Imagine you are walking through a jungle. You are hoping to get a glimpse of a wild tiger. Then by some miracle you end up not only seeing the tiger up close, it invites you to its world deep in the jungle. You get to play with the tiger, dance with it, it even lets you touch the soft pad under its giant paw. After the end of the encounter, you come out back into your own reality, all surprised, thinking what did just happen?!
That is how I felt after watching the movie Chungking Express by the very talented Wong Kar Wai. You should watch this film if you’ve not seen it already. And here is a compelling behind the scene video on making of Chungking Express.
A craftsman forced his skiving tool into a piece of leather, making a shoe sole. In the next building, out of sight, a man flirted with his female servant. Somewhere, far away, an eagle cried.
The world around us is changing faster than ever, it is been like this for centuries. While some of us have been riding the speedy ride, few have been trying to remind that we do need time to reflect.
Hometown Folk is a breathing space in a busy web, reminding that we do need take a break and consider what is happening and what matters for our happiness.
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Here is a note Sarah sent through PandoDigest today.
Hi readers-
As anyone who follows me on Twitter knows, I was thoroughly delighted with David Holmes' review of Andrew Mason's new business rock album. We've had a great few days of content but -- sorry everyone else including me-- this post was a standout example of what I love about our team. He actually took the time to listen to the entire album and write a serious music and business criticism of it.
The core observation was how Mason really seems to think of the entrepreneurial journey in terms of making money. Maybe it's a joke; or maybe he's betraying the dark side of the tutelage of Eric Lefkofsky.
I feel like that's a question that the Valley has always had when it comes to Mason-- and perhaps Wall Street as well. Would we later discover this was some Sacha Baron Cohen-like longterm high stakes performance art?
Whether it was the smugly flippant way he ran the company, related to the press, or just bizarre antics like putting on self-tanner in the bathroom before going onstage at Disrupt or sticking his tongue out for his Wall Street Journal dot picture. We seemed to always be asking that question: Is Andrew Mason just fucking with us?
I still don't know the answer, and the question matters way less. He's not running a multibillion dollar company and fucking with employee and shareholders jobs and fortunes so he can return to being an amusing distraction, as he is with this album. On our internal Yammer thread Erin Griffith noted that Groupon is trading up today. Perhaps it's relief that Mason is no longer actually running the company.
So which caused his downfall? Was in the possibly put-on obsession that making money-- not a sense of mission-- was the goal or was it this endless flippancy? I don't know him well enough to say. For the sake of entertainment, I hope Mason doesn't disappear from view. He is genuinely unlike anyone else and hilarious to watch from afar. But for the sake of his next company-- should he start one-- I hope he learned actual lessons from Groupon's collapse.
Beyond this post, one of my favorite quotes about Andrew Mason was said by Michael Arrington at the Crunchies back when we were all still friends and at TechCrunch and Groupon was then flying high. (All three seem like a lifetime ago.) He said something to the effect of: "We know a lot of founders like you, but we don't know very many successful founders like you."
Indeed.
Mason, if you are reading this (which you most certainly are not) I'm happy to come to Chicago and do a PandoMonthly with you to delve into your psyche more. Maybe you and David and Erin Griffith can even have a jam session together.
Sarah
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