The Internets: An Amazing Place

Been getting into this Twitter thing - it's actually kind of cool and surprisingly useful in a lot of ways. Less "having a bagel and juice now" updates than I previously thought. A lot of links, news, Q&As, etc; interesting social media.

But this in particular struck me as just one example of how the webernets changes things: I'm currently following Rainn Wilson ("Dwight") of The Office and he recently tweeted about new cast member Idris Elba ("Stringer Bell") from The Wire (which is awesome enough in its own right). I'm following String, man. Check out his (@driis) tweet from yesterday:

taping 6 episodes of the Office .. This ish is hilarious

Stringer MF Bell - now on the World Wide Intertubes!

Boom: Interview w/DJ Driis over at NPR. Great stuff - take a listen. Next week's ep is his first of six.

Work to Love, Wealth, and Words from Michael Scott

A few items of note. I recently read a couple excellent essays by Paul Graham, who is currently a partner in Y Combinator, among other impressive things on his CV.

In "How to Do What You Love," Graham talks about reconciling what we learn about the concept of "work" when we're children with what we learn as we get older. He talks about how it is difficult but ideal to find work that one truly loves doing (and what "loving work" really means) and two different paths that people follow to do so. It's insightful and humorous. "Always produce" is a great maxim to live by.

In "How to Make Wealth," Graham discusses why starting a business is the key to generating wealth. Several ideas in here to help one understand why startups have an extremely high upside (coupled of course with high risk and concurrent downside). I liked how he explains how startups are essentially time compression for the amount of work produced and how they are more efficient by several factors than large companies.

A couple excellent inspirational essays. I plan on reading more of Graham's stuff on his site.

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A few words from Michael Scott in the penultimate episode of this season of The Office:

I look at somebody like Jim Halpert and I think, "That guy could do anything he wants to do." He could...do anything. And he chooses to work here, selling paper. Just like me.

Related, of course. Hits a bit close to home.