Hey Everyone,
Welcome back to The Chomp—your weekly dose of the best content from the internet and beyond, designed to expand your mind and get you thinking. Let’s dive into it.
Quick Bites
Form, Storm, Norm, Perform: The form, storm, norm, perform framework is something that I became familiar with a few years ago and found quite helpful in assessing where a team is in its lifecycle. I was excited to see this highlighted in Nick Grossman’s blog recently, and hope that anyone not familiar with the framework takes a couple of minutes to learn more about it. (2min)
Your Work Is the Only Thing That Matters: This recent blog post from author Ryan Holiday serves as a useful reminder to avoid distraction and focus on what matters. He uses a few relatable examples and offers up a vivid analogy of what it looks like to be truly zoned in on your work. (7min)
Deeper Dives
7 Reasons Why Video Gaming Will Take Over: On Wednesday of this past week, Fortnite became recognized as an official high school and college ‘sport’, with the announcement of a competitive circuit for players at both levels. This is yet another step in the advancement of esports and the rise of video games in mainstream culture. In this excellent piece, digital media and gaming expert Matthew Ball outlines seven key reasons why video games are taking over as the dominant attention medium. With video game clips being the most-watched content on YouTube (the most popular site in the world), this article is worth a read to gain a better understanding of what’s driving the growth of this massive market. (22 min)
Good Science, Bad Science, Pseudoscience: How to Tell the Difference: In today’s clickbait driven world we’re constantly bombarded with sensationalized news and scientific studies that often have no merit. As most of us don’t have the proper training or time to decipher which studies and statistics are trustworthy, it’s difficult to weed out the BS. This recent post on Farnam Street seeks to change that by offering a host of useful tips and tricks to help you differentiate good science from bad science and pseudoscience. (19 min)
Media
With the Wuhan coronavirus dominating the news this week, I wanted to better understand what differentiates it from previous iterations such as MERS and SARS, which both had thousands of confirmed cases and hundreds of fatalities. Below is a chart comparing each of them along with the common cold strain of coronavirus.
Tweet of the Week
Song of the Week
Apple Music Link
Books
Currently Reading
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York(Robert A. Caro)
Dark Age: Red Rising #5 (Pierce Brown)
Recently Read
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life(William Finnegan): This is easily one of the best autobiographies I’ve ever read. William Finnegan is an incredible writer and it’s no surprise his reflections on his life in Barbarian Days won him a Pulitzer Prize. This one is well worth your time—whether you’re a surfer or not. (5/5)
Parting Thoughts
This Week in History
On January 22, 1973, a landmark Supreme Court decision established a woman’s legal right to an abortion in Roe V. Wade. The Court ruled, in a 7-2 decision, that a woman’s right to choose an abortion was protected by the privacy rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. (Source)
"Even if some obstacle comes on the scene, its appearance is only to be compared to that of clouds which drift in front of the sun without ever defeating its light." – Seneca
If you found something that piqued your interest this week, please help me out in expanding the reach of The Chomp by forwarding it along to a friend or sharing it with others in your network. Until next week.
-Cody