I am inspired by Frank Chimero’s idea of Text Playlists.
“I keep a list of the best writing on the web. I take this list and revisit and reread it every 4 to 8 weeks. You could almost consider it a playlist of text: it’s very select (I artificially limit it to 10-15 articles), I typically read them all in one sitting, and the order and pacing is very purposeful. Most revolve around what it’s like to be making things in 2010, and a lot of the people that I respect the most have pieces in it. It’s almost a pep talk in text form. I visit it when I’m down, when I’m lazy, when I’m feeling the inertia take over.”
I’ve never been conscious of it, nor have I explicitly and regularly engaged with it in the same way, but I definitely have a text playlist of my own.
- George Orwell (1946) – Politics and The English Language – For me, the defining text on how to write. I break so many of these rules so often that I need to refer back to this regularly.
- Steve Jobs (2005) – Stanford Commencement Address – You can’t connect the dots forward, find your passion, don’t settle, and remember, everyone you know, someday will die. I have thought about this speech every day since I first watched it.
- Derek Sivers (2009) – Ideas Are Just A Multiplier of Execution – A constant reminder that the important stuff comes in getting things done.
- Tim O’Reilly (2009) – Work on Stuff That Matters – A simple, timeless message summed up by Henry Kissinger’s quote: “Do the most important thing you can think of doing every year and then your career will take care of itself.”
- Jonathan Harris (2009) – World Building In A Crazy World – This is beautifully explains how I think about the web, not as it is, but how it should be. Inspiring.
Please share your own Text Playlist.
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For me I have a few videos on standby when I need a pick me up, refocus, or to open my eyes to new possibilities. The Steve Jobs speech is definitely one. I like the idea of a text playlist and actually started bookmarking a few things today thinking “what will I call this?”. Text Playlist it is!
1) Randy Pausch’s last lecture – http://www.davidgillespie.com/post/648897572/ive-never-had-an-attic-so-the-closest-thing-i#disqus_thread
2) Gary Vee’s Web 2008 Web 2.0 Conference talk – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhqZ0RU95d4
3) Less so a text, but Jonathan Harris’ original project, We Feel Fine (http://wefeelfine.org) – it’s a reminder to me that this thing is about other people and our connections with them
4) The Tim O’Reilly piece you link to, specifically “create more value than you capture” – I’ve had that pasted up in several offices now.
5) Hugh Macleod’s How To Be Creative – http://gapingvoid.com/2004/07/25/how-to-be-creative/ – it’s the post that inspired the book (five years later). And a reminder that the best ideas aren’t always the ones people freak out over at the time; sometimes they’re slow-burners.
This was the kind of comment I was hoping for when I wrote the post. Thanks David.
Awesome list.
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