Tag: Seth Godin

Bookmarked Identity and ideas (Seth's Blog)

If our ideas are equated to our identity, then talking about ideas is very much the act of talking about yourself.

Seth Godin discusses the association between ideas and identity. He suggests that we can either become attached to an idea or instead embrace improving our ideas.

One way to define our identity is to fall in love with an idea (often one that was handed to us by a chosen authority). Another is to refuse to believe our identity is embodied in an idea, and instead embrace a method for continually finding and improving our ideas.

This reminds me of Angus Hervey’s practice of ‘holding on tightly and letting go lightly’:

Don’t say “I’m right, and you’re obviously wrong.”

Say “at this point, given all the evidence I’ve considered and having made a genuine effort to try and see if from the other side (point to some examples), the balance of the argument seems to rest on this side for these reasons, so for now that’s what I am going with. If new evidence, or a better argument comes along I am totally willing to change my mind about this, and I’ll also be pleased because it will mean I’ve gained a deeper understanding about the world.”

Liked That might not be the right question (Seth’s Blog)

Are you exposing yourself to new inputs and new situations, and challenging yourself to find more interesting ideas?

Are you pushing the ideas you have further, making them more complete, turning them from hunches to notions to ideas to theories?

Are you publishing your theories, sharing your reasoning and having your ideas collide with the real world in service of making things better?

Liked Thoughts on a virus (Seth’s Blog)

The thing is, if every person on Earth was isolated for three weeks, we could be pretty confident that we could move on, but the world is a lot more connected than that. We’ve built a worldwide culture of connection, both digital and physical, and while we can slow down the spread of a virus, we can’t stop it.

Having spent years digital media “viruses”, Seth Godin shares some ideas in regards to the spread of the current coronavirus.
Listened S 5 E 5 Don’t Be Evil from S 5 E 5 Don’t Be Evil

Seth Godin recounts the story of Google and their motto, ‘dont be evil’. He begins with their start in contrast to Yahoo. Moves onto the death of RSS and rise of the algorithms. This has now moved to a push for changes to email. What it means to be evil today has morphed and Google may have lost track of this. The question then is what needs to be done to reign them in?
Liked The old media/new media chasm (Seth’s Blog)

New media tends to be adopted by amateurs first. And it rarely has a mass audience in the early days (because it’s new). But professional content for the masses is precisely what old media stands for. As new media gains traction, the old media doubles down on what they believe to be their value, because they no longer have a monopoly on attention.

Bookmarked People don’t change (Seth's Blog)

The hard part, then, isn’t the changing it.

It’s the wanting it.

I was recently told to be mindful of the phases that people are in when adjusting to change. The focus was on Tuckman’s stages of group development. The problem though, as Seth Godin explains, is that this overlooks whether people actually want to change. Dave Cormier captures this by arguing that the first principle of learning is care.
Listened S 4 E 17 Who is Banksy from S 4 E 17 Who is Banksy

Seth Godin explains that we are moving away from where something came from and what it does for us.

In the Q and A section, Godin provides his own origin story is having the confidence to speak up when you have a story to tell.