“Discard the junk…you are far better off to read a much smaller amount of good material with care and thoughtfulness.”
– Barton Biggs

Food for Thought:

• Wired – Disney’s $1 billion bet on a magical wristband.  If you want to imagine how the world will look in just a few years, once our cell phones become the keepers of both our money and identity, skip Silicon Valley and book a ticket to Orlando. Go to Disney World. Then, reserve a meal at a restaurant called Be Our Guest, using the Disney World app to order your food in advance.
• BI – I Made $15 Million Before I Was 30, And It Wasn’t As Awesome As You’d Think
• VF – The Fugitive Heir  Given this week’s events, this 2002 piece on Robert Durst is even more fascinating.
• WSJ – Why Children Need Chores.  Doing household chores has many benefits—academically, emotionally and even professionally.
• NYMag – HBO’s Scientology Exposé Going Clear Is Jaw-Dropping
• Atlantic – The Power of ‘Good Enough’.  How settling can make people happier and more satisfied than gunning for “the best”
• NYMag – How Ellie Kemper Became One of 2015’s Most Beloved Stars.  Hopefully you’ve all been tuning into Unbreakable Kimmy Schimdt, the new Tina Fey produced comedy on Netflix.

Business/Economics/Investing:

• ValueWalk – David Einhorn on Charity – Credit MH – A great speech by Einhorn when he reflects back on Greenlight’s success and what he is trying to accomplish with his family foundation.
• WSJ – Fed Puts Interest-Rate Hikes in Play.  June increase on table, but Yellen’s words and shifting forecasts show central bank’s caution
• NYTimes – A 3-D View of a Chart That Predicts The Economic Future:  The best look at the yield curve we’ve ever seen.
• Bloomberg – How to Make Millions by Marketing Yourself as a Jerk.  Tim Sykes’s outlandish self-promotional strategies have made him richer than trading ever did.
• BusinessWeek –  Venezuela’s Currency Is a Boon to Smugglers.  Venezuelans sell price-controlled goods for more in Colombia.
• Fortune – It’s Ikea’s World – We Just Live in it.

Life/Culture/Art/Science:

• AOM – How to Wear Pink, Like a Man.  Spring is around the corner…
• GatesNotes – Have You Hugged a Concrete Pillar Today?  Concrete is the foundation (literally) for the massive expansion of urban areas of the past several decades, which has been a big factor in cutting the rate of extreme poverty in half since 1990. In 1950, the world made roughly as much steel as cement (a key ingredient in concrete); by 2010, steel production had grown by a factor of 8, but cement had gone up by a factor of 25.
• Outside – Inside the Mad, Mad World of TripAdvisor.  Research almost any travel destination and you’ll probably wind up on travel-industry Goliath, where passionate people praise and denounce everything from romantic getaways to cockroach-infested hotel rooms. But who can you trust?