Mr. Brightside will never die!!
Fake northern lights, funeral scams, the cutest robot ever, and more
Hey friends, welcome back to Follow Friday! You get an extra-long newsletter since I was on vacation last week. But first, here is an AI-generated duck trying to sleep in because he is jetlagged lazy and could everyone stop making so much noise?
📰 What I’m reading
Podcasting isn’t a technology problem: “I see a deep imbalance in the kind of help being offered, which seems to show an industry-wide misunderstanding of what will make a new podcast successful. We are teaching people how to deliver, but not what to deliver. There is vast attention to systems for logistics, delivery, and marketing, but only a cursory nod to how to make shows that are worth listening to in the first place.” PREACH!
Meta commits a really stupid AI faux pas: “Oh look, our feed is full of amazing photographs of people enjoying the Northern lights. Let's quickly tell them that they can fucking fake it instead. Ugh.”
The financialization of fandom: “If positive fans can generate more money--a tall ask, and a marketing responsibility that shouldn't be on them--a thing might stick around; if negative fans can cost a company more money, or even just the threat of it, a thing might get the axe. This feels like it puts the average viewer in a bind: a show can be cancelled if there isn't enough instant buzz and viewer numbers for it, but it also can't necessarily be saved by all the passion and fandom it can muster.”
I haven’t been reading as much news as I usually do, due to the aforementioned vacation. But you know what holds up? Speaker For the Dead, the first sequel to Ender’s Game, which was written to be enjoyable on its own. I still have my old copy of it from high school, but if you’re going to read it, I’d encourage you to buy it used or borrow it from your local library, because the author is … a big problem.
🎧 What I’m listening to
I’ve been a fan of Kelsey McKinney’s podcast Normal Gossip since its very early episodes, although I admit that I missed a bunch of seasons 5 and 6 starting last year. No spoilers, but … the first episode of season 7, “Forbidden Feline Fanfiction with Ashley Reese,” convinced me I HAVE to go back and listen to everything I missed; dozens of episodes in, this podcast is still outrageously funny, and one of the best ones to listen to with a friend or partner.
Speaking of new seasons, rock critic Rob Harvilla is back with a promising — albeit awkwardly titled — new season of his podcast for The Ringer: “60 Songs That Explain the 90s: The 2000s.” I guess they couldn’t change the main title for SEO reasons? Whatever, the show is still fantastic, and Rob still goes on long digressions about topics like erotic poetry and Cormac McCarthy. And somehow, he reliably arrives back at world-beating analyses of era-defining songs, such as the millennial anthem “Mr. Brightside” by the Killers.
And I’ve edited a bunch of podcast episodes that have published since my last newsletter, so let’s start with this one from Lock and Code: David Ruiz interviews two of his colleagues at Malwarebytes, Zach Hinkle and Pieter Arntz, about a disturbing new type of scam: Phony Facebook funeral livestreams. They go over how the scam works, what to watch out for, and why its victims are so susceptible.
On Grit, there’ve been two new episodes you should check out — first is Klarna CEO & co-founder Sebastian Siemiatkowski, who talks to Joubin Mirzadegan about the feeling of being a “country cousin” as a tech exec in Sweden. They also discuss partnering with OpenAI, pushing yourself into your “stretch zone,” reinventing an established company and more.
And most recently, Joubin also interviewed Magic Leap founder Rony Abovitz about the state of mixed-reality headsets, the importance of founder voting power, giving the worst startup pitch of all time, and Rony’s efforts to create a more optimistic & democratic way forward for emerging tech. It’s a long interview but absolutely worth your time; the minutes flew by even as I was editing it.
Almost done, two more! On Building Better CMOs, Greg Stuart interviewed Nissan’s global CMO Allyson Witherspoon about why “creativity is queen,” the danger of over-reliance on AI for creativity, and how she adapted her leadership style as an American for colleagues in Japan. You can also read the full interview as a podcast transcript with chapters.
And finally, I edited this episode of Greymatter for the venture capital firm Greylock: An interview between their partner Saam Motamedi and Alvaro Morales, the CEO of the built-for-AI billing company Orb. Alvaro talks about what a new $25 million funding round means for his company, how pricing for digital services has evolved, competing with the Goliaths of the billing vertical and more.
I also edited the video version of this interview. Take a look!
🙏 Hey, thanks!
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If you or your business/school/organization are looking for help starting a podcast or leveling up an existing show, please get in touch with me at LightningPod. All experience levels are welcome!
💯 The single best thing I’ve seen online this week
is this furry mental wellness robot designed by Casio. Only $398 if someone wants to buy it for me:
🍿 What I’m watching
Movie - stars - review
The Wild Robot (2024) - ★★★★ - Gorgeously animated, frequently funny, and emotionally manipulative in the best ways. One of the few Dreamworks films that could pass for top-tier Pixar. The third act dragged a little longer than I would have liked, but I loved the subtle ways we learn about Roz’s world without having it explicitly shouted at us.
South Pacific (1958) - ★★ - ⬇️
“Hey Joshua, we want you to direct the movie version of this big musical.”
“Is it off the charts racist?”
“Joshua, please. This is 1958. OF COURSE it is!”
“OK, good. How are the songs?”
“There’s like one and a half good ones, but we’ll run them over and over again until the movie is 3 hours long.”
“Good enough for me! I just have one condition.”
“Anything!”
“This is going to be filmed in a gorgeous tropical location, right?”
“Yes! We’re filming in Hawaii!”
“OK, I’d like to ruin most that footage with a sickly yellow filter.”
“Genius! You’re hired!”
The Descendants (2011) - ★★★ - This dramedy opens with a clear idea: “Fuck paradise.” Even in Hawai’i, George Clooney’s character tells us, things can go badly and life can be hard, which is a clear enough setup for the story that’s about to unfold. Sure enough, things are not as pretty as they seem. But for the rest of its runtime, the movie fails to draw enough connecting lines between its A plot — an unfolding family tragedy — and its B plot, the potential sale of a piece of pristine Kauai real estate. The two stories do intersect eventually, but pacing problems and a few unearned tonal swings make it hard to get closure with the story. For what it’s worth, though, the supporting cast — including Shailene Woodley as elder daughter Alexandra and Matthew Lillard as a real estate agent with a secret — does great work.
Lilo & Stitch (2002) - ★★★★ - The ultimate found family picture. One of the most underrated Disney animated movies, a post-Renaissance gem that never fails to make me laugh AND cry. A lot of that should be credited to the character of Nani, who didn’t even register with me when I was a kid.
Saturday Night (2024) - ★★★ - This wants so hard to be an Aaron Sorkin movie, and I imagine Aaron Sorkin wishes he had had a crack at the script. I love the near-real time pace, and the ensemble cast does some impressing impressions, but SNL today isn’t the countercultural bomb that Lorne Michaels describes it as here; it IS the mainstream. Saturday Night is inaccessible as a work of drama to viewers who don’t know the celebrities and sketches being recreated, and underwhelming to those who do. Anyway it’s probably going to win Best Picture, so I’m just resigning myself to that now.
Follow me on Letterboxd for more reviews as-they-happen!
💀 What I’m TikTok-ing
My partner says this is ridiculous and not funny
🦆 About the Ducks
ChatGPT didn’t quite understand what I was going for here, but I think you get the gist. Here’s my original prompt:
draw a colorful picture, with a landscape aspect ratio, of a duck lying in bed, trying to cover its ears with a pillow. outside of its window are several other ducks making noise: one blowing into a trumpet, another using a jackhammer, another driving a big rig truck and blowing its horn, etc.
I was curious how that “etc.” would affect things. Here was the initial output, which has a lot of … etc.
I prefer the second illustration overall, but I like this art style better. Kinda funny how both ducks seem to have an airhorn on their beds; some days, I could use that. And they both have duck-related artwork that pokes out of the frame.