What I'm up to - June 2023 - Philip I. Thomas

✨ What I've been up to

It's been a busy month at Contraption Company. I'm amid building a new product called Booklet, which I plan to launch this Summer. It's a community platform designed to be a calmer alternative to Discord and Slack. I've also been helping some startups launch new generative AI products, which has been rewarding.

My 2015 article How Operations Research and Artificial Intelligence Overlap has been picking up traction as AI is in the zeitgeist.

I've been trying to use my Airpods less and be bored more often. It's so easy to plug in and tune out the world.

I got a shout-out in Emma's Indiehackers podcast.

🤔 Things to share

Articles: The Tyranny of Convenience. Yes - "In sum, get out of the house." Ryan Holiday's content marketing strategy, which I'm taking to heart. We stand with the Underdogs. The luxury of building without metrics. It's cheap to build suburbs but expensive to maintain them, creating a "ticking time bomb".
Books: The Pathless Path - highly recommended for capitalist creatives. The Carbon Almanac - data-focused approach to understanding carbon emissions. Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behavior - who doesn't love an entire chapter dedicated to how to talk about the weather, or a section about the "proper" way to eat peas?
Trends: Fractional labor. Everybody in my network seems to be talking about it.
Video: Sonobuoy deploying.
Podcasts: The Infrastructure of Community - "Efficiency is the enemy of social life.”
Gadgets: Flipper Zero is fun.
Coffees I'm drinking: April Pillcocaja - Ecuador - Anaerobic Pacamara (noteworthy!). Kahiwa El Obraje.
Quote: "Startups mostly don't compete against each other, they compete against no one giving a shit" -Justin Kan

📫 What I'm up to this month

With Emma graduating, we're moving back to NYC this month, and will be living in the Lower East Side.

📍 Where I'll be

(Let me know if we overlap!)

June 20-21: Cambridge, ON for Tailwind Connect 🇨🇦