January 25 Must Reads

Welcome to January’s Must Reads. Thank you for the messages on if Must Reads and if its continuing, always nice to know it is something people look forward to the newsletter!

Great news, there is an excellent mix of must reads, must watch videos and a couple of fun formats mixed in.

In this instalment of Must Reads you will want to look out for:

• CIA and their chatbots

• How to improve your working memory

• Bees and QR codes

• Addison Rae’s fandom

• Shein’s impact

• 2x shorter videos on how companies are evolving & behind the scenes at the excel championship

Must Reads From Me 👋

• How to ask the right questions to be a more informed leader 👩‍💼 - great lessons and actions for managers and deaprtment leaders

• The ultimate AI guide for Marketing Leaders 💡 - this guide also works for anyone who wants to improve their knowledge of AI and get the most out of it. If you’d rather jump straight to the Google sheet with tools, prompts and courses click
  → dannydenhard.com/aigs 

• Here is my deep dive into where AI is headed 🔮 and why we should be as much optimistic as fearful

• Why Meta’s opening up is more about ad revenue 🤑 (more content = more ad opportunities) and playing the long game vs playing free speech and Trump’s games

👓 The Must Reads 👓

• How the CIA uses chatbots to replicate world leaders 💬 - not sure to file this under smart or bizarre, but the CIA is using AI to create world leader bots to predict behaviours and next decisions made by some of the world’s most powerful people. Let’s hope the world leaders are as predictable as the chatbot models will make out…

• QR coding bees 🐝- Probably not the first use cases of QR codes you would think of but scientists are gluing tiny QR codes on the back of bees to track and understand the habits of honey bees.

• How the UFC took over combat sports 🥋🥋- I love the UFC, a sport that combines all martial arts in a cage for 5 minute rounds. It is the most dominant league in mixed martial arts and has leap frogged boxing and wrestling in recent years. How? It is always evolving, it showcases fighter talents, provides unrivalled access to behind the scenes access to fighters, their teams and their families just before the fights and has regular tournaments with reality style shows connected to showcase the next up and comers. The UFC also smartly adopted social media from the very early days which allows fan access in ways many others just don’t. Whether you are into combat sports, this is a great deepdive.

• 😶‍🌫️ → 🧠Want to improve your memory aka your “working memory” - the secret might just be in not multitasking and understanding when your brain craves different mental situmlation

• Podcast Power Shift 🎙️- If you have looked at podcast rankings recently you will likely see celebrity names and longer form you’ve been shared clips of dominating the rankings. Two stand outs recently Mel Robbins and miltary veteran Shawn Ryan’s podcast have crept up the US rankings and now often rank in the top 3. Their methods, connect with their audience by making it about the guests, while Mel’s solo episodes are extremely popular. Shawn’s grows by having veterans join him & giving us access where many others can’t or won’t and then he appears on long form pods. The podcast landscape is being shaped by PR and politics (and those releasing a book and joining every podcast under the sun without saying anything) looking for influence, in a time people are back commuting more it’s refreshing to see different podcasts becoming popular who aren’t fronted by a celebrity and ad networks.

• How Addison Rae went from TikTok star to pop princess 👸- How hand selected TikTok star Addison Rae with “Southern charm” went from TikTok star to friends of the Kadashian’s and now to the label of pop princess. Her big hit Diet Pepsi went semi viral and that says as much about how culture is shaped now by apps, but equally as much about pop music’s recent journey and song or clicks are way more important than bodies of work.

• Cole Palmer’s Backstory ⚽️ - As someone who misses well written and explored football journalism, it was nice to read the BBC’s look at Cole Palmer’s football and family history in St Kitts. A lot of this content has shifted to video but content like this should always have a place in written format IMHO.

• How ON Running Is Tackling Nike & Adidas In Running & Tennis 🎾- ON has had a huge 5 years, the cloud based running shoe is seen almost everywhere and has hit Nike hard in running and is now broadening out into Tennis (Roger will be rubbing his hands after his strategic investment). I have shared videos on ON before but go to certain cities across the world, it isn’t just runners wearing on, its the influential youth, the mums on the school run and the lunchtime runners.

• Shein’s Success? $12 dresses? 👗- I have watched numerous documentaries and economics of Shein breakdowns and it is always eye opening. If you want to understand why so many people are worried this is a good breakdown of cheap clothes = terrible conditions and implications to the planet. Shein’s listing on the London stock market (LSE) is an important signal for British stock market - lets see how investors react…

• Car Hacking Is A Scary Thing 🅿️ - Subaru car software was hacked, allowing access to your car’s location and it’s location history, hackers could also unlock and start millions of cars. Yes unlock and start their cars remotely… When we look back at this phase of the 2020’s many will look back and question our choices to allow our obbession with technology and data to not think of the second and third order effects at play.

• The Selena Gomez Effect ✨- A hugely powerful actor and singer turned entrepreneur is making waves and with her beauty brand and mental health media company (here’s an example of tips not to be lonely from therapists). What is the secret? It’s likely Selena’s connect with her fans, smartly sharing personal and professional moments on her social media and importantly actually understanding healthy consumption the key to her successes

▶️ Must Watch Videos ▶️

• How Chicken burger powerhouses Chick-Fil-A uses robots to save 10000 hours to make its popular lemonade

• How Nike new CEO is re-shaping Nike back into a brand leader with more emphasis on sports and the everyday althete who wants to wear such a culturally relevant brand again (hint he wants to stop discounts and get back into retail partners good books - best of luck competing with the likes of ON, Hoka and asics)

• This (video below) is brilliant, the excel championship yes formulas and pivot table has a dedicated championship and it is a pretty big deal

@nytimes

At the Microsoft Excel World Championship in Las Vegas, there was stardust in the air as 12 finance guys vied to be crowned the world’s be... See more

Thanks for reading again today. Want to chat about any of these stories or videos? Just hit reply.

Go and have a great week!

Danny D