My friend Seth Godin — author of Purple Cow, Linchpin, Tribes, The Dip, and This Is Marketing — writes a daily email full of excellent short ideas about life and business. But it turns out he has even shorter ideas that don’t make it into the daily email, and he’s collected them on a page called Seth’s Riffs. Each one is a sentence or two. You can vote for your favorites, which sorts the best to the top. A few of mine:

• The question shouldn’t be, “does it scale?” Instead, it might be, “is it worth it?”

• Waiting for perfect is never as smart as making progress.

• Defending mediocrity is exhausting.

• Using an existing idea to solve a new problem isn’t theft. Ideas shared are the most powerful kind.

— MF

Text as Music is a simple browser tool where you paste your writing and it colors every sentence by length, so you can literally see the rhythm on the page. Micro sentences turn one color, short another, and medium and long each have their own. It’s inspired by Gary Provost’s line, “Don’t just write words. Write music.” — CD

I love this mashup of electronic music plus French medieval instrumentation, sometimes called Bardcore. A good example of bardcore is the French group Courseval doing Daft Punk’s cover song Veridis Quo. As one commenter said “Proof that we could have had Daft Peasant any time in the last 500 years.” — KK

I bought this tiny Mbzoey Electric Foil Shaver to take on trips, but it’s become my everyday razor. It’s rechargeable via USB-C and lasts at least a few weeks of daily shaving on a single charge, with an LED display that shows how much charge is left. No more shaving cream — I just run it over my face dry. I can do an early-evening touch-up before going out in under a minute. — MF

I love the core question this piece “Navigating by aliveness” offers when wondering if you’re on the right track: “Does this feel like it’s taking me in the direction of greater aliveness?” Aliveness here means fully inhabiting an experience and shifting your attention away from what you’re feeling and toward the depth and clarity with which you’re feeling it, whether it’s painful, dull, or joyful. The author goes on to explore why this matters in an AI‑shaped future, and suggests we relate to technology a bit like the Amish do: only adopting tools if they clearly serve our deepest values, rather than assuming they’re automatically good. For me, this definition alone feels like a daily way to check my own presence, and how fully I’m actually here in my life, moment to moment. — CD

Like the podcast 99% Invisible, the newsletter/blog Inconspicuous Consumption pays obsessive attention to minor details that most people don’t even see. For instance: long essays on whether the final button holes on shirts should be vertical or horizontal, or Where Should the Apostrophe Go on a Vertically Lettered Sign?. More on ashtray designs, the colors of butter, security envelope patterns. The less significant the details are, the more attention they get. Entire worlds can be glimpsed at the end of an office stapler. The tagline for the site is Big Enthusiasm for Small Details. Few who descend down these rabbit holes return the same. — KK

I run a newsletter called Book Freak, and I’ve started a paid feature I’m calling the Deep Cuts reading club. Each month I dig up a great book that time forgot — usually something out of print and not on Project Gutenberg — and produce a clean ebook edition of it in EPUB and PDF, with a cover and a short foreword explaining why it’s worth your time. Subscribers get a growing library plus a discussion thread for the monthly pick. The first one is H.G. Wells’s strange 1928 satire, Mr. Blettsworthy on Rampole Island. — MF

This week’s What’s in my NOW? is my own issue. As editor, I usually feature other people’s lists—and we’re always accepting submissions, so if you’d like to share yours, check out this Call for Submissions. But this time I shared six things shaping my life right now: three physical, two digital, and one invisible. They’re more intimate than what I’d normally recommend here—closer to my inner life and energy healing practice—like a full-body red light therapy mat that puts me into a euphoric state in about 10 minutes, AudioPen for transcribing my dreams, and the invisible one: Ubuntu, “I am because we are,” a reminder that my growth isn’t a solo path but happens in the uncomfortable, relational space between me and others. Read the full issue here. — CD

You can buy your kid a dumbphone, or purchase an app (with paid subscription!) to make a spare smartphone dumber, but Jeremy White at Wired figured out that you can also use the buried options in an iPhone to craft a perfect device for a kid. These options are somewhat hidden under the Accessibility menu, and seem to be designed for those with cognitive disabilities, but also work to constrain the access your child has. Full instructions in this Wired article, This Buried Apple Feature Turns an iPhone Into the Perfect Kids’ Dumb Phone. — KK

Sometimes I watch a show on my phone while flying. I’ve propped it against a wadded-up napkin on the tray table, watching it slide off every time the seat in front reclines. This small metal clamp from Ugreen grips the tray table (or a seatback lip, luggage handle, or kitchen cabinet — the jaw opens 8–25mm), and your phone snaps onto the magnetic head, holding it through turbulence. It folds flat, rotates for portrait or landscape, and works with any MagSafe case. It also works on a treadmill, nightstand, or car headrest. — MF

This article introduced me to cognitive shuffling, a very simple word‑based visual exercise that helps the author fall asleep faster. You pick a random, emotionally neutral word like “duck,” picture it, then move to another unrelated word, and keep gently shuffling through these images until you drift off. I’ve been trying this for about a week now, and one of two things keeps happening: I either slip into a liminal hypnagogic state where the imagery shifts and takes over until I fall asleep, or my mind gets quickly bored by not getting to make associations with the non‑linear images and just shuts down into sleep. It might not be my favorite entry into sleep, but it did work and could be helpful to those struggling with insomnia. — CD

Pixar has been in a slump, but their newest release is fun and has some of the old magic back. Hoppers (Disney+ or BluRay) carries a convoluted plot involving animals and animal robots, downloading avatars, and key species in wildlife ecology. And for the memes, lots of beavers. It’s a fully realized world, lighthearted and whimsical, with some interesting ideas, and not too predictable. — KK

I’ve ruined my share of meat by cutting in to check doneness. The MeatStick V Duo uses two wireless probes that you can put into two different cuts, and the app predicts when each will hit its target temperature. A small LCD base shows the temps so I don’t have to grab my phone with greasy hands. The probes can handle open flame up to 1200°F and are dishwasher safe. — MF

I just got back from an overseas trip, and this inflatable travel seat cushion made a 10+ hour flight—and those board-hard seats—so much more bearable. I was hesitant to become someone who carries a personal butt pillow through the airport, but I’m glad I got over it and brought it along. It deflates and rolls up smaller than a neck pillow. — CD

What was the most streamed show in 2025? Bluey, a kids animated show from Australia. Bluey has about 150 very short episodes using an animated dog family to model emotional intelligence and give toddlers strategies for big feelings. Like Sesame Street, adults can tolerate watching it. I think early Sesame Street is better, teaching more and broader, but Bluey is a good second choice. (Technically streamed on Disney+, but available on YouTube as well.) Because episodes are shorter (about 10 minutes), small kids love rewatching them. — KK

Imagine having access to all the ancient maps of the world, and being able to explore them with AI, including searching on the words etched in the maps, or concepts about the maps – for instance “give me all the maps showing the routes of Roman aqueducts.” All this and more are available online for free, at the David Rumsey Map Collection. For 25 years Rumsey has been scanning over 140,000 maps of all kinds from his insane collection from around the world. He then innovates ways to share them. When you find a map you particularly like, you can tap a button and have it printed out on a large scale and mailed to you for a reasonable fee. This is an international treasure. — KK

I’ve been burned by buying a “buy-it-for-life” brand only to discover the company and the logo were sold years ago. Worse on Purpose rates 215 brands — tools, bags, apparel, eyewear, and footwear — as either Approved, Watchlist, Former Great, or Avoid. A sample: Ray-Ban is designated “Avoid” (“Priced as luxury, produced to commodity standards”). Another example: Peak Design is designated “Approved”, (because it is still founder-owned). — MF

One of my favorite newsletters, Down the Rabbit Hole, is a weekly, curated collection of psychoactive internet rabbit holes exploring meaning, beauty, and aliveness. The creator recently shared a virtual “window” you can click open that sends you to one of the most-clicked links from the past five years. It feels like StumbleUpon with soul— tiny portal into wonder. — CD

Electronics for Kids, a new book by Øyvind Nydal Dahl's, starts with the basics — making a battery from a lemon, turning a bolt into an electromagnet — then moves into soldering real circuits, and finally into digital electronics, introducing logic gates and memory circuits before culminating in an LED reaction game that tests how fast you can catch a blinking light. The illustrations are clear throughout. Despite the title, I'd recommend it for adults as well as kids. — MF

I am a crystal collector, although for legitimacy purposes I’d rather call them mineral specimens, and they deserve to be on display, not in a drawer or crowded on a shelf. Art Display Essentials is a great source for museum quality stands, with pricing comparable to other online storefronts. Highly recommend if you’re an amateur collector who wants to level up their setup. — CD