Out Of Office: Try it, it's really good for you

Hello and welcome to #6. I’m on holiday this week, I was tempted to skip writing, which would have been fine, but I feel quite inspired by being ‘off’ and in a different country so you lucky readers get your next edition. I’ve spent time with my son, not just time but proper time that is sometimes harder to find at home. I’ve seen how he is navigating all the new experiences of our holiday, being a bit scared, a bit excited (usually at the same time), and sometimes a bit emotional, but he tries whatever it is anyway, sometimes it works, oftentimes it doesn’t. There’s something in that mindset that has spoken to me. Yes, I know this sounds very trite and a bit of an entry from ‘shit that didn’t happen’ but you know what? It did.

I’ve tweaked the normal format for a condensed, perhaps more restful Substack this week, because, well - I’ve been in a swimming pool for 3 days already, this Substack and my writing will flow with my surroundings and right now it’s very flowy.

The moral of this story is to rest more, it really is good.

Now, on to the #content.

👉🔗 1. Ex-WhatsApp Chief Business officer thread

Long thread from the ex-Chief Business officer of Whatsapp on how the deal went down and why he regrets it. I love Whatsapp, hard not to agree with him, though I think it’s been relatively left alone vs other Meta buys. Worth a read 👇🏼

neeraj arora @neerajarora

As we began talking through the acquisition, and made our stance very clear: - No mining user data - No ads (ever) - No cross-platform tracking FB and their management agreed and we thought they believed in our mission.

👉🔗 2. Quitting social media? What ppl who did think now.

Some fun bits in this - I have a complex relationship with social, it’s my job (isn’t it all marketers now?) and I use it a huge amount. But I don’t really feel it interferes with me. I don’t feel any more or less down by it. Maybe I’m numbed to it and I don’t know.

👉🔗 3. What makes a good YouTube video

This feels like an old school social post. But it isn’t, it’s from someone who watches videos every single day. They have their own style preference and bias, don’t we all. But worth reading.

👉🔗 4. Video calls hamper ideas and creativity

Think this one feels right, small-ish study, but video calls can be super productive but are functional. I had a session end of last week which turned into a working planning and brainstorm - the best kind - kinda pressured but not meant to be a brainstrom. It was great, ideas flowed and got planned and we got drinks after. You can’t do that on video calls.

5. Instagram is getting into NFTs, at about the worst time it could.

This is a very odd time. But to quote (these are NOT my words) Garbage Day talking about the video below…

In an announcement that is honestly a perfect and hilarious indictment of exactly how out of touch everyone at Meta is with the internet of 2022, Instagram’s Adam Mosseri decided to pick the morning after one of Ethereum’s worst market drops this year to cosplay as Jared Leto and announce that Instagram will soon support NFTs.

When you see the chain, you can’t unsee it.

Adam Mosseri @mosseri

NFTs on Instagram 🎉 This week we’re beginning to test digital collectibles with a handful of US creators and collectors who will be able to share NFTs on Instagram. There will be no fees associated with posting or sharing a digital collectible on IG. See you next week! ✌🏼

Odds and ends, basic links. Little commentary, just pure linkage, in wine terms, low intervention links.

• Work trips are looking more like holidays as business and pleasure blur

• Pop Culture has become an Oligopoly (it means limited competition, yeah I didn’t know what it meant either, but it’s a good read)

• 7 essential ingredients to the Metaverse - A16Z are in deep on all this, I’m not sure it’s totally right to be that definitive but worth a save and read.

• Gen Z have got to the Wunderlust phase and are planning to travel more than ever this year. Rightly so.

• Crypto and NFTs are crashing, it has been coming - I was in a deck on this coming about 3 months ago. Here are 3 (potential reasons why).

• UK Government is trying to do something about online influencers. Probably a good idea. Will they be able to move fast enough to fix problems? Almost certainly not.

• Spotify x Roblox. Makes sense, almost felt like this had been done already.

Adieu.

Thanks for reading, I appreciate everyone who opens and clicks a link. I find this really fun to put together and hope it’s useful. Let me know what works and what you like and don’t like.

Bonus.

I finished Severance a while back and have thought about it on and off since. Apple TV has made some fantastic TV recently, but Severance is on that line of genius. It feels like Lost in many ways - those who know me know how much I loved Lost - but also Hitchcockian and lots more. It’s genius.

All the spelling and grammatical mistakes in this Substack are on purpose to test you, actually. Well done. You got them all. No, I don’t need to know about then, you have that kudos.