George Mack Profile picture
May 14, 2023 11 tweets 4 min read Read on X
The 0.1% of ideas this week.

The rabbit holes I've gone down -- without the distractions.

8 best examples: Image
1. Rich and Poor Work Similar Hours

The top 1% only work 3.4 hours more per week than the bottom 1%

My assumption is leverage, education, environment and type of work are bigger factors than raw hours alone.

H/T @rubenbmathisen Image
2. Password Safety 101

If your password is 8 lowercase letters, hackers can brute force it instantly.

If your password is a mix of 18 numbers, lower/uppercase, and symbols -- it takes hackers 26 trillion years to brute force it. Image
3. Munger on Envy

Envy is the worst negative-sum game.

1. The envious person is miserable

2. The envied person is under attack

It's a virus of the mind that eats joy from everyone involved. Image
4. Cold Email Magic

Re-discovered this email from @niraj to Evan Spiegel (CEO of Snapchat)

Might be the best cold email of all time. Image
5. Noticed I do 2 kinds of walking activities:

1. Walking to be at a certain place at a certain time (100% utility)

2. Walking for the sake of walking with no specific intention (0% utility)

In hindsight on a long time horizon, No.2 often had greater utility than No.1
6. UK Productivity Is Stalling

The UK appears to be entering a golden era -- of stagnation. Image
7. Walt Disney's Obsession with Toy Trains

When Disney became a multi-million dollar company -- Walt should've been laser-focused on animation.

Instead, he followed his boredom.

He became obsessed with Toy Trains.

People thought he was losing his mind... Image
He moved houses so he can build Toy Trains in his backyard.

Walt turned part of Disney's HQ into a section to tinker with Toy trains.

He followed his boredom and curiosity.

And it resulted in... Disney Land.

H/T @HTTOTW Image
8. Tucker Carlson Goes Fishing

The first 10 seconds are like every viral heated political video.

And it then takes a wild left turn.

They treat one another like human beings -- despite their differing politics.

I've watched this video 10+ times.
PS. I put together a list of the best 0.1% of ideas, articles, and videos I've ever found.

"The Lindy Library" - Resources I've returned to at least 3+ times.

It's completely free -> george-mack.com

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More from @george__mack

Aug 12
"Most people die at 25 and aren't buried until they're 75" - Benjamin Franklin

Why?

4 reasons and solutions: Image
Reason 1 - Milestones

0-25 is a well-designed video game.

You level up each year.

There are regular milestones as you go from infancy to school to entering the workforce.

You constantly feel like you're making progress -- and have reflective milestones.
After 25, it's a terribly designed video game.

Society places you on your own.

If you don't have the agency to design your own 25+ video game, the only milestones life will give you are the funerals of your loved ones -- followed by your own funeral.
Read 23 tweets
Jun 16
What idea do you think is true AND underpriced?

Here's mine: The most productive people turn life into a video game.

Let's go deep into this...Image
I had this red pill moment when I saw the following:

The laziest person I’ve ever met play a video game for 16 hours straight, 7 days per week.

My brain began to hurt: The laziest person I knew just did more focused work than I’d seen anyone ever achieve.
I’d hit level 100 of cognitive dissonance:

The laziest person in my life is also the hardest working person in my life?!

I needed a software update for my broken worldview:
I realised this person wasn’t lazy…

Instead, their reality was just a poorly designed video game.
Read 23 tweets
May 30
How to choose where to live and what locations to visit:

12 non-obvious thoughts:
1. The 3 big decisions: Where you live, what you do, and who you're with.

Location might be the most important one because the other 2 are often downstream of location.
2. Good rule of thumb for locations to avoid: What places has the most amount of sofa people? (People that drain your energy you need to lie down on a sofa to recharge)
Read 15 tweets
Mar 24
The history of technology by Brad Jacobs: From fire and shelter, to the internet and AI.

I wish I was taught this at school...

More than 2 million years ago - Early humans in Africa make the first stone tools from split pebbles

1 million years ago - Humans begin to use fire as a tool

500,000 years ago - Humans build the first shelters

350,000 years ago - Humans begin to hunt with spears

100,000 years ago - Humans begin to trade using beads made of shells

60,000 years ago - Humans begin to use spears for hunting, protection, aggression

1000 BC - Early accountants in Asia create the abacus

635 BC - The Chinese produce the first coins

600 BC - The Romans build the first public sewer system

200 BC - The Chinese invent the compass

AD 725 - Buddhist monk Yi Xing creates the first mechanical clock

900 - The Chinese first use gunpowder in war

1182 - The Chinese invent the magnetic compass

1284 - The Italians invent eyeglasses

1328 - The Europeans invent the sawmill

1440 - Johannes Gutenberg invents the printing press

1530 - Europeans invent the spinning wheel

1609 - Galileo Galilei invents the telescope

1662 - Blaise Pascal invents the public bus

1698 - Thomas Savery invents the basic steam engine

1769 - A French military tractor becomes the first self-propelled road vehicle

1793 - Eli Whitney invents the cotton gin

1795 - Nicholas-Jacques Conté invents the modern pencil

1838 - A British steamship makes the first transatlantic crossing

1839 - Charles Goodyear develops a way to make rubber strong, durable, and elastic

1850 - Isaac Singer introduces the sewing machine

1857 - William Kelly invents the blast furnace

1865 - Giovanni Caselli introduces the first commercial facsimile system

1869 - John Wesley Hyatt invents synthetic plastic

1874 - Remington Company introduces the mechanical typewriter

1876 - Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone

1877 - Thomas Edison invents the phonograph

1880 - Thomas Edison invents the incandescent light bulb

1882 - America opens the first hydroelectric power plant

1883 - England constructs the first electric railway

1885 - Gottlieb Daimler builds the first four-wheeled automobile using an internal combustion gas engine

1886 - Josephine Cochran invents the first practical dishwasher

1892 - Rudolf Diesel invents the diesel engine

1894 - Nikola Tesla invents radio signal coils

1896 - Gottlieb Daimler builds the first truck

1901 - Henry Booth invents the vacuum cleaner; Thomas Edison invents the alkaline storage battery

1902 - Marie and Pierre Curie discover the existence of the elements radium and polonium

1903 - Willis Carrier introduces the first electric air conditioner

1908 - Henry Ford uses the assembly line to introduce the Model T; Thomas Edison develops a moving picture with sound

1910 - A plane transports commercial freight for the first time

1913 - England manufactures the first stainless steel

1914 - Electric traffic lights are invented in the United States

1920 - James Smathers invents the electric typewriter

1921 - Karel Čapek invents the robot; Western Union introduces the telegram

1923 - Clarence Birdseye invents frozen food

1927 - Erik Rotheim invents the aerosol can; Philo Farnsworth invents the all-electric television

1933 - Eric Fawcett and Reginald Gibson invent polyethylene

1935 - Robert Watson-Watt pioneers the development of radar

1936 - A rail provider transports a truck trailer for the first time

1937 - Frank Whittle invents the jet engine

1938 - Philip Wiles invents the stainless-steel artificial hip

1939 - Sikorsky builds the first viable helicopter; The United States builds the first mass-produced remote-controlled aircraft, or drone

1940 - England uses the first operational computer in WWII

1943 - America begins operating the first nuclear reactor

1945 - Raytheon Corporation introduces the microwave oven

1946 - The first general-purpose, programmable computer (ENIAC) is developed for the U.S. Army

1947 - William Shockley, John Bardeen, and Walter Brattain invent the transistor

1949 - De Havilland Aircraft builds the first commercial jet airliner

1951 - Charles Ginsburg develops the videotape recorder

1952 - America develops the first hydrogen bomb; Swedish scientists Åke Senning and Rune Elmqvist implant the first cardiac pacemaker

1953 - NBC begins broadcasting television programs in color

1955 - IBM introduces the first transistor calculator

1956 - The “Ideal X,” the world’s first commercial container ship, sails; IBM develops the FORTRAN computer programming language

1957 - Russia launches Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite

1959 - Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce
invent the silicon chip; Xerox introduces the first commercial copier

1962 - NASA launches the first privately built satellite; Nick Holonyak Jr. invents the first visible light LED

1963 - Digital Equipment Corporation introduces the minicomputer; Philips introduces the compact audio cassette

1965 - The first robotic exoskeleton for assisted walking is created; Stephanie Kwolek invents Kevlar

1966 - Marie Van Brittan Brown invents the first video home security system

1968 - Ivan Sutherland implements the first virtual reality system

1969 - The internet is created through the ARPANET network

1971 - Intel introduces the first microprocessor; Texas Instruments introduces the first pocket calculator

1972 - Landstat 1 creates the first comprehensive mapping of Earth

1973 - Xerox develops the first personal computer

1977 - The VHS video recorder is developed

1978 - The first human is born through in vitro fertilization (IVF)

1979 - Nippon launches the first 1G wireless network in Tokyo

1980 - Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer invent the scanning tunneling microscope (STM)

1981 - The mobile phone is invented

1982 - The compact disc player is developed

1983 - Apple introduces the Graphical User Interface (GUI); Bill Gates introduces Microsoft Windows; GPS technology is made available for civilian use; Charles Hull invents stereolithography

1984 - Carnegie Mellon University develops the first truly autonomous vehicles

1991 - Ann Tsukamoto identifies and isolates stem cells

1992 - Apple introduces the first PDA; Vodafone sends the first SMS text message, “Merry Christmas”

1994 - Jeff Bezos founds the first purely online retail company; Dan Kohn completes the world’s first secure credit card transaction over the internet

1995 - Gary Kremen launches Match. com, the first online dating service

1996 - Email communication is widely adopted; Scientists at the Roslin Institute in Scotland clone “Dolly” the sheep

1997 - AOL makes instant messaging available; Videophones are first used in business settings; IBM supercomputer Deep Blue defeats chess champion Garry Kasparov

1998 - Google is incorporated; MP3 files begin to be transmitted on the internet; Microvision introduces the virtual retina display; IBM introduces the first speech recognition software; The first high-definition television is sold

1999 - The first wearable continuous glucose monitoring system is approved by the FDA; The first human organ, a bladder, is artificially engineered using 3D printing; TiVo introduces time-shifting broadcast recording

2000 - The “ILOVEYOU” virus infects 50 million computers

2001 - Apple launches the iPod; The first artificial heart is implanted in a human; Capsule endoscopy technology is introduced

2002 - The birth control patch is first released in the United States

2003 - The U.S. government establishes the National Cyber Security Division; Skype launches videoconferencing applications

2004 - Mark Zuckerberg and fellow Harvard students launch Facebook

2005 - YouTube launches its video-sharing website; Scientists complete the first comprehensive comparison of the genetic blueprints of humans and chimpanzees

2006 - Amazon Web Services is launched; Twitter is introduced; Nintendo introduces motion sensor–controlled technology; The first commercial drone is permitted by the U.S. FAA; Food is 3D-printed for the first time

2007 - Apple introduces the iPhone; Amazon introduces Kindle

2008 - Blockchain is introduced for bitcoin transactions

2009 - Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna invent CRISPR; Google launches Waymo

2010 - Apple introduces the iPad; The first ever Uber trip is completed; Palmer Luckey completes his first VR headset prototype

2011 - Apple introduces Siri

2012 - The Higgs boson particle is discovered; Australian surgeons implant the world’s first bionic eye

2013 - The Apple App Store exceeds a million apps; The FDA approves the first retinal implant in the United States

2014 - A robotic lander built by the ESA makes the first soft landing on a comet

2015 - NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft reaches Pluto; PayPal’s Venmo reports 40 million annual users

2016 - The FDA approves the first artificial pancreas; AlphaGo defeats Lee Sedol at Go

2017 - SpaceX reuses a Falcon 9 rocket; Ericsson introduces support for the 5G network; Apple launches facial recognition on the iPhone X

2018 - Instagram reaches 1 billion monthly users

2019 - Astronomers release the first photo of a black hole; IBM unveils the first quantum computing system for commercial use; Israeli researchers print a 3D heart using human tissue

2020 - Zoom is downloaded a record 2.13 million times in a single day

2022 - OpenAI releases ChatGPT; The first full-color images from the James Webb Space Telescope are released; A robot performs laparoscopic surgery on a pig without human assistance.

2023 - Google releases Bard.
Thought 1 - I wish I was taught this at school

It connects subjects: Physics, maths, chemistry, biology, business and geography through an interconnected timeline -- with practical implications.
Thought 2 - The current education model defies how we learn

Having random subjects with no interconnection, timeline or narratives -- is awful for learning.

You could scrap 90% of the education system and replace with a detailed breakdown of this full timeline.
Read 7 tweets
Jan 28
What idea changed how you view the world?

Here's mine: High Agency.

The high agency library: (19 best examples I've found in 4 years)Image
1. High agency in a video: This guy.

Watch how the low agency crowd goes from judgemental to joining in, once everyone deems it acceptable.
2. High agency in a photo:

Some historians believe this to be August Landmesser.

He refused to join the german crowd in the Nazi salute in 1936.

He was eventually imprisoned and killed by the Nazi party for dating a Jewish women, Irma Eckler.Image
Read 26 tweets
Dec 18, 2023
16 differences between USA and UK:

(Written by a Brit) Image
1. Accents

In America, if you drive for 2 hours -- people's accents don't change much.

In Britain, if you drive for 2 hours -- people's accents change a lot.

UK is way smaller than Texas -- but has 40+ accents. Image
2. Apple vs The UK

Apple (US company) is worth more than the entire UK stock market. Image
Read 25 tweets

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