Photo by Emerson Peters on Unsplash
Sent as an email newsletter Tues., January 7.
👋 Hi, friends. Welcome to the latest edition of Newley’s Notes, a weekly newsletter containing my recent Wall Street Journal stories, must-read links on tech and life, and funny dog videos.
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🌟 Recently posted on Newley.com: The 10 Best Books I Read in 2019.
TLDR: My pics include books about tech giants such as Airbnb, Uber and Google; titles on economic development and Indian billionaires; a true spy story from the Cold War; and a sprinkling of classic fiction…
What memorable books did you read last year? Hit reply and let me know.
Here are ten items worth your time this week:
🔮 1) A 2013 longread that’s been doing the rounds given recent events: The Shadow Commander [The New Yorker)]
“Qassem Suleimani is the Iranian operative who has been reshaping the Middle East. Now he’s directing Assad’s war in Syria.”
🔎 2) ‘Shattered’: Inside the secret battle to save America’s undercover spies in the digital age [Yahoo News]
“The OPM hack was a watershed moment, ushering in an era when big data and other digital tools may render methods of traditional human intelligence gathering extinct, say former officials.”
🗑️ 3) The Global Garbage Economy Begins (and Ends) in This Senegalese Dump [The Nation]
“How Dakar’s trash depot became a battleground for Chinese industry, the World Bank, and Senegalese organized labor.”
⌨️ 4) The Strange Life and Mysterious Death of a Virtuoso Coder [Wired]
“Jerold Haas was on the brink of blockchain riches. Then his body was found in the woods of southern Ohio.”
🇲🇳 5) This dad took his son to Mongolia just to get him off his phone [BBC News]
“How do you get a teen to put down their phone and talk to you? Jamie Clarke went all the way to Mongolia to find out.”
⏳ 6) Aging-related chart of the week: how life satisfaction changes with age [Danny Blanchflower/Twitter]
“I have a new paper available on request showing that happiness is U-shaped in age minimizing at around age fifty in 132 countries – here it is for Europe from 1.2 million observations.”
⚡ 7) Amid shut-off woes, a beacon of energy [Washington Post]
“A Native American tribe has insulated itself from California’s blackouts by creating a microgrid utility.”
🧠 8) For the New Year, Say No to Negativity [WSJ]
“By recognizing it and overriding our innate responses, we can break destructive patterns, make smarter decisions, see the world more realistically and also exploit the benefits of this bias. Bad is stronger than good, but good can prevail if we know what we’re up against.”
🇩🇪 9) The power of naming: 10 German Expressions that don’t exist in English and their Wisdom [Leo Widrich]
“In German, certain words exist that describe some of our human experiences so accurately and precisely that I’ve marveled at how much helps us to express ourselves.”
🐕 10) Dog-related video of the week: A Jenga-playing canine [Steve Stewart-Williams/Twitter]
“Holy crap, this is incredible: A dog playing Jenga. Turn-taking, fine motor control, apparent understanding of the aim of the game. I would not have guessed a dog could do this.”
💡 Quote of the week:
“If you have good habits, time becomes your ally. You just need to be patient. You just need to let that compounding process work for you. But if you have bad habits, time becomes your enemy.” – James Clear
👊 Fist bump from New Delhi,
Newley