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Welcome to my little corner of the internet. I'm David, a journalist and a curious generalist.
The Weekly Filet is my humble part in the necessary rebellion against the enshittification of the greatest information ecosystem we've ever had.
We live in an age where trustworthy and substantial information is hard to come by.
If we don't actively resist, all of this is imposed on us through hyperpersonalised, superaddictive feeds.
They are convenient. And they work so well because they show you what you already like, confirm what you already believe, and get you enraged about what you're convinced is wrong.
Real value, though, comes from things that make you pause. That invite you to take a different perspective. That make you rethink.
That pause and the brief moment of reflection is a win in itself, always. Sometimes, though, it's the seed that grows into something bigger. Changes in how you see the world and how you choose to act often start with that one irritation: Huh, I never thought of it that way!
It comes down to this: Nothing matters more than what you pay attention to. Where you invest your time, what you open your heart and your mind to.
The Weekly Filet is all about mindful attention.
To what really matters. To what truly moves you. And to people who inspire.
I will be there, by your side, trying to be a helpful guide in this endeavour.
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Brief and interesting. Two bits stood out to me: 1. «All behavior makes sense with enough information.» 2. «Life appears better in the past because in hindsight there wasn’t as much to worry about as you were actually worrying about at the time.»
Dario Amodei has dropped another epic essay. After laying out the best possible future with artificial intelligence in «Machines of Loving Grace» (WF #501), this one explores the dark side: the risks of powerful AI, and what’s needed to mitigate them. On the one hand, you should definitely read this as the CEO of a major AI company signaling to regulators «See, we’ve got this!» and nudging them towards thwarting competition from China. On the other hand, Amodei has a front-row seat to all of this and clearly gives a lot of thought to where we’re headed. Either way, it’s a compelling read you won’t regret taking the time for.
My friend and colleague Marie-José has written a thoughtful and wise essay on why people’s fear of being left out makes them susceptible to autocrats. One of those rare pieces I already knew I’ll keep thinking of a lot in the future even while I was still reading it. If you understand German, read the original; if not, reading a translated version is better than not reading it at all.
State-funded research often looks boring and has no immediate benefits. That’s exactly why it needs to exist.
Predicting the unpredictable: possible Black Swan events in 2026. I think I speak for everyone who has managed to get through January: Thanks, but no thanks.
A guidebook of sorts for developing more agency in deciding where to go with your life, professionally or otherwise. A couple of insights: Ask for things, especially things that feel unreasonable to ask for. Assume everything is learnable. And be willing to cross the «moat of low status«, a period of time where you are actually bad at the thing you’re trying to grow into. (Also, I’m totally stealing this as a life goal: «Over the years I’ve gradually grown dumber relative to my peers through a combination of aging and making smarter friends.»)
I can’t do better than quote Rebecca Solnit in full: «We do not know what will happen. But we can know who we can commit to be in the face of what happens. That is a strong beginning. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything, and everything we can save is worth saving.»
The start of the year has been so dramatic that there was barely time for reflection on the year ahead. This conversation aims to take a step back and imagine a path forward for climate action – with Kim Stanley Robinson, who famously imagines a path forward in his novel The Ministry of The Future. He lays out his counter-vision to the increasingly popular abundance agenda.
I really wished we lived in a world where this wasn’t a defining speech. But sometimes hope comes from clarity, from naming things exactly as they are, undesirable as they might be. Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney delivered that clarity at the WEF in Davos. «In a world of great power rivalry, the countries in between have a choice. To compete with each other for favor or to combine to create a third path with impact.» Worth watching or reading in full.
This is for everyone who – like myself – knows way less about Asia than we should. A set of lenses through which to look at Asia, that immensely large and diverse continent. The key ones: