Every so often, things fall apart.
In the words of those who lived it, here are the vibes and the semantic signatures of the twentieth century’s most devastating social collapses.
From the meaning in their words, wisdom for our future emerges.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
This is an exclusive subscriber-only preview of the first six chapters of Rusty Guinn’s upcoming book Outsourcing Consciousness: How Social Networks are Making Us Lose Our Minds. The book explores how evolution, polarization, and technology are slowly transforming humanity into a hive mind - and what we can and can't do about it.
The Long Now is everything we pull into the present from our future selves and our children. We are told that the economic stimulus and the political fear of the Long Now are costless, when in fact they cost us … everything.
Tick-tock.
Men of God in the City of Man is a nine part series about a Narrative virus that infected the charismatic and Pentecostal churches in the United States. It isn't a story about Christian Nationalism. It isn't a story about January 6th. It isn't a story about why people voted for Trump. It is a story about a story. It is a story about the language that created a self-sustaining movement defined by its unwavering belief in a fundamentally corrupt electoral system.
Men of God in the City of Man
Amid the Widening Gyre of politics and the black hole of financial markets, the only anchor is us, together, walking with Clear Eyes and Full Hearts. Experience Ben's original 4-part series.
Outsourcing Consciousness
The Long Now
Men of God in a City of Man
Things Fall Apart
Recent Notes
The ANDs of Asylum
In the midst of a complicated issue, an article from a small regional outlet manages to remind us of the power of AND in storytelling and connecting the understanding of those across the widening gyre.
Zeitgeist Narrative Map – Week of June 16 in Review
This is our graph of the narrative structure of the last full week in financial markets news.
The Half-Happy Horror
The Half-Happy Horror is the realization that pursuit of multiple objectives can end up with a baby split in two.
At best we give lip service to secondary or tertiary goals, all as part of some Cartoon we’ve constructed about our “process”.
Yes, optimization is a scourge, and it hits every aspect of modern life. It hits the professional investor hardest of all.
A Modern Vocational Curriculum
So if you COULD prepare most Americans for their jobs and lives in less than a year, how WOULD you? Well, we took a shot at answering just that, and I’m sure you’ll all agree completely and wholeheartedly with our conclusions.
That Time I Bought Blockbuster Debt
Management is not lying to you. It’s probably a really good turn-around plan. It could probably work out fine … IF they are given enough time. But they won’t be. Particularly when it’s the second turn-around plan.
Secularly declining companies ALWAYS run out of time.
It was one of the most expensive lessons of my investing career. And worth every penny.
Democracy Dies with Dancing
There’s a critical, indispensable feature of a free nation we call a free press. And then there’s the Meme of free press!. The latter is a pure narrative construction, and a thing well supplied in the DC market.
Office Hours – 6.18.2019
Join us here at 2PM Eastern today for the latest edition of Office Hours. Today’s edition is all about the grotesque charades and cartoons being used to cynically manipulate narratives. Not one to miss.
After All, We Are Not Communists
It’s all been leading up to this.
We’re sharing the summary results of our core investment research project with The Narrative Machine.
If you’ve ever wondered, “Gosh, how DO you apply these cool narrative maps to an actual investment strategy?” … well, here’s your answer.
Election Rewind: June 2015
What if there was a way to spot who would jump in the GOP primary polls back in June 2015? What if we could spot something in the way that the crowd watched the crowd talk about the candidates. What if we could imagine what that meant for this election and how we process information about it?
Warren in June: Back in an Unflattering Spotlight
Elizabeth Warren is among the front-runners in polls, but in media, a cohesive, connected narrative has yet to form. More importantly, even as attention to her campaign has grown, the sentiment attached to her ideas in media has declined sharply. It is a problem shared by other women candidates that we think should guide readers to consume news cautiously.
The Not-So-Much War
A tug-of-war is only a tug-of-war if both sides, y’know, are capable of pulling on the rope.
Zeitgeist Narrative Map – 6.14.2019
Every morning, we run The Narrative Machine on the past 24 hours worth of financial media to find the most on-narrative (i.e. interconnected and central)…
Victims of Success
If you’re going to trade on story and sentiment, more power to you. But over time, the mind naturally searches for justification and credibility for continued ownership of something. Take care when you start to feel that pull.
Live from Potemkin
Sometimes a news article that’s all over the map is just a badly written article. Sometimes it’s like a glitch in the matrix. I think the changing narratives and weakening Common Knowledge around Big Tech are causing the latter.
The Most Valuable Commodity I Know
What’s the most valuable commodity Gordon Gekko knows? Information.
How valuable is Wall Street research? How much information does Wall Street research have? LOL.
MIFID II is making the jump from Europe to the US. Time to polish those sell-side research resumes. As if you weren’t already.
Sanders in June: Polarizing…Except in Media
Bernie Sanders isn’t leading in the polls. He may also be the most polarizing candidate – again. But don’t tell the political media, whose Sanders content thus far in the primary process has the strongest, most positive narrative of any candidate. And it’s not close.
The Crossover Point
There’s a point in any human activity – investing, politics, religion, or business – where a thing we do together becomes a thing in-itself. It’s a point that changes our thinking and the moral questions we are forced to answer. Knowing where this point lies is in all our activities is important.
Americans Rely on Public Restrooms
The need to control and influence common knowledge knows no boundaries. And I mean literally no boundaries.
Big Tech Has Lost Control of Its Cartoon
There are two narrative structures that have grown to a size and a level of cohesion that makes them impossible to be politically ignored.
One is the student loan “crisis”. The other is the Big Tech “monopoly”.
And yes, I’m putting those words in air-quotes, because the first isn’t really a crisis and the second isn’t really a monopoly. But since when did that matter in narrative-world?
Vanguard Doesn’t Care About Your Trade War
Vanguard just announced a joint venture with Ant Financial in Shanghai. They’re not waiting around for a trade “deal”, and they’re not clutching their pearls about Chinese IP “theft”.
No, Vanguard is going to do what they always do … they’re going to obliterate their competition with the pricing power that comes from government collaboration.