Patrick B Lyons

“Force is force...matter is matter...will is will...the infinite is the infinite...nothing is nothing”
-Tolstoy

[Blake @FrostedBlakes34]

RDJ and Tom Holland deepfaked in Back to the Future breaks my brain

[Chris Bakke @ChrisJBakke]

AI startups pitching VCs in 2023:

[Bill Ackman @BillAckman]

This is a math class this morning at @MIT. This is the state of learning and ‘free speech’ at our top universities. It would not be happening without a failure leadership at MIT.

Imagine being a student who borrowed $250k to attend MIT or a professor who is trying to do research in this environment.

[bill hofheimer @bhofheimer_espn]

30 years ago, Vince Vaughn played @NDFootball tailback Jamie O'Hara in the classic 'Rudy'

Now on ESPN's @CollegeGameDay w/ @jess_sims, the letterman jacket still fits. It's Vaughn's 3rd visit to the show as guest picker. 🍀

[Roy Price @RoyPrice]

Boy you watch Rich Men North of Richmond and one Lynyrd Skynyrd video and YouTube puts you in a very specific box!

[ATP Tour @atptour]

OH MY CARLITOS 😤

@NBOtoronto | #NBO23 | @carlosalcaraz

[Ali G @Ali_G_and_Doge]

@Grimezsz @anyma_eva It’s kinda sad that everyone feels the need to record on their phones instead of just fully enjoying and experiencing the moment

[Lucas Shaw @Lucas_Shaw]

People spend more time watching YouTube on a TV than ABC and CBS put together.

They spend more time watching Netflix on a TV than NBC and Fox combined.

[Austen 🇺🇸 @Austenouttaten]

If there had been a Chinese on the ship in Ridley Scott's Alien they woulda been like mmm dinner and the film would have been over in the first act

[CNN @CNN]

A university janitor who turned off a freezer after hearing multiple “annoying alarms,” ruined more than 20 years of research, according to a lawsuit filed against his employer by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in upstate New York https://t.co/SeS4ccSZ32

[unusual_whales @unusual_whales]

Americans removed $472 billion out of their bank accounts in the first quarter of this year, an all time record since 1984, per the FDIC.

[Billy Oppenheimer @bpoppenheimer]

In the back of a comedy club, a struggling comedian got a chance to talk to Jerry Seinfeld.

He said he’d been struggling and sacrificing for about 10 years to “make it” as a comedian. Approaching his 30s, he was worried he’d taken the wrong path.

Seinfeld gave him this advice:

“This [pointing at the stage] is such a special thing,” Seinfeld says. “This has nothing to do with ‘making it.’”

“But did you ever stop and compare your life?” the struggling comedian says. “I see my friends, and they’re making a lot of money. They’re moving up. They’re all married. They’re all having kids. They have houses. They have a sense of normality.”

Seinfeld makes a disgusted face and then says, “let me tell you a story. This is my favorite story about show business.”

“Glenn Miller's orchestra is doing a gig...They can't land the plane because it's winter, a snowy night—they have to land in this field and walk to the gig.

They're dressed in their suits. They’re carrying their instruments. They’re walking through the snow—it's wet and slushy.

And in the distance they see this little house…They go up to the house and look in the window.

Inside they see this family.

There's a guy and his wife—she’s beautiful. There's two kids, and they're all sitting around the table. They’re smiling. They're laughing. There's a fire in the fireplace...

These guys are standing there in their suits. They're wet and shivering, holding their instruments, and they're watching this incredible Norman Rockwell scene.

And one guy turns to another guy and goes, 'How do people live like that?'

That's what it's about.”

Takeaway 1:

Comparison, it is said, is the thief of joy.

James Altucher has written about a cure for comparison.

Usually, when we compare ourselves to someone, we compare ourselves to a select few aspects of their life (their house, their good looks, or their professional success, etc.).

Instead, James writes, “picture that you can change places in every way with them. But then it’s forever...Would you do it.”

Usually—as Seinfeld’s story illustrates—the answer is…no, you wouldn’t want their whole life.

Takeaway 2:

One of the differences between Seinfeld and the struggling comedian is the way in which they view comedy.

The struggling comedian sees comedy as a means to some end—there’s some amount of money or celebrity that would make him feel like he “made it.”

For Seinfeld, comedy is an end in itself. “[It] has nothing to do with ‘making it,’” as he said.

For Seinfeld, as Ryan Holiday once told me, “The work is the win.”

- - -

“The set I get to do tonight at 7:20 PM is the win. I get to do comedy—I won. It being predicated on doing X or being bigger than Y—no, no, no. To me, it’s always just been about the work. I’m on house money, full-time.” — Hasan Minhaj

Follow @bpoppenheimer for more content like this!

[Barsee 🐶 @heyBarsee]

Text-to-Videos are getting insanely powerful.

Few years and we will watch Hollywood movies generated by AI.

Here are 12 incredible use cases of #Gen-2 changing the industry very rapidly 🤯 👇

[Pete @nonmayorpete]

JUST IN: NVIDIA dropped new text-to-video research.

While still far from Hollywood quality, it's pretty damn impressive how fast this is moving.

"a storm trooper vacuuming a beach"

[TG4 @TG4TV]

Nuair a bhíonn Gaeilge Dhún na nGall ag an scrúdaitheoir! 😅 #BAFTAs #EEBAFTAs

[Johnny Kelly @MrJohnnyKelly]

I once suggested a TV series to Richard Scarry’s lovely family with @nexusstories and we spent a few days making a pig. It didn't happen in the end, but I’m still quite fond of Mr Frumble here (modelling by Nur Diker, light + render by Florian Caspar)
#richardscarry #pulledpork

[Zach Cregger @zcregger]

Preach motherfucker!

[NFL @NFL]

.@ChrisStapleton brings the house down with his performance of the National Anthem! #SBLVII

[Darren Rovell @darrenrovell]

In 1972, the Yankees asked former players for their most outstanding experience at Yankee Stadium.

Mickey Mantle’s response was so lewd and graphic it could never be printed.

The original is up for auction for the first time at @Lelandsdotcom.