I'm Not Stopping.

Yet.

Photo by James Lee on Unsplash

Don't stop thinking about tomorrow
Don't stop, it'll soon be here
It'll be here better than before
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone

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Somehow I have this feeling that you haven’t been waiting for this particular missive - much less sat on the edge of your seats?

It has been a while, and it got me to thinking that I needed to write another newsletter. I logged on and discovered that I have clearly felt this way 14 times just ‘recently’ - assuming that each time I feel that, I log on to Substack and start a draft.

I didn’t start another one. Instead I popped over to my ‘ideas’ app of choice and unearthed a note I had written recently about a podcast from the mighty Douglass Rushkoff. He of Team Human fame. He also wrote this.

The Podcast is Episode 292 : Breaking With The Speed Of The Internet.

I mean, it sounds grim. But what I've been thinking is that I can't do this anymore. And I don't mean everything. I'm happy to write and podcast and teach and talk. That's me. And that's all good. What I'm finding difficult, even counterproductive is to try to keep doing this work at the pace of the internet.
💬 Douglas Rushkoff

… in short after 292 episodes, many more articles and interviews and a ’satchel full of books, he is cutting back, primarily down to a “growing dissatisfaction with the relentless pace of online content creation, driven by algorithms and profit motives”. I think we can all relate. Douglas is questioning the ‘value’ of producing his work on ‘internet schedule’ at ‘internet time’. So he’s going to stop and advocate for taking a more human approach to his creations with an emphasis on quality over quantity.

🎵 2️⃣ 👂🏼

A few months ago, you might have read about YouTuber’s ‘🔎 getting out of the biz’ (the link is a google search.) this seems to be Douglas’ version. He can’t keep up with the internet.

Spoiler Alert — None of us can.

I am not going to regurgitate what he summarizes in his short podcast - you should listen to (or read) his words, because they capture the spirit of my (lack of?) motivation and resultant periodicity of this very newsletter. In short, if I don’t have anything to say - why am I driven to inventing something to put into a newsletter and send to you all, that you already don’t have the time to read?

Maybe Tom’s vision of one future is not far off.

So, yes - maybe I have unknowingly already been doing what Doug has decided to do.

He also talks about his blog in the same way. My own blog is a bit different. Yes there are occasional contributions in there that should be read - but my blog is primarily designed as what I have called a ‘Public Journal’ - in essence a public space of ‘Johnisms’ that reflect what I am thinking and saying and doing at that moment in time. It has its followers, but most of it you wouldn’t want it to be arriving in your inbox on a weekly schedule - much less a daily. So that’s not going to happen ….

I sense a collective ‘phew’ and wiping of brows.

Onwards. Just sharing so that you know that if you feel overloaded - you aren’t alone.