Our longtime friend, Austin Kleon, has a great newsletter.
Every week, he sends out ten links of stuff he finds interesting. New writers, new businesses, new ideas, new music.
There’s no theme, other than it’s just stuff Austin likes.
There’s no A-B testing beforehand, no test marketing to try to second-guess what the audience would prefer to receive in their inbox.
It’s just Austin. Nothing but Austin.
And hey, it works.
Why? Because it’s human. There’s no way a robot or a low-paid intern or an algorithm intern could fake Austin’s voice, so nobody bothers to try.
In a world that is forever trying to slip the mechanical past us without our noticing (Yeah, Twitter and Facebook, I’m talking to you), it’s an easy thing to forget: that the main reason people are on the Net is to interact with other human beings. Human contact.
And God forbid, should you ever be hit by a potentially fatal disease, you want to be told that by a kindly, empathetic doctor. Nobody wants to be informed by a glorified ATM machine that they have six months to live…
It’s an interesting question, what can be replaced by machines; one that our current generation seems determined to answer. A far more interesting question is what can’t.
Bonus link: Our buddy Howard’s weekly email is also pretty amazing. More links, mostly business, AI and science related.
