Zoom Zoom

OPM.55 (notes on) Small is the New Big, Seth Godin, 2006

Stop making products and start making magic.

This has been Seth's mantra over the years. This book is no exception.

It's a fun read, delightfully nostalgic for someone that live through the internet revolution. Even though this book was about the World Wide Web before social media inhaled the information superhighway, Seth's encouragement is still as powerful as ever.

Go out there, let it all hang out, and do something.

This book emphasizes "zooming" — acclimating to the difficult art of change. He posits that zooming is a powerfully motivating way to view the world.

This book comes from that short lived genera of collected blog-posts volumes. The world has changed a bit since publication, but it still rhymes with the 00's, even if things feel a little gloomier.

Seth has been telling the same story for the past three decades.

So if you dig him, check it out. If you don't, this book won't change your mind.

With AI, change is coming (again!). What would you do if you knew for certain that what your work today won't survive the next two decades of disruption? How will you embrace the change that is coming? Are you gonna zoom?

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One of my favorite riffs is when Godin embarks on an extended discussion about "maybe-proofing" the company. One of the best ways to kill a project flow is to dawdle. Sometimes we should pause and let things develop, but that should be a deliberate choice. As OPM's, we have to maybe-proof ourselves. Our job is to make choices.

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In the two years after reading this book, I've realized that I'm on the back half of my career. So I've lost interest in self-help and Seth has been a casualty of this shift. He's correct that one needs to embrace change in your career, but I'm not focused on my career anymore.

I will always work hard and dabble with process improvements, but when I'm not at work, I focus on other joys. I no longer feel an urge to to maximize my output or lead the charge to make things better in the office.

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Some Links

At the end of each month, I often need to use up my quota at Hoopla (a library streaming service). I invariably return to these albums. Two of them are absolute classics. The third is lesser known, though by perennial request by our kids. The fourth is a nod to my weakness for EDM.

Keith Jarrett's Koln Concert. It's the best selling solo jazz album of all time, but I'll switch it up and borrow his Paris Concert which forays into baroque counterpoint.

The Awakening is one of the most sampled albums in hip hop. Recorded in February 1970, it feels like a distinct evolution by the Ahmad Jamal Trio from the bebop of past decades. If I've had too much piano lately, I'll get Way Out West with a unique trio of bass, drums, and saxophone colossus Sonny Rollins.

My kids are obsessed with the "Ballad of Pancho Villa" (which they call "cafe music") so they always insist on borrowing From All Sides, a collaboration between guitarist Bolo Sete and the Vince Guaraldi Trio.

I recently mentioned Klangphonics for their quirky YouTube shorts. Driving feels better with Songs to Try on the speakers (but it's not so aggressive to become dangerous).

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Park Shade, 2022

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Thanks for reading!
Justus Pang, RA