The Economy of Words →

Another great episode of Luke Norsworthy’s podcast. Luke had a great interview with Nadia Bolz-Weber, a Lutheran pastor in Denver. My favorite part was her discussion of 12-minute sermons and why she rarely exceeds the allotted time: she believes in the “economy of words.”

Here’s the full description of the episode, in case it helps pique your interest:

Nadia Bolz-Weber returns to the show to discuss Luke’s visit to House for All Sinners and Saints, Nadia’s re-connection with the churches of Christ, twelve minute sermons, church plants as a birthday party you throw for yourself, well-differentiated leaders, democratizing church and of course, CrossFit.

When the Music Finds You →

M.G. Siegler:

There’s something different about hearing a song you love on the radio. It just sounds better.

I know that sounds absolutely crazy. And, in a way, it is. I mean, a song is a song. It should sound the same no matter how you hear it. Or maybe over radio it should actually sound worse given the relatively low fidelity of radio.

And yet, it sounds better. You simply cannot convince me otherwise. This has been on my mind this week following the launch of Apple Music.

It’s sort of like when a movie comes on TV. It’s one that you would have never picked to watch, but because it’s on TV you decide to watch it. You may even own the movie, but you choose the worse experience (i.e. ads) because it’s what was presented to you.

Last week’s Accidental Tech Podcast highlighted the negative side of radio, namely the inability to skip songs because it’s live. But now that the music industry has shifted to on-demand access to almost any song ever written, it’s nice sometimes to have something chosen for you. Something you can’t skip. It feels retro. That’s how M.G. closes his post:

In the age of hunting and pecking and searching for music amidst endless catalogs and repositories and libraries, there’s something great in this process being taken out of your hands; in not choosing what to listen to, but having the music find you. And in it being a song you want to hear, even though you maybe didn’t know you did at that moment.

‘The Sikhs who saved Parmesan’ →

The title says it all. Great read.

‘Where Virtue, Pragmatics, and Mission Meet’ →

Speaking of Greg McKinzie, check out what’s driving his decision to pursue doctoral education:

If this seems heady, well, it will be; it’s doctoral work. But my commitment is to serve the fruit of the ministry of study at the congregational table. What we need, in Churches of Christ at least, is a real hermeneutical alternative to the defunct interpretive habits that haunt us, and that alternative should be rooted in participation in God’s mission. I care deeply about hermeneutics because congregations need to live missionally in the world through the biblical narrative. We need reading practices that help us to embody God’s purposes, both in the interpretive process and in word-and-deed proclamation of the kingdom. Where virtue, pragmatics, and mission meet, we have in view roughly two kinds of interpretive practices:

1. Practices that transform the church—actually making us who we are supposed to be, not just people who affirm the conclusions they are supposed to affirm.

2. Practices that transform the world—actually participating in the restoration of all creation.

If, in the next three years, I can make any contribution in this direction, I will consider myself deeply privileged. I thank God for the opportunity.

Writing That's Worth Reading →

Greg McKinzie has been tearing it up on Scripture and Mission in the few months between his family's move back to the U.S. of A. and starting his doctoral studies in Pasadena.

I’m linking to a great post of his from the beginning of May. It’s exemplary of the type of post you’ll often see on Scripture and Mission, where Greg not only presents original material but also walks his audience through the process of how he got there. I love it.

Of course I enjoy and benefit from Greg’s interaction with the actual material. But more than anything I love his introductory comments (or, in this case, introductory sections). Those who minimize Greg’s contributions because he uses big words and dissects difficult subjects miss an important point. Greg is using his site to teach. He’s not just doing the talking himself, he’s teaching readers how to read the Bible for themselves and draw their own, informed conclusions. In math terms he’s showing his work, which is harder than just persuasively presenting your own position.

Incidentally, Greg is also raising the standard for what is published on “blogs” (the term “blog” for me devalues content, which is why I like to say “website” instead of “blog,” and talk about “writing” instead of “blogging”). In a day and age of cheap information, lists of 27 things (of which YOU WON’T BELIEVE NUMBER 14), and easy solutions, I want to support thoughtful publishing online.

There’s a reason that Greg’s homepage only displays one post at a time. He writes standalone articles. A single post might even have 28 footnotes.

If Greg’s writing is difficult for you to read all the way through, here are a few tips:

• Set aside 15-30 minutes. This isn’t the Internet equivalent of a fun-sized Snickers bar—it’s more like an Argentine steak with a side order of Peruvian potatoes.
• Be ready to learn something. Pull up your dictionary app, or, even easier, make it a habit to 3-finger tap the words you don’t know (this works on OS X. On iOS, you have to highlight the word and tap “Define”).
• Read.
• Then, summarize what you’ve learned in your own words. Consider joining the conversation (on your own site, not Facebook) with a nuanced response.

Good writing is worth reading.

Not Really the World’s Greatest Dad →

Peter Rollins, on honesty and idealizing:

It might seem that the only alternative to idealization is a bland world where parents talk about their child being reasonably attractive compared to other infants, and children buy cards that state, “You’re roughly average in your parenting skills.” But there is also the stance that Freud called “sublimation.” This is where some particular thing/person/cause takes on an absolute value for us, not in wanton ignorance of his/her/its imperfection, but in the very acceptance and even celebration of those imperfections.

Of course I had to wait a few days after Father’s Day to link to this, if only to lessen truth’s sting a bit.

Don’t miss the video at the end of his post. Hilarious.

Down with ‘Depends on Experience’ →

Good post by Vu Le over on Nonprofit With Balls, regarding the common practice of not disclosing salary ranges with job postings:

The expectation for candidates to not bring up the salary until the end is naïve and irresponsible. We need to live and support our families on these salaries; our payment is not a pleasant bonus we get for saving the world.

And:

We in the nonprofit sector must blaze the trail for equity, and not just thoughtlessly follow the ineffective and inequitable practices we inherited from the business world like a bunch of sign-spinning robots. #DownWithDOE. Tweet that, and let’s start to end this practice.

I’ve been following this site for a while, but just stumbled across the story behind the site’s name. It’s worth the three minute read.

Alto’s Adventure →

Some games are good for the soul.

From the App Store description:

Join Alto and his friends as they embark on an endless snowboarding odyssey. Journey scrap the beautiful alpine hills of their native wilderness, through neighbouring villages, ancient woodlands, and long-abandoned ruins.

Along the way you’ll rescue runaway llamas, grind rooftops, leap over terrifying chasms and outwit the mountain elders – all while braving the ever changing elements and passage of time while on the mountain.

Besides MarioKart on the Nintendo 64, I don’t play video games. Alto’s Adventure caught my eye, what with the thrill of snowboarding, randomness of catching llamas, and stunning design. I’m terrible at it but it’s so fun.

And right now it’s just 99 cents on the App Store.

See also: Dan Moren shares why he likes the game over on Six Colors.

Reforming Education Reform →

Nicholas Kristof in his opinion column for the NYT a couple weeks ago:

I support education reform. Yet the brawls have left everyone battered and bloodied, from reformers to teachers unions. I’m not advising surrender. Education inequity is America’s original sin. A majority of American children in public schools are eligible for free or reduced price lunches, and they often get second-rate teachers in second-rate schools — even as privileged kids get superb teachers. This perpetuates class and racial inequity and arises in part from a failed system of local school financing.

But fixing K-12 education will be a long slog, so let’s redirect some energy to children aged 0 to 5 (including prenatal interventions, such as discouraging alcohol and drug use among pregnant women).

That leads to my third reason: Early education is where we have the greatest chance of progress because it’s not politically polarized. New York City liberals have embraced preschool, but so have Oklahoma conservatives. Teacher unions will flinch at some of what I say, but they have been great advocates for early education. Congress can’t agree on much, but Republicans and Democrats just approved new funding for home visitation for low-income toddlers.

“The Mustachioed Little Man” →

Hilary Greenbaum, in an article on The 6th Floor blog for the NYT:

The Moka Express, a stovetop espresso machine that was meant for the home, provided both an affordable espresso and a beautiful object to make it in.

Today it is unimaginable to think of Italian homes without a Bialetti. Everyone still prefers drinking an espresso at the bar—that much hasn’t changed. But the Bialetti is indispensable for the early morning caffè latte and after dinner espresso. It’s amazing just how widespread its adoption was.

I love this little bit on Bialetti’s mascot:

To differentiate his family’s machine from potential imitations, Bialetti commissioned a mascot from the Italian artist, Paul Campani, in 1953. In Italian, the figure is known as l’omino coi baffi, or “the mustachioed little man,” and was printed on the side of the coffee machine. It is rumored that l’omino is a caricature of Alfonso Bialetti himself, but according to the Bialetti historical archive, the black-suited man is actually his eldest son, Renato. In addition to l’omino‘s presence on the side of every Moka Express, he also starred in the company’s early television campaigns.

Clear Language and Respect →

Another enduring post by Seth Godin:

If the agreement starts with “whereas” and continues along with, “notwithstanding the foregoing,” and when it must be decoded by a lawyer on the other side, something has gone wrong. These codewords, and the dense language that frequently appears in legal agreements, are symptoms of a system out of whack. It’s possible to be precise without being obtuse.

There’s actually no legal requirement that an agreement not be in specific, clear, everyday English. To do otherwise disrespects the person you’re hoping to engage with. There’s no legal requirement that even the terms of service for a website can’t be clear and easy to understand. In fact, if the goal is to avoid confusion and the costs of the legal system when conflicts occur, the more clear, the better.

N.T. Wright on Resurrection and Postmodernity’s Inevitability →

N.T. Wright:

Faced with this situation, many have tried—some are still trying—to deny the presence of postmodernity, to retain the modern world in which we felt so comfortable and in which (whether we realize it or not) we preached a modernist gospel. Many want to turn the clock back, culturally and theologically.

It cannot be done.

My proposal to you is that we should not be frightened of the postmodern critique. It had to come. It is, I believe, a necessary judgment on the arrogance of modernity, and it is essentially a judgment from within. Our task is to reflect on this moment of despair within our culture and, reflecting biblically and Christianly, to see our way through the moment of despair and out the other side. That is why I want to talk to you about the resurrection and about the Emmaus Road story; that is why I want to do so through the lens of the poem that we call Psalms 42 and 43.

‘Sometimes We Should Do What We Hate’ →

Compelling piece by Gordon Marino in the NYT Opinion Pages:

Perhaps you relish running marathons. Perhaps you even think of your exercise regimen as a form of self-improvement. But if your “something higher” is, say, justice and equality, those ideals might behoove you to delegate some of the many hours spent pounding the track on tutoring kids at the youth center. Our desires should not be the ultimate arbiters of vocation. Sometimes we should do what we hate, or what most needs doing, and do it as best we can.

How to Be Polite →

Paul Ford over on Medium’s The Message:

Real politeness, I reasoned, was invisible. It adapted itself to the situation.

This is the best piece you’ll read today if you care about showing grace to other humans.

But then, suddenly — it mattered. My ability to go to a party and speak to anyone about anything, to natter and ask questions, to turn the conversation relentlessly towards the speaker, meant that I was gathering huge amounts of information about other people.

Here’s a polite person’s trick, one that has never failed me. I will share it with you because I like and respect you, and it is clear to me that you’ll know how to apply it wisely: When you are at a party and are thrust into conversation with someone, see how long you can hold off before talking about what they do for a living. And when that painful lull arrives, be the master of it. I have come to revel in that agonizing first pause, because I know that I can push a conversation through. Just ask the other person what they do, and right after they tell you, say: “Wow. That sounds hard.”

Because nearly everyone in the world believes their job to be difficult.

Don’t miss the conclusion. It’s the best part.

Interviewing the Inventor of the Aeropress →

Steven Levy scored an interview with Alan Adler, inventor of the Aerobie flying disc and my go-to coffee maker: the Aeropress. Here’s Levy’s intro from Medium’s Backchannel:

So I recently ventured to the small suite towards the back of a tiny industrial complex near 101 in Palo Alto, the home of the Aerobie company and its unsung master maker, Alan Adler. At 75, he is still at it, the canonical independent inventor, digging in file drawers for blueprints, shuffling to a storage space to locate an early version of his long-flying disk, lining up AeroPress prototypes like the iconic illustration of Darwin’s vision of the evolution of man. Across the room is his granddaughter, who does his PR. If the Maker Movement needs someone to put on its postage stamp, Adler would be perfect. He agreed to speak to Backchannel about coffee, flying saucers and invention. The interview is edited for length and clarity.

Adler’s line about the Aerobie stuck with me:

I set about trying to come up with a disk that was stable at all speeds. By this time Parker Brothers had made a million Skyros and returned the rights to me. Eventually I developed a little ridge on the perimeter, [like an airfoil]. The effect of that was just absolutely magical.

Regarding the self-cleaning nature of the Aeropress, which I thought was always part of the design, Adler says:

Total good luck. It was what I call serendipity.

He says that the popular method of inverting the Aeropress with a longer brew time (which I use) contradicts the philosophy of the Aeropress. For a long time I used the out-of-the-box instructions, but have been doing inverted brewing for a while (following the basic recipe of the folks at the late Tonx). I may have to give the regular method another shot—especially if it’s won the last couple U.S. Aeropress Championships.

If you want more, don’t miss The Invention of the Aeropress from Priceonomics just over a year ago.

Tweeting the Psalms →

Ben Myers has been tweeting through the Psalms. Now, obviously something of the Psalms’ intended purpose is lost in reducing poetry to a tweet. But of course I love the project, since I love both Twitter and the Psalms.

Some of his #psalmtweets are outright poetic:

Psalm 43: O Joy of my joy, with hands lifted high I drag my heavy heart into Your presence.

Others are modernized for effect:

Psalm 45: Faster than a typewriter, as fluent as a twitter timeline, my tongue pours out praises to Your Messiah.

Some are downright theological:

Psalm 8: The stars are a minor achievement (Your finger-painting). Humanity is Your masterwork; the stars gaze down admiringly.

He’s compiled his tweets into posts for Book I and Book II, respectively. I assume Book III will hit the press soon, since he tweeted Psalm 89 back in February.

Inside the Mad, Mad World of TripAdvisor →

Tim Vanderbilt, writing at Outside:

Leaving the cave tour at the cenote-and-zip-line complex Aktun Chen, where the guide’s joke-filled patter was as smooth and gently worn by time as the stalactites, we saw a huge sign, decorated in TripAdvisor green, with the brand’s signature owl, imploring visitors to post reviews. Spotting the owl became a game for my daughter: at the palateria in town, on the gate at Don Diego. By the time we were at the Cancún airport, passing by a small room that a TripAdvisor sign claimed was the best “fish spa” in Mexico (the fish nibble at your feet, offering a unique sort of pedicure), I began to feel a rash desire to partake in some activity that was not on TripAdvisor, an experience that had not already been mediated by the leveling winds of mass opinion—a rathole restaurant or fleabag hotel where I didn’t already know the front-desk clerk’s name. I wanted to have no expectations, either exceeded or unmet.

But all this was my young backpacker self speaking; as a harried dad, I needed some assurance that things would work out. I’d been wise to give in to the crowd.

This is a fascinating piece. Just eight years ago I studied abroad in Italy and traveled through Europe for a semester, all without this now-indispensable resource of instantly accessible information and recommendations. Part of it is that I didn’t plan ahead enough to take advantage of it. Another part of it is I didn’t yet default to “just Google it.” Now when you Google any type of travel question, you’re bound to get a TripAdvisor result somewhere on the first page—usually at the top. Its rise to the top of every search query is astounding. But the first search result is only the beginning.

What begins as a simple search-engine query becomes an epic fact-finding mission that leaves no moldy shower curtain unturned, a labyrinthine choose-your-own-adventure—do you read the one-bubble rant?—in which the perfect hotel always seems just one more click away. For all the power of the service, it raises deep questions about travel itself, including, most pressingly, who do we want—who do we trust—to tell us where to go? “The future,” Don DeLillo once wrote, “belongs to crowds.” Are we there yet?

The problem that TripAdvisor is working to solve is not yet solved. Questions remain regarding who you should trust for your travel decisions. Super-human complainers are a dime-a-dozen, which is why we reserve a grain of salt for each review we read. At the end of the trip, the best story may very well be the experience that no one recommended but the one you just stumbled into.

(Via The Loop)

Sharing at Its Best →

Seth Godin:

The fear of being judged is palpable, and the digital trail we leave behind makes it feel more real and more permanent. We live in an ever-changing culture, and that culture is changed precisely by the ideas we engage with and the ones we choose to share.

Sharing an idea you care about is a generous way to change your world for the better.

The culture we will live in next month is a direct result of what people like us share today. The things we share and don’t share determine what happens next.

The Very Worst Missionary Deconstructs ‘#Blessed’ →

Jamie Wright, aka The Very Worst Missionary, on why she hates the hashtag #blessed phenomenon:

We've created a culture in which we measure God's “blessings” in terms of dollars and cents, comfort and pleasure, wealth and well-being. So, if we're happy and healthy and have everything we need, then we're blessed, and we should thank God on social media. We tend to ignore the secondary message this sends to those who are unhappy or unhealthy, or for whom things are just generally crappy. Too bad, so sad, if your life sucks, you're #NotBlessed. The third unintended takeaway we get when we slap the word "blessed" on every aspect of our own upward mobility is that God's blessings obviously belongs to the rich, and must be doled out to the poor as the rich see fit. The richer, the #Blesseder.

It’s a pet peeve of mine too. While she focuses on deconstructing the concept of blessing, I couldn’t agree more with her conclusion for what blessing actually is.

Dillon on Mexico

6 year-old Dillon, responding to allegations that he doesn’t like Mexican food:

I like Mexicans, and I like their food.

Well said.