It's not exactly a secret that once-reputable news brands (looking at you, CNN) have been squeezing money out of online eyeballs by publishing product reviews and recommendations with affiliate links and other non-obvious exchanges of data value.
They no longer even bother making these "articles" unique. The headlines follow the same formula: "I've tried (x) of [product] and only (y) deliver." Oh, really? Tell me more!
Readers don't know know they're purchasers until they read these suggestions and click through. What else can they be programmed to do? Is the power of suggestion limited to the dark side of ultra processed foods and divisive politics. Can (should) we use these powers for good and harness them in service to collective actions like volunteering or community composting?
I'd like to learn more about what's going right in your online world. If you've designed, led, or run across an example of effective online strategy that has recently galvanized viewers into becoming active participants – in a positive way – please let me know.
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Some of the smartest, most successful people I've ever met used the simplest, most obvious tools and techniques. What's your favorite hammer? Drop me a line – I’m curious!
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Open-Source Learning is yours. Free. Get the white paper here. Use what works and customize whatever you need, however you want. I’m here to help.
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Curiosity is worth practicing. That’s how we get better at it. When it’s done particularly well, curiosity can be elevated to an art form. Curiosity makes life worth living. I am literally Curious AF. And now you can be too! Click HERE to unlock your free membership subscription.
Here is a taste of what I’m doing, reading, watching, and thinking about.
What I’m Reading –
Three hundred fifteen million years ago, a photon slipped free from the clutches of its parent star and raced 93 million miles across the void. Some 99.9999999 percent of its fellow photons kept on sailing past eternity. A rare few, after billions of miles, bounced off the craters and canyons of some savagely bleak world in the outer solar system. Still others – after a billion billion miles more – mutely scattered off disembodied nebulae, drifting through space. But our photon was headed to the most interesting place in the known universe: the Earth.
So begins "The Story of CO2 Is the Story of Everything" by science writer Peter Brannen. From the New York Times Review of Books:
"This ambitious, absorbing book begins with the origins of life and stretches through the rise of human civilization and technology, including all the modern woes associated now with the troublesome greenhouse gas.
By the end, the reader feels convinced: Evolution and human prehistory and wars and the Dutch East Indies Company and the attack on Pearl Harbor and Reagan and Thatcher and and and and and and. … All of it looks like the story of carbon dioxide, after all."
Tech That Finally Solves Your Younger Self's Gmail Address Problem –
When I taught high school courses, I routinely advised students who were writing resumes to open new Gmail accounts with usernames that were more professional than their eighth grade choices.
Now, according to Android Authority, you can change your Google account username without losing your data. The path: Google Account settings → Personal Info → Email → Google Account email → Change Google Account email. Google started testing the feature earlier this year and it's now widely available across the US.
Quotes I’m pondering –
In late March, while I was huffing and puffing through the Ironman triathlon in Oceanside, CA, my wife and daughter attended the local version of "No Kings," the largest national protest in American history. They held simple signs with thought-provoking quotes.
You ask me what forces me to speak? A strange thing; my conscience.
– Victor Hugo
It is a sin to be silent when it is your duty to protest.
– Abraham Lincoln
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Best,
Know someone who is also Curious AF? Please share this edition with them!
David Preston
Educator & Author
Latest book: ACADEMY OF ONE
Over 800 subscribers
