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An inflation-adjusted chart of Global Box Office + Home Video compared to budget. All in millions. The inspiration from this episode was Tyler Cowen’s response to Tim Ferriss’s question: What would you put on a billboard? “If you look at billboards we actually have, what do you see on those billboards? The billboards I see a lot of them are advertisements for insurance. Some of them are, “Don’t drive drunk.” You see a bail bondsman on billboards and suicide hotlines. I guess I would study the market and pick one of those four things like, “Buy this insurance, bail bondsman, suicide hotline, don’t drive drunk.”It’s to ask, what’s the business model? This episode covers a 1975ish onward look at the movie business model. Briefly sequentially:* National advertising plus national distribution * ^ plus merchandise* ^ ^ plus home video (VHS then DVD)* ^ ^ ^ plus more movie screens* ^ ^ ^ ^ plus international The number of movies made and the kinds of movies made are the direct results of the underlying business model. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

This is an attempt at understanding R0 (reproductive number) as more than a numbing number. View these notes as less definitive. In his (2014) paper Risking It All: Why are public health authorities not concerned about Ebola in the US?, Yaneer Bar-Yam writes about why R0 isn't an even distribution.One April report noted the coronavirus reproductive number was 5.7 but offered a range of 3.8-8.9. In January the estimate was 2.6. There's many reasons but one is that the reproductive number varies by the individual in the network.Humans form the same (power-law graphed) networks over and over again. In research about Wikipedia edits the graphs of posts per user was nearly identical across languages. It holds across time too, we can imagine that church members knew their parson but not every other member. This network holds on TV shows too.Image from Funkhauser.These networks are so common, they may be part of our evolution, like ten fingers. Nicholas Christakis said, “Maybe natural selection had something to do with the topology of human networks.”Christakis looks at networks to seed interventions like a farmer who avoids the arid or soaked parts of a his field. In lab research, Christakis found that when one person is nice to another person (via monetary rewards) then that person is nicer to the next. Courtesy is contagious.In other studies, Christakis changed the visibility of charity (or selfishness) and the  contagion changed too. Visibility of inequality mattered a lot, unseen inequality mattered very little. That's kinda interesting.Christakis has found three features which influence how things spread through networks.* Connections, more lines between hubs* Contagions, faster spread between hubs* Positions, different originations hubsIf Larry David gets an idea for his television show and he wants Julia Louis-Dreyfus to guest star he can ask her (#1), but if it's someone he doesn't know he'll have 'his people call your people'. He could pitch Julia via text (#2) or write her a letter. If it's Jeff Garlin that has the idea and not Larry David, (#3) then the idea has to wind through Larry to get onto the show.A real example of virality is the Zillow Zestimate. Co-founder Rich Barton wanted to advertise. That had worked for Barton at Expedia. But Bill Gurley said, "If you're buying ads to sells ads, then you're arbitraging traffic and that dog don't hunt very long." Barton wanted to focus on spreading the message (#3) far and wide. What worked better was creating something people would share (#2) among themselves.Bar-Yam warns about an average R0 when he writes about Ebola:"However, in a complex interdependent society it is possible for the actual number due to a single individual to dramatically differ from the average number, with severe consequences for the ability to contain an outbreak when it is just beginning."Ebola needs to be a disease of more concern, he wrote in 2014, because the epidemiological models used the connections, contagions, and positions of Africa which is a different network structure. "One person is not likely to be in close contact with much more than about 10 or 20 family members." That is, the rural African figures for 1, 2, and 3 are quite different from the urban African figures. "In urban areas in Africa and in the US, the nature of the contact network is different."Ebola is a hot virus and should be treated with extreme caution. Richard Preston's book, The Hot Zone is about the mid-90s almost crisis when the Ebola virus was spreading through the air in a monkey research facility just outside of Washington D.C.(Here's Preston in 2019)In the book Preston writes about the history of research. Recalling one trip in the mid-80s:"Occasionally they (researchers) came to villages, and at each village they encountered a roadblock of fallen trees. Having had centuries of experience with the smallpox virus, the village elders had instituted their own methods for controlling the virus, according to their received wisdom, which was to cut their villages off from the world, to protect their people from a raging plague. It was reverse quarantine, an ancient practice in Africa, where a village bars itself from strangers during a time of disease, and drives away outsiders who appear."Some strands of Ebola pass through he air (#2). Some do not. African villages follow the precautionary principle.Thanks to Tim H and Tim B for the suggestions and trailheads for this post. For thinking about position (#3) check out the Friendship Paradox.  This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

I finally found the name for a thing I’d noticed. For a long time, I was in a crowd, of ideas, not people. I saw something, only a glimpse. Without knowing what it was, or what to look for I didn’t know how to see it again. Then, a succession, bam-bam-bam, I saw it and I heard its name. Jobs-to-be-done. Enjoy. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

BIG ideas this week: framing, jobs-to-be-done, latent needs, and local logic. What’s great about this collection is the cost-benefit analysis. One small change can lead to huge returns. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

A few ideas from the letter ‘E’. Cue Sesame Street theme. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Some of my favorite ideas around design, doing (or not), and understanding. Happy Thanksgiving. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Our weekly audio for our weekly email. Enjoy. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Our weekly audio update from the weekly typed posts. Enjoy. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

This week is an alphabetical experiment from a long piece of content.No one knows everything but we don't know what specifically we are wrong about. Sometimes we guess right. Sometimes we don't. Sometimes the HiPPO chooses. Sometimes the Highest Paid Person's Opinion is right. Sometimes it's not. The solution to all the 'sometimes' is a debate. Good arguments are central to that. Devil's advocate, red teams, debate are all synonyms for this idea - and it doesn't matter what we call it so much as how we do it. John McCain said that arguing well was one of Ted Kennedy's biggest strengths. Ted argued well because, McCain explained, "he divorced personal relationships and personality from the issues." Arguing well is about ideas, not individuals. Kim Malone Scott calls this approach "radical candor" and saw it during her work within Google on AdSense, YouTube, and Doubleclick Online Sales. She recalled one meeting where Matt Cutts was yelling at Larry Page. She told Kara Swisher:"I started to worry that Matt was going to get fired. Then I looked at Larry and he's got this big grin, his whole face was lit up. It was such a productive way to have arguments… being willing to challenge authority and the authority welcoming it." Good arguments require the boss to be focused more on the truth than their ego. Technology companies seem to do this well. As a venture capital company, a16z seeks investments with large possible payouts. Scott Kupor was one of the early hires and said that a cardinal mistake of the venture capital industry "is investing in something that turns out to be a good business in a small market." Avoiding this mistake, Kupor explained, was the reason a16z failed to initially invest in Airbnb. The ‘A' in a16z is for (Marc) Andreessen and the ‘Z' is for (Ben) Horowitz. The mistake they try to avoid the most is missing something, like Airbnb. To do this, the bosses model good arguments. Marc told Tim Ferriss that when Ben brings an idea he will pounce all over it. Andreessen sounds like a natural contrarian and he's supernaturally inclined to being right. With a boss on both sides of the issue, it's easier for employees to avoid career risk and say what they believe rather than what they believe will get them promoted. Like all the tools that follow, this one is quite situational. Sometimes a business must focus on making the trains run on time and sometimes a business is laying new track. Once a good argument is over everyone should still be able to break bread or go get beers but then focus on the collective choice. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

What is ease? It’s sending a message “in stride”. It’s coaches to a player, copywriters to a reader, a legislator to a constituent. Whenever we want to persuade someone we should make it easy for them. What’s common to these situations is the interactions. Recently I finished Alexandra Watkin’s book, Hello My Name is Awesome. It’s a good, quick, fun book. Watkin’s big idea is to make names that offer ease to a consumer, specifically naming things that “have something people can latch onto.” It has to make sense. Steve Jobs did this naming the first Mac computer, Mac Man. Wait, that’s a terrible name and never saw the light of day. But Jobs liked it. Ken Segall was in the room at the time and tried to convince Jobs that iMac was a better name but Steve like ‘Mac Man’. Watkins wasn’t around at the time but in hindsight would probably note that Mac Man was a terrible name. It was gender-specific and sounded like Walkman, a portable device! This week we’ll look at four ideas around making things easier. It doesn’t matter if we’re persuading spouses or marketing men’s mustaches razors, the goal is the same. Make it easy. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Relating to last week’s episode about stakeholders is the cadence of work they allow, permit, or encourage. This week is heavy on examples from entertainment. It’s artsy and I’m okay with that. As the replicable parts of our jobs change with technology the non-replicable parts become more important. One of those is creativity. In Tyler Cowen’s book, Average Is Over he wondered what was scarce (read: valuable), one idea, “Intellectual property, or good ideas about what should be produced.” Another, “Quality labor with unique skills.” That sounds like jobs with a healthy dose of creativity. Meta note: As you’ll hear, my cadence has slowed thanks to the allergies stuffing my head like packing peanuts. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

One big email this week, as the experiment continues. Briefly, businesses succeed with the right people making the right decisions over time. In this episode, we call them stakeholders. This idea is obvious yet there’s value in thinking about the principal-agent problem, inbound referrals, and the ‘skills to pay the bills.’ There are also cameos from two classic characters from the 1980s. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Thank you, everyone, for the feedback. The audio posts are much more popular than I would have guessed. Here’s this week’s midweek. These are also available on iTunes and Overcast. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Subscribe in your podcast player of choice: What we’re looking at this week is going to be hard. Built off a podcast between Zach Lowe and David Epstein. “I think what frustrates people about this whole (decision making) arena, there is no way to know, you can’t know.” Zach Lowe"We have a name for this in academia, irreducible uncertainty and people don't like to acknowledge and accept irreducible uncertainty." Wharton Professor, Cade MasseyThe Philadelphia basketball fans adopted a 'trust the process' mindset because of the 'frustration' and 'irreducible uncertainty' in the decision making process. One way to get better is to be rangy. How?* Read more fiction.* Avoid 'the next...' trailhead and find a harder path through the woods.* Argue fairly and vigorous, especially in outlier and winner-take-most competitions.* Embrace intellectual diversity and weird teams.* Create the right culture, from the top down.* Avoid the principal-agent problem and it's CYA cousin, Cover-Your-Ass.* Make the hidden salient and the salient measured, carefully.Stay tuned for these stories and more. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

Our audio experiment continues this week. If you want to subscribe in your podcast player, here’s the link.Today in the email a checklist. ☑️ What is the story around what you're doing? For example, does a company in an industry have a net-positive (or negative) reputation that's irrelevant to the facts? ☑️ What is the latest consistent data? For example, sabermetrics changed baseball and driving feedback would change commutes.☑️ What is the outside view? The base rate isn't the answer but it's the place to start. Take it with a grain of salt when it confirms your priors.☑️ Beware of stories, the sweet-talk of information. The media serves stories, people feast on them, and none of it may be true.☑️ Is this black and white or shades of grey? Getting to the core of any issue takes all this effort and yet it's still shade of grey. Dan Carlin studies history and said this:"Any time I hear an argument that's black and white I can almost automatically assume that it's wrong. Sometimes reality is black and white but that happens so rarely. The majority of the time it's complex."Make it a great weekend. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

💡 What’s it take to have a good idea and where do we get them? 💎 Good ideas are like precious elements, only instead of centuries for chemical bonds to form, one new perspective can spark one. We’ll look at a few ways in this episode. 🌪 Programming note, hurricane Dorian is heading my way so this week will be audio only. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

The experiment continues. Enjoy this audio version of this week’s posts. Note: this was fun to create and I’d wager more fun to listen to. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com

The short. This is an experimental feature. If you like it, let me know. If you listen it will spoil some of the surprises from this week. -Mike The long. I need to send this out to populate the RSS feed so that iTunes will validate the feed and the episodes will populate in other podcast players like Overcast. Ideally the form has to match the function and I never listen to the audio episodes in my inbox. Rather, audio is a ‘podcast job’ and so that’s where I’d like this to land. Thank you for your patience, to be continued… This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pov40iq.substack.com