Steve 🤙

I always assumed “parasocial” was an internet-era word. Turns out it was coined in 1956 in a 15-page paper about radio and TV. I broke it down, and it's fascinating how well it holds up today for modern social media.

Going live with @mfigge to chat about his background, his focus areas at @yugalabs, and of course, Mudwater! Swing through! 👇

Gonna bet my 12-year-old son that he can’t beat Ocarina of Time in three days with no guides or walkthroughs. That’s what I did during winter break in 1998.

Following a recent work trip, I had a giant pile of clothes and towels at the foot of my bed. I saw a mess that stressed me out. My dog saw an opportunity to build an epic pillow fort. Two takeaways: 1) Life’s all about perspective 2) Dogs rock

guys will see this and say hell yeah

Some perspective about how lucky we are to live in 2026... 100 years ago (basically one person’s lifetime ago), most homes didn’t have running water, electricity, indoor plumbing, or heating/air conditioning. Now we have all of those plus a magical hand-held device that connects us to people across the world instantly and can access all the knowledge the world has ever known. Think about that. Your grandparents literally may have spent years before taking a warm shower that didn't require heating water on a coal stove. You can ask a robot a question about quantum physics and get an instant answer. Onward we go 🤙

Checked in on my three-month X stats since I started posting more consistently. Work and life had taken me off the timeline, sometimes for days at a time. Showing up and seeing it pay off! Onward we go 🤙

Achievement Unlocked: Civic Duty #ElectionDay #Midterms2026

Been working on an article I'm titling "The Friendship Recession" about loneliness epidemic in adults. Some interesting research I've found so far... - In 1990, 3% of American men said they had no close friends. By 2021 it was 15%. Over the same stretch, the share of men with six or more close friends fell from 55% to 27%. (source: Survey Center on American Life) - Part of the reason is time. Jeffrey Hall at the University of Kansas estimated it takes about 50 hours together to go from acquaintance to casual friend, about 90 to become actual friends, and more than 200 to become close friends. So with jobs, kids, and responsibilities, friendship mostly comes down to hours, and adult life doesn’t leave many. - An encouraging one - reaching out works better than we expect. In a set of experiments with about 5,900 people, Peggy Liu at the University of Pittsburgh alongside other colleagues found we consistently underestimate how much someone appreciates hearing from us. The gap was biggest when the message was unexpected. So friendships are dropping, the bustle of life is an issue (not an excuse, so don't beat yourself up about it), and the old friend you keep meaning to text would probably be happier to hear from you than you think. Anyway hoping to have this one spun up in the next few weeks. The research is inspiring me...I actually texted an old friend who I'm meeting for breakfast this week.

Whoever wins on Election Day, I'm the real winner because I'll no longer get dozens of these texts harassing my phone.

Be careful what you hand off to search engines and AI. Some fascinating research I came across while writing a new piece on cognitive offloading... - In a 2001 Harvard study, brain scans showed that being stuck on a word you know, and actually thinking versus searching it up, activate the parts of the brain that detect a problem and direct the effort to fix it. - A 2014 UC Davis study found that being curious about a trivia answer increased activity in the brain’s reward circuit, and people remembered those answers better a day later. - A 2018 study found the same reward system lights up the moment an answer finally clicks. I’ve always called remembering something on my own a "bicep curl for my brain." Turns out there are decades of research supporting that. When you use your brain instead of AI or search engines, it strengthens memory and likely improves general problem solving.

Agree and I’ll build on it. In NFTs, rares can carry a premium, but usually only at the high end. Mid-rares and commons often go for the same floor price. Pokemon cards have an efficient market with strong price distribution from common to rare. You see prices from $1 to $1M, with entire websites build on valuing specific cards. NFTs and Pokemon cards absolutely share some similarities, but are still very different products.

I disagree and I don’t think it’s a pivot at all. The card market is one of the industries that makes sense to integrate blockchain. These brands are uniquely positioned to experiment here, just as they have with ticketing and gaming. Innovators innovate. 🤙

Great list! I’ve been to all of these except Philly, Houston, and Nashville. All three are on my shortlist, too. I love how diverse American cities feel. It’s like visiting another country when you go to different regions.