John Stokvis
@johnstokvis.com
does Product at Outschool. formerly at Indiegogo, Twitter, Groupon a captain at sea
“irony is the order of the day at the Obama Center.” @katewagner.wehwalt.net nails the eerie feeling of visiting. Our ironic moment: our visit led us to discover the Osaka Garden right next to it. A 130 year old, exquisitely designed (free to visit!) gift from one of Chicago’s sister cities.
kate wehwalt@katewagner.wehwalt.net · 3w agoI wrote about the Obama Presidential Center for @thenation.com www.thenation.com/article/cult...
It’s striking how many people described fixing a specific problem as if doing so would fix ALL PROBLEMS. Some were big problems! Clean running water whenever you want, remember every loved one forever, etc. It’s a reminder of the “one weird trick” fallacy. Fix a big problem ≠ utopia
Hetan Shah@hetanshah.bsky.social · 3w agoThis is a lovely site which helps remind us of much of what we take for granted in material progress ordinaryabundance.com (HT @aveek18.bsky.social)
“It’s 480 BCE, our Spartan warriors have been beaten by the Persians and everyone is talking about Homer’s Odyssey. It’s 2026…”
Gingerspiced@gingerspiced.bsky.social · last mo.Pete Hegseth: "We need our warriors to embrace the Spartan mindset" U.S. Military: *suffers crushing defeat to the Persians*
Denis Villenueve’s adaptation of Ursula LeGuin’s Earthsea cycle
☀️ Starshine@starshine.bsky.social · 3mo agoWhat’s your white whale tv/film adaptation that needs to happen
I highlighted a bunch of passages when I read @tricialockwood.bsky.social’s No One is Talking About This years ago, and every now and then one will pop up again and I am forced to pause and sit in awe of just how perfectly she puts her finger on the pulse of the zeitgeist.
no one: me: funny you should mention that. I've memorized all the lyrics to Tom Lehrer's The Elements - there's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...
Farce is one of my favorite genres because when done well, it’s superficially silly but underneath is a profound exploration of the human condition. It’s enjoyable the way people enjoy watching those intricate rolling ball sculptures. The intricate mechanics that all make weird sense together.
Zach Weinersmith@zachweinersmith.bsky.social · 4mo agoOne thing I love about Wodehouse, and tried to duplicate a little in the last book, is the rules of Edwardian farce allow you to just make up social conventions in order to force plotlines, and he really makes use of it. As an example:
A type designer walks into a bar, with thick black lines accentuating her eyes, nose, and mouth. The bartender says “why the boldface?”
Zach Weinersmith@zachweinersmith.bsky.social · 4mo agoCan we get an official form of this joke going? Something like... A man walks into a bar, with a head that becomes more vertically compressed as it rises from chin to hair. The bartender says "why the log face?"
Why did we call it “microblogging” when “take fountain” was right there?
John Scalzi@scalzi.com · 4mo ago"Take Fountain" is still the best way to get somewhere in Hollywood all these decades later, thank you Bette Davis for your eternal wisdom
Ursula K. LeGuin, in the afterword to A Wizard of Earthsea. Wowee.
@visakanv.com‘s description of good work having “an idea in the car” echoes the feeling of reading a lot of AI writing. The human impulse towards efficiency strips all the dynamic life from the writing. Lots of interesting parallels between the photocopier and LLMs as well, prob not a coincidence.
@visakanv.com “The lotus of my optimism grows out of the mud of my despair.” 🔥 It’s like the serenity prayer for the person blessedcursed with an overactive mind.
This reflects the difference between a “technology” and a “product.” Technology is how something functions. It’s amazing and fascinating to people who are into how things work (which is not everyone) Product is how something functions in a person’s specific context. Very different things!
Blaine@blaine.bsky.social · 6mo agoWhen technologists talk about how we should just use markdown for everything, or just use git for everything, or just go back to RSS, it just tells me that they're not being especially thoughtful or sensitive to all the ways that those technologies don't work for people who aren't technologists.
meta-note There’s a lot that is tragic (in the Greek sense of the word) about what happened to Twitter, but 1 of the most profound is the lost potential for it to be the medium for something like this. Not a post with a screenshot of a book. But another strand in a great web of connected thought
John Stokvis@johnstokvis.com · 6mo ago(Re-)reminder to stop writing for everyone and write for someone instead, whoever that someone is for you (for me). Via @visakanv.com
(Re-)reminder to stop writing for everyone and write for someone instead, whoever that someone is for you (for me). Via @visakanv.com
Absolute gem in @visakanv.com‘s FAN. To paraphrase: Ppl who are blindly confident are unlikely to worry about being blindly confident So if you worry about being blindly confident, you likely don’t need to worry about it as much as you do (esp if worrying holds you back from doing what want to do)
plot twist: the tech CEO is the child and the venture capitalist is a hallucination, they're actually a surgeon and tech CEO is on the operating table and the surgeon is saying "I can't operate on this person, they're my child" and the surgeon is the mom
Ben Collins@bencollins.bsky.social · 6mo agotech CEO in 2026: My computer has anxiety. venture capitalist in 2026: Here, have 200 billion more dollars. child in 2006: My NeoPet is angry at me. mom in 2006: No it isn't sweetie, go to bed. mom to dad in 2006: We have an idiot boy. Our boy is a little idiot person. It's too late to fix him.
My favorites are the ones I've seen in action (coincidentally, one by kids, one for kids). Titus Andronicus put on by high schoolers. What they did with the over the top violence was 😚👌 Comedy of Errors when done right, the jokes had an audience of middle schoolers falling out of their chairs
Aaron Smith@aaronsmith377.bsky.social · 6mo agoJust because I woke up thinking about it, those of you who have read Shakespeare, what is your favorite play (or plays, if you have several)?
Are we talking about people writing stuff in books today? Sweet! That means I can share one of my all time favorite poems: Marginalia by Billy Collins
being a Mets fan is enough of an adventure, thankyouverymuch
Philip Bump@pbump.com · 6mo agoChoose your own adventure.
’Twas brillig, and the NPCs Did mog and rizz in their drip: All skibidi were the delulu OPs, And the looksmaxxers did simp.
Groundhog Day | noun | a situation in which the same usually negative or monotonous experiences occur repeatedly or are felt to occur repeatedly with no change or correction
Merriam-Webster@merriam-webster.com · 7mo agoGroundhog Day | noun | a situation in which the same usually negative or monotonous experiences occur repeatedly or are felt to occur repeatedly with no change or correction
Honestly saying “I don’t know” is such a power move. If you think about it, it also creates a sympathetic bond with the audience because it’s highly likely many of THEM don’t know as well. After all, you’re the one on stage and they came to watch you speak.
Ben Balas@bjbalas.bsky.social · 9mo agoWhen I talk to students about public speaking or teaching, I always bring this up: Just tell people when you don't know something! It's remarkably powerful b/c it signals to your audience that you know the boundaries of your expertise and they can trust what you DO talk about.
Any game designers out there? Specifically focused on deck building games?
