Rohit Bhargava's Blog, page 19

The Problem of Expertise

Is your expertise holding you back from being more open minded?

Recently I sat down with Ben Weiss for his excellent Leaders + Legends Podcast and shared the vision behind Non-Obvious Thinking and why I believe expertise sometimes creates a mental trap where we are unable to explore other perspectives because we become so good at thinking in one way.

Rohit Bhargava, Founder of Non-Obvious Company, on how to think outside the box for disruption!

Here’s a short clip from our conversation ...

The Beautiful Thing About Paradoxes

If you’re like me, you may soon find yourself with just a little more time to think, due to business travel slowing and holidays not quite starting yet. This combination may offer you just a little more time to consider new ideas. When that happens for you, this collection of “20 Paradoxes That Will Boggle Your Mind” from Mental Floss may be a fun read. Many of the paradoxes are described through stories and moments from history or myths that add color to the idea of the paradox.

How you’ll f...

Why Do So Many Companies Want People Back in The Office Now?

The future of work is hybrid. If there was one prediction I heard most often about the workplace coming out of the pandemic, this was it. Why would anyone want to return to work once they were able to stay at home and do Zoom calls in their pajamas? And presumably the savings on office real estate would bring companies on board with this too. Then we hit 2024 and huge tech companies and many others reversed course and demanded employees come back into the office, sometimes five days a week. The ...

Michelin-Starred Chef Discusses the Art of Plating

Anytime I have the opportunity to dine at a nicer restaurant, there is always someone immediately pulling out their phone to take a photo of the food when it arrives. Taking pictures of beautifully plated food is the ultimate pointless exercise many of us do anyway. Unless you’re a food or culture influencer, you’re probably not posting that photo. You will rarely show it to anyone else. And you’ll probably never look at it again. It’s a bit like taking photos of fireworks on the 4th of July. Yo...

Is All-Blind Narration the Future of Audio Description for Films & TV?

“He looks ahead, his dark eyebrows overshadowing his dark eyes. One of his several gold teeth gleams in the dim light.”

This is the audio description for a scene from a limited series called The Penguin from Max, a part of the Warner Brothers group. This isn’t just another AI-generated audio description of a visual scene, it was created by an all-blind and visually impaired team of actual humans who could describe the scene based on a combination of notes and scene descriptions from the origi...

A Short Tour of the Best Inventions of 2024 According to TIME Magazine

The newly released TIME Best Inventions of 2024 was a lovely diversion today and I probably (definitely!) spent way too long digging into the many different products and ideas on the list. From there, I selected eight that really stood out to me in particular and they are below. The full list is worth a read.

Diaa – A Ukrainian marriage app that allows couples who are physically separated by Russia’s invasion of the country to propose and get married via video call. It’s simple, necessary...

The Non-Obvious Book of the Week: Win Bigly – Persuasion In A World Where Facts Don’t Matter | 2nd Edition, by Scott Adams

Back in 2017, I selected this book as a winner in our Non-Obvious Book Awards program that year because of how perfectly it described a new sort of persuasive art that then President-elect Donald Trump had perfectly mastered. Just in time for this latest election, Dilbert-creator Scott Adams has a 2nd Edition of the book out (released in September 2024) and it’s worth picking up. I have to admit, I’m conflicted about him as a person. The level of delight he takes in childish name calling and his...

Pet Cloning Isn’t the Future … It’s Already Happening, With A Long Waiting List

The promise is simple: your pet can live as long as you. Or, at least, a version of your pet thanks to the largest commercial pet cloning company who is remaking thousands of dogs, cats and even horses. Apparently, there are specific rules to consider if you’re in the market for this pet cloning service. They need a piece of the pet’s ear, it must be harvested within five days and you’ll need to refrigerate (not freeze) the sample before providing it. Oh, and the service costs upwards of $50,000...

The One Marketing Change That Could Help Save Journalism

The survival of journalism and a free press largely depends on all of our willingness to fund it. One overlooked element of this issue is how digital marketing is purchased and valued. Consider this eye-opening assessment of how digital marketing and “brand safety tech” works and why these tools that were designed to prevent ads from appearing beside potentially controversial content based on using broad keywords like “shooting” or “drugs” have indiscriminately also created an impossible standar...

Netflix Launches “Moments” Feature to Save Your Favorite Movie Scenes

I have probably watched that darts scene from Ted Lasso a dozen times. If you know the show, you probably understand why I would love it. And if you haven’t, you need to see it now (you’ll still get it even if you haven’t seen the show). I’m linking the full video below.

This week Netflix shared the news that they are creating a new feature called “Moments” that lets you save scenes like this that you might want to watch and rewatch. This is absolutely brilliant on many levels. For one, b...