Apologize later: Renowned tech journalist and writer Steven Levy chats about his new book, Facebook: The Inside Story, which peers behind the scenes at the biggest social media monolith of our day. Levy breaks down how he convinced Facebook to give him inside access, what was happening there during the 2016 election, and why Mark Zuckerberg loves Caesar Augustus so much. Caution, books spoilers ahead!

Links: 

Steven Levy 

Hackers - Steven Levy 

The Perfect Thing - Steven Levy 

Backchannel - WIRED

Sandra Upson - WIRED

The Devastating Decline of a Brilliant Young Coder - WIRED 

Facebook: The Inside Story - Steven Levy

Carlyle Group 

In The Plex: How Google Thinks, Works and Shapes Our Lives - Steven Levy 

The Social Network - IMDB

Outliers - Malcolm Gladwell 

Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer that Changes Everything - Steven Levy 

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Paul and Rich have a follow up discussion about Marc Andreessen’s newest article and ask the important question: How can we connect and empower people to create crucial tools for society when the industry has become so transactional? Are we able to create necessary social momentum when there’s no money involved? Paul puts out a plea for Postlight to create a software development kit for education at a platform level. It remains to be seen if VCs are ready to shift their focus to do the same. (Perhaps that’s an idea for Marc Andreessen to think about!)

 

Links

‘It’s Time To Build’ by Marc Andreessen

Marc Andreessen

Andreessen Horowitz

React

Bell Labs

Xerox Parc

Khan Academy

The Last Dance

Class Dojo

Google Classroom

 

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There’s a reason to expect criticism: Paul and Rich dig into the newest article from VC Marc Andreessen. In it, Andreessen exhorts Americans to innovate and blames our lack of preparation for the pandemic on a lack of desire to do so. We reflect on the current state of America and how apparent the holes in our social governance have become since COVID-19 (especially the education system). Is there a world where VC and startups can help us improve these old systems? Has social policy towards more privatization led us towards the wrong things being optimized? We look to other innovations that have come from crises and ask: How can you install that startup-style motivation outside of commercial profit? (Spoiler: Marc Andreessen doesn’t have the answer!)

Links:

“It’s Time to Build” by Marc Andreessen

Andreesen Horowitz

Marc Andreesen 

José Andrés 

José Andrés Wants To Feed The World Through The Pandemic 

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Brand Safety: Parse.ly founders Andrew Montalenti and Sachin Kamdar chat about their analytics platform and share the content trends they are following during the global pandemic. They discuss how publishers and media outlets are being impacted by COVID-19, and the myriad ways that advertising and brand safety are changing. They also share how to give clarity to clients in a time of uncertainty: with the insights of analytics.

Links: 

Andrew Montalenti 

Sachin Kumdar - Twitter

Parse.ly 

Facebook

Netflix 

NPR

Gannett 

Lee Enterprises

Berkshire Hathaway 

Parse.ly Content Conversions 

Vox 

The Atlantic 

The New York Times 

Toyota 

Twitter 

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Scripted Interactions: On this week’s episode of Track Changes, Paul, Rich, and Gina chat about ways to keep your team focused and on track when working remotely. How do you create urgency to make sure things get done? How can you keep people focused during remote calls? They discuss the need for clear communication and accountability, and share some tools to help structure meetings and interactions in a digital-first work world. 

Links: 

Gina Trapani 

Cheer on Netflix 

Tiger King on Netflix 

Campfire 

Navigator 

Second Life

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This isn’t remote, this is pandemic: On this week’s episode of Track Changes, Paul and Rich chat with friend and client Tim Meaney about when things could return to normal and if they should return to normal. We reflect on some of the positive changes that have come from this pandemic, like more time with family and getting rid of inefficiencies. We also talk about the importance of resilience and of course, the hit documentary series Tiger King.

Links: 

Coronavirus chic: Top sales up, bottom down at Walmart - Global News 

Tim Meaney - SageSure 

The Evolution of Software - Track Changes Podcast 

Zoom 

Facetime 

Kind Bar 

Andrew Cuomo - Wikipedia 

Tiger King - Netflix 

Smart Home: 10 Tips for Working Remotely - Track Changes Podcast 

Google cancels its infamous April Fools’ jokes this year - The Verge  

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Excelsior: In this episode of Track Changes, Paul and Rich discuss the new Apple-Google contact tracing app aimed at tracking the spread of COVID. We explain what contact tracing is and how the app works. We chat about the potential difficulties of onboarding these types of apps and whether the app will be able to help the most vulnerable. We also discuss how we can best combine technology with good old fashioned testing. 

Links: 

Dyson 

Andrew Cuomo 

Video, B-Roll, Audio, & Rush Transcript - Governor Cuomo Returns Ventilators 

Apple 

Google 

What is contact tracing? - The Verge 

Papa Johns 

Steve Jobs 

Eric Schmidt 

Zoom 

Amazon 

Facebook

Google Home 

Amazon Alexa

Nest 

Wemo 

Motorola 

CNN 

Clay Shirky - Twitter 

CVS 

Walgreens

Trump tweets prompt speculation he could fire Fausi - The Guardian 

WhatsApp

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Priorities as a leader: On this week’s episode of Track Changes, Paul and Rich sit down to discuss how the pandemic is impacting business and mental health. Priorities are changing, so what comes first? In juggling health, family, and work, it’s important to give employees space and empathy. But work can be a welcome distraction from the news and rising COVID-19 numbers.

Links: 

Yeti Nano 

Screen Time

Linux

Windows 8 

Windows 10 

HP Pavilion

Candy Crush 

Chrome 

Zoom

Remember Jade Helm 15, the controversial military exercise? It’s over - The Washington Post 

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The Grind: This week on Track Changes, Paul and Rich chat with Postlight’s Head of Engineering Jeremy Mack about all things video games. Jeremy teaches us about current video game trends. We learn about loot boxes, battle passes, pay-to-win games and the controversy surrounding these types of monetization. We also get some great indie game recommendations and chat about the future of gaming. Warning for anyone playing the game Journey, this episode contains some spoilers. 

Links: 

PlayStation 4

Jeremy Mack - Twitter 

Atari 

Nintendo 

Ultima Online 

World Of Warcraft 

Super Mario Brothers 

Civilization 

Age of Empire

SimCity

PlayStation 4 Pro 

FIFA 

EA

Activision 

Ubisoft 

Call of Duty 

NBA Playgrounds 2 

NBA Jam 

Stardew Valley 

Harvest Moon 

Dead Cells 

Steam 

Nintendo Switch 

Journey 

Wii U 

Twitch

Black Desert Online 

Fortnite 

Half-Life: Alyx 

Half-Life 2 

Oculus Quest

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Specify like a caveman: This week on Track Changes, Paul and Rich are joined by Gina Trapani, a managing partner at Postlight, to talk about statements of work (SOWs). We chat about Postlight’s unique SOW process. We talk about why we base our approach on trust and relationships rather than just time and money. We also talk about managing risk, what to do when someone oversteps their original demands and Paul gives some tips on how to make the SOW writing process easier. Hint: write like a caveman. 

Links: 

Gina Trapani 

React Native 

Org Mode 

Google Analytics

Facebook

Twitter

Github 

LinkedIn 

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