next Saturday.
Have heard from a lot of folks who appreciated my piece in Fast Company on how
tech workers are experiencing burnout in the face of the pandemic
[https://www.fastcompany.com/90515519/tech-workers-are-showing-the-effects-of-covid-19-related-burnout]
. I spoke to
Jun 13
On Protests and Movements —
This is an attempt to integrate a series of shorter, related writings that I’ve
published in my newsletter [http://jasonshen.substack.com] over the last few
weeks. Much of it touches on the Black Lives Matter movement, which I wrote
about back in 2016,
[https://www.jasonshen.com/2016/
Jun 13
MC#006: The Exponential —
Bounded performance vs unbounded success. The Thief of Joy. A Movement's Tipping Point.
Jun 07
MC#005: Protest Edition —
The Law of the Instrument. When Aggressive Tactics Backfire. How Much Money is Enough? Who Guards the Guards?
May 30
Making Connections #004 | What opportunity looks like, learning by shipping & the arc of social progress —
Hey friends,
Welcome back the 4th edition of Making Connections, where we take a random walk
down tech, fitness, product thinking, org design, nerd culture, persuasion, and
behavior change.
Today we’re talking about what opportunity looks like, learning by shipping &
the arc of social progress
1. Knowing the
May 23
Making Connections #003 —
Biological thinking, no sweat workouts, "talent needs trauma", birthday coaching
May 16
Making Connections #002 (purpose, iteration, social games, + more) —
Hey friends,
Welcome back the 2nd edition of Making Connections, where we take a random walk
down tech, fitness, product thinking, org design, nerd culture, persuasion, and
behavior change.
1. Dan Pink's "Small P" and "Big P" Purpose
Psychology | Burnout
I was talking to
May 11
The Product Genius Behind Jackbox Games —
This article first appeared on TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2020/05/04/all-product-creators-can-learn-something-from-jackbox-games-user-experiences/]
During this periodof shelter-in-place, people have had to seek out new forms of
entertainment and social interaction. Many have turned to a niche party series
made by a company best known for an irreverent trivia game in
May 09
Making Connections #001 —
A list of TikTok formats, why friction can be good, working out with a mask, and Pmarca's It's Time to Build
May 08
Making Connections #001 (audio) —
00:18 - Incomplete List of TikTok Formats
02:57 - Friction Theory
04:01 - Working out with an N95 mask will not supercharge your fitness
06:04 - My problem with “It’s Time to Build”
Article link: Making Connections #001 [https://www.jasonshen.com/making-connections-001/]