January 2011
18 posts
The Absolute Moron's Guide to the Debt Ceiling →
“… journalists should create an online dictionary of the different meanings...”
– Cognitive linguist George Lakoff, interviewed by Lois Beckett at explainer.net.
Nice to hear that I’m not the only one who thinks this kind of archive is a good idea.
Corporate cobblers
Just back from a GSB lecture by Brad Whitworth, Cisco’s Senior Communication Manager. I was already suspicious about this lecture, Communicating as a CEO: Lessons from the top, as it purported to draw from the experiences of top companies such as GM, Boeing, Kodak and others. GM? Really? Kodak? Boeing? Dreamliner, anyone?
Whitworth is an excellent communicator. My public speaking teacher...
Christopher Hill at CISAC
Stanford’s Center for International Security And Co-operation (CISAC), is one of my favorite places on campus, for two reasons.
1. They invite great speakers to talk and answer questions.
2. The events are catered, with some of the best food to be found on campus!
Today’s speaker was Christopher Hill, the former US Ambassador Iraq and North Korea, and his talk was every bit as spicy...
Ideate or die?
Phuong Ly and I went to the dschool today, to pitch an idea to Perry Klebahn and Michael Dearing. They teach a class called LaunchPad, in which grad students design and launch a product or service in just ten weeks.
The class isn’t until next quarter, but we wanted to see whether our idea was complete rubbish. It’s certainly pretty half-baked: we’ve only talked about it a couple...
Thinking about starting a news venture?
Adriano Farano spoke to the Knight Fellows last night about his experience starting the multilingual European news website CaféBabel.
Adriano’s a great speaker. He’s engaging, amusing, and brimming with Southern Italian charm. He’s also got a great brain, that’s brimming with good ideas.
But as we keep hearing around the Stanford campus and its environs, and as Adriano...
“It looks like a speech by Brezhnev!”
– Knight Fellow Seda Muradyan on the grim-faced standing ovation at the start of the #SOTU
“Lemmy would be the only one standing with the cockroaches after a nuclear blast”
– Motorhead fan on the biodoc “Lemmy.” Quoted on npr.
Where's the most dangerous place in the world?
a. Pakistan’s North West Frontier
b. Northern Mexico
c. North Korea
I'd love to know what people think about this... →
“Reasons are bullshit. The only reason you use them is to make yourself sound...”
– Bernie Roth, Stanford Institute of Design
Prediction
Normal Neurosis - The Adjusted American. It’s the starting text for the Designer in Society class I’m taking (with a number of other Fellows) at the dschool. It’s also the essential text for the course, in that, as one of the class teachers said last week, if you read the first ten pages and hate it, you’ll know the course isn’t for you.
It’s a cracking book,...
The ideal explainer
Tristan Harris of Apture asked me an interesting question yesterday: what makes a good explainer?
I was tucking into a roasted wild mushroom and gruyere sandwich at the time, at the American Grilled Cheese Kitchen, just around the corner from the Apture offices in San Francisco. The sandwich was delicious, but Tristan’s question halted my jaws for a moment and set me ruminating.
My first...
“Engineering is the new Liberal Arts”
– Jigar Mehta, Knight Fellow, Class of 2011 (currently without a moustache)
Zen and the art of course selection
Here’s the great thing about being at Stanford: the school is small! There are less than 7000 undergraduates, and fewer than 8500 grad students here.* That means classes are small, you get lots of personal attention, and you learn fast.
The range of course offering is vast, and the facilities, both academic and sporting, are outstanding. No wonder most of the people on this Fellowship had...