Paying for Freedom

“I would pay for a service that never sells a single piece of my life. For a service that cares about my emotions and not ad impressions. For a service that is committed to putting me first and not the advertiser. For a service that emphasizes and never blurs the sanctity of my privacy. For a service that fosters real friendships with real friends and not the consumption of information. For a service that respects my time and never dares to distract me. For a service that humbly gets the fuck out of the way, becomes invisible and allows for humanity to prosper. For a service that isn’t a service at all, but a beautiful supplementation to life.” – Youssef Sarhan

One of My All-Time Favorite Tech Legends

“Retreating to his garage, he cut a block of wood to fit his shirt pocket. Then he carried it around for months, pretending it was a computer. Was he free for lunch on Wednesday? Hawkins would haul out the block and tap on it as if he were checking his schedule. If he needed a phone number, he would pretend to look it up on the wood. Occasionally he would try out different design faces with various button configurations, using paper printouts glued to the block.” – Alberto Savaia, Pretotype It

Be Your Own Business Cycle

“…to the extent that Etsy, Kickstarter, and other platforms can disintermediate the labor economy, we should be very grateful. Not only are these platforms beneficial technologies of resistance as Reihan emphasizes, they might be generators of macroeconomic robustness.” – Eli Dourado

I encourage you to read the whole thing. I especially found the employment = bond financing , self-employment = equity financing comparison very intriguing.