Your Weekly Tasty Morsels - #3
Hi All, I am iterating to figure out the voice of this newsletter. This process is challenging to do in isolation. Can I ask you to reply to me and let me know what is working, what is not, what else would you like to see in the newsletter?
Parasite became the first Non-English movie to win the Oscar in the Best Picture category. It is a historical moment in the world of Cinema. Why should one care, though? Isn't this victory the result of a Bong Joon-Hoo(Koren Director) successfully lobbying the movie to the members of the Academy? Anyone who has the money and the access to resources can do it, right? Or Was it the Academy being too woke? Whatever the reason, the impact on the world cinema taking centre stage is inevitable. Bong put it beautifully "Once you overcome the 1-inch-tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films" I strongly recommend you to watch the movie Parasite.
Sriram Krishnan, an ex Twitter employee and a thought leader, put up a tweet that went viral in the tech community.
The question is about tradeoffs. In the Netflix case, it is between editorial or algorithmic curation of content. Essentially it is the tradeoff between what the customer wants and what the company wants. How do we bridge these two seemingly parallel variables? I recommend you to attempt to answer the question and consider it as a thought experiment. Focus on the approach to the solution than the solution itself. Sriram found many people flounder while answering the question. How would you respond? Please reply and let me know.
Amazon Associates and the Andon Cord
Unlike most live agents, Amazon associates are empowered to pull the "Andon cord." This quality control check, born in the factories of Toyota, allows workers across hierarchies to notify management of manufacturing issues. A Toyota worker could simply push a button or pull a cord, and production would be paused to address the problem. In Amazon, service agents pull the cord on marketplace items that are defective or suspicious. The products are then taken off the site until internal audits determine if they can be listed again or not.
What's the Andon cord equivalent to your organization? Can you bring the production to a halt?
Did you know?
The three-point seatbelt which you wear every time you hop onto the car was invented in 1959 by a Volvo engineer Nils Bohlin? That's not the story, though. Volvo realized the massive impact of the patent and made it available for free to all the car manufacturers. Volvo had the option not to do it and collect fees from others, but it chose the right thing to do.
In addition to the stories above here are my three recommendations of the week:
Video
How does the Internet work? - Glad you asked If you can ignore the sheepiness of the video, there are useful concepts to learn here.
Product
I use loom to make videos for the customers. Its a super easy tool to create explainer videos. It can trim the videos and has a neat extension on Google Chrome.
Book
When Breath becomes Air is a moving autobiographical account of Paul Kalanithi. It is a memoir about his life and illness, battling stage IV metastatic lung cancer. Random House posthumously published it on January 12, 2016.
Please reply to me and let me know which story surprised you the most. What you liked and disliked about this issue? And if you found value in what you read, please forward this to a friend. Thank you for being a subscriber.
Until next week,
Adi Patil.