Nine quick links for Saturday morning

Things Ray enjoyed in 2023. Always good for some inspiration.

Designing alien alphabets for Rebel Moon. Love a good Louie Mantia breakdown of his creative process.

The gory history of barber surgeons. For centuries in Europe, barbers performed surgical procedures like tooth extractions, stitches, and amputations in addition to haircuts.

A self-enforcing protocol to solve gerrymandering. Someone just solved gerrymandering using a mechanism that doesn’t require a neutral third party as arbiter.

93% of paint splatters are valid Perl programs. Who knew that ;i;c;;#\\?z{;?;;fn':.; was a valid Perl program?!

A unified theory of fucks. You only have a finite number so give them to living things (people, animals, plants) who will give them back, not institutions (companies, platforms, systems) that will suck you dry.

Why bad strategy is a ‘social contagion’. Strategy often lacks a focus on real challenges and problems due to “success theater” and ends up with everybody getting a little piece of what they want to do.

Why you’ve [probably] never been in a plane crash. Annex 13 holds that the primary purpose of an aircraft accident investigation is to prevent future accidents, over the search for liability.

Stop arguing, start debating. Decision-making skills are crucial to scaling and growing a company. Skilful debate allows you to move quickly and reliably through issues, and requires planning, structure, and discipline.