Some really interesting developments for European Basketball:
NBA Europe The NBA officially announced that they’re looking at creating a league in Europe — which has been rumored for 30 years, with a big increase of rumors these past few months. There’s a lot that’s still up in the air between FIBA vs Euroleague, and the NBA announcing this in partnership with FIBA. But the future of European Basketball is definitely going ti be defined by this, whether it works or not.
A Fantasy Baseball update:
My draft was on Sunday, mid-afternoon, so I had to draft using the Yahoo Mobile App, while being out and about, hanging out with friends.
Here’s what I got — wish me luck!
Batters:
Salvador Perez Luis Arraez Maikel Garcia Max Muncy CJ Abrams Jackson Merrill Michael Harris II Nolan Jones Shohei Ohtani (Batter) Vinnie Pasquantino Matt Chapman Yandy Díaz Carlos Correa Connor Norby Evan Carter Pitchers:
Recently finished Onside: Major League Soccer, the documentary series on TV+ about the past MLS season.
It was a nice and refreshing view compared to team-specific documentaries I’ve seen in the football (⚽️) world, and I really enjoyed the variety of discovering different teams, personalities, and players!
For someone like me, based in Europe, it was super useful to learn more about this league and its personalities. I wish more teams were covered, but I’m assuming that this would be the case if the show was to get renewed for another few seasons… MLS has definitely had the perception of being the “soon-to-be in the Top 5 of football leagues in the world” for 15 years now and we’re still waiting to see it happen, but at least the marketing has been good and the level of play has increased significantly.
Well… @ACMomento doesn’t yet support the basketball “Coupe de France” but last night was a nice and simple victory against JDA Dijon in the Quarter Finals round.
Yesterday’s game marked the anniversary of moving from the old Halle Carpentier on the southernmost part of town, to the shiny new Adidas Arena located in the northernmost point at Porte de la Chappelle.
Hard to believe everything that has happened so far in just over one year:
📚 I met my friend @JamesMayes.bsky.social about a dozen years ago at a local chapter of TEDx in Brighton, where I used to reside during my university studies and the early stages of my career.
We quickly connected due to our shared heavy social media usage and mutual attraction towards good food & drinks, good people, and a passion for technology. Since then, we’ve been friends, and I’m grateful to have him as both a friend and a mentor in my professional life.
For national, world, and general interest news, Apple News is really good. (…) it’s truly excellent. And a News+ subscription gets you access to a bunch of great publications with paywalls on the web.
My wife and I are on the bundled package which includes Fitness+, News+, TV+, and a bunch of iCloud storage and we haven’t looked back.
I don’t use Apple News+ as much as I’d like purely because I also have RSS/social + occasionally open the NYTimes app or The Athletic.
Another post inspired by @Manton, as I continue to read my way through my subscribed feeds:
I’m Tibz on most socials, @tibz.blog on Bluesky, and @tibz@micro.blog on Mastodon / @iTibz on Threads. These are all managed by Micro.blog. “Are you getting it? These are not three separate accounts… This is one place to post. And we’re calling it a blog.” 🤪
I’ve been loving the idea of Micro.Blog since its inception, but over the past few years, it’s really become a super interesting, powerful, and simple way for me to manage my personal online presence!
Getting ready to say goodbye to Foursquare, an app I’ve used almost daily since its earlier form back in 2009 between my time studying and working and living in the UK, then in San Francisco, Paris, and my native French Riviera. Back then I used to check-in to places I visited from the mobile browser of my Nokia blackberry knockoff (E63) (2009-2011), then an Android phone (2011-2013), and finally from the dedicated iPhone apps (2013+).
Getting this basketball doubleheader started with @ParisBasketball Women’s first home game (for their inaugural season).
Our new women’s team is in the fourth tier but we’re hoping they’ll climb the ranks over the next few years.
Love the example it sets for our daughters to have role models to look up to just a few minutes away from home!
The Problem As a sports fan following different teams/leagues/sports, keeping track of “what game is on today?” or “I have some free time on Sunday, is there anything good on?” has been a STRUGGLE these past few years.
Usually, there are existing apps you can use, mostly for ⚽️. Or Sports Media apps (like L’Equipe here in France, or The Athletic, or ESPN) etc.
But these aren’t great for the purpose of knowing - What is on?
🏈 I’ve been running a league with a few friends for the past 5 years or so, and even won in my 3rd year!
Here’s my team as we get ready for the season next weekend!
“The Creator” - 3.5/5
Glad enough enough time has passed that I could form my own opinion of this movie. Quite liked it and visually/conceptually it was really interesting!
🎶 About last night:
My all-time favorite artist (John Mayer) playing his very first concert in Paris. It was my second time seeing John after attending the Paradise Valley tour back in 2013
It was really cool to see him take the stage by himself for 2 hours! John played mostly acoustic, but it was an opportunity to hear songs from every single album he put out (with the additions of In Your Atmosphere and his iconic Free Fallin' cover!
The Call If you’re fortunate to live long enough, eventually you get The Call. Sometimes it’s an actual call, sometimes a social media post or a conversation on the street. But the message is the same: A friend of your youth has died.
The death of Matthew Perry was sad for all the reasons it is sad when a gifted, nimble, charming performer who has shared his struggles dies too young.
👋🏼 It’s been a few months since I’ve gotten back to freelancing and I wanted to share that I have some availability between now and the end of the year.
💼 I’m looking for additional work in Customer Success / Product Marketing starting at the end of August.
🙋🏻♂️I’m flexible but typically specialize in early stage startups and small companies looking for a Jack-of-all-trade profile, across a wide range of industries.
I’m not a fan of modern fandom. This isn’t only because I’ve been swarmed on Twitter by angry devotees of Marvel and DC and (more recently) “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” It’s more that the behavior of these social media hordes represents an anti-democratic, anti-intellectual mind-set that is harmful to the cause of art and antithetical to the spirit of movies. Fan culture is rooted in conformity, obedience, group identity and mob behavior, and its rise mirrors and models the spread of intolerant, authoritarian, aggressive tendencies in our politics and our communal life.
Day 11 of the March Photoblogging Challenge: “gimrack”.
I had to look up what it means, and it turns out it’s similar to knickknack.
My favorite one is this framed letter that Shana wrote after our first date, when I got home and she was traveling for work. Our first date was in London on Feb. 14th 2017, and our second date was a month later in Amsterdam for an extended weekend together.
Let’s continue helping Tweetbot and Twitterrific, the small indie developers who have given so much to our early-Twitter community of the 2010s-2020s:
If you’re a subscriber to either Tweetbot or Twitterrific, you can help them out with three simple steps:
Reinstall the app if you’ve already deleted it; otherwise, make sure you’re running the latest version.
Tap the “I Don’t Need a Refund” button.
Feel good and go buy yourself a treat, knowing you helped the good folks at a small company whose work you’ve appreciated (and will continue to).
📣 💼 I’ve been thinking of how best to apply my skills and help companies grow. I can add a lot of value to a team focused on business & product but that hasn’t had the chance to think about how to support customers and how to onboard new users.
My sweet spot is early-stage startups and companies that need to set up and launch their customer experience: setting up their support strategy, help desk, help center, segmenting the customer base and understanding how to educate users in the best practices, how to use features, how to make sure they make the most out of a given product, all the way to community building.
Really enjoyed this piece on my childhood club: AS Monaco 🇲🇨
The Monaco academy boasts a star-studded list of alumni: World Cup winners Thierry Henry, Emmanuel Petit, Lilian Thuram, David Trezeguet and Kylian Mbappé all graduated from the club. When Monaco tinkered with their successful formula of youth development, signing Radamel Falcao and James Rodríguez for big money, they won Ligue 1 and reached the Champions League semi-finals
[≠]
Shoutout to employers making missteps
Layoffs are among the most challenging life experiences, causing more psychological stress than even divorce, according to one study. Losing a job can upend workers’ finances and their sense of self, and layoffs in the world of remote work have in many cases been especially destabilizing, with employer missteps fueling uncertainty and unnecessary unknowns.
[≠]
Felt this part a lot too:
Last year ended with job cuts across tech behemoths […] For many of these companies, these cuts followed years of free-flowing perks and flexible work arrangements that were part of what was called a “war for talent.
This was too relatable considering my current personal situation and professional predicament.
“Right now you’re in a very specific moment. It’s called liminal space. You’re in the ambiguous or disoriented phase, also known as the middle of a rite of passage. Part of that is just growing up, but it also has to do with what you found out. Now you’re transforming, incorporating that information into your identity. It can be scary, like free-falling.
”Wout Weghorst briefly went supernova”
”What’s your favorite part? Mine is the bit where Cristiano Ronaldo walks down the tunnel, crying.”
”Next, Morocco gets to play its other former colonizer, France, for a chance to complete the re-enactment of its own liberation.”
“Mbappé has been romping through this World Cup with supreme Meryl Streep Doing Community Theater energy—the talent so vast, the stage so small.
”The letter is typed on AS Bondy headed paper, dated 17 May 2011. It gives permission for a 12-year-old French boy named Kylian Mbappe to attend a four-day trial the following week. Mbappe was on his way to Chelsea.”
{≠}
“His raw copy was as clean as a Lionel Messi first touch, and the ideas within it always crystal-clear and refined.”
⚽️ 🕯️ The Athletic: Remembering Grant Wahl
I just received this email and I’m unsure how I feel about this…
On the one hand it’s a bit chaotic, on the other it’s very convenient, and allows more people to find alternative transportation methods compared to the Metro/Taxis/Uber.
But emailing your customer base without giving them facts is equivalent to sharing fake news and masking ‘opinion-as-fact’ in a way that is reminiscent of US Republicans and far-right politicians.
As I pointed out three years ago, if you woke up on a Casper mattress, worked out with a Peloton, _Uber_ed to a WeWork, ordered on DoorDash for lunch, took a Lyft home, and ordered dinner through Postmates only to realize your partner had already started on a Blue Apron meal, your household had, in one day, interacted with eight unprofitable companies that collectively lost about $15 billion in one year.
I tried living there for a bit last year, and the ambitions of the inhabitants are not intellectual ones. The message Paris sends now is: do things with style. I liked that, actually. Paris is the only city I’ve lived in where people genuinely cared about art. In America only a few rich people buy original art, and even the more sophisticated ones rarely get past judging it by the brand name of the artist.