What Works Tara McMullin

This is the second edition of Cold Pitch, an experimental project from YellowHouse.Media about media, curiosity, and identity. In this edition, Sean and I talk about our favorite daily YouTube show, Good Mythical Morning.
It's the backbone of our evening routine, the content we rely on to draw a thick line between the workday and rest time, and, as you'll hear, a rich text.
Footnotes:


Good Mythical Morning on YouTube
Ear Biscuits on YouTube
"Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal" on Wikipedia
"From Work to Text" by Roland Barthes
"Parasocial Interaction" on Wikipedia
"Mass Communication and Para-Social Interaction" by Donald Horton and R. Richard Wohl in Psychiatry

"We Found Extremely Rare Toys in These Blind Boxes" on GMM
"Five Guys vs. Shake Shack | FOOD FEUDS" on GMM
"Our 2500th Episode!" on GMM
"We React to Photos That Will Break Your Brain" on GMM


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Over the next few weeks, I've got something a wee bit different for you! This is the very first edition of Cold Pitch, an experimental media project from YellowHouse.Media. Cold Pitch explores media, curiosity, and identity through a variety of forms and methods.
In this first edition, Sean McMullin (my husband & partner at YellowHouse.Media) and I talk about, well, cold pitches. A cold pitch, simply put, is a request to a stranger to do something for you. Podcasters deal with cold pitches every single day. Most are terrible. Not only are they irrelevant and poorly executed—they most often start with an outright lie.
I have feelings. Clearly.
In this conversation, we talk about the social "meat space" basis of a cold pitch, the psychology of email, what you might learn from the autistic folks in your life about honest & direct communication and more.
If you dig it, follow along with Cold Pitch at coldpitch.substack.comAnd you can find a written version of this edition, along with links to references, here: https://coldpitch.substack.com/p/an-inbox-full-of-lies


Learn more about YellowHouse.Media, our audio production agency
Find out more about Sean McMullin
Support What Works


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This is the final installment in Strange New Work, a series that uses speculative fiction to explore radical work futures.
Power. Some fear it. Others hoard it. Some with power speak softly. Others carry a big stick. Power is charisma, or coercion, or violence. Power is name recognition, or money, or computer code.
Regardless of your definition or perceptions of it, power plays a critical role in how we work.
Today, we explore power—what we can do with it, how we can grow it, and, critically, how we can share it—because power in the future of work will look very different than it does today.
Footnotes:

Find out more about Tania Luna

Lead Together by Tania Luna

The Power Paradox by Dacher Keltner

The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin
"The Lathe of Heaven" BBC film adaptation
"Mary Parker Follett—Creativity and Democracy" by Gary M. Nelson in Human Service Organizations

"There Is a Better Way to Use Power at Work. This Forgotten Business Guru Has the Secrets" by Matthew Barzun in Time Magazine

"Content Decision Making" via Sociocracy For All

Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown

The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
"A Band of Brothers, a Stream of Sisters" by Ursula K. Le Guin



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This is the penultimate episode of Strange New Work, a special series from What Works that explores the future of work through the lens of speculative fiction.What's the most undervalued skill of the 21st-century economy? Moderation.
I very well might be forgetting something. But with more of our lives and work showing up online every day, the way our feeds, data, and connections are moderated is critical to our daily lives. Moderation can be many things—it's how platforms are designed, how content is incentivized or de-incentivized, and how communication between people is mediated. Some moderation is done structurally, some is done with code, but lots of moderation is done by real people all over the world.
In this episode, I take a close look at the skill of moderation, its role in our evolving tech futures, and the politics that complicate this essential work.
Footnotes:

"Welcome to hell, Elon" by Nilay Patel on The Verge

"Why Elon's Twitter is in the Sh*tter with Nilay Patel" on Offline with Jon Favreau


Fall; Or, Dodge in Hell by Neal Stephenson

Work Without the Worker by Phil Jones
"Content Moderation is Terrible by Design" featuring Sarah T. Roberts on Harvard Business Review

"Moderating Social Media" on the agenda on YouTube
"How Microwork is the Solution to War" by Ben Irwin on Preemptive Love
"Reddit faces content quality concerns after its Great Mod Purge" by Scharon Harding

Rosie Sherry on tips for content moderation
"Neal Stephenson Explains His Vision for the Digital Afterlife" on PC Mag
Love What Works? Become a premium subscriber for just $7 per month. Your subscription helps make my work sustainable and gets you access to twice-monthly This is Not Advice episodes, quarterly workshops, and more. Click here to learn more and preview the premium benefits!


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I've got something short, sweet, and really special for you today. Sean, my husband, my go-to extrovert shield, and the co-founder of YellowHouse.Media has a new project that is pretty cool, if I do say so myself.
It's a hotline! Or rather, it's a weekly call-in prerecorded pep talk. It's sort of like a podcast, but you have to call a phone number to hear it. Trust me, this is a very Sean thing to do.
Each week, he shares a fresh pep talk along with a poem, some tunes, and other audio goodies. You just select from the phone tree which you'd like to hear. Plus, you can even leave him a message yourself! 
You can hear this week's edition by listening to this quick episode. Or, dial 1-406-200-8460 to get the full experience. You can also learn more about Sean and grab the number from his website: seandmcmullin.com.
Without further ado, here's this week's dial-in affirmation for daily living!


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This is the 6th installment of Strange New Work, a special series that uses speculative fiction to explore radically different work futures.
Find the work you were born to do. Do what you were meant to do. Discover the work that makes you feel alive.
We've all heard these messages. Crack open any career, self-help, or personal development book on your shelf, and you're sure to find a similar message. It seems pretty convenient that our "purpose" in life is work, doesn't it? In this episode, I unpack the "made for work" message, take it to its logical sci-fi ends, and draw on a key idea in the sociology of work to consider how we might shape the next 40 years into something more humane.
Footnotes:

"If you 'don't dream of labor,' should organize for socialism" by Caitlyn Clark for Jacobin


Embassytown by China Miéville

Translation State by Ann Leckie

The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz

The New Spirit of Capitalism by Eve Chiapello & Luc Boltanski
Love What Works? Become a premium subscriber for just $7 per month. Your subscription helps make my work sustainable and gets you access to twice-monthly This is Not Advice episodes, quarterly workshops, and more. Click here to learn more and preview the premium benefits!


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