Marvin’s Best Weekly Reads July 16th, 2023
“If you get tired, learn to rest, not to quit.” — Bansky
"Unmanned platforms simply provide a better way to execute the age-old functions of warfighting -- from intelligence to command and control to fires – with the latter including the ability to strike in the electromagnetic and cyber domains. This better way is so much better that it renders all other methods obsolescent – and many western nations will be envying the Ukrainians the flexibility of their procurement system as they watch their own defense budgets channel absurd amounts of money into platforms that are obsolete at proto-type.
What we are seeing in Ukraine is just the latest chapter in the evolution of unmanned platforms. Since the first drone attacks on western soldiers occurred in Iraq and Syria in 2015, there have been signs aplenty that drones are changing the face of war."
https://amilburn.substack.com/p/a-new-level-of-war
2. "But why the rise of part-time creators?
Because they're waking up to the realities of 2023.
Regular folks are putting in a few hours each week to share insights on platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn. And by selling advertisements, digital assets, services or affiliate marketing, many are raking in anywhere from $20k to $200k annually.
And, let's not be mistaken, this trend is not exclusive to those newly unemployed.
Even those currently employed at big tech companies are dabbling with part-time content creation.
The once invincible fortress of “job stability” at the likes of Amazon or Google are a mirage. In an economy as unpredictable as a rollercoaster ride, relying solely on the security of a 9 to 5 job is a gamble that fewer are willing to take. So, they’re dabbling."
https://latecheckout.substack.com/p/the-year-of-the-part-time-creator
3. An Interview with a master at his craft. Arguably one of the top influencers in the world and a brilliant businessman: Mr Beast.
Pure dedication and commitment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IQ_ldV9z_A
4. "How can we make sanctions more effective - well more sanctions, better targeting, use of secondary sanctions to discourage third parties from trying to help Russia circumvent sanctions.
And I think we also need to look at new innovative ideas. Therein Nigel Gould Davis at IISS has proposed an innovative idea that we go to a maximum sanctions regime - plan to ban all trade with Russia by a certain date, and then work backwards in terms of providing licensing. To get around the exploitation of dual use products to help rebuild the Russian military international business should be made to apply to trade particular products with Russia."
https://timothyash.substack.com/p/russia-are-western-sanctions-working
5. "During boom times, investors compete to win deals in many ways. Some give on terms, some on price, and some on governance. I think the record will show that many investors gave on multiple dimensions during a period when founders had lots of leverage and choice.
We are returning to a period where I think the balance will reset, and we will land where I hope most companies have greater oversight and we can put more trust in the reported data and KPIs."
https://chudson.substack.com/p/all-venture-booms-end-with-a-return
6. "Said differently, history shows that the painful seismic shifts part of the Big Cycle comes about when there is simultaneously
1) too much debt creation that leads to debt bubbles bursting and economic contractions which cause central banks to print a lot of money and buy debt,
2) big conflicts within countries due to big wealth and values conflicts made worse by the bad economic conditions, and
3) big international conflicts due to rising world powers challenging the existing world powers at a time of economic and internal political crises.
In doing this study, I also saw two other big forces that had big effects. They are:
-Acts of nature (droughts, floods, pandemics) including climate change.
-Learning leading to inventions of technologies that typically produced evolutionary advances in productivity and living standards —e.g., the First and Second Industrial Revolution, and computing/AI revolution."
https://time.com/6286449/ray-dalio-world-great-disorder/
7. "Autocrats suffer from their anti-truth diet when they begin to believe their own lies. When truth is not valued, flattery and conformity prevail. Putin’s generals told him what he wanted to hear, and he grossly miscalculated the cost/benefit of invading Ukraine. This happens in democracies, too, when truth is sidelined.
George W. Bush developed a faith in alternative facts that defined his presidency. His historic blunder in Iraq was based on “intelligence” which should have been badged “belief dressed up as fact.” Common to both regimes was/is the exiling of dissent. Truth can admit doubt, but authority cannot survive it."
https://www.profgalloway.com/truth/
8. Very interesting take on how the world is organized and why society does what it does. Worth a read as it does explain a lot.
"Let’s imagine a group of people (let’s call them the elites) that acquired a lot of liquid money, control of land, and power – and to be realistic, let’s say the money and land are under investment firms they control, and their power comes from their influence and ownership over the media, politicians, contractors, etc.
The elite do not want competition. They know no one stays at the top forever, and they want to maximize their time there.
They want other people (the masses) to not do well in their pursuit of money, land, and power."
https://lifemathmoney.com/want-to-understand-whats-going-on-in-the-world-read-this/
9. This was a great discussion this week. Said it before: they are at their best when they are discussing policy in America and what's happening in VC investing and startup land.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-hTgRO093Q
10. This is a must read for those interested in tech and macro global. Its ugly out there for many so-called Unicorns (aka Zombie-corns) and its backed by data. But there is a way forward for founders.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23864037-final-emw-2023-macro-keynote-062823
11. Good investing themes and thesis here: Aging, Climate & Sustainability, Education, Consumer, and AI-Enabled.
"Does the entrepreneurial nature of building a venture firm get me fired up? Of course. Does working closely with founders through good and bad times feel meaningful? Yes. But the thrill of discovery, of unearthing a company that I think could be the next big thing, is incomparable."
https://nbt.substack.com/p/investment-themes-mid2023
12. "During the early internet era of the mid-90s – and crypto in the early 2010s – very few people showed up in the first few years, but almost all of them made money.
AI seems like the inverse. After the ChatGPT launch, everyone has shown up to participate in the AI game: researchers, developers, VCs, startups. But unlike former technological shifts, it is possible that very few new players stand to win in the deployment era of LLMs. Unlike crypto, the value prop of LLMs is immediately obvious, driving rapid demand; unlike the internet, LLM products leverage cheap ubiquitous computing to deploy quickly. The few AI players in pole position are winning at lightning speed.
Because the AI revolution is so unevenly distributed, there are very few people defining the frontier – this unfortunately means that the rest of the technology industry is some combination of uninformed and biased. Most talkers are playing catch-up, hallucinating a self-serving worldview that’s a mix of despondence (mope), denial (cope), and salesmanship (hope)."
https://luttig.substack.com/p/hallucinations-in-ai
13. "In the meantime, though, we Americans to the south need to take a hard look at what Canada is doing, and ask ourselves why we can’t do something similar. Like Canada, the U.S. is a highly diverse nation of immigrants. Like Canada, our fertility is below replacement (though not quite as bad), and we rely on immigration for population growth. Like Canada, we face the inherent economic disadvantage of being located far from the world population supercluster in Asia, and thus we will always be fighting an uphill battle to get high-value industries to want to locate here.
So like Canada, we should be importing huge numbers of skilled immigrants — especially because our software and finance and biotech industry clusters, and our world-beating research universities, make it easier for us to attract skilled immigrants in the first place. We should be playing to our strengths.
And yet in the U.S., immigration of any kind is now at the center of a vicious culture war.
I wish Americans could tell themselves a positive narrative like Canada’s — of immigration as the way to build a multicultural nation. Many of us have tried to tell that narrative, and have foundered on the rocks of America’s age of division.
As John Higham wrote, when America is underconfident — when we start to doubt who we are as a people and a nation — we instinctively think about closing the door. Right now, America definitely doesn’t know who we are, as a people and as a nation. Maybe next decade we’ll remember."
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/maximum-canada-is-happening
14. Codie is the best. If you want financial independence, this is a good place to start.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkxZCJ2pYqs&t=110s
15. Why Defensetech really matters.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79yCw8AGbCE&t=3s
16. Article is old but Dubai is more relevant than ever. Its not my favorite place personally but recognize the draw it has for people and its an important Freeport city.
"Overall, this leaner role of government makes for a much better deal for anyone who is productive and creates significant amounts of wealth. This is one of the reasons why jurisdictions like Dubai attract an unusually high number of entrepreneurs, rather than those seeking to live off welfare. Right now, entrepreneurs and other wealth-creators are flocking to Dubai in numbers not seen in years.
Dubai originally became famous as a place for beach holidays, shopping bargains, and good airline connections. It's now much more than that. Increasingly, it's an economic hub not just for the Middle East but for companies from all over the world, even including Australia.
It's among the world's greatest and most important cities in finance, media, and other important sectors. I am saying this even though I've never been Dubai's biggest fan. Given recent developments, even I need to acknowledge that Dubai is about to reach the next level."
https://www.undervalued-shares.com/weekly-dispatches/the-great-escape-part-2-investing-in-dubai/
17. This is not good.
But it's what happens when people stop believing in the American Dream.
Especially as they see all the grifting & incompetence of our Washington political elites added to the stupid woke-ism and self serving military leadership + the Forever wars.
18. "There is a broader political dimension to all this. Western countries have supplied weapons to Ukraine on the understanding that they will make significant gains against the enemy. For the first time, Ukrainian comms have let Kyiv down. Many in London and Brussels and Washington appear to believe that the counter-offensive means thousands of Ukrainians charging the Russian lines and breaking through — but here on the front, it just doesn’t work like that.
“The counteroffensive is military dancing,” Bereza concludes. “We move our troops from point to point to make them think we will break through in that exact place. And when they move, we destroy them, draining their reserves. It could last for months without a breakthrough. It’s not a miracle.”
https://unherd.com/2023/07/dodging-shells-on-ukraines-eastern-front/
19. "Don’t look now, but the era of the “streaming wars” might have come to a quiet end. In a rather anticlimactic fashion, there’s no clear winner; the wars have simply become too costly for all parties involved to carry on.
All in all, it is evident that Hollywood is entering what Disney CEO Bob Iger recently dubbed “an age of great anxiety,” as the industry actively confronts the new reality and scrambles to find viable solutions. The previous focus on growing subscriber bases for streaming services has been deprioritized to make room for new tactics aimed at improving ARPU. But can Hollywood simply hit the brakes on its decade-long shift towards streaming and remake the TV bundle online again?"
20. Business lessons in focus. This is a fun conversation on pursuing your craft.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXKJJlG7cus
21. I LOVED this book.
A talk behind the true life international investor John Kleinheinz behind the fictional, yet based on true story, book "The Siberian Job."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1utEaoyev-8
22. "Look for customer value financing to become more popular and common in all recurring revenue businesses. It’s a huge win for entrepreneurs and much needed in the market."
https://davidcummings.org/2023/07/01/customer-value-financing-example/
23. "It is too easy for modern man to get sucked into a mindless trap of mediocrity, degeneracy, and roboticism.
When people break away from the default path, they get scared of the unknown.
There is too much information to explore.
Too many opportunities cause overwhelm.
Too many opinions lead to anxiety.
To find clarity, you have to battle through the chaos.
You can’t just shy away at the first site of struggle.
For every good thought, there are 100 bad.
Your version of success is empowering, but in comes the thought of failure, how long it will take, which skills to learn, and different career and business paths to get there.
Then, those bad thoughts can splinter into 100 more.
That is unless you learn how to order your mind.
To create clarity from chaos."
https://thedankoe.com/letters/focus-is-a-superpower-how-to-succeed-in-the-information-age/
24. Always thought provoking. A rational perspective. He has been right more times than wrong.
The USA is not a hyper power anymore. Blue American elites have rekt America through their incompetence, grift & ideological stupidity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADISDec7adU&t=3626s
25. "Arguably not since the Fauci mania of the early pandemic has a scientist become as famous, as quickly, as Huberman. The 47-year-old Stanford University neuroscientist hosts the Huberman Lab podcast, which consistently ranks among the top 10 podcasts on Spotify and Apple and has more than 3.5 million subscribers on YouTube. Since the show’s first episode in January 2021, Huberman has branched out into ticketed live shows, launched paid premium content for subscribers (with much of the net proceeds donated to scientific research projects), and signed a two-book contract with Simon & Schuster, the first of which is set to come out in 2024.
Fans recognize him on the street, which isn’t entirely surprising considering that, in an effort to make his wardrobe simple and spill-proof, he almost always wears the same thing: a black button-down, black jeans, and black Adidas sneakers.
These practices make Huberman Lab appealing to the same audience that might listen to the popular podcasts hosted by productivity guru Tim Ferriss or longevity expert Dr. Peter Attia. (They’ve both appeared on Huberman’s show, and he on theirs.) Their content broadly falls under the umbrella of “biohacking,” or trying to improve physical and cognitive function through targeted lifestyle tweaks, from intermittent fasting to ice baths. Biohacking is a bona fide hobby for a certain kind of person—stereotypically, someone wealthy, male, and ambitious, though Huberman says his audience is split equally between men and women—and it’s become big business in the world of podcasting.
Huberman hates the word “biohacking,” because he thinks it implies people are taking shortcuts when they’re just harnessing science."
https://time.com/6290594/andrew-hubman-lab-podcast-interview/
26. I'm fascinated by Bryan Johnson's Blueprint plan. He is a pretty interesting person. Entrepreneur, investor and extreme biohacker.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ-QKrGg8yA
27. "In the past, when Putin faced setbacks in Ukraine, he lashed out: declaring illegal annexations of Ukraine after Kyiv’s successful Kharkiv offensive; threatening nukes; unleashing relentless missile strikes on Ukraine’s population. Putin may attempt an escalation to show the public, and the world, that he is in control of his country, and his war.
Prigozhin’s mutiny tested the premise that Putin, and Russia, could outlast Ukraine, along with Western support and attention. An indefinite war, with an indefinite end, may have more political costs than Putin anticipated."
https://www.vox.com/2023/7/1/23779941/wagner-group-revolt-ukraine-counteroffensive-putin-war
28. I might have to visit Lublin soon when I am in Poland soon.
"Lublin is a beautiful city where renaissance mansions sit next to gothic castles, brutalist shopping malls, techno clubs and cool cafes; a fun and fascinating place to experience Poland’s rich and innovative past, present and future."
29. "So what the counteroffensive that the Ukrainians launched (or more appropriately started a new phase in) is doing is revealing the state of the war and the balance between the two armies. It’s not determining the outcome of the war, its revealing exactly where we are now.
Basically three quarters of the US population supports continuing military aid for Ukraine. This is in some aspects higher than support last year at this time (there was a dip in support for Ukraine amongst the US population last May). This strong support reveals a few things about how the US population is approaching the subject. Americans are generally of the view that Ukraine can ‘win’ the war.
I dont mean to say that the US population has a highly developed idea of what a Ukrainian victory would be—but they do believe that the war is going in Ukraine’s favor and whatever happens Ukraine can end the conflict in good shape. The great worry for Ukraine was not that the US population would get bored of the war—this was always a silly argument, the US does not get bored of war. The great worry for Ukraine was that the US population would decide Ukraine could not win—and this would mean they would not support aid.
Now that the US population has seen that Ukraine can fight well, and indeed has shown greater smarts and effectiveness than the Russian military over the last year, it has adjusted to the new reality. The great regret, however, is that it had to take a year of horrible war to get here."
https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/weekend-update-35
30. "Why do I embrace added challenges and costs instead of resisting them?
Here is my answer:
Chaos and challenge give us purpose. Purpose gives us pride. Pride feels good.
People like to feel good.
A cognitive behavioural therapist would say this fills our human need for significance.
All humans have this need. And recognizing that we have it is important - because either we choose our purpose, or a purpose will choose us.
Let me explain.
Building a business or raising a family is a long-term application of purpose. If done correctly, the result is a lifetime of fulfillment and significance.
It requires focus and determination. It is a journey that will inevitably present hardship and failure, with the opportunity to persevere and fight for success over many years."
https://jaymartin.substack.com/p/this-is-how-you-outlast-your-monsters
31. This is an optimistic view of the future and a call to action for all of us investors and entrepreneurs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biLNOTqMT_U
32. Some pretty good examples of leadership and smart tactics for improving your life & business.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpmVb1rvnBA
33. Don't build a biz, buy one. This is a great step by step on how to buy a small business and start building your empire.