Sublime

This curiosity is about models, frameworks, cultural understandings, disciplines, and methods of thought, the kinds of traits that made John Stuart Mill such a great thinker and writer. A more recent example is Patrick Collison, CEO and co-founder of Stripe (and also an active writer). His content can draw from economics, science, history, Irish cu

People gripped by the career consolidation task are often driven by a desire for mastery—the intrinsic pleasure of becoming quite good at something. They get up in the morning and work their rut. There’s a big field to be farmed out there, the great project of their vocation, but each day they can only work their rut. When they do that, they have a

A biographer of the novelist E. M. Forster wrote, “To speak to him was to be seduced by an inverse charisma, a sense of being listened to with such intensity that you had to be your most honest, sharpest, and best self.” Imagine how good it would be to be that guy.

Crawford analyse les vertus de l’artisanat et, au fond, de tout travail avant le taylorisme : en modelant un donné extérieur, en opérant une transformation tangible, on exerce son intelligence de manière immédiate, vérifiable. Surtout, on projette sa propre individualité dans le monde. Ces rênes seront à jamais les miennes. Nul besoin d’être décroi

In Miami, for example, people wonder why intersections in residential neighborhoods are often so fat: two relatively narrow streets will meet in a sweeping expanse of asphalt that seems to take hours to walk across. The answer is that the firefighters’ union once struck a deal that no truck would ever be dispatched without a hefty number of firemen

their job title, the business school they went to, the number of assistants they have, the location of their parking space, the grants they earn, their access to the CEO, the size of their paycheck, or the number of fans they have.

Anything you do to optimize your work, cut some corners, or squeeze more “efficiency” out of it (and out of your life) will eventually make you dislike it. Artisans have their soul in the game.