Blossoming
Seen on a walk on Saturday.
Quote of the Day
”I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong.”
- Bertrand Russell
Musical alternative to the morning’s radio news
Sonny Boy Williamson and the Yardbirds | Pontiac Blues
Long Read of the Day
My Prodigal Brainchild
Lovely essay by Neal Stephenson on how Marc Zuckerberg screwed up an idea that he had conceived.
I am, thank God, curiously detached from all this. Four and a half years ago I was minding my own business, cutting metal in my machine shop, when I received a text message from John Gaeta, a former colleague at Magic Leap, reading simply “Sorry for your loss.” At first I thought that he’d sent it to me mistakenly, but after a bit of Googling I became aware that Facebook had changed its name and announced that it was now going to build the Metaverse.
In retrospect, John’s message was prescient, since it marked the moment when the Metaverse really did break free and become my alienated, prodigal brainchild.
In the following weeks I had to make a few Tweets trying to convince incredulous strangers that I had no connection with what Meta was up to; that they hadn’t communicated with me in any way; that they hadn’t paid me off; and that, no, I wasn’t going to sue them. All of these things remain true.
So there wouldn’t have been any upside for me if Meta’s Metaverse had succeeded. What remains to be seen is whether there’s a downside for me now that it has failed. I think I’m standing clear of the blast radius, but seeing the front page of the New York Times’s business page dominated by the inevitable Metaverse tombstone image does give one pause…
It does. He’s such a good writer. Enjoy.
Feedback
- My item about a search for literary sources on the Magnolia tree brought a lovely email from Diane Coyle with a link to Ted Hughes’s poem, Snowdrop.
Now is the globe shrunk tight
Round the mouse’s dulled wintering heart.
Weasel and crow, as if moulded in brass,
Move through an outer darkness
Not in their right minds,
With the other deaths. She, too, pursues her ends,
Brutal as the stars of this month,
Her pale head heavy as metal.
The link came with a commentary.
This poem, published in 1959, has as its subject the earliest flower of the year, the snowdrop. The thick, tough leaves push up in late December, and flowering is most abundant in January and February. Snowdrops are resistant to frost and the coldest winter weather. Hughes expresses admiration for the flower and its resilience.
- The item about the book on ‘learning from Leonardo’ brought an email from Ronald Young pointing out that there are two books about learning to think like Leonardo da Vinci! Unfortunately, the Link to the other one doesn’t seem to be working just now.
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