Make It Good

Folks, it’s the final 24 hours to not get a Fuck This Stupid Culture shirt. Seriously, do not buy them.

Something I am proud of with my original video work is this. The top priority was always to push myself to do the best I could, to make it good.

I loved when bands and filmmakers and authors demanded that I meet them at their level. They made me raise my game in order to understand and appreciate their work. This was my approach too, though I also employed as much entertainment, humor, brevity and simplicity as I could because I valued those things too. But when the choice had to be between making it good and making it more entertaining or funny or shorter or simpler, I chose making it good.

I much preferred making unpopular things I liked to making popular things I didn’t like. I was going to cite this Iron Man Dance video I made back in Brooklyn with my friend Jasmin Rituper as an example of something popular I made and didn’t like, but then I watched it again and realized actually I do like it.

As my longtime e-friend Jesse Walker wrote to me: “You’ve made stuff that’s strong enough to endure, and people will keep finding it and citing you years after you first published it.” (By the way, don’t worry, I don’t quote email replies without permission.)

I collected plenty of a valuable asset: prestige. Prestige is a rare and precious commodity and it lasts longer than money. There’s a lot more cash in the world than there is prestige. Prestige doesn’t pay the bills on its own, but it’s an asset I have going forward into this next phase.

One of the other results of conducting myself this way is that I have a mailing list of 6,500 people and these emails are consistently opened by 75% of you, which is extraordinary. Also, it has been well-documented by our robot overlords that my newsletter readers possess incredibly high levels of smoldering sexual magnetism.

When I send out an email to this list, I can get hundreds of replies and they are not just quick notes of good wishes. People tell me about their lives, they offer help and insight, they tell me the story of what I meant in their lives and how I changed them. These are long, thoughtful emails, plenty of which get sent a week or more afterwards because what I said stuck and it was important to them to find time to write. The connection I have to you all through this newsletter is deeper than what I get from views, likes or follows.

Writing a good email, which takes hours, and mailing it out feels equal to how it felt to release many of the good videos I labored over for months. Many of these videos ultimately get seen by over 100 thousand people. The maximum number of readers of any of these e-mails is about 6.5 thousand.

Serving a smaller audience, but serving them more deeply, feels about as significant as publishing Artificial Creativity did.

This leads me to two changes I want to explore. I’m thinking out loud here; these are works in progress. The first change is this.

I want to serve a smaller audience more deeply. Nobody is entitled to a large audience, and it’s an unfair expectation to have of yourself. But we can all, in some way, serve a small audience and have a meaningful connection with them.

The second change is this.

Make it good was always my highest value. It eclipsed everything. And the ultimate judge of what was good was me. For this next phase of my career, I want to not decide what is good. I want other people to decide what is good. I don’t decide what works, they do. And I want to find joy in serving the needs of others. Of course, I’ll still want to make it good, but it won’t dominate my values in the same way.

This newsletter meanwhile will be the place where I make it good. In a smaller way, often a simpler way, certainly a quicker way.

By the way folks, I’ve switched this mailing list to a new provider, SquareSpace, which is the platform my site and my shop operate on. This emails looks a little different but otherwise nothing should have changed. If you notice anything weird, please me know.

Thank you SquareSpace who donated web hosting to me all those years ago and it’s still running.

You guys make my heart floppy,
k

You read the whole email! I am so proud of you.

From altruism to capitalism

THE STORY SO FAR

• I'm best known for the series Everything is a Remix

• I'm pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons

• I'm seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life

• I'm thinking about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything I say here.

Before I get to it, I have a question for you. Over the last 12 months, what has been your most consistent problem? It only takes seconds to submit. Your answer is anonymous, though I might use it in a newsletter. Onward!

A core component of my next phase is to build a new kind of business. In the past, my main goal was to make awesome stuff and then somehow money happens. This worked once, it hasn't worked since, I'm done. I talk more about this here.

What will this new business do? Don't know! I want to discover this by having the market tell me what works. I plan to do this through small, cheap, preferably free experiments. I'm coming up with a bunch of experimental products, tools, and ploys which I'm calling candidates.

The candidates that create a spark get built upon or expanded. The ones that don't work, I learn from and murder. Score is kept in dollars.

Ideally, one candidate will take over and that'll be the business. But it's perfectly plausible that the business will remain a mixture of smaller sub-businesses.

(Is this methodology good? Does it suck? If you know of a better way of testing and growing business ideas, please reply.)

Candidate #1 was video production. It's good work, I like it, but there are issues with that work providing what I need. (I talked about this here.)

Today I'll introduce Candidate #2!

I've been thinking about three things a lot lately and they lead me to an idea.

1. Green shoots

Where is the growth in my recent history? What has generated some pop, some interest, some excitement? The original Everything is a Remix did this long ago. More recently, the Angry Kirby newsletter did this. In a small but significant way, the worksheets in my shop—The 4 Steps to Getting an Idea and Getting Unstuck—did this. Sales were small but they didn't take long to make and were well worth the time. And they continue selling.

2. What problems can I solve?

A basic tenet of entrepreneurism is find a pain and cure it. I've been thinking about what problems can I solve. And even more importantly, what problems do I have that I need to solve? And can I solve this problem for others?

3. Education

I'm very interested in the broad category of education because I consider myself an educator and it's an industry with clear demand. This is also a good pivot at this stage of life (middleage) because it plays to my strengths and builds on what I already have, which is some prestige and a quality body of work. Plus, Everything is a Remix is very popular in schools.

This was reaffirmed by my discovery that middle aged and older people are well-equipped to excel at teaching. We aren't necessarily as quick or as innovative as we once were, but we can be even better storytellers and this strength can persist deep into old age.

All this lead to Candidate #2 which I will now explode your mind with.

Candidate #2 is turn the Everything is a Remix site into a source for educational products

The Remix video curriculum will of course be featured prominently and maintained. Around these videos, there would be a wide variety of educational products.

This idea ticks all the boxes I listed above.

The green shoots are the worksheets I already sell. Those worked well enough that I’d like to see if I can grow them.

The problems I can solve through education are many. I know loads about creativity and knowledge work. And the problem I am working on now—financial stability and fulfillment in middle age—has clearly struck a chord. If I can solve this for myself, I can create products to help others solve that problem for themselves.

And finally, it's educational, which is a domain I like.

Pros of this idea

• Already have the skills

• Helps people with their problems

• Probably makes at least some profit

Cons of this idea

• Saturated market

• Kinda similar to what I was doing before

• Might be small

The risk of running this experiment is low because I’m confident I can get a decent return on the time put in. So I'll likely try it and we'll see if it's worthwhile.

Ladies, gentlemen and gender nonconformists, that is Candidate #2! Thank you very much and good night!

That’s it for this week, folks. As always, it’s me on the other end of these. Just hit reply and you’re talking to me. No pressure, don’t panic.

Remember to get your pets spayed or neutered,
Kirby

P.S. You did, yes, kudos.

Tech make-overs and underrated sci-fi flicks

THE STORY SO FAR

• I'm best known for the series Everything is a Remix.

• I'm pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons.

• I'm seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. Current business candidates for my next phase are video production and turning the Remix site into a source for educational products.

• I'm thinking about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule any of these statements.

Happy Monday everybody!

First off, a question: are you a teacher or professor interested in helping me learn about how I could serve schools? If yes, please take just a few seconds to send me your info!

This week I’m putting business and life stuff aside and getting geeky. I'm going to talk about my software make-over and wrap-up with a few underrated science fiction films.

My Tech Make-over

Whenever I finish a chapter of life—like moving or completing a large project or y’know stopping doing the thing I’ve done for a couple decades—I always feel compelled to clean house in a variety of ways. I tidy up my workstation and do chores that have been kicking around for months. I organize my computer, archive old stuff, and clean up my desktop. Although even at the worst of times, gotta say my desktop is pretty dang tidy.

But the most impact comes from the improvements I make to my software workflow. Occasionally these changes don’t stick, occasionally they end up being horizontal moves, but mostly, they’re meaningful upgrades to how I work.

Here’s my tech changes from recent years. (Some of these are Mac only.)

The Switch
For writing I switched from the writing application Scrivener to the note taking application Obsidian.
The Result
Excellent move but Scrivener is great and might work well for you.

The Switch
For video editing I switched from Adobe Premiere to Davinci Resolve.
The Result
Entirely superior application, great move, many other video editors are now following suit. This also saved plenty of money. Everything after This is Not a Conspiracy Theory has been made in Resolve.

The Switch
For photo editing and graphics work I switched from Photoshop to Affinity Photo.
The Result
This also saved money and it works well enough for me because I don’t use Photoshop that much anymore. But Photoshop is still the best and if I did more graphics work I would switch back.

I've also made new additions, like the Mac-only application Drafts. This is where I do transient bits of writing, like important messages or posts, handy references, notes from meetings—actually I’m writing this newsletter in Drafts! (Obsidian is more like a personal library, a “second brain.” Drafts is more like a notepad.)

And I love Text Sniper for capturing bits of onscreen text. Can’t say enough good things about this application and I use it almost everyday.

Here’s the changes I’ve made in recent months during The Middle Age Pivot. Some of these are still on-going.

The Switch
For browsing, switched from Brave to the Arc Browser, which is still a beta.
The Result
It’s better, do it. You can probably find an invite in this Twitter thread. I made this video with Nick Milo about Arc.

The Switch
Although I’ve run a Mac for a long time, I didn’t actually use much Apple software or services. I didn't even have an iPhone. But now I’ve now joined the Apple Cult.
The Result
I realize this choice isn’t very exciting or original, but in my new dad life using Apple everywhere makes life easier. Everything works well, connects well and the user interface is consistent. I now use Apple Music, Podcasts and Notes regularly. I’m even trying out Apple News for news. I now have an Apple Watch. I love being reachable all the time by my family, and I often use it for podcasts, alarms and UV readings here in sunny San Diego. Nora got me AirPods Pro for Christmas and I love them so so much. Nora and I use Photos all the time for family photos and it’s one of our absolute favorite things. These all get synced up to an ever-ballooning iCloud account. (I tried to use Siri with my watch for a while and gave up.)

The verdict is not yet in on these current switches.

• Trying Spark email client for business email. I’ve used Gmail forever, but I’ve moved the Remix addresses to iCloud. This is just an area where I’m looking to freshen things up and have a feeling of renewal.

• I’m moving away from Notion, Apple Reminders and Asana and trying ClickUp for task and project management. The free plans have everything most of us will ever need.

• I’m likely switching to the very exciting, kinda geeky launcher Raycast, which would replace three apps: Alfred, TextExpander, and Default Folder.

• A lot of business and productivity books are padded and shouldn’t be 300 pages long, and I often find podcasts fluffy and meandering. I’m currently using Blinkist for 20 minute summaries. I still read the most important books, but for the next tier down, this is seeming like a great way to pick up some good bits.

And these old-timers hang in there year after year.

• 1Password for passwords.

• iStat Menus gives me system and network stats I sometimes need.

• Slack for messaging.

• Breaktime for focusing. I set it to 52 minutes, then take a break. I’m sporadic at this.

• Chronosync for backups.

• DropBox is still the best for online file storage. I like WeTransfer for sending large files.

• We need Excel for the business so we use Microsoft 365 or whatever it’s called this week.

All told, almost my entire suite of applications has been replaced over the past few years, including stalwarts like Scrivener and the Adobe suite. These changes have been overwhelmingly beneficial.

3 underrated science fiction films

While researching my final video, Artificial Creativity, I watched (or at least skimmed) lots of science fiction films looking for robots and rockets. These three are the most underrated.

3) Europa Report
Ultra low budget film about a research mission to one of Saturn’s moons, the ice-covered Europa.

2) Sunshine
This is gorgeous big budget sci-fi and still looks fantastic. There are definitely issues. I won’t spoil it by saying what they are but you’ll see for yourself.

1) Aniara
Based on a Swedish epic poem from the fifties, this film is about a massive, cruise-like spaceship taking settlers to Mars. A dark, dark masterpiece that should only be watched when you can handle an unrelenting journey into the abyss.

That’s it for this week folks! I hope you’re all well! We have COVID in the house, so this next while will be… ugh.

Don’t take any wooden nickels,
k

P.S. How about you follow me on all this shit down below?

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Now entering Stage 1

THE STORY SO FAR

• I'm best known for the series Everything is a Remix.

• I'm pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons.

• I'm seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life.

• I'm thinking about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule any of these statements.

Hello everybody! I finally got COVID! I give it no stars.

The complete edit of Everything is a Remix 2023 is back online! There was much rejoicing! And by popular request, there are music playlists for Spotify and Apple Music.

In this week’s exciting installment I have not one candidate for my next phase but two! And I’ll be announcing the first major event of this era of my life and career. I’ll also talk about why I’ll never make a podcast, and I’ll close out with some feedback from you. Why am I showering you with such riches?!?!?

But first, folks, my weekly question: what’s your favorite way to learn? Replies are anonymous and it only take a second. (Teachers thank you for reaching out! I’ll be getting in touch with every single one of you. This is now my rallying cry.)

Without further ado, candidate #3 is...

marketing!

(For those who don’t know, I refer to the options for the next phase of my career as Candidates.)

Funnily enough, in the past I’ve mostly not done a good job of marketing for myself. Why am I so confident I can do it well now?

Before I was too consumed by the films I was making. The research and production of these was incredibly intense and consumed almost my entire bandwidth. There was very little left of me for anything else. And of course, I never really cared about business. The goal was to make great stuff and everything else was peripheral.

Why can I be excellent at marketing now? Cuz I’ve got it all folks.

• I care about business now and I have the bandwidth.

• Marketing is for generalists. That’s me.

• Marketing is for designers. That’s my background.

• Marketing is, above all, for storytellers. And that, above all, is me.

I doubt that marketing on its will be the new business. More likely, the business itself will be marketing-driven. But as always, I’m open to just being a marketing business if that’s what the, uh, market wants. I’ll be here all week, folks!

But wait there’s more!

And our final candidate is... writing! For this next era, writing will occupy the space that filmmaking used to. It’ll be where I explore and I learn. I’ll kinda be doing what I’ve always done except without doing a mountain of audio and visual work. It’ll be faster and easier. But the writing will also have a new mission: to support the business. Nowadays you need content in order to get attention. So I’ll still be in the content game, it’ll just be in a leaner, more efficient and more targeted way. Again, seems unlikely writing will be my main occupation, but it can always grow.

Now entering Stage 1

And with that, we have our template for this next phase of my career, which I am dubbing Stage 1. Here’s the projects that are underway for each of the candidates.

• Video Production
  A new AI video coming for Bloomberg.

• Educational Products
  New products being developed for the Remix site. I’ll also be talking with teachers about what their needs are.

• Marketing
  Relaunch of Everything is a Remix site.

• Writing
  An upcoming AI article in a popular site plenty of you know. There will also be some new written content, and this newsletter is where I’ll talk about this whole endeavor.

The purpose of Stage 1 is to build a foundation and launch some experiments. I’m not trying to have all the answers. I’m trying to make some moves, see what works, build and grow.

The relaunch of the Everything is a Remix website will be the first major event of Stage 1. We’ll have several new downloadable products, several new physical products, a new-and-improved look, and plenty of other upgrades. I’m not sure what this launch date is yet but I’ll announce it when I have it.

Now let me tell you why I’m not making a podcast

A lot of people have said I should make a podcast. I get why people think this. It seems a natural fit because I already have the skills and I could make top tier content there. It’d be quicker and easier than making videos. However, for now this is idea is a non-starter for these reasons.

• I don’t love podcasts which means I don’t think I could make a great one.

• Podcasts are an infinite commitment and that freaks me out.

If someday I connected with podcasts and found a sustainable way to make them, hey, it could happen. But it’s unlikely.

Notes from readers

• Longtime Remix friend Hans Sharler summarized Tony Fadell’s recent book, Build.

• James recommends the gorgeous calendar-based planning app, Sunsama.

• TJ made the excellent point that we should not fear saturated markets. He’s had better luck outperforming in those, rather than chasing the few opportunities in tiny niches.

• Samuel Arbesman compiled this Canon of Modern Wisdom.

• I recently caught up with long-time friend Mark Hurst. My first ever public speaking event was at his conference, Gel. Here I am! Mark writes a fantastic newsletter himself called Creative Good, which is about ethical tech. He also created one of the all-time great to do apps, Good To Do, one of the few to do apps that let’s you place tasks in the future, so they’re not cluttering up your list (and your mind) before you actually need them.

See you next week folks!
k

P.S. Need to freshen up your work space with inspiring art? Check out the Everything is a Remix printable artwork below.

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Let’s lose 20 pounds and be less creative!

THE STORY SO FAR

• I'm best known for the series Everything is a Remix.

• I'm pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons.

• I'm seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life.

• I'm thinking about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule any of these statements.

Howdy folks!

I’ve written a new AI piece for the fantastic site Freethink, which is part of the Big Think media juggernaut. It’s called “Why artists shouldn’t fear AI.” It’s an adaptation of the last Everything is a Remix episode, Artificial Creativity, but it’s substantially revised and in some ways it’s a deeper exploration of the topic. (And in case you didn’t hear, the complete edit of Everything is a Remix 2023 is back online!)

I’m now on the new, decentralized social app Blue Sky. (Thanks Sebastian!) It’s still invite-only, but if you happen to be on there, come follow me. Otherwise, you can join the waitlist.

And one last thing before we proceed, I have a question for you: where do you compose ideas and do your thinking? It only takes a moment to respond and it’s anonymous.

Last week’s results looked like this. Clear winner: you folks like to learn by watching. Thank you to everyone who voted, and thank you also for your many helpful comments.

I’m choosing to be less creative

I wouldn't say I'm slaughtering my sacred cows lately, but I'm certainly worshipping them less. A new and somewhat shocking decision I finding myself making lately is choosing to be less creative.

Old Kirby would have found this choice radical, weird and probably sad. But creativity is a monumentally inefficient undertaking. It requires loads of exploration, experimentation and failure. I've done an incredible amount of all these over the years. A minority of this work has been published, the rest sits on my hard drive. Much of it is junk, but some of it isn’t.

I abandoned loads of ideas that got stuck, and I was always in a rush to get on to the next thing. After dropping a major video, which was the product of months of work, I didn’t do anything further with that material and just zipped along to the next thing. I have loads and loads and loads of research that never got used for anything.

Any kind of knowledge work is about exploration and exploitation. I’ve done a lot of exploring, and not much exploitation.

I don't need to chart new realms. I've already explored plenty. I’m looking to exploit my existing body of creative work and research: simplify, popularize, augment, transform, and commercialize. There’s still plenty of creative effort required, but it’s a more modest variety. The results of some of these efforts are starting to appear in the redesign of the Everything is a Remix website, which is currently underway.

Let’s lose 20 pounds!

Like many of you I’m sure, the last few years have not been kind to my waistline or my health. There was of course the COVID years, but for me, the major culprit was parenthood. Prior to having a baby, I’d finally gotten my diet and exercise pretty dialed-in after having yo-yoing weight my entire adult life.

The lack of sleep and relentless work of co-parenting sapped my willpower and resulted in me taking lots of shortcuts and craving ease wherever I could find it. I cannot deal with figuring out how to not eat pizza right now. I gained over 20 pounds, going from 190 to 212—or maybe more. I stopped checking the scale after a while.

The intensity of parenting has eased-up as we approach the mid-point of Kirby Junior’s second year and I now have the strength to get my health back in order and keep it that way. My goal is to get back down to 190 pounds. I’m 6’2” and this feels like a good weight for my frame, but I’ll reevaluate my goals once I get there.

This isn’t a short-term plan to drop some pounds, I’m changing how I eat forever. The approach I’ve chosen is pretty simple. It’s the Harvard Medical School plan plus the Mediterranean diet, which seems the consensus choice for overall best diet. (The Japanese diet is probably equivalent or even a bit better, but that’s hard for Western people like me to pull off.)

Red meat, flour, processed stuff, and sugary treats have been cut way back. Dairy and potatoes, both beloved staples of mine, have also been reduced. You can see the Harvard food pyramid here, which is my template.

My lifestyle is decently active. I love to get Little Kirby plenty of play and outside activity so when I eat well, the pounds zip off. I’ve already lost about 12 pounds—though I got a little assist from catching COVID, which knocked out my appetite for a few days. I’m already over half way to my destination.

The major difference I’m experiencing already is that I just feel better on my frame. I feel bouncier, quicker, and less achey. Basically, I’ve rewound my age about five years.

This is all still a work in progress. When life gets more stressful, my willpower lapses and my old habits score some wins. After a truly wretched recent day, I Doordashed Wendy’s and watched NBA playoffs. It was both glorious and immediately regrettable.

But I know my old ways just aren’t sustainable, and after getting off track, I just turn ‘round and head back in the right direction.

If your weight’s been creeping up over the years, losing some pounds really does make a big difference, not just to your long-term health but to how you feel right now. If you think this could help you, the Harvard plan and the Mediterranean diet work. Join me.

I'm also drinking salt for some fuckin' reason. Is this bullshit? I dunno but I have to say, I feel like it improves my energy. Maybe it's just the placebo effect but nowadays, I’ll take that placebo, thanks.

Happy post-Mother’s Day to all the moms! Have great week everyone!
Kirby

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The Latest From Kirby

Making binging work for you

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

Howdy folks!

I have a burning question for you all: who are you? Let me know, what is your profession or area of interest? Replying only takes moments and it’s anonymous.

Here’s the results from last week’s poll. The unlikely winner: good ol’ paper! I was a little surprised by Apple Notes performance too. But as you can see, there’s not a lot of consensus here.

I found it hilarious how many people thought I was asking about a physical location. My Twitter friend Ronnie recently remarked on “the curse of knowledge,” a fallacy where we assume people know what we know, and here it is at work again.

On the topic of health from last week, Sheri mentioned Peter Attia’s Outlive and I also recommend this book. This Andrew Huberman interview is a good introduction. (Huberman’s podcast, by the way, is why I’m now drinking salt for some fuckin’ reason.)

And thank you to Jordan at Bodygym, who sent me a Bodygym kit! I’m definitely interested in gaining some strength because all the lifting of fatherhood has given me perpetual lower back pain. Jordan’s done a great job with his product and marketing and I look forward to chatting with him about how he did it.

To binge is human

I’m not blessed with a great memory. It’s not bad, but it’s certainly not a talent. And yet somehow, I’m a very good researcher and have produced work at an academic standard.

How did I do this? Repetition. And by repetition, I mean repetition, repeating the same thing repeatedly over and over and okay I’ll stop.

I make plenty of highlights on my Kindle, but I’m not great at synthesizing the highlights into notes. (By the way, the cool kids are now using Readwise, which just launched an exciting-looking reader app.)

Rather than further processing what I’ve read, which frankly would be better, I tend to barrel ahead and consume more. To binge is human. But I’ve made this tendency work for me.

The crude but effective method I relied on was, of course, repetition. Y’know, repeating the same thing over and okay seriously I’m done. I consumed multiple books, articles, videos and docs about the same topic, and followed many different creators from the same realm. Sometimes I would even read the same book twice, and then re-read my highlights of that book several more times. (My most read book of recent years is Thinking in Systems. Few books have been as transformative for me. This is Not a Conspiracy Theory was deeply influenced by it.)

Repetition is your friend when learning. This method might not be efficient but it’s simple and effective. It’s good enough for most of us. But lately I stumbled upon an even better way to make binging and repetition work for me.

I’m reading lots of about business, productivity and mindset. These books are often padded, have way too many examples and are overall just super mediocre reads. But they do contain good stuff and I want that information. I’m finding Blinkist to be an excellent way to just get the good stuff. Often I’ll listen to these summaries when I’m out with little Kirby. My attention will fluctuate so I listen to interesting summaries multiple times. 

I’ve started a playlist here of some of the blinks that merit multiple listens. You can listen to these for free. I’m pretty sure anyway. I’ve never used this feature before so if your phone explodes and melts your face Raiders-style, don’t blame me.

When a Blink is especially good, I’ll read the full book—or at least parts of it. I used to consider it a badge of honor to read every page, but I don’t have time for that shit anymore.

Another cool service I found via Annie Duke is LIT Video Books. These are like abridged versions of popular nonfiction books (about an hour long) presented as little documentaries featuring the author. This is a new-ish service and they’re offering great deals right now. With this link, you’ll get 50% off, which works out to $5 per month. (You’ll get the discount code when you checkout.)

The repetition stack I’ve got right now is this.

• Listen to the summary on Blinkist

• If it merits it, repeat the summary once, twice or more

• Get the book if I want more depth

• Watch the videobook to get the ideas yet again, this time in video format

In the case of Allan Dib’s The 1-Page Marketing Plan, a nice concise marketing primer, I watched the video book first, then bought the book, and have listened to the Blinkist summary a couple times.

Listening to podcast interviews with authors is another good way to double up on their ideas.

That’s my formula, but there’s an infinite number of ways to do this. The more senses you can incorporate the better. Listen, read, watch. Feel and taste if you can!

That’s it for this week folks! Again, I wanna know more about you! Take a minute to tell me more here.

HAVE A GREAT WEEK EVERYONE!
k

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The Latest From Kirby

Networking is friendship

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

Howdy folks! Happy long weekend to those of you who just had one!

This week is a longer message about loneliness and isolation and how I’m using business to address these problems for myself.

But first, here’s my weekly request of you: go to this form and tell me something. Take that however you like. The line is open. You write it, I’ll read it. It’s anonymous. Say whatever you like.

Last week I asked about what you all do. The top spot was developer, followed by designer. This is what I figured, though I didn’t know which order those would be in. Third place was business owners and fourth place was teachers. There’s also a fair amount of writers and filmmakers among you.

Also among my readers are a potter, a parole officer, a rabbinical student and even a magician/educator. These replies were anonymous so I have no idea whatsoever who that could be.

Networking is friendship

I’m naturally an introvert. I like to work, create, and ingest media. I can go way overboard with all these.

Those are the interests that emerged when I was a teen. But by my early-thirties, I’d done a good job of building a social life for myself. I lived in Toronto during this era and had a strong network of friends. We made comedy videos together, we played ultimate frisbee in Trinity Bellwoods Park, we had a regular book club where we took turns hosting and preparing meals from different cultures. My sister, niece and nephew were out in the suburbs and I could see them and take the kids to Canada’s Wonderland.

I worked freelance jobs as a graphic designer and had a fine middle-class income. But the work was dull and I yearned for something else. Nonetheless, this was the sweetest phase of my single adult life.

I met Nora in New York in 2006 and we decided we would live together in NYC. As much as I loved my life in Toronto, I wanted to find my thing, to get good. The best of the best congregate in New York and I was excited to go. I left Canada in 2007 which meant leaving behind my friends and family.

Life in New York was more about what you did, it was about work. This is where I ultimately launched Everything is a Remix and it was the period of my greatest professional success. I found my thing and I got good. But I also became more and more isolated. After I established myself as an ideas person, my main interest became pursuing knowledge as far as I could. After years of cramming this activity into evenings and weekend, I was in the fortunate position to go full throttle so I did.

Having a life just wasn’t that important. I had friends in New York and I’m still in touch with many of them, but we weren’t tight, these are the kind of friends you see every few months, rather than daily or weekly. During my time in the US, it’s mostly just been me and Nora. Most of my time was spent in the realm of media and technology.

This sort of tech-media dominated lifestyle used to be limited to a small minority of us, but for most people now it’s just life. The Covid years accelerated this trend and pushed everybody inward. Isolation and loneliness are now cultural defaults, you have to work to overcome them.

Three things have happened that to turn the tide on this for me.

The first was moving to San Diego. I didn’t expect this to help, but it did. I’ve been lucky to move to a tight-knit community and I’ve made lots of friends among my neighbors.

The second thing is being a parent. If your neighbors have a toddler and you have a toddler, you will hang out with them. Kids give everybody a reason. Me and little Kirby walk the hood first thing in the morning and again in the evening. We see all the neighbors and he plays with his friends. He throws balls, climbs fences, splashes in puddles, rides wiggle cars.

The third thing has been talking to a bunch of you folks. When I started doing Zoom conversations with some of you a couple months ago, I didn’t think it had anything to do with trying to reconnect with life again. I thought it was about researching and networking. And it was about that, but not first and foremost. 

I’ve spoken with entrepreneurs like Jeff Vinokur, Jay Acunzo, Adam Quirk and Jordan Terry. I’ve spoken with ideas people like Matt Klein. Most of these conversations have been with teachers. I’m interested in opportunities in education so I’ve spoken with Jeremy, Ted, Eamon, Smriti, Sandi, Joey, Peter, Joseph, John, Jason, Paul, Chris, Ben and his awesome students, and there are more to come.

These conversations have been a revelation. It’s been amazing to connect with people whose lives I’ve already been part of for many years. I’ve gotten to experience just how wonderful my fans are. I’ve somehow attracted awesome people to me. 

I have an agenda in these conversations. I’m seeking knowledge, I’m seeking opportunities, problems I can solve, notes I can take, areas where I can help. I’m trying to make money, preferably a lot of it and preferably fucking fast because I’m getting old.

But none of that is the point. I’m not thirsty. I don’t actually care if anybody I speak with can benefit me. I just love the conversations and I’m now a better listener and more present than I used to be, probably because I’m not itching to get back to chasing some intellectual Moby-Dick.

Alright, what does all this have to do with business?

In order to work hard and focus, I need purpose. You need purpose. The essential objective of business is money but money is not purpose. Nonetheless, I am indeed finding purpose in business.

Business is reconnecting me with life. It’s connecting me with people. Businesses exist to serve people. To serve people you need to be communicating with them deeply. You need to understand their problems and empathize with them. That’s my major interest right now: listening and finding ways to serve that fit my talents.

Out of these talks has arisen an actual promising business opportunity. It’s the sort of discovery I could have researched until I was blue-in-the-face and never would have found. I could have looked right at it and not seen it. I needed to talk to people to understand it. Here’s the broad strokes.

It turns out I’m popular with international schools (click the link if you want to know more about what that is). These schools are global, they’re growing, and the area where I can contribute is mandatory, not elective. I’m going to be creating workshops for international students and teachers. I’m working on a pilot presentation and I even booked my first paid workshop in the fall. (Thank you Eamon!) If you’re an IB teacher I haven’t talked with, reply to this email, I’d love to chat. (And thank you to Jeremy who was the first to bring this to my attention.)

Who knows where this will go but it has the qualities I’m seeking: scale, growth and stability. And it’s well-suited to my talents and interests. It’s a worthy contender and I found it by just having fun, pleasant conversation with lots of people.

Final thing.

Something happened a few times in these calls that I’ll admit caught me off guard: people told me they love me. Gotta say, this made me freeze. Remember, I’m an introvert. But I’ve started to just say “I love you” right back and it feels right and true. You guys have been connected to me for years and now I’m connecting back.

As usual, it’s me on the other end of these emails.

I love you all,
Kirby

P.S. Buy my shit you cheap asshole.

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The Latest From Kirby

The Ideas That Made Me

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

GREETINGS EARTHLINGS!

For this week’s question I’m going back to basics: where are you from and what’s your first language? It only takes seconds to respond, it’s anonymous and it helps me understand who you all are. Also, I command you to do it. (Form closes end of day Tuesday.)

Last week’s question was a beauty. I asked you all to just “tell me something” and you did! The responses were both feely and fascinating. I’ll elaborate after I’ve processed them more, but here’s a message that touched my dad heart.

My high-schooler has been touched by the grammar fairy and usually has no trouble writing well. They were having trouble on a school project. I told them to search for similar things to learn how others have presented the info. "But I can't just repeat what other people have already said." Of course not, but you can take inspiration and add your own interpretation… remember that Everything is a Remix thing? And the shirt I bought you? "Oh yeah."

The Ideas That Made Me

Lots of you are listening to my collection of book summaries. You can read or listen to these for free on Blinkist.

Paul Vahur wrote back and said he thought the collection was missing an important book, David Allen’s Getting Things Done. I couldn’t agree more. Getting Things Done is an essential book and if you haven’t read it you should.

This got me thinking, “What are the essential ideas of my life?” What ideas have become little background applications that chug along in my brain year after year?

Below is what I came up with. This is not a list of the most important ideas or the best ideas, these are the ideas that resonated with me the most deeply and changed how I think and live. With every video I’ve ever made, I tried to do the same thing in some small way. And in a different way, this remains what I aspire to do.

These are mostly listed in the order I encountered them. The links below lead to Amazon, and most of these can be found as summaries in my Blinkist collection.

Fun Fact #1: I was 34 when I started to get into nonfiction books and ideas. Before then, I was mostly into movies, music, fiction and blogs. A few years after getting into nonfiction Everything is a Remix was brewing and I don’t think that’s a coincidence.

Getting Things Done, David Allen
I discovered this book in 2006
I think Getting Things Done is the first powerful work system I ever came across. I don’t think I had any formal methods at all before this. In particular, Allen’s framing of capture was a big deal for me. I actually need to re-read this book because I’m sure it’s full of stuff that I do everyday and have forgotten I got them from Allen. (I likely found this through Merlin Mann, who was an outspoken acolyte at the time.)

Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Discovered in 2006
Flow gave a name to something I blissfully experienced but never knew what it was or had any idea how to recreate the magic. “Flow” is a psychological state of heightened experience where you are performing at the outer boundaries of your abilities, where the activity is not too easy and not too hard. The entire book isn’t required to get the idea. The summary, which is in my Blinkist collection, will be plenty for most of you.

Fun Fact #2: If you can pronounce “Csikszentmihalyi” you are officially a card-carrying member of the intelligentsia. 

The Waste Book or Commonplace Book, Various
Discovered in 2010
The “waste book” (Newton’s term) or “commonplace book” (Ben Franklin’s term) is simply your notes. It’s simply snippets of things you’ve encountered or thought: ideas, bits of writing, memorable phrases—anything that created a little spark in your mind and potentially can be used later. Tiago Forte popularized this idea most recently by calling it a “second brain.” This is actually something I was practicing for a few years before I had any idea it was a thing people did. I explain the wastebook process I used back then here. This is still a great way to work; you can do awesome shit with just that. (I think I might have discovered this idea through Steven Johnson’s Where Good Ideas Come From but I’m not totally sure. That book was a big influence on Everything is a Remix.)

Mindfulness, Various
Discovered in 2010
This is something I found in a variety of ways and through no particular practitioner. Mindfulness is basically just being aware of the present moment and your emotional state. Meditation is a key component. It’s simple and endlessly difficult. I am actually bad at practicing mindfulness. I mostly don’t do it. But I always return to it. And being bad at mindfulness is far, far, far better than not knowing mindfulness exists.

Fun Fact #3: I haven’t meditated in… years! I’m gonna break that streak this week.

Nonviolent Communication, Marshall B. Rosenberg
Discovered in 2012
Nonviolent communication is a type of communication focused on expressing feelings and communicating needs. In our personal interactions, we all have a tendency to make generalized, exaggerated declarations and then defend those statements. For instance, “You’re being inconsiderate because you never put your dishes in the dishwasher.” If this is instead expressed as something like, “I feel hurt when you don’t put your dishes in the dishwasher because I have a need to have my time respected. When you don’t put the dishes away, I have to do it for you.” It might sound kinda goofy but this shit works. This is trickier to grasp than mindfulness because it’s surprisingly hard to identify emotions and needs. And like mindfulness, it’s endlessly challenging to do and keep doing. An unusual quality of this book is that I remember finding the writing kinda hippy-dippy and corny. Whatever. Deal with it, it’s worth it.

Thinking in Systems, Donella H. Meadows
Discovered in 2012
This is a titanic book for me. It’s the most accessible introduction to systems thinking and systemic thought. It’s what really gave some detail and features to the vague, amorphous concept of the system.Thinking in Systems is what spawned my series This is Not a Conspiracy Theory. If there’s a single idea that still needs storytelling development, though, it’s systems. If you’re a storyteller and want a challenge, this is a worthy one. Thinking in Systems is great but I think somebody out there can do better and bring these ideas to more people.

Hunt Gather Parent, Michaeleen Doucleff
Discovered in 2020
I’ve not read a lot of parenting books and I make no claims to be well-read, but this one resonated with both me and Nora deeply. It basically synthesizes traditional knowledge about parenting, mostly through Mayan cultures. To me, the modern Western style, typified by “helicopter parenting,” seemed excessively managerial. I think children need as much freedom and autonomy as is age-appropriate. A lot of parenting I saw seemed to both underestimate what children can do (no chores or responsibilities) and overestimate what children can do (exhaustive negotiations about things they aren’t yet mature enough to make decisions about). This book helped to clarify and systematize my values and to validate the best parts of my own upbringing.

Fun Fact #4: One thing I’m certain of about parenting is there’s a million ways to do it. Anything can work, including helicopter parenting.

Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), Various
Discovered in 2019
This is related to the “waste book” concept. Personal Knowledge Management is essentially a systemization of this concept into a varying set of methods and tools. There’s no consensus way to do it. Zettelkasten, or Smart Notes, is the formative system. Tiago Forte uses PARA (Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archive). PKM is a social creation that belongs to nobody in particular. Forte has great storytelling on this topic, but my favorite methodology is Nick Milo’s. Nick doesn’t yet have a single, definitive work, but I would start with his Obsidian for Beginners series.

Fact #5: I’ve said the word “system” 11 times in this email! I mean 12! Systems are my thing. Make that 13.

From Strength to Strength, by Arthur Brooks
Discovered in 2022
This is the most recent book to change my life. It’s about the transition that takes place somewhere in midlife, where we lose some mental speed and agility and have to change direction in order to suit our strengths. My email about resentment and disappointment resonated with a lot of you. I’m still sending out replies to that one. (If you missed that email, search your email for “Everything is a Remix now sustainably fueled by disappointment and resentment.”) If that message connected with you, you should read this book.

Fun fact #6: Strength (along with length) is a word I have never ever gotten used to spelling. I still type it wrong constantly.

Fun fact #7: I asked ChatGPT what words end with “gth” and it helpfully suggested width, growth, fifth, eighth, twelfth, breath, depth and yes, highsmith. Thanks superintelligence!

Everything is a Remix, This is Not a Conspiracy Theory, et al, by Me
Started creating Everything is a Remix in 2009
Started creating This is Not a Conspiracy Theory in 2012
Fuck false modesty: by miles and miles and miles, the biggest influences on my life are my own stuff. Visit this newly renovated page to ogle them all. As I’ve collected them and tidied them up lately, I’ve watched some again and I’m immensely proud of the entire lot. A couple underrated ones are the Rogan Vs. Jones series, which I happened to press play on then got sucked into watching the entire 90 minutes, and The End: In Praise of Credits, which has a new level of meaning cuz, y’know, I’ve ended making videos. Every single one of these is something I wished existed and now it exists. The influence that they’ve had on my life is immeasurable, vastly beyond anything I merely read. Nothing will change you more than the thing you create yourself.

Use this link to save 50% on This is Not a Conspiracy Theory.(Offer expires June 16th!)

Things I’m into at the moment

• Blinkist
  Audio book summaries are one of my main media sources right now. You can listen to the books in my shared space for free. 

• LIT Video Books
  These are mini-doc versions of popular nonfiction. Really great deal right now.

• Tana
  I’m experimenting with merging notes and project management and it’s looking very promising. For PKM nerds, Tana is kinda like a combination of Roam and Notion. It’s still early and in beta so you need to get on the waitlist. (Sorry I have no invites!)

• Fathom
  Using this for Zoom call transcriptions and AI summaries. Works amazingly well, with only the occasional gaffe.

• Drinking fuckin’ salt for some reason

What are your essential ideas? Reply and tell me.

That’s it for this week folks! Be sure to let me know where you’re from and what’s your first language. Have a great week you and talk to you all next Monday!

Hugs and kisses,

k

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The Latest From Kirby

The Joys of Angry Rumination

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

I don’t know how many people perceive me as angry, but anger is like my thing. I love it. It’s my trusty go-to. I’m pretty good at managing it and directing it, so I’m not sure how many of even my closest friends know how much anger I lug around. To be clear, I definitely experience far more happiness than anger. By a lot. But I regularly experience episodes of concealed rage. It’s a problem I have.

I’m gonna talk about my anger problem this week. I’m sure many of you have the same thing—maybe worse, maybe not so bad. Or perhaps you have a similar experience but with a different emotion, like sadness, guilt, fear or anxiety. Maybe the person you beat-up in your imagination isn’t another person, it’s you. 

Many men, especially men of my era and earlier, had anger demonstrated to us. We were subjected to anger, we were even expected to be angry at certain times. If you don’t display appropriate anger, that’s not masculine.

I understand my anger decently. Anger and violence were pervasive dangers of my childhood. Brutal, fearful boys reigned the schoolyards in the time and place I grew up. I suspect the abuse they took from their fathers flowed down to the rest of us.

Anger is so embedded in men, some of us don’t even recognize anger as an actual emotion. I repeatedly hear “strong” angry men describe others (generally women) as “emotional.” They can’t even see that it’s them who are the most emotional people around by far.

But hey, let’s give anger its props.

Anger is one of the secret ingredients of creativity. I don’t know how you create without at least some anger. I remember watching the Mr. Rogers doc Won’t You Be My Neighbor and thinking “Wow, Mr. Rodgers waspissed off.” He had plenty of anger and it drove him to create something bold and different. Fred Rodgers had an edge.

The edge gives you direction, it gives you something to push against, something to defy. What you don’t want to be is every bit as important as what you do want to be.

I used my anger as creative fuel. Lots of my early comedy stuff was inspired by the anger I had over being subjected to homophobia. (I’m actually straight, but homophobes are quite unconcerned about your real sexual orientation.) Everything is a Remix was a swing at artistic narcissism and superiority. I fought against conspiracy theories because I was attracted to the intellectual combat. 

I’ve always liked good provocation, the kind of controversy that has a purpose and spurs an interesting debate. This sort of conflict helps us all attain higher understanding.

But like everybody less, I’m also a sucker for bad provocation. Stupid arguments can be even more engaging and addictive than substantive ones. The triumphs of performative assholes like Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and the sports pundit Stephen A. Smith are due to them making the biggest, ugliest arguments around.

This is the problem with living with anger. It’s indiscriminate. We don’t just get angry over good provocation, we also get angry over bad provocation—and probably even more so. Cheap shots enrage us most of all. Engaging arguments are often the most worthless.

One of my most embarrassing pastimes is angry rumination. I like to dwell on an argument or insult then improv out imaginary arguments, one after the other. It’s like I’m workshopping different comebacks to the points of my opponent—who is an asshole and fucking idiot, by the way. I seek the ultimate comeback, the kind of righteous zinger that reduces my adversary to wracking sobs of shame.

I get especially angry when I think people are wrong, stupid, or domineering. And I have to admit, it really pisses me off when men think I’m not masculine and therefore weak or pathetic. The anger I experience over that, by the way, is strong, manly and virile and really very impressive.

Sometimes I only ruminate briefly, but especially toxic stuff can loop for weeks or even months. The arguments do sometimes evolve and improve through this angry looping. But ultimately, I don’t think angry rumination is about that. It’s too reactive and repetitive. The topics I ruminate on are the least worthy of extended examination. I’d be better off thinking nothing at all.

I’ve been ruminating a lot lately and it’s over a ridiculous situation. I made the mistake of giving my number to an eccentric and probably alcoholic neighbor. He started sending me weird texts which I mostly ignored. I think this eventually irked him, so out of the blue, he hurled a series of crazy cheap shots my way. For instance, this was in reference to me pushing my toddler son in a stroller: “you push your baby in the cart is it groceries I ain't criticizing but bro it ain't that heavy.”

That hits several of my sore spots: it’s wrong, stupid and he’s calling me weak and “not masculine.” (Y’know, I don’t even care about being masculine. Maybe it's the contempt behind remarks like these that bothers me. Maybe it bothers me because I think it’s wrong—I actually am plenty masculine.)

And does he have children or know anything about them? Of course not!

Anyway, I blocked him and moved on but his stupid insults somehow festered. So I’ve been having an imaginary argument with him since. This is someone who didn’t say anything meaningful and I don’t care about at all. 

Most disturbingly, I’ve found myself flipping back-and-forth between taking care of my son and a furious, imaginary and entirely worthless argument. I drift off into some incensed fantasy, snap out of it, and see my toddler son staring back at me on the change table. I’m flipping back-and-forth between tenderness and fury and I think my one-and-a-half year-old son senses me repeatedly floating off into some weird, tightened trance.

I’m not headed to a tidy resolution here, folks. But let me say this.

One of the most impactful things I’ve ever done was an email to you all that I wrote about resentment and disappointment. It was about when shit doesn’t work out, or in my case, didn’t last forever like it should have. It produced a flood of replies and people are still talking to me about it. I’m still trying to reply to all the emails because they were heartfelt and thoughtful.

In many ways, that message I sent is spoiled ranting and I knew that when I wrote it. But it was also real. It was where I was at and had been for a while. And the point of writing it was to let go. I wanted to acknowledge the ugly, self-pitying chapter I was in and close it.

By the way, folks, that worked. I’m not saying I’m fixed, but I’m much improved. Try it for yourself. You don’t have to write something public. Start a journal. Talk to your future self.

I used to think talking about my problems would reveal something horrible and repellent about me. I thought it’d just worsen my problems, it’d make them more real, it’d create a vortex that’d suck me in. The opposite is true. Talking about your problems, writing about your problems, is a way to create distance between you and the feelings. It’s a way to get some elevation. It’s like staggering out of a dense forest—scratched-up, exhausted, squinting—then hiking up a grassy hill, looking around, and seeing where you are.

I don’t have any great wisdom to share yet. Right now I’m just trying to get out of the forest. I think I’m almost there. And when I get up that hill, I’ll tell you what I see.

Love,
K

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The Latest From Kirby

Why I removed Kanye West from Everything is a Remix

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

Happy Monday everybody! Happy Day After Father’s Day, Dads!

Friends, I am rounding up a posse! If you want to volunteer to help out with this new endeavor I’m undertaking, please fill out this short form.

What do I need help with? Basically anything and everything, small contributions and large. A few realms that spring to mind are digital marketing, SEO, email marketing, website stuff, and analytics. If you don’t think you have any applicable skills, you can test out products and give feedback. All are welcome!

A few recent things from me

• I did an interview with Jess Larson for his business podcast Innovation and Leadership.

• For anybody who watched Across the Spider-Verse or will be watching it soon (like me and Nora), be sure to revisit my creative breakdown of the original film, Into the Spider-Verse.

• And I have a new video coming soon! It’s about AI and copyright and it was produced for Bloomberg Law. I’m guessing it’ll be out in a week or two.

Anger Revisited

Last week’s newsletter was about my issues with anger and my habit of dwelling on stupid bullshit. I received lots of wonderful feedback from people who relate, but there were also a couple valuable suggestions on how to manage anger and other destructive emotions.

A nice suggestion from Zeb is to try feeling sadness towards whoever angered you. I would guess that the people who anger me, anger lots of other people too. They might piss off multiple people per day. Their lashing is probably a tactic they developed to cope with how difficult their lives have been. If I could watch the life story of my neighbor who’s been sending me insulting texts, I bet I’d feel sorry for him.

And Adam sent along a couple specific techniques that are useful for anger or negative habits: the Swish Pattern from Neurolinguistic Programming and Emotional Freedom Technique or “tapping.” There’s loads of YouTube videos and other content about both of those.

Why I removed Kanye West from Everything is a Remix

Kanye West is as canceled as canceled gets. He might still be a giant celebrity, maybe he can even make lots of money somehow, but he is utterly exiled and it’s hard to imagine how he returns. I don’t foresee his mind becoming more ordered in the future. 

On his way down, West left a string of humiliations in his wake, both for himself and anyone he touched. His final stop on the bus ride to oblivion was an interview with Alex Jones on Infowars. It was a dumb, depressing spectacle in which Jones was actually forced to distance himself from West’s anti-semitism. (Jones typically just ignores anti-semitism and moves on, but he couldn’t pull that off with a guest this high profile.)

In my little world, Kanye West has the odd distinction of crossing over between my two major projects, Everything is a Remix and This is Not a Conspiracy Theory. West’s music was in the original Remix and he was featured in the final segment of the new Everything is a Remix Part 1. West wasn’t in This is Not a Conspiracy Theory, but he would have been if I’d made it later. Jones was in it and I also did a whole mini-series about Jones and his most outspoken champion, Joe Rogan.

Generally speaking, folks, you wanna be featured in Everything is a Remix, not This is Not a Conspiracy Theory.

A number of people have noticed that Kanye isn’t in the final edit of the new Everything is a Remix. But this is not quite what it appears. I didn't remove West because of his long series of anti-semitic remarks, which were stupid, wrong, and sad. My reasons were much more mundane. I removed West for format reasons. Let me explain.

The original version of Everything is a Remix had post-credit segments, which were inspired by Steve Jobs’ “one last thing” bits where he’d announce the biggest product after the presentation seemed over. I did one about Tarantino which was very popular, but my favorite is the one about multiple discovery. Actually, that’s one of my favorite scenes of mine, period.

In the Remix reboot in 2021, I wanted to honor the series’ original format and continue doing these post-credit sequences. Kanye West was the first post-credit segment in the new Everything is Remix. But after seeing how that played, I felt like it didn’t fit on contemporary YouTube. It was hard to make that segment but most people didn’t see it. I decided to not do one in Part 2 and see what happened.

Aaaaand… crickets. Nobody cared. So I nixed them after that. (This video about Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood was initially going to be the post-credits segment for the new Part 2). 

When the new Everything is a Remix was completed, the Kanye segment was the odd man out: it was the only post-credits segment in the series. It wasn’t consistent with the rest of the videos, so I cut it from the final all-in-one version, which is the version most people see. 

But Kanye should be in Everything is a Remix and if the series ever gets a maintenance upgrade in the years to come, I’ll put him back in. West is a master remixer, arguably the GOAT. His music endures, with or without him.

Kanye West should be seen as someone with an ailment. Exile is probably the only place suited for a media juggernaut with fairly serious mental illness. But I don’t see any purpose in the rest of us depriving ourselves of the joy of hearing his music, or worse yet, editing him out of musical history. West’s music was beautiful when he made it, and in many ways, so was he. That segment in Everything is a Remix Part 1 honors what he did and who he was. I’m proud of it. Go watch it again.

Things I’m into right now

• Turning off badges
  Badge notifications are those red circles that appear on your phone’s app icons and show you how many whatevers need your attention. They suck, turn them off, it’s better. (Here’s how on iPhone.)

• Weighing myself everyday
  An extremely clever trick I used on myself during past weight gains is I would stop weighing myself. Nothing bad is happening if I don’t see it, right? But if I know I’m up a couple pounds, I’ll reign things in to get back on track.

• Tana
  Tana continues to be my productivity hub and I’m also starting to do journalling-type things in it, which is new for me. I track my daily weight in Tana.

• Blinkist
  I mostly listen to book summaries while out strolling with Little K. You can listen to the books in my shared space for free.

• Spark email
  Loving the Mac email client Spark. Way nicer than gMail or Apple Mail and has some of the best features of Hey. It’s a keeper.

• The School of Thought
  My teacher friend Jason mentioned The School of Thought and I’ve been very impressed with what they’re doing, like this Critical Thinking Cards Deck. I’ll be stealing lots of tricks from them.

• I continue to drink fuckin’ salt for some reason

See you next week everybody!

k

P.S. Remember to go fill out that form if you’re interested in helping me out with my next thing.

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The Latest From Kirby

How your brain tricks you into starting projects you won’t finish

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

Hi everybody!

Folks, I am collecting testimonials for Everything is a Remix! If Everything is a Remix matters to you, if it changed your life, head over here and tell me about it. Some of these will be used on the Remix site. Name and photo are required.

How to stop starting

I have a problem with starting. I don’t mean that I can’t get started. I mean starting too quickly and starting too much. This can produce small problems like buying software or gadgets I barely use. Or it can produce big problems like unfinished projects or worst of all, projects that are way more crazy-making than they should have been. 

And you’ve got the same problem. Why do I know this? Because what I’m talking about is a human bias called the action bias. The purpose of the brain isn’t just to think thoughts. Its purpose is to make things happen. Your brain wants you to do it: set that goal, buy that course, start that project. But it’s not so good at helping you achieve that goal, learn that material, or finish that project. 

The action bias tricks you into thinking you’re getting something done. But all you’ve really done is begin… and that’s the easy part. Impulsive starts will waste your time and resources. And if you fall prey to the action bias frequently enough, you’ll find yourself demoralized and doubting you can achieve much of anything.

I got burnt by the action bias in an unusually epic way. In 2012, I was finishing the original Everything is a Remix series, which was a big success. I was hot and I wanted to capitalize. I wanted to launch something and I wanted to do it fast. I launched a KickStarter for a new series, This is Not a Conspiracy Theory. I had almost no clue what it was or what I was going to deliver or how long it would take or how much it would all cost. (How many successful KickStarters have ultimately cost the creator money? I’m guessing plenty.)

This is Not a Conspiracy Theory worked out. I made the thing I wanted to make, I got to the place I wanted to go. But it took eight years and the process was far more painful than it needed to be. The premature launch made a hard project even harder because I later wasted time wracking my brains trying to solve problems that couldn’t be solved. If I’d pumped the brakes at the beginning and thought things through a bit more, I could have saved myself substantial time and a lot of misery.

It often requires more energy and more discipline to not act. To wait, think things through and then act is actually harder. It’s way easier to just let it rip and make something—anything—happen. 

By slowing down, making sure you want to make the move you’re making and figuring out how to do it the best way you know how, you’re setting the stage for a more efficient and less painful project. You’ll start less but finish more.

I have to say: this problem is a shadow of what it once was for me. The major thing that has helped has been awareness. My snap decisions stung me enough times that I got wise. I didn’t know anything about the action bias, I just learned through repeated mistakes.

I’ve developed some tricks too. For instance, I create little holds for ideas and review them repeatedly. Like if there’s a new product I want to sell, I place it in a hold list and revisit it occasionally over the course of weeks or months. Most of the time I’ll eventually decide I’m not that interested in selling whatever it is. But if something survives all those revisits, I know it’s worth a shot.

The practice of mindfulness has also helped with this. I’ll again admit, I’m pretty bad at mindfulness, but even doing mindfulness badly can still really improve your life. (There’s a few mindfulness book summaries in my Blinkist playlist, which is free to read or listen to. There’s also loads of other fantastic stuff in there.)

The action bias is one of those things that you never banish. It’ll always return with inventive new ways to trick you. But with time, you can develop some good defense.

Things I’m into right now

• The YouTube Channel of Dr Dan Wilson
  Check out his new video about Robert F. Kennedy Jr, an anti-vaxxer who’s running for US president. If you don’t have time for the full video, this short excerpt is a jaw-dropper.

• The Thinking Shop
  Loving the critical thinking tools at The Thinking Shop.

• Yep, still drinkin’ fuckin’ salt

Talk to you next Monday everybody!
k

P.S. Remember, if you love Everything is a Remix, come tell the world about it!

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The Latest From Kirby

New video, vacation, and a gift for those who need it

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson. I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

Happy Monday everybody! 

I have a new video! It’s about copyright and AI. This was a commission for Bloomberg. GO WATCH IT. NOW!

Summer vacation

Summer is here! Unless you’re in the southern hemisphere, in which case, winter is here! Yay winter! 

I’m about to head all the way across this fabulous content, back to my home, Prince Edward Island, Canada. Little Kirby is going to meet his grandparents and his two Ferguson aunts for the first time!

This newsletter is also going to go on vacation! It will resume bright and early September 4th, which will be the relaunch of the new Everything is a Remix site. Several exciting new and improved products will be making their premiere. If you miss me for the next couple months, I would check out any previous messages you might have missed. Just search for “Kirby Ferguson” in your email.

A gift for those who need it

I have an offer for those of you of limited means right now. If you cannot afford my downloadable products, I’d still like you to have them. If you’re a little down on your luck, I hope these tools might help you jumpstart something new and generate some excitement in your life. Fill out this form and I’ll hook you up. You’ll get the current toolkits and the upgrades when they’re released. I hope these small gifts might help you the same way that many of you have helped me in recent months. Good luck!

And for the rest you, it’s a great time to save on these toolkits! Get them now at the lowest possible price, then get the upgrades when they come out this fall!

Stories From You

This will be a longer message because I want to share some of your stories. These are messages of connection, struggle and even triumph – albeit, maybe not quite the expected kind.

This first one comes from Fülöp in Hungary. This is something I could never have imagined happening starting out. That I could touch someone from a different culture, on the other side of the planet, and that it would start through… a TED Talk? Did not see that coming.

Dear Kirby,

We have never met and we most likely never will, but I want to tell you a small story.

I found your TED Talk in my early twenties. I was a resentful, sad, pessimistic person from Hungary. I was spending more and more time online, and TED Talks were like a warm blanket of curiosity satiating information. I vividly remember seeing yours for the first time. It was packed with humor, interest and an enthusiasm that was unusual in my life. I spent the next hour rewatching it, and trying to find every example that you talked about.

It was fun. Actual, childlike, joyous fun. And then it was over and I felt happier. The world wasn’t as dark and the shadows didn’t feel as scary. I went outside and enjoyed the sunlight, while listening to the music you mentioned.

When you announced the KickStarter project, I was one of the first people to sign up. I barely had money, but I felt like I could help bring to life something important. It felt momentous. And then you started work and every now and then, there would be an update. A new video, narrated by your friendly voice and edited to absolute perfection. I would rewatch all the episodes, when a new one came out, so I could be up-to-date. I felt all the same joy and elation, as watching that TED Talk, all those years ago.

I have found a path in life that brings me happiness. I am surrounded by people that I love and cherish. My work is fulfilling and fun. And I believe that you had a small part in making that happen, by being yourself, and allowing a young man (albeit, older and older by the day) to come along for the ride.

I want to thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for doing so. And I wish you all the happiness that you can handle.

Thank you, Kirby.

Fülöp Tardos

(Shared with permission)

This next message is from an indie musician who had their peak success in the 2000s. I was a fan before we met during the heyday of Everything is a Remix. Their transition is similar to mine — still raw, still a work-in-progress, still hurting but finding purpose and joy  in small, simple things.

I underwent a similar transition over the last few years. I’m in the final stages (ha ha) of my shift from a touring and recording artist (my equivalent to you making “Everything is a Remix”) into something else. Right now it’s more teaching, producing, and composing musicals.

For me, some of this change was motivated by age (I wanted different things out of life, my physical and mental well-being were suffering) and some of it was a response to the market (like you, not matching the “success” of an initial project). I think you put it well when you said, “trajectory is everything.” My trajectory was headed down for at least a decade, but I kept hanging on, to the detriment of all aspects of my life.

Initially the pandemic was a blessing. It got me off the hustle in a way that I didn't have the fortitude to do on my own. But then I also did something instructive/stupid in that I tried to make, release, and tour a record. The trajectory was unchanged, but I was changed by my time off. I was miserable in that album cycle. But it also finally gave me the strength to walk away from the identity and career I'd built over 25 years. 

In December 2021 I got a puppy. I did it because I have always wanted to do that. I did it because I knew it would make me change my life. I did it because I wanted something else to force me to make decisions with someone besides myself in mind. I live alone and am single (very happily) so taking on this responsibility was… clarifying.

I'm not totally past the resentment (or grief), so I especially appreciated that part of your email. I think success, however long ago, is confusing. I know I am very, very good at being a writer and performer. Reconciling that with the reality of it no longer working in my life has been one of the greatest challenges I've taken on. Good luck to you as you do the same!

E

And our final message is from a long-time fan who worked a bit on This is Not a Conspiracy Theory. This is a midlife transition that leads to triumph, although an unexpected one.

Kirby,  

I hope this longer than intended letter finds you well. You are a wellspring of inspiration for so many in the creative community. I had the good fortune to collaborate with you briefly on a chapter or two of This is Not a Conspiracy Theory and as someone who had early aspirations to be a filmmaker or special effects artist in my early 20s, being able to contribute to your production is certainly among the highlights of my career. You're a great storyteller.  

I started in 2004 translating my knowledge of CAD design into civil engineering marketing proposals and presentations. By 2007 I was regularly shooting video pieces and helicopter photo/video for strategic campaigns across the US.  

In 2008, the recession hit and I was overhead that was quickly dispensed of. After 8 years with the company, I decided that it was time to start my own business developing media for AEC companies (Architects, Engineers, and Construction). It was not exactly my passion but I had connections and momentum in that direction and decided to give it a shot. 

At the time, I had a partner who helped shoulder the cost of making that leap. I was extremely naive about business but in my 30s, I felt that being in the corporate system amounted to being in daycare and that I was far too old to be told what to do while having my profit robbed from my labor.  

My income was unstable at best. I had good months and bad months. The company that let me go was one of my clients. Then a former coworker that moved to another company looked me up for services. My reputation and network slowly expanded but after 14 years and working with the largest and most prestigious brands in that industry I was no better off financially for it.  

In 2012, I was fortunate enough to work with a company that invited me to work on a documentary project. The doc itself was nowhere near enough money to live on and in order to stay with the project and get the final credits, I decided to remain an independent contractor.  

I lost everything. My house. My relationship. My credit. Money. I had an irrational, Moby-Dick-like obsession with seeing the film and its 150 page historical companion book through to the finish line. I gave more than anyone asked or was reasonable to give. Most people would not have done what I did, but I did it. Today, I cannot say that I regret my decision.  

In January 2016, we premiered the documentary and went on to win numerous awards at festival. I was worse than broke but I did what I set out to do. I completed a film and designed a companion book which was probably as close to Ken Burns as I would ever get. It was not my original goal of directing or visual fx but I learned enough to know I probably wouldn't ever want those jobs. You need to be obsessed and work 16-20 hour days for 3-4 months at a time with a desire to prove you are the best. It was not the quality of life I ever wanted to create. In my 20s, after seeing the Matrix and other films that impacted me, I just thought it sounded cool. Vfx artists are notoriously underpaid and directors give their entire lives for film projects. In order to be that obsessed, it would have to be a story that I was passionate about the world needing to hear. Few stories impact me that way.  

Last October, after 14 years as a rogue corporate castaway, I entertained the idea of becoming an employee once more. What I didn't realize during those years of self-imposed poverty, strain, and unreasonable expectations was that I had developed a resume unlike anyone else's in the industry. Despite only having a high school level of education, my experience and successes blew away most of my competition.  

I always wanted to do something altruistic with a non-profit. Something that moved the needle in a meaningful way for the social changes I longed for. I had really high expectations. I have to say those 14 years in the employment desert beat that idealism out of me. I was now a master storyteller that did not care what ends my services were used for as long as they were used and I was compensated.  

In October, I was hired as a Lead Visual Designer at a huge, global company. I negotiated a pretty high salary based on my experience. It is the most anyone in this position has ever been paid but in the last 9 months, the marketing and sales team only want to work with me. The level of service I'm accustomed to offering my clients goes far beyond what other designers can deliver in the department. As of now, I'm slated to join the C-suite at the end of next year. I'm going to be in the top tier executive class of a giant company. It still blows my mind.

Anyway, this is not a brag. I just wanted to tell you that your experience and what you have created is invaluable to someone. I don't know how long I will do this but I am grateful for the second life this job has given me. All of my debts are paid, I'm saving more money than I ever had in my life while also not needing to worry about spending it either. I go out when I want, buy whatever I need for the family, and have fun with money left over every month. It's surreal. Next year I will use the surplus income to start testing new company ideas with the goal of beating my own salary so that I can quit again or at least be a highly paid consultant.  

In 2020, my father had a blood infection that infected two of his heart valves and his brain. I saved his life by dragging his belligerent ass to the hospital and nursing him back to health from home over the next 8 months during COVID. The reason I went back to work was to take care of him and my daughter as a single father.  

It all worked out beautifully. I know in the depths of my soul that if it worked out so well for me and all the stupid little shit I did that is insignificant to most, that it will happen for you too. You have created some amazing, thought-provoking, and far reaching content which very few people can do. You are special. Your gifts are needed in the world. If there is anything I can do to help you get to where you want to go, let me know. I will do whatever I can.  

I love what you have put into this world. Your heart is genuine. You are very thoughtful in a world that lacks thought more than ever.    

I appreciate you.  

All the best,  

Matt

Thank you to these people for sharing their stories here in the newsletter. And thank you to everyone who has told me your stories. I’ve read them all, you’ve influenced me and I think about you. I’ll be catching up on as many replies as I can over the summer.

And for all of you who just quietly read these message, thank you for being with me in these recent months. Happy 4th of July to the Americans, Happy Canada Day to the Canadians, happy other July holidays to the countries I’ve never lived in.

Kirby loves you all. Especially you. Bye!

K

P.S. YOU READ THE WHOLE EMAIL! Here take $5 off any apparel in the shop! Use the code GIMME5.

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The Midlife Remix

Hi there, I’m Kirby Ferguson! I’m best known for the series Everything is a Remix. I’m pivoting away from free content creation for financial and personal reasons. I’m seeking financial stability and personal fulfillment in the second act of life. I’m thinking aloud about all of this here. I might later revise, discard or ridicule anything said.

New stuff! My brand new guide to ChatGPT!

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back! Happy autumn! (Or spring if you're in the southern hemisphere!)

I hope you all had an awesome summer. I sure did. Loads happened, I've got tales of disaster and triumph, and insights that will melt your brain all over your shirt. Apologies in advance for that.

But right now, all this must wait because I've got new stuff!

My new digital toolkit: Write Now With ChatGPT

Folks, I'm thrilled to announce that I have a new digital toolkit for sale: Write Now With ChatGPT.

This guide is about getting real work done with ChatGPT. I do real work and show you how to do the same. These aren't chintzy little demos that don't prove anything. I don't blather on about how ChatGPT will help you do everything in five minutes or make a million dollars. I show you how to do actual writing by actually writing.

Write Now With ChatGPT is now on sale for half-off! It’s just $25 until September 13th at midnight. (No discount code required!)

This is an early access sale. If you have any feedback, if you spot any errors, if you think of any good improvements, email me at kirby@everythingisaremix.info. Any errors or shortcomings that can be fixed, will be fixed asap. (And of course, you'll get access to the updated file.)

Check out the product page to learn more and to buy now!

Ch-ch-ch-changes!

Autumn is a season of change. I suppose all seasons are, really, but just work with me here. Leaves are falling, children are back in school, parents are back at work, projects are launching, credit card bills are coming due. Change is afoot and things are changing here in the humble world of Kirby Ferguson.

Changes to this newsletter

Welcome to The Midlife Remix. Some of you may have noticed a new title at the top of this email. Yes, this newsletter is now called The Midlife Remix and it will kinda sorta maybe have a more prominent theme going forward. It’ll primarily be about the middle age pivot, a journey I remain in the midst of now. (Spoiler: I’ve not fixed everything yet.) It’ll be about work, money, life, and change. And yeah, it’ll sometimes be eclectic and about whatever I want. Hm, maybe it’s not actually changing that much.

Also, this newsletter will now be sent out every two weeks. But if you want a weekly email newsletter from me, hey, I just happen to have one of those!

The Official Everything is a Remix Newsletter is here

This newsletter has long served as an Everything is a Remix newsletter, but it’s actually just my newsletter. It’s been about Everything is a Remix, it’s been about This is Not a Conspiracy Theory, and it’s been about whatever the fuck I’ve been doing this year. Everything is a Remix needs a dedicated newsletter and now it's got one.

The Everything is a Remix newsletter is entirely about Everything is a Remix and creativity. No more bullshit about my self-pity and anger or drinking fuckin’ salt for some reason. These emails are short and can be read in a minute or two. They're about creativity, productivity, media, technology and great ideas you should copy and use for yourself.

The new Everything is a Remix newsletter will launch on Wednesday, so if you subscribe now, you’ll receive the very first newsletter, which is sure to be a future collectors’ item.

Click here to subscribe and you'll get my brand new toolkit, Finish It Now for free!

Phew! To recap, I have three major new things:

• A new toolkit, Write Now With ChatGPT

• A new Everything is a Remix weekly newsletter

• A new FREE toolkit, Finish It Now, which you get when you subscribe the new newsletter

That is it for this week, folks! Everyone have an awesome week and I’ll see you again in a couple!

Kirby

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