Iterate Weekly - Issue 48
This week we're doing what we can to help Ukraine win, a book giveaway from 80,000 hours, Whole Foods encourages shoplifting, a Spotify thing for you car, and eating some Licorice Pizza!
Welcome to issue 48 of Iterate Weekly!
Just a reminder that you can always reply to this email or leave a comment on the web version. I read all of them, and I appreciate the feedback, questions, and insights from all of you.
Let’s jump into this week’s stories.
🤖 Tech
Help Ukraine Win
It’s impossible to ignore the current situation in Ukraine. Personally, my company works with a team of engineers based in Kyiv. It’s been scary to see their change in demeanor as things have escalated. For months, whenever we asked about the tension in their country, they brushed it off as the American news cycle making more of the story than it actually was.
Obviously, things changed once the invasion was officially underway. Their updates were more curt and serious. They planned routes out of the city to visit extended family in safer locales. They considered a possible permanent move to Poland to escape the turmoil. One of them preferred to hunker down and make their home as safe as possible.
While I am by no means an authority on global politics, I’ve seen the impact of the situation firsthand. I can take a break this week from talking about the latest tech news to share some important ways to help.
You can find a list of donation sites and other resource links at Help Ukraine Win. Let’s all spend some time this week donating our time, money, and attention for an extremely important cause.
🎓 Education
Free Book Giveaway
I want to highlight a free giveaway going on right now for those looking to find some clarity on their career passions.
It comes from the folks at 80000 hours. If you’re not familiar with their work, they believe that we all have about 80,000 hours of work to contribute in our lifetimes. The math checks out. 40 years x 50 weeks x 40 hours = 80,000 hours.
Their goal is to help you make the most of that time. We could all use a little guidance in this area. Right now they are giving away your choice of three different titles when you signup for their newsletter. No strings attached, you can always unsubscribe later if you like.
You can signup here if you’re interested.
♻️ Health & Environment
Healthy Shoplifting?
Whole Foods wants you to just walk out with groceries. They know you, they trust you, you’re good for it!
The grocery chain is testing out a new concept store in Washington DC that just lets people scan once and take whatever they’d like from the store. It does seem a little creepy that “sensors” are tracking the items you put in your bag as you walk around the store. I do love the idea of just taking items off a shelf and putting them in your bag. The whole process of using a cart or basket, then transferring to a bag seems like a waste of time. People will still shoplift if they want to.
I imagine many issues with these stores as they get ramped up. You get emailed a receipt when you leave the store, but I imagine there will be plenty of adjustments required so you’re not overcharged. You can also opt-out of the technology and just shop like a normal store with a self-checkout line if you’d prefer.
There is a plan for a similar California store coming later this year. I’m certainly excited to try the experience myself to decide how creepy versus convenient it feels.
🛍 Grab Bag
Spotify Has a Thing…for Your Car
Spotify has an interesting new product on the market. They’re calling it the “Car Thing”.
I’ll admit that my first instinct was to laugh. It’s a silly name, for a silly product. We all have our phones attached to our dashboards at all times right? They are certainly more powerful and versatile than this…thing.
But how good is the experience of listening to music on your phone in the car? When it works, it’s fine. When it doesn’t work, it’s borderline dangerous. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to swipe at the screen when my voice controls weren’t being picked up over the ambient road noise.
The Car Thing does just one thing and (presumably) one thing well. It just plays Spotify content. No navigation, no other crazy voice commands. It just plays your music, podcasts, audiobooks, and whatever else you have in your Spotify account.
The aesthetics of this thing bring me back to the early 2000s of tech. It almost has a Microsoft Zune look to it, and I dig it. Is it insane to want a full-fledged smartphone in this form factor? A 4-inch screen, covered in matte black textured rubber? You could really beat this thing up and it should still be in good shape. Plus it has a big knob! The knob worked for car audio controls for decades, why did we think everything needed to switch to a touch screen? (which the Car Thing also has).
Am I going to buy this thing? Probably not. While I have given in to using Spotify for most of my audio needs, it’s still nice to be able to use other services. I’m still horrible with directions and need my phone’s GPS to guide me. I can’t really imagine having two screens mounted above the screen that’s already built into my car’s dashboard.
But give this thing a 50% discount (it’s currently $90) and sure maybe I’d give it a whirl. If the experience is good, I could see it catching on with those who are Spotify die-hards.
💬 Quote of the Week
“Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.”
— Pablo Picasso
🎥Content Recommendation
Licorice Pizza
It’s Academy Awards season! Over the next month, I’ll be doing my best to see as many nominated films as possible. This week I saw “Licorice Pizza”.
This is the kind of film that I love seeing amongst the best picture nominees. I don’t want to say that nothing happens in this movie, but it’s a fun slice of life, a series of vignettes.
The plot is easy to follow. Every scene is filled with stars, and yet the two main actors are first-time leads. You feel like you’ve traveled to the early 1970s in Southern California and it’s a refreshing place to visit. The soundtrack is also perfect.
I really loved this film and can’t recommend it enough.
Thanks for reading, I’ll see you next week!