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You Become What You Write About
No matter how fast digital software evolves, there are some habits and objects ground in the physical world that draw me towards them. One of these is physical notebooks, usually a Moleskine. I’ve filled out three of them the past couple of years, and brought a fourth half-filled with me halfway across the world. It…
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How to Take Your Career to the Next Level with Notes
It was only yesterday when I needed to make a minor decision I had been stuck on for a week. The situation didn’t require a friend or advisor’s advice, precious time I’d prefer to save for something of greater gravity. Instead, I consulted a set of notes I’d taken on making decisions, which took me…
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Digital’s quieter half has been doing its work this whole time
While far from a successful case study, I’ll never forget stumbling across multiple copies of Airbnb’s discontinued Pineapple travel magazine in the back corner of Bouwerie Iconic Magazines in New York City. Of course, I recalled the powerful first impression Pineapple’s stories, layouts, and photography made on me—a jog through my inbox lets me know…
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A Founder’s Guide to Startup Branding Through Writing
The sun was setting as I wrapped up the workday, taking my final call with a former colleague who had recently raised seed funding and was the CEO of a new startup. We were both based in Toronto, known more for its biting cold winters and less for its booming technology scene. The conversation started…
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Content, Without the Marketing
I’ve kept my studio Wonder Shuttle mostly dormant for the past four months, as I got into the groove of a full-time editorial director assignment at WorkOS. Some more notable projects include launching a podcast, setting up the editorial calendar and hiring a technical editor, and editing and publishing (and even co-writing some) blog posts.…
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Great Writing Is an Extension of the Product
In 2008, designer Paul Armstrong launched web.without.words, a project where he eliminated words and turned popular websites into wireframes. For example, he covered what Apple’s website would look like without words, which frankly doesn’t look all too dissimilar from what one of its product pages looks like today. Armstrong wanted to, “visually represent [his] core…
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Big Ideas, Small Papers
One of the most painful things about writing in small amounts of time is the lack of time for re-working. It feels like writing on a scrap of paper that’s way too small. I would wish that I hadn’t spent so much space on that first sentence or doodle. Upon realizing I don’t have enough…
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Why Unrealistic Expectations May Be Exactly What You Need
In the 1980s, educator Jaime Escalante taught calculus at one of the worst schools in East LA, with a dropout rate as high as 55%. Escalante and his calculus class turned the reputation of the school around, with a high percentage of his students passing the AP calculus exam. When a film based on this…
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The Devil’s in the Details
Practically a decade before I wrote the words you’re reading now, I wrote a series of op-eds for HYPEBEAST. I had pitched a few that didn’t make the cut, my favorite of which was entitled, “God is in the Details.” I wanted to cover how typography could make people think differently. The idea was interesting,…
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How to Write Faster
Image: Lady Writing a Letter (1887) by Albert Edelfelt/Artvee Every day, you and I write. We write emails, text messages, letters, birthday cards, and search queries. This is a practical guide on how to write faster, because we spend so much time writing. This isn’t about touch-typing faster or handwriting faster, but the process of…