North Star Podcast

Drew thinks and writes about cities, technology, and their dystopian future - mostly at his blog, Kneeling Bus, and previously as a Ribbonfarm resident (Ribbonfarm is one of my favorite blogs on the Internet). It’s a longform blog devoted to unusual takes on familiar themes. Drew lives in New York, works at Uber, and was educated as an urban planner. If you'd like to keep track of what he's up to, I’ve linked to his weekly newsletter in the show notes.

I live in constant pursuit of new ideas. The best ones change my worldview by giving me a new lens that I can use to analyze the world. Superfandom: How Our Obsessions Are Changing What We Buy and Who We Are did exactly that. Authors Zoe Fraade-Blanar and Aaron Glazer delve into the history, sociology and psychology of fan culture, and how it impacts business.

In this episode, we talk about how Zoe and Aaron followed their North Star by founding an open-source stuffed animals company called Squishables. In this episode, we talk about how the internet has changed the nature of fandom by making it a two-way conversation between fans and the people, brands, and stories that engage them. Without question, the case studies are the best part of the book.

And because I can’t resist, I have to tell you about Hatsune Miku, a Japanese virtual celebrity whose songs are composed entirely by fans, the dynamics of fandom—the activities we perform to show we belong to a group of people with common interests—may be as old as culture itself. In addition, we dive into the wonderful worlds of Disney, Harry Potter, Polaroid film, and European classical music.

This episode is a special treat for anybody who cares about, contributes to, and lives in our rapidly expanding fan-driven economy.

Meagan Cignoli is the founder and creative director of Visual Country, a creative video production agency that creates animated short videos for the world's leading brands including Pepsi, Starbucks, and Amazon. The videos are mesmerizing! With innovation and originality, Cignoli and her team have won more than 23 advertising awards including. 

Meagan has been called the Queen of Branded Vines. When social video first came to mobile phones through Vine and then Instagram, Meagan set aside a successful photography career to dive in headfirst with Visual Country. Today, over one million people follow Meagan across social media channels.

Cignoli was named Digital Entrepreneur of the Year by the Hubbies (2014) and top 100 Creative by Ad Week (2015).

In this interview we dive into her experience growing up on Long Island. Meagan's love for art began when she was young and has evolved ever since. We talked about her experience traveling alone for a month through India and studying in Cuba during the embargo. After listening to the podcast, Meagan will feel like a close friend.

Listen on: iTunes | Overcast"I think that what we're seeing now is that knowledge work has become commoditized for lack of a better term. What we see is this huge increase in supply that's driven by the developing world. I spent two years living in Southeast Asia and many people don't realize there are people whose grandparents were rice farmers in small towns in Vietnam and the people I met were Javascript programmers.The development that took the West 200 or 300 years is being replicated now in Asia over the course of 20 or 30 years, or a couple generations.The statistic that jumped out at me was that there were more college graduates from 2000-2010 than 2000 back to the beginning of history."

Taylor is an entrepreneur and author of The End of Jobs . Inc Magazine rated The End of Jobs one of the Top Three ‘Start Your Own Business’ Books of 2015 and a Top 25 Business Book of 2015. It has sold tens of thousands of copies and been translated into Chinese (simple and complex), Japanese, Korean, and Thai. WSJ Bestselling Author and Entrepreneur James Altucher said of it:

“Entrepreneurship is not a choice you can make at your leisure. You have to jump on the train or lose your chance. Now is the time and Taylor’s book describes exactly how to do it.”

His work has been featured in dozens of media outlets including Business Insider, Inc, and Entrepreneur. A former Brazilian Super Bowl champion, Taylor has lived in Tennessee, Alabama, Argentina, Brazil, Vietnam, Thailand, San Diego, Texas, and, currently, New York.

Links:

• The End of Jobs
• The End of Jobs Summary
• Antifragile
• Antifragile Summary
• Listen to What's Being Whispered, Not What's Being Said
• Paul Graham Essays
• Ribbonfarm
• Seeing Like a State
• The Fourth Economy

Social Media Links:

• Twitter
• The End of Jobs Facebook Group

 

In December, I went to a live taping of the Tim Ferriss Podcast at the famous 92nd Street Y in New York City. There was a surprise guest at the event named Adam Robinson, and after hearing him speak, I tapped my friend on the shoulder and told him I’d find a way to get him on the podcast.

And now, it is my honor to welcome the man himself! Adam Robinson, the man who cracked the SAT before co-founding the Princeton Review and write the only test preparation book to ever become a New York Times bestseller. He attended The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania as an undergrad before studying law at Oxford University in England.

He’s a rated chess master with a Life Title and as a teenager was personally mentored by Bobby Fischer—considered by many experts to be the greatest chess player of all time—as he prepared for the world championship.

Today, he applies his unique philosophy and methodology as an independent global investment advisor to the heads of some of the world's largest hedge funds.

After this conversation, I can confidently say that nobody thinks like Adam Robinson.

In December, I went to a live taping of the Tim Ferriss Podcast at the famous 92nd Street Y in New York City. There was a surprise guest at the event named Adam Robinson, and after hearing him speak, I tapped my friend on the knee and told him I’d find a way to get him on the podcast. His wisdom, and his unique worldview truly blew me away.

And now, it is my honor to welcome the man himself! Adam Robinson, the man who cracked the SAT before co-founding the Princeton Review and write the only test preparation book to ever become a New York Times best-seller. He attended Wharton University at UPenn as an undergrad before studying law at Oxford in England. He’s a US Chess Federation Life Master and was personally mentored by Bobby Fischer, who some people call the greatest chess player of all time. And today… he works as a global macro advisor to the heads of some of the world's largest hedge funds.

After this conversation, I can confidently say that nobody thinks like Adam Robinson.

Neil De Grasse Tyson has been the Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City since 1996. He discovered his love for the universe at an early age when he visited the Hayden Planetarium, less than 100 yards from where we recorded this interview. You may know him as the modern day version of Carl Sagan or seen Cosmos, his Netflix show where he takes viewers on a journey across the universe. Or maybe you know him from Startalk, where he brings on popular guests including former US Presidents, astronauts, comedians and athletes from outside the scientific realm to show how culturally pervasive and entertaining science can be. In this episode we talk about his new book, his career trajectory, role models, how he thinks about education, and the intersection of pop culture and science.

Favorite Part of the Podcast: David: Why is philosophy so important for us to understand beyond academia? Ian: "Popular science fiction is loaded with philosophical questions and a lot of those questions are questions about human nature and what we are. They are really important questions and even if you don't necessarily get an answer from reading a work of philosophy, you get a kind of vocabulary or a way of understanding the world that you may not have gotten before. That's what philosophy does very well. It allows you to describe what's at stake, clarify and refine the questions that matter to us, and discover questions that matter to us." Ian Olasov is a graduate student at the Graduate Center of New York. His research centers around moral theory and the philosophy of language. He is currently writing his dissertation on moral discourse and focuses on the following questions: What speech acts are involved in moral discourse? When do people moralize? What can these teach us about the role of morality in everyday life? Olasov is also the founder of Brooklyn Public Philosophers, the first forum for philosophers working in the greater Brooklyn area to discuss their work with a general audience. Subscribe: iTunes | Overcast | Start Here: IanOlasov.com Brooklyn Public Philosophers Ian's Favorites: Crash Course WiPhi Gareth Matthews Martha Nussbaum Inside Higher Ed Jonathan Haidt David Hume Simon Blackburn Jack Sidnell Derek Barthet The Denial of Death Personal Identity 13th The New Jim Crow John Perry: Structured Procrastination Are Prisons Obsolete?

Meagan Morrison is a NYC-based, Canadian fashion illustrator, and the creator behind TravelWriteDraw. "Traveling the world and illustrating the journey through a fashion-art lens."

In this episode, we discuss romantic love in today's world and what society misses when we idealize it. We dive into the philosophy of love, the role of Disney movies and popular culture, and question the institution of marriage. This episode was a success solely because I witnessed an philosopher talking about Tinder, Love Actually, and why Americans buy Valentine's Day gifts for their pets. Skye Cleary is a PhD/MBA and author of Existentialism and Romantic Love. She currently teaches at Columbia University and the City College of New York. Previously, she was an international equity arbitrageur, management consultant, and Lieutenant in the Australian Army Reserves. As you will discover, Skye is as curious and adventurous as anybody! She has a black belt in taekwondo and loves scuba diving. She stands up for marine conservation and against palm oil. Skye misses swimming and diving in Australian water but loves New York City’s icecream and cocktails. Not mixed together. Side-by-side is ideal :)