Moonshot

Brilliant advertising #apple, you got us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM8DcCoZulw

THE GOOGLE TAX via Seth Godin Actually, there are two. The first is the tax we each pay so that companies can bid against each other to buy traffic from Google. Because their revenue model is (cleverly) built on both direct marketing and an auction, they are able to keep a significant portion of the margin from many industries. They’ve become the internet’s landlord.... The difference between a successful business in New York and an unsuccessful one is just a few percentage pointsthe successful ones pay 95% of their profit to landlords, while the unsuccessful ones pay 105%. It doesn’t matter if there are competitors to Google in search: the model of bidding for attention is so economically compelling (because attention is so scarce), that companies are going to be paying ever more to reach people in this wayor allow their competitors to do so. The second is harder to see: Because Google has made it ever more difficult for sites to be found, previously successful businesses like Groupon, Travelocity and Hipmunk suffer. As a result, new web companies are significantly harder to fund and build. If you’re dependent on being found in a Google search, it’s probably worth rethinking your plan. The open web (and search particularly Google) has created huge benefits in access, competitiveness and selection for so many markets. At the same time, there are structural challenges that are making the future less commercially interesting in many ways. Capitalism is an efficient system for surfacing and addressing the needs of consumers. But once it veers toward control over markets by a single entity, those benefits disappear. The existence of DuckDuckGo doesn’t significantly change Google’s position as a monopoly able to dictate how most people experience everything on the web. https://seths.blog/2019/11/the-google-tax/

Here are some happy places to go to on the internet! Especially if you're sick of #covid and want to be fascinated, educated, or inspired by some of the better parts of the internets. https://theoutline.com//if-youre-sick-of-reading-about-cor

We’re all in this bizarre predicament together, and this crisis affects almost every aspect of our lives. Along with SutherlandGold Group, Moonshot produced a resource to help leaders navigate #communications and #brand during these trying times. https://bit.ly/Brand-Response-covid19

Honoring a history-maker, barrier-breaker, hero and legend. RIP Katherine Johnsonthank you for all your contributions to our world and the exploration beyond it. https://www.nbcnews.com//katherine-johnson-nasa-mathematic

Brilliant advertising #apple, you got us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM8DcCoZulw

THE GOOGLE TAX via Seth Godin Actually, there are two. The first is the tax we each pay so that companies can bid against each other to buy traffic from Google. Because their revenue model is (cleverly) built on both direct marketing and an auction, they are able to keep a significant portion of the margin from many industries. They’ve become the internet’s landlord.... The difference between a successful business in New York and an unsuccessful one is just a few percentage pointsthe successful ones pay 95% of their profit to landlords, while the unsuccessful ones pay 105%. It doesn’t matter if there are competitors to Google in search: the model of bidding for attention is so economically compelling (because attention is so scarce), that companies are going to be paying ever more to reach people in this wayor allow their competitors to do so. The second is harder to see: Because Google has made it ever more difficult for sites to be found, previously successful businesses like Groupon, Travelocity and Hipmunk suffer. As a result, new web companies are significantly harder to fund and build. If you’re dependent on being found in a Google search, it’s probably worth rethinking your plan. The open web (and search particularly Google) has created huge benefits in access, competitiveness and selection for so many markets. At the same time, there are structural challenges that are making the future less commercially interesting in many ways. Capitalism is an efficient system for surfacing and addressing the needs of consumers. But once it veers toward control over markets by a single entity, those benefits disappear. The existence of DuckDuckGo doesn’t significantly change Google’s position as a monopoly able to dictate how most people experience everything on the web. https://seths.blog/2019/11/the-google-tax/

Quantum radar has been demonstrated for the first time. A radar device that relies on entangled photons works at such low power that it can hide behind background noise, making it useful for biomedical and security applications. https://www.technologyreview.com//quantum-radar-has-been/

Hahaha, this happens all the time. But it doesn't have to when you have a story to tell, something more meaningful to believe and buy into. Those that don't stand for something, must lean only on their logo and identity.

Seth Godin: Since the first story was carved on a rock, media pundits have explained that they have simply given people what they want, reporting the best they can on what’s happening. Cause (the culture, human activity, people’s desires) leads to effect (front page news).... In fact, it’s becoming ever more clear that the attention-seeking, profit-driven media industrial complex drives our culture even more than it reports on it. Thoughtful people regularly bemoan our loss of civility, the rise of trolling and bullying and most of all, divisive behavior designed to rip people apart instead of moving us productively forward. And at the very same time, reality TV gets ever better ratings. So much so that the news has become the longest-running, cheapest to produce and most corrosive TV show in history. Increase that exponentially by adding in the peer-to-peer reality show that is social media, and you can see what’s happening. Imagine two classrooms, each filled with second graders. In the first classroom, the teacher shines a spotlight on the bullies, the troublemakers and the fighters, going so far as to arrange all the chairs so that the students are watching them and cheering them on all day. In the second classroom, the teacher establishes standards, acts as a damper on selfish outliers and celebrates the generous and productive kids in the classroom How will the classrooms diverge? Which one would you rather have your child enrolled in? We’re not in elementary school anymore, and the media isn’t our teacher or our nanny. But the attention we pay to the electronic channels we click on consumes more of our day than we ever spent with Miss Binder in second grade. And that attention is corrosive. To us and to those around us. The producers of reality TV know this. And they seek out more of it. When they can’t find it easily, they search harder. Because that’s their job. It’s their job to amp up the reality show that is our culture. But it’s not our job to buy into it. More than anything, profit-driven media needs our active participation in order to pay their bills. It’s an asymmetrical game, with tons of behavioral research working against each of usthe uncoordinated but disaffected masses. Perhaps we can find the resolve to seek out the others, to connect and to organize in a direction that actually works. The first step is to stop taking the bait. The second step is to say, follow me.

NASA scientists have compiled a map of all known exoplanets. In this 1 min video, watch the map grow with each new discovered exoplanet every year since 1991. https://youtu.be/aiFD_LBx2nM

Over 1,000 shopping sites, from J.Crew to Walmart, are deceiving users, study shows Researchers at Princeton expose just how many shopping websites use dark patterns to convince you to buy more or give up more data. https://www.fastcompany.com//over-1000-shopping-sites-from

Creative #campaign of the day: Esther was actually Ethan, a 20-year-old college student who used Snapchat’s popular gender-swap filter on himself and then created a dating profile with the image in the hopes of catching a sexual predator a strange case of someone using a seemingly silly bit of tech for vigilante justice. https://futurism.com/the-byte/gender-swap-filter-fools-cop

Wonderful piece on the 5 best pitch decks "of all time." Hint, it comes down to storytelling and finding the right angles to demonstrate your opportunity. The article breaks down what makes each Winning pitches. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/333045

Signals from Beyondhot off the press! This edition explores thinking through the long game. We share the best content we've combed from a timelapse of the end of time to beautiful contemplations of doomsday. But as far out to the future as we can imagine, we got back to the beginning as well. Oh, and a little sprinkle of some branding/ storytelling wisdom. Find it here: http://bit.ly/SgnlsBynd

#Artemis If it succeeds, NASA’s upcoming lunar mission will the first time in history that a woman astronaut walks on the surface of the Moon. To commemorate the occasion, NASA has named the mission Artemis after the Greek goddess of the Moon, according to Ars Technica. The new mission is also a homage: In Greek mythology, Artemis is the sister of the god Apollo, which was the name of the mission that first brought astronauts to the lunar surface for the first time in... 1969. https://futurism.com/the-byte/nasa-moon-program-name