Interchapter (Apr. 6, 2023)

Data Council '23, Stealth Startup, Aliens, Reckless Poker Hands

Hey y’all,

Back at it again for Vol. 3. We’ll jump right into it.

Data Council ‘23

Last week I went to DataCouncil’s annual meeting - a three-day conference going over the latest in data science, data engineering, and AI.

I didn’t really have any expectations for this one, but it turned out to be really informative.

Things in the space are changing so fast. Every quarter there seems to be a new set of tools and strategies that data folks are implementing within their companies. Not to mention all the LLM stuff.

Off the top of my head, the topics that I walked away most interested about are:

• Semantic Layers: The layer of logic that standardizes metric definitions and calculations for end-consumers of data

• Metric Trees: How to ladder up and ladder down metrics to make sense of all of a business's activities in an easily communicatable way.

• Data as a Product: The idea of creating data sets and data processes that have multiple downstream use-cases.

• Streaming Data: Real-time data streams are becoming a more plausible solution for teams to use when combined with batch-loading strategies.

It’s been fun going to conferences and I’m still learning a ton each time.

That said, I think I’m conference’d out for a while and will take a break from going to these types of things for a sec.

I’m running a stealth startup…

But this is not just any stealth startup…

It’ll be separate from my data consulting business.

It’s gonna be permanently in stealth, and always in R&D mode.

I don’t have a good name for it yet.

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve maxed out on turning on my business-brain to start my indie consulting journey. But it does feel like some of the creative part of me has been slightly under-engaged.

For those that don’t know me well, I can become very intense in business/work settings despite wanting to be someone who is generally pretty chill.

So now I’m making sure that I make time to work on my Creativity Business.

The North Star of this company is to read, go down rabbit holes, hang out, have conversations, and indulge in general learning.

At this company, everything sorts itself out naturally, and there are no OKR’s.

By the way, I’m joking by calling it a stealth startup.

Pretty much I’m just telling myself it’s okay to relax, enjoy life, explore, have fun, and find random things to be passionate about.

There will be no official launch date for this one.

Waking up every day as an alien

I really enjoyed reading The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang earlier this week.

I won’t go into detail in case you want to read it on your own, but one of the images that Chiang toys around with is the idea of being an alien living on a different planet.

This lent itself to a fun thought experiment:

What if, each day this week, you woke up as an alien?

How would you move through the world? What would you observe as bizarre that you don’t typically pay attention to? What behaviors would you find strange when observing people? What behaviors would you re-adopt? How would you look at your own work or craft?

As humans, we’re naturally on an endless search for novelty and interestingness, a lot of times reaching for our screens as a first resort.

But it’s cool to think that you can just turn on interestingness in your day-to-day by slapping on a different lens on the world, even for a brief period.

While this wasn’t exactly the main thrust of the story, it’s a fun tool to add to the imaginative toolbox.

Go be an alien.

Reckless Hands: End-Games in Poker

New personality trait just dropped: Weekly Poker Player

It’s funny because I only watched a couple videos on Poker strategy and now I’m hooked. I’ve only played a few games, but I immodestly like to think that I play pretty decent for a beginner. More-so, it’s fun to be a table-jester and just shoot-the-shit with the homies.

For the few games that I’ve played, I did notice one tendency though.

I’ll be up in chips for most of the night until the end-game, and then I’ll start to play the last few hands recklessly. Rules and strategy just seem to go out the door for a chance to win the last few glory pots and I’ll end up losing the lead at the very end.

This made me think about compounding, risk, and general discipline in life.

Won’t reach too far to extend the metaphor right now, but if you’re looking for a fun game to play, there are many subtle lessons that you can take from the poker table.

What I’m listening to:

Going to try adding music to my newsletter again.

Man, I miss 90’s hip hop so much. I’ve been banging this on most mornings lately after hearing slowthai recommend this on a mix he curated.

Also found this acapella version of C.R.E.A.M. - will always be a classic.

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That’s it for this one!

Felt refreshing to add some variety back in.

Hoping each volume feels this way.

See you next time,

Genesis