The best stories, podcasts, and books you’ve ever seen

We have three big announcements…

1. The Mission’s Podcast Network!

To get first access to the podcasts, shows, and our launch contest, make sure you’re subscribed to our daily (M-F) newsletter.

We can’t reveal too much about this yet except:

We’re launching the first two live video shows in mid July, and the podcast versions in mid August. We have a sweet launch contest coming up (everyone who enters will win something) and we’re lining up some (amazing) sponsors around the shows and podcasts. If you’re interested in sponsoring, please reach out here.

2. The Mission’s Creative Studio

You can check out our 2017 media reel here:

Here’s an example of one of our interactive videos:

And here’s a trailer for one of our original series. This is a twelve part original series called Hacking the Net that we created for Twilio:

We can’t wait to share more of what we have in the pipeline. For more information about our services, which include: thought leadership and PR for executives, branded content, interactive videos, and original series… you can reach out to our creative team here.

3. We’ve acquired Humanizing Tech!

We’re excited to welcome Sean Everett, the founder of Humanizing Tech to The Mission as our first Entrepreneur In Residence. I had the pleasure of meeting Sean a year ago, and we hit it off. At The Mission, we’ve been gearing up to cover technology in a new kind of way.

Sean will be providing analysis and stories that help humanize tech and turn recent advances into first principles that you can use to make your life better. Sean has already started publishing his stories with us, and expect to see him in a lot of our upcoming media, podcasts, and shows.

In Case You Missed It…

The stories of triumphs and tradegies we’ve been publishing will live on outside the newsletter. You can checkout the latest one here:

What We’re Reading & Re-Reading

And There Was Light by Jacques Lusseyran

All you need to know about this book is in it’s subtitle:

The Extraordinary Memoir of a Blind Hero of the French Resistance in World War II

“Inside me there was everything I had believed was outside. There was, in particular, the sun, light, and all colors. There were even the shapes of objects and the distance between objects. Everything was there and movement as well… Light is an element that we carry inside us and which can grow there with as much abundance, variety, and intensity as it can outside of us…I could light myself…that is, I could create a light inside of me so alive, so large, and so near that my eyes, my physical eyes, or what remained of them, vibrated, almost to the point of hurting… God is there under a form that has the good luck to be neither religious, not intellectual, nor sentimental, but quite simply alive.” –Jacques Lusseyran

And a side note on trolls, haters, and cynics. It’s funny how even for this literal miracle of a true story… trolls show up in the reviews. When you do anything, it’s important to remember: You can be virtuous, blind, and start leading the French Resistance as a teenager and you’ll still have critics.

And There Was Light is the biography and historical non-fiction story behind the fictional story of the book, All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr.

In other reading news… Neal Stephenson released his new book, D.O.D.O.

About D.O.D.O. and a quote:

“Melisande Stokes, an expert linguist, meets Tristan Lyons, a military intelligence operator who works for the Department of Diachronic Operations — D.O.D.O. This mysterious government agency enlists Mel’s help to translate ancient and (unknown to her) magical documents. Tristan’s mission is to not only uncover why magic stopped, but ultimately bring it back. This story follows Tristan and Mel as they adventure into the realm of the unknown, each with their own motives.”

“When you just wing it, you are aware of the risk and the uncertainty, and inclined to be more cautious. When you have a high-tech tool giving you an illusion of omniscience, I am concerned that it will lead to greater risk-taking.” –Neal Stephenson

After I started reading Dodo (love it so far), I felt an urge to revisit my highlights from his classic, Snow Crash.

For the uninitiated…

“In real life, Hiro Protagonist is a mere pizza delivery boy. In the Metaverse, he is a Warrior Prince tasked with destroying the computer virus that has been causing havoc for hackers everywhere. Snow Crash takes us out of our own world and drops us into one of Sumerian myth and virtual reality.”

Both books are well worth the read. They’re great examples of a sci-fi author who is accurately predicting certain aspects of the future. Both books will help expand your mind and think longer term.

What We’re Meditating on

“A Time to Kill didn’t sell. It just didn’t sell. There was never any talk of going back for a second printing. No talk of paper back. No foreign deal. It was a flop. And I told my wife, I said, ‘Look, I’m gonna do it one more time. I’m gonna write one more book…hopefully something more commercial, more accessible, more popular. If this doesn’t work, forget this career. Forget this hobby. I’m just gonna be a lawyer and get on with it.”

–John Grisham, on his first book. Now he has published 38 bestselling books.

What We’re Learning

You’ll become what you think about. Now science is starting to catch up:

The researchers found that people tend to use a combination of ease-of-processing and their beliefs about memory when making recall predictions. –Link

For those trying to conceive children… more than 2 cups of coffee per day prior to or after conceiving increases the chance of miscarriage. There are several studies out about this, and it’s a fiercely debated topic. Read more about this here.

What We’re Listening to

The Chainsmokers — All We Know (Faux Tales Remix)

Faux Tales is one my favorite musicians. You can listen to his music and support his work here.

What We’re Watching

The season finale of Silicon Valley on HBO had all the ups and downs that characterize powerful storytelling.

The season closes with Pied Piper making some promising steps towards achieving a decentralized Internet. For those who have been following the show, you know that success is an uncommon occurrence for these guys. It was fun to see the team start to gain real momentum.

Mike Judge, the Silicon Valley team, and HBO have succeeded in satire, comedy, and truth telling on a large scale. Many people think Silicon Valley will turn the public off to technology, startups, or the Valley, but I couldn’t disagree more. The show has presented Silicon Valley and the absurdities required to make new things in a funny and teachable way.