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Inside Late Night with Seth Meyers (AKA, SETHXSW)

  Something happened right before I asked my question at the microphone in the middle of 700 people who crammed into a mini ballroom to hear Saturday Night Live alum, Seth Meyers, talk about his new show. I intended to ask him what the most challenging part of his new job was. But instead, my mind went blank. And what came out of my mouth in this moment of panic was, “So how did you get this job?” Or something to that effect. His answer—if you’re curious—was that it was basically Lorne Michael’s idea, and everyone just seemed to agree.

  Sidenote: I may not be the biggest Seth fan, or “Admeyer” (he’s still looking for the right pun to match “Fal-Pal” and “Fallonista”). On a scale of one to 10, you could say I’m a seven or eight. But I like him more after hearing him answer several other questions more interesting than mine.

  But the most notable highlights of the session included:

  • The show will be a work in progress for some time. Seth isn't afraid to try new things that don’t work. In fact, experiments are preferable over doing old things that probably would work. “Perfection is never the goal, improvement is.”

  • Twitter has completely democratized the hiring of comedy show writers. It’s one of the first places Seth’s team goes to predict a writer’s talent and potential.

  • “The creative process is always hard work. It never gets easy. And that’s what makes it fun.”

  And in case you’re wondering, Stephon “might” make an appearance eventually. But for now, he’s just happy that Seth’s schedule is more conducive to their domestic bliss.

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The Future of Making

This conversation with Joi Ito, Director of the MIT Media Lab, and Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, focused (initially) on how the tools and methods we use to make things are evolving, and how those tools (and things) will change our personal lives, communities and economies.

Examples included modifying amino acids to create life forms that are completely immune to any existing viruses, as well as some others that can be found at madeinthefuture.co (a great site created by IDEO and the MIT Media Lab. Seriously, check it out and poke around). But the session soon turned more philosophical.

Both Brown and Ito both emphasized the value of learning by doing, as opposed to learning by or through instruction. (Ito offhandedly mentioned how he failed to graduate from college three times, and told a funny story about how he once tried to raise $600K from a company, but the company paid a consultant $3M for a feasibility study telling it not to invest the $600K.)

Likewise, the experts agreed that in evolving the technology we’ll use to make things, problems and mistakes will be inevitable. Therefore, the goal is not to avoid them, but rather to become resilient. By learning the best ways to respond to problems, we not only minimize the chance that any of them will become fatal; we (and what we make) become stronger in the process.

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Reid Thorpe shares his dream apps