10 Years of Acquired (with Michael Lewis)

Name: 10 Years of Acquired (with Michael Lewis)
Duration: 2 h 47 min 37 s

Michael Lewis · 2h 47m · youtube.com ↗

16 korrents from this recording

Michael Lewis did not write this page.

Every claim below is a statement made in this recording, quoted word for word and linked to the second it was said, so you can hear it rather than take our word for it. The wording comes from the transcript published alongside the recording; the sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording.

0:07:26 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
The job of a writer is to get the reader into a state of mind where they will follow you anywhere, including into subjects they never knew they wanted.

Their wordsyou grab the listener like I try to grab a reader and get them to the state of mind where they'll let you take them anywhere uh and teach them about stuff that they don't even know they want to learn about.

Interesting
11 min later
0:18:21 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
Starting from what worked rather than from what failed is a different starting point from almost all journalism, and a journalist who did it would be accused of hagiography.

Their wordsIn fact, if most journalists started there, they'd be accused of heography

Interesting
6 min later
0:24:35 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
Hollywood will woo you with its enthusiasm and then take you down a rabbit hole where you spend years of your life and have nothing to show for it.

Their wordsThat's a really intelligent way place to land because what they will do is woo you with their enthusiasm and then take you down a rabbit hole where you will spend years of your life and have nothing to show.

Interesting
2 min later
0:26:19 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
A writer's audience does not carry from one book to the next: every book is another startup you have to make happen from scratch.

Their wordsI see no evidence that I'm dragging people along with me. I feel like each each book feels like another startup and that I've got to go out and make it happen almost as if I've not written one.

Interesting
1 min later
0:27:39 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
An audience is not buying the subject you cover; it is buying your interest in the subject.

Their wordsThey learn to trust you that if you're interested, they'll be interested. That what in fact what they're buying into is not the subject, but your interest in the subject.

Interesting
5 min later
0:32:50 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
The best sign that a subject is worth writing about is that you are interested in it and nobody else is.

Their wordsAnd I've learned just to not even talk about it cuz it kills my interest to watch it kill their interest. But I know why I'm interested and why it's important and I'm not I'm not relying on the world telling me it's important.

Interesting
8 min later
0:40:30 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
An audience disengages the moment it knows nothing can go wrong, which is why a speech read off the page is dead on arrival.

Their wordsThe audience is waiting for you to get through this thing because they know nothing's going to happen. Like whatever's on that page, that's what's going to happen.

Interesting
9 min later
0:49:55 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
You never call a source uninformed: you call knowing everything already known, and then ask for what has not been said.

Their wordsYou don't call uninformed. You call knowing as much as there is to know and then you start picking the brains of people who might know more and have not said.

Interesting
7 min later
0:57:08 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
The aim of a story is to be so complete that once it has been told there is nothing left to say.

Their wordsI want to give something that's good and pure and true and is like is like the thing that will once it's said there's nothing else to say. It's like done.

Interesting
5 min later
1:02:20 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
Taking notes by hand is a filter, and recording an interview removes the one filter that decides what is worth keeping.

Their wordsSo this is a filter. Like if I'm talking to you, it takes effort to put it down on the page. I don't record anything that I've filtered it. It's interesting enough to me that it belongs on the page.

Interesting
1 min later
1:03:32 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
Until you know how a story ends you cannot know how it begins, and that is why a book with material but no shape cannot be written.

Their wordsI just don't know where this is going. I don't know what the end is. When I don't know what the end is, I don't know what the beginning is. And it's that simple.

Interesting
1 min later
1:04:23 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
Good reporting is being the world's best student: gather everything before making judgments, and make people want to teach you.

Their wordsYou are gathering before you make judgments. You're open to learning things. You're trying to be the world's best student. You want people to want to teach you.

Interesting
12 min later
1:16:22 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
If you take a deadline deadly seriously and refuse ever to violate it, your mind simply finishes the work when it needs to be finished.

Their wordssomehow if you take your deadlines seriously, that's the key. You take the deadlines deadly seriously and you just refuse to violate them. Um then you're serious when you establish them and you your mind just finishes when it needs to finish.

Interesting
12 min later
1:28:08 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
In creative work there is a real benefit to not following the financial incentives, and to creating scarcity for the sake of quality rather than for its own sake.

Their wordsWhen you're in any kind of creative thing, there is this benefit to not just following the financial incentives and and not trying to kind of like milk every last penny out of it. And to creating scarcity, not just for the sake of the scarcity, but for the sake of the quality.

Interesting
1:28:29 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
You should only start a book you believe is going to be great, whatever it turns out to be.

Their wordsAnd only do it if it's great. If you only do it, it's it's a long-term strategy. I mean, it's not that I think all my books are great. I don't write them, though, unless I think they're going to be great.

Interesting
1 min later
1:29:20 · watch on youtube.com↗

Our reading
An athlete who moves his family across the country for a few million dollars more is trading a life that loves him for money that will not improve it.

Their wordsthe average athlete who's taking a few million dollars more to move his wife and kids from one family, one city that they loves him and that he loves to some strange place where everybody's going to be unhappy.

Interesting