In this week’s edition of On Strategy by Sorin Anagnoste, I draw inspiration from Tom Whitwell’s remarkable yearly reflections to share “52 Things I Learned in 2024.” These are lessons shaped by a year of exploration, observation, and growth - spanning business, strategy, and life itself.
I hope they inspire and provoke thought as we step into 2025 🎉
- What a 45-year-old orchestra conductor making $950,000 eats in San Francisco. LINK
- Why is India so bad at sports? LINK
- The fight for Gabon’s forests. LINK
- 27 of the top 30 cities in the USA with the most crimes are run by Democrats. LINK
- on US Labour Day, by George Friedman. LINK
- The Brutalist may be the best film of 2024. LINK
- On the receovery birth rates front: Mongolia. LINK
- EVs might be too heavy for the US bridges. LINK
- Washing vegetables doesn’t actually remove pesticides; you need to peel them. LINK
- Colombia faces a new problem: too much cocaine. LINK
- The Chef’s shoes, by Grenson. LINK
- Unbusy - a poem. LINK
- The German Army still uses floppy disks because they consider them more reliable. LINK
- Damaged knives of the Japanese chefs are for sale on eBay. LINK
- Hydra is probably one of the coolest islands to go in Greece. LINK
- There is a Fight Club for drones in San Francisco. LINK
- Steve Jobs helped make podcasting popular. LINK
- Researchers identify gene that helps cancer cells spread throughout the body. LINK
- Lee Kuan Yew on what enabled civilization in Singapore: Air conditioning. LINK
- George R.R. Martin initially didn’t want dragons in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” saga. LINK
- Across Andalusia on horseback. LINK
- New research shows that drinking and flying could be bad for your heart, especially on long flights. LINK
- The first doctors to treat cancer were ancient Egyptians. LINK
- Austria is a failed state. Politico has a long piece on how Putin hijacked Austria’s spy service. LINK
- Europe’s political divide over the return of wolves. LINK
- Stop eating ultra-processed foods. LINK
- The rain is a serious reason for delays in the construction sector in the UK. LINK
- How marijuana affects the brain & body. LINK
- Premier League took over the world, proving once again that the British are the best at creating pop culture. LINK
- We could run out of cocoa. LINK
- Bottega Veneta’s Matthieu Blazy: ‘If I do just fashion, I will go cuckoo’. LINK
- An orangutan in Indonesia has self-medicated to heal a wound on his face. LINK
- What ancient Roman wine tasted like. LINK
- Yes, smartphones are bad in school, and overall, for kids. LINK
- Why the real estate is cheap in Japan. LINK
- Costco is selling up to $200m in gold bars per month. LINK
- Dubai 2040. LINK
- In Alaska, vegetables can grow to enormous sizes because they benefit from 20 hours of daily sunlight. LINK
- Ludwig Von Mises + MMA fighters = LOVE. LINK
- Robert Maddox, the engineer YouTuber who puts jet engines on absolutely everything. LINK
- A detailed analysis of the Havana Syndrome on the US Stuff in Cuba. LINK
- This is an interesting thread about the Comanche, the most brutal and feared American Indian horse warriors. LINK
- A whisky distillery with two Michelin stars in Scotland. LINK
- The UK has 500,000 redwood trees. LINK
- Dallas is looking for a design that can tackle loneliness. LINK
- Alzheimer’s may be caused by a build-up of fat in brain cells. LINK
- Inside the glorious afterlife of Roger Federer. LINK
- The more household work men do the more fertility increases. LINK
- What really happens to our memory as we age? LINK
- Scientists say they’re closer to reviving mammoths. LINK
- Venezuela’s currency is so worthless there’s no point hiding PINs. LINK
- Learnings from building Boston. LINK
The feedback from the readers for my newest book has been amazing…so far 🙃
Through 28 chapters I covered three parts: (1) Strategy, (2) Innovation & Growth, and (3) Generative AI.
See a full sample - the chapter on Network Effects. - click HERE
