Share this page!

Tiago Forte Profile picture
Twitter logo
15 Dec, 21 tweets, 13 min read
Presenting...my top 20 reads of the year

Including an excerpt or takeaway from each one

👇
1/ How an Excel TikToker Manifested Her Way to Making 6 Figures a Day by @reckless ft. @themissexcel

Eye-opening look into the emerging power of TikTok specifically, and a new generation of social algorithms designed to surface new talent generally

theverge.com/authors/nilay-…
2/ Ruggedize Your Life, by @AlexSteffen

Most pieces on climate change present vague arguments w/out specifics. Alex strikes a practical balance of realistic strategies we can take to prepare in short to medium term for impacts already happening

alexsteffen.substack.com/p/ruggedize-yo…
3/ Standing Out as a Student, by @mariepoulin

It takes a lot to succeed in an intensive educational program, online or offline. I love how Marie breaks down how to stand out as a student with specific, actionable steps she has tried herself

mariepoulin.com/blog/standing-…
4/ The Brain Maps Out Ideas and Memories Like Spaces, by @jordanacep

A summary of fascinating research on how the brain plots knowledge using "features of interest," like a map

quantamagazine.org/the-brain-maps…
5/ The Document Culture of Amazon, by @rothgar

One of my biggest goals for next year is to institute a truly asynchronous, document-based culture, and this case study offers many great suggestions for how to do that

justingarrison.com/blog/2021-03-1…
6/ American Idle, by @eugenewei

This article convinced me to try TikTok, and I'm so grateful it did. TikTok is the most creative, original, inspiring, and beautiful social platform I've seen in a long time

eugenewei.com/blog/2021/2/15…

On the virtues of sampling:
7/ How Harvard’s Star Computer-Science Professor Built a Distance-Learning Empire, by @erenorbey

Eye-opening look at how Harvard's most popular course, on computer science, has given birth to an online distance learning phenomenon, CS50

newyorker.com/news/our-local…
8/ How to Choose the Right Note-taking App, by @anthilemoon

Introduced a very helpful framework for choosing between the 3 main categories of knowledge management apps, based on notetaking style of an Architect, Gardener, or Librarian

nesslabs.com/how-to-choose-…
9/ Lila, by @RobPirsig

This excerpt from a short story contains some real gems of language describing how words and ideas can emerge organically, bottom up, to reveal new insights about a person's life

members.optusnet.com.au/~charles57/Cre…
10/ The Coming Disruption, by @MrJDWalsh

An interview with Professor Scott Galloway, revealing how the economics of higher education (90%+ margins) make it extremely profitable, but also unsustainable

members.optusnet.com.au/~charles57/Cre…
11/ Course Mechanics Canvas: 12 Levers to Achieve Course-Market Fit, by @wes_kao

It's extremely rare to find guides to designing effective online learning experiences that are this detailed and specific, drawing on Wes' real-life experience with AltMBA

weskao.com/blog/course-me…
12/ Wittgenstein’s Revenge, by @harmonylion1

I don't usually enjoy abstract discussions of truth, but Mike presents a provocative take on why facts *just might* not exist or be useful

ribbonfarm.com/2020/09/03/wit…
13/ Chasing the Sun, by @Zheschool

Absolutely loved this story of how Thor Heyerdahl and his wife, through their obsession with discovering how Polynesians crossed the Pacific, threw scientific orthodoxy into question through a practical experiment

thenewatlantis.com/publications/c…
14/ How the Internet Gets Inside Us, by @adamgopnik

Insightful article on how our exposure to technology and vast amounts of info online is changing our relationship with ourselves

newyorker.com/magazine/2011/…
15/ Does Class Size Matter?, by @dougledIHE

Interesting article that supports what I've long suspected: high-quality education CAN be delivered at scale to large groups, just not using methods designed for small groups

insidehighered.com/views/2007/12/…
16/ Waking the Leviathan, by @AndrewLiptak

"Behind the scenes" and "Making of" is emerging as my favorite genre of content these days, and this one is a doozy, documenting how a video game turned into a book, and eventually the sci-fi series The Expanse

andrewliptak.substack.com/p/the-expanse-…
17/ How Will You Measure Your Life?, by @claychristensen

Just an all-around classic I like to return to regularly, to help keep things in perspective about what really matters in the end

hbr.org/2010/07/how-wi…
18/ 11 Reasons Not to Become Famous, by @tferriss

An extremely sobering look at what it can really mean to have a large following and be a public figure. With some chilling stories that have made me really reconsider my public presence

tim.blog/2020/02/02/rea…
19/ Geeks, MOPs, and sociopaths in subculture evolution, by @Meaningness

A very entertaining look at subcultures, how they work and rise and fall, which has been useful in considering how to expand the PKM subculture to the mainstream

meaningness.com/geeks-mops-soc…
20/ Mindset Over Toolset in Building a Second Brain, by @christinayluo

Loved this piece on how the mindset of creating a "Second Brain" is so much more important than the "toolset," drawing on Christina's experience as a coach in my course

christinaluo.substack.com/p/mindset-over…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
　

Keep Current with Tiago Forte

Tiago Forte Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @fortelabs

Tiago Forte Profile picture
10 Jul
1/ The cohort-based course I’d most like to see:

How to survive and thrive in the face of climate change, individually and collectively
2/ It would address 3 major problems I see with most discussions on climate change:

1. Too much focus on convincing people
2. Too conceptual and global
3. Too narrowly focused on one aspect
3/ #1 – Too focused on convincing ppl

Those who aren’t yet convinced it’s real never will be. Beliefs not based on facts can’t be changed by facts

I want a course that doesn’t waste time on the background and focuses on what we can do to prevent, postpone, or mitigate impacts
Read 10 tweets
Tiago Forte Profile picture
5 Jul
1/ I think of every creator business in the creator economy as being built on a 6-level “stack”:

Level 6: Social distribution
Level 5: Email distribution
Level 4: Content hosting
Level 3: Content creation
Level 2: Ideation & development
Level 1: Information capture
2/ It is a “supply chain of ideas” from the first moment an idea pops into your head, all the way to spreading all over the world via the internet

The lower levels are like R&D and wholesale warehouses, and the higher layers are retail stores and “last mile” delivery of products
3/ To have a viable business that can monetize effectively and stand the test of time, every creator ultimately has to own or control every level in their stack

For every level you don’t control, you become vulnerable to a gatekeeper or platform squeezing you for money & power
Read 10 tweets
Tiago Forte Profile picture
24 May
1/ The act of building a Second Brain is an act of revolution
2/ Your experience is the sum of the information you consume

When you take control of that information stream, you push your world into a state of change

You become a destabilizing force to the prevailing worldview
3/ Your ability to shape your information stream becomes the power to shape your own experience

Once you master this, you can also shape the experiences of others

It’s all just information
Read 15 tweets
Tiago Forte Profile picture
8 Apr
1/ The upcoming cohort of our Building a Second Brain course, cohort 12, will be the last time we offer all students lifetime access to join future cohorts

This was a really difficult decision, and I wanted to explain our thinking around it
2/ This won’t affect anyone who’s purchased the course in the past. Students through cohort 12 will always be able to join any future cohort

And it only applies to joining live Zoom calls. Everyone will continue to get future curriculum updates & lifetime access to Circle
3/ First, why did we offer lifetime access in the first place?

Honestly, in the early days it was because I was embarrassed by the quality of the course. I had no idea what I was doing, didn’t live up to my own standards, and lifetime access was my way of making up for it
Read 14 tweets
Tiago Forte Profile picture
20 Mar
1/ My latest thoughts on one of the most common questions I receive about building a Second Brain:

How and when do I *retrieve* all the knowledge I've saved in my second brain?

👇👇👇👇👇👇
2/ Retrieval is a trickier question than it seems on the surface, because it's not inherently desirable

If you never encounter a situation where a given note is relevant, than the ideal amount of retrieval is exactly zero
3/ Because retrieval takes work and energy, we want to minimize it unless we know it will be worth it

As with so many things in productivity, our motto should be "as much as necessary, as little as possible"
Read 30 tweets
Tiago Forte Profile picture
16 Mar
1/ As I see people start on the path of creating CBCs (cohort-based courses), there's a way to tell where they will do well and where they'll struggle:

It comes down to which of these adjacent identities they're coming from:

1. Consultant
2. Coach
3. Contractor
4. Creator
2/ 1. Consultant

They will understand high-touch customer service, the importance of managing expectations, and be able to pivot on the fly

They'll have trouble creating reusable assets, articulating their ideas precisely, and high production values for course content
3/ 2. Coach

They'll do well in real-time interaction, listening for the question behind the question, and building motivation

They'll struggle in creating high-level frameworks/models, completing and shipping course deliverables, and motivating themselves
Read 6 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

Like this author's thread?

Get emails when @fortelabs has new unrolls!

Check out other threads from @fortelabs!

Read all threads by @fortelabs

:(