10 things worth sharing this week

Loving, whenever in Tokyo, the sensation of so many highly crafted experiences - from eight seat restaurants and tiny bars to owl cafes and artisanal cotton candy shops. Why aren’t there 1000x more of these experiences in all societies? And especially in the USA, what prompted “scale” (more seats, more franchises, more reach at lower cost) as the... See more

The draw of big cities, like New York, London, LA, or Tokyo is that they are made of a series of distinct, colorful neighborhoods, each with their own identity, vibe, and demographic. What makes them different are the small, local, mom-and-pop shops—not the chains of identical mass retail stores.

As anything scales too effectively - from fashion to restaurants to music - the market opens for more non-scalable alternatives. Once Starbucks opens on every block, many of us crave the artisanal coffee shop. Once our favorite Italian restaurant becomes a chain of three, we grow tired of it. Why? First, so much of what we buy and do is tied up in ... See more