‘Smart Writing’ is about cultivating taste, suspending judgement and chasing your curiosity
I saw someone tweet “I wish smart writing came to me as easily as dumb tweeting” — and so I am here to share my strategy
The public is insufficiently educated on how to be a good public
The public is insufficiently educated on how to be a good public. I think this is civilisation-specific (ie not an issue for e
2018 bookmarks
📱 media / internet best tech reads https://substack.com/profile/2417812-packy-mccormick/note/c-14475201 what do you h
salaryman suspicions
my 6-month hiatus from salaryman life has confirmed a lot of my suspicions about myself there are many layers to this I was wo
hire me (2018)
Hire me (Check 2019 notebook for more details) What I can do for you Speaking engagements I have emceed several weddings, co-w
flirting is about signalling interest with plausible deniability
What I tell my nephews: flirting is basically this – give moderately strong signals of interest with plausible deniabili
We need to get better at dealing with assholes if we are to progress as a species
— 1 — As I get older I feel this subtle-but-strong pressure to become more “professional” – more “civil”, mo
LKY
Friends from abroad often ask me for suggested readings re: Lee Kuan Yew. I recommend starting by reading The Art Of Charlie C
writer master plan
Oct: Writer Master Plan I’ve been doing some soul-searching and I’ve concluded that the one thing I want to do wit
rationalbros are mainly interested in scoring points in the rationalbro game
This is a collection of notes and tweets I have about the times I’ve used the phrase “rationalbro”. I may so
different hours = different worlds
It never gets old: waking up at different times feels like inhabiting different worlds. Now I’m thinking of God of War. Did
#StrugglePorn – is it painting a false picture?
good conversation started here with Nat & Gary I’m not personally a fan of Gary’s overall brand, but I appreci
Singapore
I’ve somehow found myself in an interesting position of getting to be the only Singaporean in a room full of foreigners
my life in pictures
This post exists to help me, at a glance, get a sense of my own life over the years. 1990 – 1996 1998 2001 2003 2004 2006 20
The Statement / JIBABOM! story, so far
Statement is a t-shirt company that we started in 2011. I posted some ideas on Facebook, and they were pretty well-r
I used to be a picky eater
I saw somebody make fun of picky eaters on Twitter, and I felt compelled to write about my own experiences. I was like this my
men can and should creature nurturing spaces for each other
My wife pointed out to me recently that there are so few spaces for men to gather and talk about their feelings. We could crea
our metaphors for god adapt to keep up with our technology
Most of us inherit an idea of God as a “world craftsman”. If you think about it, this idea could not predate craft
minorities have to be extra-sensitive
(these were thoughts in response to Sarah Jeong being called out for being racist towards white men) I think one of the rules
women’s perspectives are criminally underrepresented
(2025mar8: I wonder if I still feel this way? The climate feels different than in 2017, but I think fundamentally… IR
mansplaining is sometimes (but not always) innocuous
If I had to do a “the difference between men and women” type of standup set, I think I would focus on the phenomenon of ma
many women want to have sex
my wife was telling me something interesting about an all-women FB group she was in women very often want to have sex with men
menworld: a way of considering the patriarchy
(Clarification: for the whole of this thread, when I say Men, I’m referring to the subset of straight men who live &
“I only like Chinese girls”
There is some nuance in the space between having a preference and articulating it. Lots of dudes are utterly incapable of walk
Speaking
I thought it would be interesting to make a list of notable events where I’ve spoken at. I’ve emceed 2 weddings. I
naughty boy ideation
(2024: I believe this was a wordvomit i tried to write but gave up on halfway.) Starting a second vomit hot on the heels of th
Breakfast AMAs
Every so often I have breakfast alone, and I ask Twitter to ask me questions. I enjoy it a lot – I find it to be a great way
Punching nazis is probably good, but never be gleeful about violence
There was a period of time where people on Twitter seemed very gleeful about punching Nazis, and the idea of punching Nazis.&n
cultural cosplay: a broader framework for thinking about cultural appropriation
I’ve never quite been satisfied with the overuse of the phrase “cultural appropriation” in all sorts of cont
Talking about cultural things means getting things wrong.
I think cultural things are the most interesting things but they’re also the hardest to talk about with other people A b
different people have different mental models
People typically have high-res models of their own lives and lower-res models of other people’s. We are all born clueless wi
People are tired, and this leads to suboptimal outcomes on many fronts
A thing I didn’t appreciate as a kid, but understand better now, is why so much of the world is suboptimal – it’s no
do you know what you want?
What do you want? Do you really want what you think you want, or did you inherit it from your parents, your peers, from societ
lessons from reflections
2006 sigh im back, may 07 the thoughts that inspired \(n_n)/, Oct ’07 What makes a show? Oct 07 performer’s insecurity, no
Attempting A Reading Into Indian History
What is India? What is Indian? I like to start with words. The name India is derived from Indus, from the Old Persion word Hin
electricity
How electricity works We live in an electric world – lightning is electricity, electric currents run through our bodies. ele
Why I stopped blogging in 2013, I think
Before I start with this, I want to take a moment to summarize a 2014 blogpost, “Why should we blog?“ It allows fo
tedtalks
TED talks
Books I’d like to talk about
I used to have a really old version of this blogpost that was tattered and patchy, until eventually I got sick of it and decid
Narcissist PR works because we can’t shut up about it
WIP I tweeted a more cautious version of this blogpost in July, and it’s been on my mind so I wanted to take some time t
Crazy Rich Asians [2018]
(copypasting from Twitter) So I finally watched Crazy Rich Asians and I actually really enjoyed it + recommend everyone else g
Most people over-tolerate assholes, which lets them get away with it
[Original thread] As I get older I feel this subtle-but-strong pressure to become more “professional” – more “civi
WWE
I remember when I was a young child – maybe five or six years old – when I first watched WWE on TV. (At the time it was ca
Hypothesis: people with uncommon names are likelier to develop uncommon identities
Here’s a nominative determinism flavored hypothesis: I believe that people with uncommon names are likelier to develop u
Helm Of The Arse Gods
Oddball confession: one of my first life-shaping experiences on the Internet was lying on a video game forum (Darkstone, Delph
Bangkok [2013]
India [2016]
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
dan dennett
Dan Dennett Notes
russell barker
russell barker add – do I want to do a blogpost about this? yes Revisit his videos… Russell Barker Executive function self
Why do we want to become productive members of society?
I’ve had a few different interesting conversations with a few different people. One friend said, when she was asked to a
Naughty Boy
Naughty Boy: Under-table Scribblings Of A Recalcitrant Joker is a collection of poems by blogger and entrepreneur Visakan Veer
Education is about lighting fires
My teachers recognized that I lacked internal motivation, but they never really addressed it. _ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
day 4 of free agent life
2018 Jul3 – Day 4 of free agent life: I went to bed at about 230am last night. I was somewhat disappointed in mys
what i look for in a writer
in a marketing context signals I like – using a domain rather than gmail. but of course, totally understandable if someone
ecommerce growth plans
(abandoned draft) Last week, I wrote about my own journey as an ecommerce retailer and how we built our business from cringe-i
sheryl sandberg 2012 HBS speech
sheryl sandberg 2012 HBS speech Full transcript
baidu eric xu talk
notes i took a long time ago from some talk he gave Introduction / Story Defining a successful startup Equity structure Founde
The Absurdity Of Modern Civilization, A Prison-Zoo Of Our Nightmares and Fantasies
– 1 – To be born into modern human civilization is both a great privilege (for the safety and opportunities it provides) a
Being Smart vs Being Kind
Originally written in July 2017, over at @1000wordvomits. When I was a child, I was told that I was smart. I wasn’t great at
Inner Newsfeed
I’ve been thinking about this concept for a while. Discussed it with a couple of online friends: Just think of your own
stop “confessing your feelings”, women are not confessional booths
 "Can I know you?" "Will you be my friend?" "I think I've fallen in love with you" are all
Radical Candor
I find myself referencing Radical Candor in many conversations over and over again. It’s a very powerful, simple and use
saas marketing struggles
Brief: what should a saas marketer be prepared for? A window into the experiences (good/bad) that you’ve had as a market
One Must Imagine Sisyphus LOL-ing
Life, particularly in modern civilization, is an absurd circus. We’re all clowns living in boxes trying to amuse ourselves w
sitemap
This is a test post that I might use to list out all the posts on visakanv.com. I’m wondering if visakanv.com might be a
money or life
https://twitter.com/visakanv/status/988756622477479937 Book opens by talking about how shitty people are with their money and
Tribe, by Sebastian Junger
original thread This book grew out of this 2015 Vanity Fair article about soldiers and PTSD Junger grew up in a Boston suburb.
echo chambers are inescapable; the challenge is to design good ones
(2015nov11 thread) It’s interesting to witness how people throw the term “echo chamber” around to criticize
It’s my fault and that’s a good thing
(notes for a future essay about self-blame, responsibility, the concept of fault) A long term tension in my life: I don't
a system can only be improved at its tightest bottleneck
I’ve been thinking a lot about Tiago Forte’s point about bottlenecks – that the only meaningful improvement you
Skinwalkers: mass shootings are nihilistic acts of disaffiliation
(Writing this post because I’m cleaning out my bookmarks in one-tab and realizing that I’ve mentioned Skinwalkers
we turn our lives into mostly-predictable sitcoms
(The following is from a conversation with a friend, after an acquaintance told us about feeling suicidal) it’s interesting
I have to articulate my fears so I can defeat them
I have two big fears that are holding me back in life 1 is a fear of daily reviews 2 is a fear of scheduling in both cases, it
timing like a state
We have colonized time just the way we have colonized space – and our wild, natural rhythms are in a sense contained and imp
there are no trusted adults, you have to supernanny yourself
The following is a cleaned up transcript of a conversation I had with an older friend in 2015 Visabot: I hate that I keep gett
stress log: identify the root causes and address them
2018-feb-24: i was feeling super chill after a really slow, luxurious shower, trim beard, etc. then sat in my chair to start d
Bestof 2018
todo: search twitter for “from:visakanv 2018” FB Jan happy new year I want to go to the moon (hilarious) trippy gl
sexual objectification – “the standards don’t apply equally”, because the costs are unequal
I would say that this IS objectification, but the context we live in dictates that men are affected differently by objectifica
Krabi [2017]
Twitter thread of pics – Day 1 – Day 1 – was sleep deprived – didn’t sleep all night. flight was relatively short, p
My National Service Experience
Wrote this a few years ago. While I was still in NS. Around Dec 2011. I still remember when I went for my medical check-up a f
surviving in jailworld requires some complicity; dismantling it will take lifetimes
Notes from a conversation about Oprah and Neoliberalism: yeah so there are multiple things going on at the same time, and peop
to sleep earlier I need to fix my poverty mindset
I had a post called “next“, and in that post I concluded that I should write how-to guides to myself. At the top o
Bestof 2017
FB Jan Emotional labor thread and discussion “Was 2016 dangerous for celebrities?” – clever use of Wiki article
a set of notes about storytelling
Storytelling Heft? (2022/2023) fiction should slap you in the face and kick you in the gut and spit in your mouth otherwise wh
sinister connotations allow people to be assholes with plausible deniability
I like words. It’s a big part of why I’m a writer. I like everything about them. Here are some interesting things
Remind me later
I think a lot about the passage of time. About how the past and future each have histories of their own. The sun used to revol
Listen to your “naggy” wife
Written as a Facebook comment on February 22nd. Today’s coffee thoughts shall be about this. My wife is my best friend a
there are several kinds of happiness, so be precise about what you’re pursuing
Martin Seligman: The new era of positive psychology 3 kinds of happiness pleasure home warddrobe commute workspace dates food
jamming studios
The first jamming studio that was a significant part of my life was some dingy place in Clarke Quay. I don’t remember the na
Chennai Express [2013]
Rewatched this with the wife. Watched it once I think a couple of years ago on Deepavali. It was funnier than I expected, but
The Good Place
I wasn’t really expecting to like this show, but it’s well written, tight and snappy, and it does some really fun
Madam Secretary
Binge-watched the first three seasons with the wife over the last few weeks. I got a little bit bored with some of the story â
Blade Runner [1982]
This movie was made 8 years before I was born, and I waited 27 years to see it. I always heard good things about it, but I nev
Five Foot Two (Lady Gaga)
Watched Gaga’s Five Foot Two a few days ago. I liked it. Was planning to watch a little bit of it and then stop halfway,
train station
Train Man, what a long day it had been. So many terribly written emails to respond to. So many arrows to siam. Another day. No
Threads
startup bullshit Just shipped some stuff for work, so I thought I'd take a second to explore some thoughts that have been
smartphones and other linguistic legacies
Language is full of interesting legacy issues. The pocket supercomputer I'm writing this on isn't really a "phone
Moneyball [2011]
Watched Moneyball a few weeks ago- had always wanted to get into it because of the statistics/disruption angle, but hes
eddies
I love this comic by Kevin Simler of Melting Asphalt: Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. Between the