Hasty Briefsbeta

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creativity

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How to Do Great Work
2 months ago
- Choose work that matches your natural aptitude, deep interest, and offers scope for great achievements.
- Develop a habit of working on your own ambitious projects, driven by excited curiosity.
- Learn enough to reach the frontier of knowledge in your field, then notice and explore gaps.
- Great work requires hard work, but sustained by deep interest rather than mere diligence.
- The three most powerful motives are curiosity, delight, and the desire to do something impressive.
- Figuring out what to work on is hard but essential; be curious and try many things.
- Avoid pretentiousness, fashion, and fear by sticking to what genuinely interests you.
- To find new ideas, be strict about detecting broken models and willing to break rules.
- Originality is a habit of mind; generate ideas by working on slightly too difficult tasks.
- Consistency and finishing projects, even when harder than expected, are key to great work.
- Collaborate with high-quality colleagues and protect your morale as a living organism.
- Curiosity is the central guide for all steps: choosing a field, reaching frontiers, noticing gaps, and exploring them.
You Should Be Writing By Hand
2 months ago
- Writing by hand ensures privacy, as it cannot be easily copied or mined by algorithms.
- Handwriting forces deeper thinking and uses different cognitive 'muscles' than typing.
- A blank page is less intimidating than a blank screen, and rewriting by hand produces solid first drafts.
- You cannot delete mistakes while handwriting, encouraging discipline and visible progress.
- Handwriting is less antisocial than using a laptop and makes others feel listened to.
- Notebooks serve as a defense against accusations of using AI for writing.
- The ritual of handwriting fosters a sense of being a 'real writer' and aids creative practice.
- It's never too late to start; carrying a notebook and writing when drifting or overwhelmed helps clarify thoughts.
- The author's personal experience shows handwriting helped with concentration, recovery from illness, and creative exploration.
What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?
2 months ago
- Charles Bukowski's approach to writer's block teaches developers to step away and wait rather than forcing low-quality output.
- Quality matters more than quantity; Bukowski was comfortable deleting work that didn't meet his standards, even before editors could reject it.
- AI tools should ideally free up time for developers, but many are still overworking (e.g., 996 culture) and shipping excessive PRs without meaningful improvements.
- Neil deGrasse Tyson's comment suggests AI could allow more leisure and creativity, yet developers often ignore this and continue grinding.
- Bukowski's self-awareness and acceptance of creative lulls offer a lesson in balance and patience for AI-driven development.
The Only Skill That Matters Now
2 months ago
- The restaurant owner replaced human chefs with machines, turning cooks into inventors who design new dishes machines cannot yet make, leading to a three-year waiting list and emphasizing creativity over traditional cooking.
- Wayne Gretzky’s advice to 'skate to where the puck is going' is often misinterpreted; his skill in skating itself was the key, not just prediction, especially as AI pucks change direction unpredictably.
- AI evolves rapidly, making predictions difficult (e.g., RAG systems becoming obsolete overnight), contrasting with slower tech shifts in the past like mobile's steady rise.
- With advanced AI coding tools, people often build the same old apps (SaaS, CRUD) rather than innovating new creations that match the tools' transformative potential.
- The 'zamboni' analogy highlights the need for tools that smooth over AI-induced complexity, like a visual app explorer that helps developers mentally model rapidly changing codebases.
- Adaptability is the ultimate skill now; failing to learn AI tools like Claude Code leads to obsolescence, as you'll be replaced by those who embrace them rather than by AI itself.
Art Doesn't Scale
2 months ago
- The author recounts overhearing a debate between a tech worker and an artist about whether AI-generated art is 'art,' highlighting the classic 'Boomer vs. Doomer' conflict.
- AI art is compared to forgeries, where the aesthetic value of a piece is tainted once its origin (e.g., AI or forgery) is revealed, undermining the criteria for judging art.
- The author argues that the value of art lies in the human effort, context, and sacrifice behind its creation, not just the final output.
- Efficiency and cost reduction are not valid reasons to replace human-made art with AI-generated content, as the choice to consume authentic, human-made art is essential.
- The author prefers the 'ache' of unfinished art from a real creator over infinite AI-generated continuations, because the waiting and uncertainty are part of the art's meaning.
- AI tools are presented as a threat to remove choice and devalue the human connection inherent in artistic creation.
The Tapestry of Influence: The Inspirations That Shape Us
2 months ago
- The author's perspective is shaped by a fascination with people who distill complexity into essence, seen in architecture, philosophy, comedy, and design.
- Influences include modernist simplicity (Mies van der Rohe, Jony Ive, Brionvega), Zen teachings (Suzuki Roshi, Tao Te Ching), and comedy/improv (George Carlin, Andy Kaufman, Daniele Luttazzi).
- High school experiences—a film forum and a tech lab—exposed the author to diverse arts and early digital tools.
- Pop culture (Neon Genesis Evangelion, Dreamcast, REZ) and lowbrow/highbrow juxtapositions (comics, Dragon Ball, Balzac) are equally formative.
- Self-production of video and audio since before algorithm feeds, and tinkering with technology, led to early career opportunities.
- Street photography is a creative outlet that marries formal design with spontaneous truths, akin to visual zen koans.
- The author's outsider perspective—coming out as gay at 15 near the Vatican—amplifies the ability to see connections between disparate ideas.
- The core message: one's unique voice comes from combining highbrow and lowbrow, ancient and modern, serious and playful influences.
Your Teenage Self is Not a Bug, It's a Feature
2 months ago
- Creativity often stems from compulsion, not ambition, serving as a form of resistance.
- A dog's reaction to Trump's voice symbolizes political distress detection.
- Living a desired life creates tension between gratitude and rebellion.
- The teenage internal voice pushes back against routine responsibilities and public discourse.
- Creating art or expression is a peaceful resistance against social and personal banality.
- Maintaining creativity preserves humanity within oppressive structures.
- A healthy life requires both engagement and self-preservation.
- Internal discomfort guards the vital need for meaning, connection, and resistance.
- The key is to interpret internal warning systems rather than silence them.
- The journey involves balancing gratitude, rebellion, stability, and freedom.
Stimulating Innovation with Money - Bert Hubert's writings
2 months ago
- Money can both foster and kill innovation; constraints often drive creativity and resourcefulness.
- The MIT cyclotron was beautifully engineered but produced few results, while Princeton's messy, constrained setup yielded more scientific output.
- Cornell's small cyclotron allowed hands-on control and innovative techniques, leading to significant discoveries.
- Pouring large sums of money into innovation is not enough; creating an environment that encourages experimentation and ownership is crucial.
- The Feynman anecdote illustrates that excessive professionalism and lack of direct involvement can hinder innovation.
Celebrating Cerebration: ON CREATIVITY - by Isaac Asimov - Bert Hubert's writings
2 months ago
- Creativity involves making cross-connections between seemingly unrelated facts, requiring daring and uncommon thinking.
- Isolation is crucial for the creative process; group sessions are better for sharing information than direct creation.
- A permissive, informal atmosphere is essential, allowing participants to feel free to sound foolish without judgment.
- Optimal group size is small (no more than five), avoiding dominant personalities that inhibit others.
- Avoid a sense of responsibility for generating ideas; creativity thrives as a side issue, not a primary obligation.
- A session arbiter can guide discussions with shrewd questions while maintaining a relaxed environment.
Your pie doesn't need to be original (unless you claim it so)
2 months ago
- Sharing a creative project often invites criticism about its novelty, but for personal projects, originality is not the goal.
- The mismatch in values occurs between personal creative acts (e.g., baking a pie for enjoyment) and academic or community contributions (e.g., advancing pie-baking techniques), which require positioning work in context.
- To avoid confusion, creators should clarify their intent upfront, but in practice, projects often evolve from playful exploration to serious research.
- Starting with a playful mindset encourages creativity and reduces early doubts, while beginning with a serious goal invites harsh critique.
- Feedback-givers should understand the creator's goals, especially when the creator may not yet know them.
wonder
2 months ago
- Felt wonder and joy throughout the year; thanks to friends for showing beauty.
- Took a photo in East Austin after dinner with old company friends during pouring rain.
- Bought a magic item at a sale on Airport Boulevard in Austin.
- Night photo from company office capturing vast emptiness and city hum.
- Photo from roof of MLK library in DC, feeling the city alive.
- Closest to visiting space through a photo or experience.
- Heard 'The Art Teacher' by Rufus Wainwright, condensing a lifetime of regret and longing.
- Heard Rachel's Song from Blade Runner, for entities missing a life never their own.
- Heard 'I Want To Live' from Baldur's Gate.
- Read 'Lull' by Kelly Link, indescribable and takes half an hour.
- Read 'Ancillary Justice' by Ann Leckie, exploring a ship as person and not, and a choir with many bodies.
- Read 'Untitled Crab Project' by Jana H-S, about crabs.
- Created a collection of date ideas readable only in reverse.
- Bursts into laughter every time seeing something.
- Expression: 'FUCK YOU CHICAGO AND NORTHWESTERN RAILROAD COMPANY'.
- Created the tip to use bold magenta instead of bold white for highlighting, both gay and useful.
- First time feeling like a woman.
- Encourages discussion on Hacker News, Lobste.rs, Mastodon, or Bluesky.
The Age of the Essay
2 months ago
- Real essays are explorations of ideas, not defensive arguments; they begin with a question, not a thesis.
- The teaching of writing in schools historically became intertwined with literary analysis, making essays seem pointless.
- Essays are a tool for thinking, not just communication; writing helps form ideas, as Montaigne discovered.
- Good essays aim for surprise, following interesting threads like a river, even if they meander.
- To write well, be disobedient: question conventions, observe anomalies, and write for yourself, not for a teacher.
Writing, Briefly
2 months ago
- Writing generates ideas, not just communicates them; poor writing skills cause missed ideas.
- Write a fast first draft, then rewrite repeatedly, cutting unnecessary parts.
- Use conversational tone, imitate good writers, and read aloud to find awkward or boring parts.
- Expect 80% of ideas to emerge during writing and 50% of initial ideas to be wrong.
- Get feedback from trusted friends, cut confidently, and avoid detailed outlines.
- Write on topics you like, don't try to impress, and publish online to generate more ideas.
The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
2 months ago
- Great work requires not only natural ability and determination, but also an obsessive, disinterested interest in a specific topic.
- Obsessive interest drives people to explore unpromising paths others ignore, as seen with Darwin's endless curiosity and Ramanujan's calculations.
- The 'bus ticket theory' reframes genius as an infinite capacity for taking pains driven by interest, not mere diligence, and must focus on something that matters.
- It is impossible to know in advance which obsessions will lead to breakthroughs; risk/reward trade-offs mean wasted effort is part of the process.
- To foster great work, relax and pursue fun projects; cultivate deep, obsessive interests in children by following their natural curiosity.
- The uncertainty about how to do great work is itself an exciting area for discovery—there is still much to learn about the process of discovery.
Early Work
2 months ago
- Fear of making something lame is a major barrier to doing great work, as many ambitious projects start off unimpressive.
- To succeed, you must push through the early stage where your work seems unimpressive, even to yourself.
- Inexperience leads to harsh judgment of early work; we need to treat new ideas as challenges to our imagination.
- Silicon Valley's culture encourages new ideas and has evolved customs that support ambitious projects despite initial lameness.
- Self-doubt and skepticism are powerful forces; techniques to overcome them include overestimating importance, overconfidence, and ignorance.
- Surrounding yourself with the right colleagues and teachers can help you see the promise in early work.
- Focusing on the rate of change rather than current state, and treating work as a sketch or experiment, can reduce discouragement.
- Curiosity and learning from failure are effective motivators to push through the lame phase.
- Studying histories of great work can help recalibrate your judgment of early efforts, recognizing their true value.
How to Think for Yourself
2 months ago
- Independent-mindedness is essential in fields like science, investing, startups, and essay writing, where novelty and correctness are both required.
- Most jobs (e.g., administration) only require being correct, not novel; choosing the wrong type of work based on your innate mindset can lead to unhappiness.
- People often misjudge their own independence; schools don't measure it, and conventional-minded people may overestimate their originality.
- You can enhance independent-mindedness by avoiding awareness of conventional beliefs, surrounding yourself with independent thinkers, reading history, and cultivating skepticism.
- Independent-mindedness consists of three components: fastidiousness about truth, resistance to being told what to think, and curiosity, which can compensate for each other.
- Curiosity can be cultivated by indulging it and seeking topics that engage you; the motto should be 'do what you're curious about.'
<antirez>
2 months ago
- Programming and writing novels share common traits: both involve writing with grammar and structure, requiring coherence at micro and macro levels.
- Consistency is crucial in both activities; daily progress—even small amounts—is key to success.
- Writer's block exists in programming as well, though it's perceived as laziness in engineering versus a creative process in art.
- A key difference is that novels are mostly immutable after finalization, while code evolves continuously through multiple changes.
- Programmers can learn from writers: treat the first version of a system as a single bullet, revising it thoroughly to ensure a strong initial design.
- Author provides an update on his sci-fi novel: manuscript sent to editor, with plans for review and eventual publication in Italian and English.
I Started a "Dirt Notebook"
2 months ago
- The author struggles with turning notebooks into overly organized, cherished items, hindering spontaneous note-taking.
- To counter this, they started a 'dirt notebook' called 'The Drainage Channel' for messy, unstructured thoughts using an old, low-quality notebook.
- The notebook contains random quotes, story ideas, personal memos, and learning goals, scribbled without structure, making it fun and rediscoverable.
- Their goal is to fill this notebook to embrace messiness, potentially returning to better materials once comfortable with the approach.
The Act and the Outcome of Creation
2 months ago
- Creation serves as an outlet, providing joy and blocking anxiety or boredom by making something from nothing.
- Approach creation with a childlike mind: effortless, exploratory, and without predetermined outcomes, as exemplified by Picasso's attitude.
- Treat creation as play—flawless, free, and calm, allowing thoughts to flow naturally and fulfilling oneself by sharing inner thoughts with the world.
- Creating should make a difference, triggering change in oneself and others; it involves empathy, love, and sparking joy and laughter in the audience.
- Following emotions and instincts without boundaries leads to deep focus, where unresolved thoughts can be resolved, making creation an inner outlet.
- Creation is unique to the creator and can inspire others long after one's death, emphasizing learning and personal rhythm over conventional success metrics.
- Success in creation is defined by the experience and learning process, not just outcomes, as highlighted by the scientist's approach to tiny experiments.
- The creative process is slow, requiring time, craftsmanship, and attention to detail, with the goal of producing quality work to proudly share.
- View creation as a gift to the world, offered without expectation, freeing the creator from the burden of pleasing others.
- Creation is largely driven by the subconscious mind; use the conscious mind for refinement only after allowing ideas to flow naturally.
- Incorporate design elements that spark joy, similar to the Spark Joy Philosophy, to enhance reader enjoyment and avoid shallow distractions.
- Despite the initial friction, creation yields long-term rewards, including deep happiness, flow states, and a magical sense of presence, as discussed in works like 'The Artist's Way' and 'Finding Flow'.
Cottage Computer Programming (1984)
2 months ago
- Paul Lutus, a former NASA engineer, left his job and moved to a remote cabin in Oregon to live a simple life.
- He bought an Apple II computer in 1976 and began programming for fun, eventually creating Apple Writer, a popular word processing program.
- Despite being isolated in the wilderness, Lutus found success by selling his programs to Apple, leading to a royalty-based deal.
- He argues that individual creativity and solitary work styles are more effective in programming than teamwork, citing industry examples.
- Lutus discusses the advantages of living in a 'computerized cottage,' including freedom from trivial tasks and the ability to focus in silence.
- He also notes the challenges of backwoods living, such as potential loneliness, but believes technology can help connect people.

firstprev0next

creativity

How to Do Great Work

You Should Be Writing By Hand

What AI developers could learn from Charles Bukowski?

The Only Skill That Matters Now

Art Doesn't Scale

The Tapestry of Influence: The Inspirations That Shape Us

Your Teenage Self is Not a Bug, It's a Feature

Stimulating Innovation with Money - Bert Hubert's writings

Celebrating Cerebration: ON CREATIVITY - by Isaac Asimov - Bert Hubert's writings

Your pie doesn't need to be original (unless you claim it so)

wonder

The Age of the Essay

Writing, Briefly

The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

Early Work

How to Think for Yourself

<antirez>

I Started a "Dirt Notebook"

The Act and the Outcome of Creation

Cottage Computer Programming (1984)