AI transcript
0:00:03 Would you rather have good laws or good people?
0:00:08 I think that justice is a direction rather than a destination.
0:00:10 I don’t think you would achieve it.
0:00:12 I think you’re constantly striving for it.
0:00:18 I’m Preet Bharara, and this week, former dean of Harvard Law School Martha Minow joins me on my podcast,
0:00:25 Stay Tuned with Preet, to discuss the limits of law, the role of forgiveness, and why justice is always a work in progress.
0:00:28 The episode is out now.
0:00:32 Search and follow Stay Tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts.
0:01:15 One query I often get is, what class or skill would you suggest our kids take and learn to compete in the modern economy?
0:01:23 A few years ago, people expected me to say STEM, or make the contrarian case for a liberal arts education.
0:01:25 Today, the expectation is AI.
0:01:29 But my answer remains unchanged.
0:01:33 To be successful, master storytelling.
0:01:42 Communities with larger proportions of skilled storytellers experience greater levels of cooperation and procreation.
0:01:48 Storytelling equals efficient transmission of survival-relevant information.
0:01:56 Among men, being skilled in storytelling increases attractiveness and perceived status to potential long-term mates.
0:02:00 The arc of evolution bends toward good storytellers.
0:02:06 In the business world, the flow of capital concentrates around good stories.
0:02:17 Entrepreneurs, a.k.a. salespeople, a.k.a. storytellers, deploy a narrative that captures imaginations and capital to pull the future forward.
0:02:25 Valuations aren’t a function of balance sheets, but of the stories that give those balance sheets meaning and direction.
0:02:30 Every business I’ve ever started was based on a compelling story.
0:02:33 Prof G Media is no different.
0:02:35 Those stories are our product.
0:02:41 Mia Silverio, our research lead, plays a key role developing the stories I tell.
0:02:47 This week, I asked her to write about the art and science of effective storytelling.
0:02:56 See What Others Miss, the Prof G Storytelling Playbook by Mia Silverio, as read by George Hahn.
0:03:03 I’ve been on hundreds of Zoom calls with Scott, not an exaggeration.
0:03:08 Over the past five years, I’ve learned how he crafts powerful presentations.
0:03:12 This is how we think about business storytelling at Prof G Media.
0:03:18 Scott will often stop me when we’re reviewing his decks to call for more drama.
0:03:24 Infusing a narrative with drama and emotion separates an exceptional storyteller from a mediocre one.
0:03:27 A good storyteller is simply a good entertainer.
0:03:31 Am I discounting the importance of underlying content?
0:03:32 Somewhat.
0:03:38 But the unfortunate truth is that even if you have revelatory information to share,
0:03:41 it’s not going to have an impact if no one’s paying attention.
0:03:45 As writer and podcaster Derek Thompson observed,
0:03:51 there’s something overlapping in the Venn diagram between what is demanded of stand-up comics
0:03:54 and what is demanded from public intellectuals.
0:04:07 Research tells us that experiences that elicit emotions are more memorable than ones that don’t.
0:04:14 Your story doesn’t need to make your audience cry or laugh, but it should inspire thoughtfulness or surprise,
0:04:19 promote introspection or curiosity, or evoke longing or guilt.
0:04:25 At the very least, you need to be self-aware enough to make a deprecating joke about a dull topic.
0:04:30 Two ways to inject emotion into your presentations.
0:04:37 Number one, lean into provocative, contrarian takes that surprise your audience or challenge their assumptions.
0:04:42 The first slide of Scott’s 2024 TED Talk asked,
0:04:43 do we love our children?
0:04:47 The question begs an obvious answer, yes.
0:04:55 But it sets up the next slides, which show irrefutable evidence that young people today have been handed a sour deal.
0:05:01 If we’ve elected officials who have let the American dream and the promises of capitalism die
0:05:04 in the service of older generations in Richmond,
0:05:10 Scott asked, how does that behavior square with really loving our children?
0:05:13 Powerful stories surprise us.
0:05:19 Harry Potter running into a brick wall and not getting head trauma is so delightfully perplexing
0:05:23 that it prepares you for the magical new world you’re about to enter.
0:05:26 Scott is well known for his surprising takes.
0:05:28 Young people need to drink more.
0:05:30 The era of brand is over.
0:05:32 Tesla is dramatically overvalued, etc.
0:05:38 But provocative statements only work when they’re anchored in evidence.
0:05:42 If you don’t have the evidence or creative leeway with your content,
0:05:45 you can still deliver surprises through how you present.
0:05:49 Hide half a chart in PowerPoint and reveal it at a key moment.
0:05:52 Drop in a video or audio clip.
0:05:54 Bring in a guest.
0:05:55 Move, literally.
0:05:59 Scott has worn wigs, lip-synced on stage,
0:06:02 and jumped up and down shirtless at South by Southwest.
0:06:06 No one expects these stunts, which is why they land.
0:06:10 Surprise gets attention and draws your audience into the story.
0:06:16 I never thought I’d use the words accounting and viral in the same sentence,
0:06:20 but a professor at the University of Oklahoma changed that.
0:06:24 Instead of droning on about balance sheets,
0:06:28 Jonathan Kern runs around his classroom singing about depreciation
0:06:31 and leading chants about cash flow.
0:06:36 Viral TikTok videos show lecture halls full of engaged students.
0:06:41 He made the most boring subject in business school unforgettable
0:06:46 by doing the exact opposite of what everyone expects from an accounting class.
0:06:49 Number two.
0:06:52 Use engaging data.
0:06:54 Be selective with your data.
0:06:56 And by selective, I don’t mean stingy.
0:07:00 Any persuasive story should include quantitative evidence.
0:07:07 What I mean is, select quantitative data that has an outsized qualitative impact.
0:07:09 Use the wow test.
0:07:15 If a data point, sentence, or slide doesn’t challenge or surprise you, cut it.
0:07:18 Dig for the good data.
0:07:20 Don’t settle for the bland stuff.
0:07:32 For example, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft will together spend $364 billion on capital expenditures this year.
0:07:34 I could leave it at that.
0:07:41 Or I could make that data dramatic and meaningful by telling you that for the same amount of money,
0:07:47 you could build another international space station, reinvent the nuclear bomb,
0:07:50 construct six nuclear submarines,
0:07:54 dig the channel tunnel between England and France,
0:07:57 run Japan’s military for an entire year,
0:08:04 and still have enough left over to buy everyone in Manhattan and the Bronx an iPhone.
0:08:11 I believe there’s wow factor data in every field, no matter how boring.
0:08:13 Consider this dull data point.
0:08:20 The IRS processed over 266 million tax returns and other forms last year.
0:08:22 To add drama, try this.
0:08:30 Cumulatively, Americans will spend 7.9 billion hours doing taxes this year.
0:08:34 That’s equivalent to about 900,000 years,
0:08:38 or three times the amount of time Homo sapiens have been on planet Earth.
0:08:43 Okay, maybe that’s a bit too dramatic, but you get the idea.
0:08:51 Good stories teach us something new.
0:08:56 Good storytellers cultivate the ability to see what others don’t.
0:08:58 I call this zooming out.
0:09:02 Most people analyze events as if they’re looking through a camera lens,
0:09:04 only seeing what’s in focus.
0:09:10 Skilled storytellers pull back to capture the wider landscape,
0:09:12 revealing potential causes and effects
0:09:15 that were invisible in the close-up shot.
0:09:20 Put differently, zooming out requires moving from the
0:09:22 what-happened layer of understanding to the
0:09:27 so-what, what-made-it-possible, what-happens-next layers.
0:09:33 Zooming out is most helpful in the analysis and brainstorming stage,
0:09:35 when you’re deciding what story to tell.
0:09:41 That’s how I arrived at my prediction that GLP-1s will supercharge the medical aesthetics market.
0:09:47 Most GLP-1 news covers how the drug will affect the food and beverage industry.
0:09:48 That’s the obvious story.
0:09:50 What’s a more interesting one?
0:09:52 I zoomed out and asked,
0:09:57 what exactly happens after a patient loses 50-plus pounds?
0:10:01 Rapid weight loss can create beauty problems.
0:10:04 Excess skin and ozempic face.
0:10:07 The gaunt, aged look you get from losing facial fat too quickly,
0:10:10 often fixed with filler.
0:10:14 I wondered if this was already fueling demand in medical aesthetics.
0:10:24 The numbers are striking.
0:10:30 Surgical lifts and tucks are up 20% to 40% since 2019.
0:10:36 Facial fat grafting jumped 50% in the past year.
0:10:39 The American Society of Plastic Surgeons found
0:10:43 that two in five GLP-1 patients are considering surgery
0:10:46 and one in five already went under the knife.
0:10:49 Now zoom out further.
0:10:55 Probably more than 40% of Americans qualify medically for GLP-1s,
0:10:58 but only 2% are taking them.
0:11:03 As adoption scales and insurance companies expand coverage,
0:11:06 we’re looking at massive demand for cosmetic procedures
0:11:10 to address the unwanted byproducts of weight loss.
0:11:13 Zooming out works in investing too.
0:11:19 In 1900, betting on the automobile probably seemed smart,
0:11:23 but U.S. automakers delivered mediocre returns
0:11:26 thanks to competition and consolidation.
0:11:31 The real windfall came decades later from the ripple effects.
0:11:33 Cars enabled suburbs.
0:11:37 Suburbs fueled demand for big-box retail.
0:11:44 And Walmart stock returned 1600x between 1980 and 2020,
0:11:48 roughly 70 times better than Ford over the same period.
0:11:51 When everyone spots the primary trend,
0:11:55 zoom out to spot the causes and effects.
0:11:58 When Scott presents in a different country,
0:12:01 I adapt his deck with region-specific data.
0:12:03 Even small details get tailored.
0:12:07 People pay more attention when content is personally relevant,
0:12:10 so frame your message in a way that makes them care.
0:12:13 Great storytellers do this.
0:12:16 Ruth Bader Ginsburg advanced gender equality
0:12:19 by taking on cases where men, not women,
0:12:21 were harmed by gendered laws,
0:12:24 forcing male judges to confront bias
0:12:26 in a way that felt personally relevant.
0:12:29 Personalization is only half the battle.
0:12:31 The other half is context,
0:12:35 framing numbers, concepts, or jargon,
0:12:37 so their meaning is instantly clear.
0:12:41 When Elizabeth Warren protested Trump’s tax bill,
0:12:43 she told Congress,
0:12:46 no baby should lose health care
0:12:49 so Jeff Bezos can buy a third yacht.
0:12:53 She could have cited the revenue loss in billions,
0:12:55 but that wouldn’t land as hard.
0:12:58 By putting the cost in human terms
0:13:01 and tying it to a vivid image,
0:13:04 she gave a dry budgetary trade-off context
0:13:07 and made it impossible to ignore.
0:13:10 You can do the same with business data.
0:13:14 NVIDIA is worth $4.5 trillion
0:13:17 is just a statistic.
0:13:20 But saying NVIDIA is worth more
0:13:22 as a percentage of global GDP
0:13:26 than the UK, France, and Germany’s stock markets
0:13:28 provides the context needed
0:13:30 to understand the company’s scale,
0:13:32 just like Warren’s yacht line
0:13:34 and made people feel the trade-off.
0:13:40 Context also makes complex topics accessible.
0:13:41 Take this stat.
0:13:45 Living next to a nuclear power plant for a year
0:13:50 exposes you to 0.1 microsieverts of radiation.
0:13:52 That sounds terrifying
0:13:55 until you learn that eating two bananas
0:13:57 gives you nearly twice that dose.
0:14:01 TikTok creator Becca Bloom nails this
0:14:03 by explaining finance terminology
0:14:05 using colloquial Gen Z language.
0:14:07 She defines market cap
0:14:10 as the total value of a company’s shares,
0:14:13 a.k.a. checking someone’s hinge profile
0:14:15 and instantly knowing if they’re high effort
0:14:17 or still figuring life out.
0:14:21 You can supercharge the power of context
0:14:23 through visualization.
0:14:26 Data visualization is a defining feature
0:14:27 of our work
0:14:29 and core to the Prof. G. Media brand.
0:14:32 It also leverages a basic fact
0:14:33 about comprehension.
0:14:35 The human brain processes images
0:14:39 60,000 times faster than text.
0:14:42 Scott’s presentations reflect this.
0:14:47 His AI Optimist talk features 13 text-based slides
0:14:49 and 104 slides filled with charts,
0:14:52 images, and videos.
0:14:54 Back in 2021,
0:14:57 when everyone was losing their minds
0:14:58 over the metaverse,
0:15:00 Scott was famously bearish.
0:15:01 Quote,
0:15:03 Headsets are nothing more
0:15:05 than wearable sex repellent.
0:15:05 Unquote.
0:15:08 I was putting together slides
0:15:10 to back up his position,
0:15:12 so I pulled Google search data
0:15:13 for metaverse.
0:15:15 The chart looked okay in isolation.
0:15:17 A big spike
0:15:19 followed by a higher baseline.
0:15:23 But here’s why context is so important.
0:15:24 For fun,
0:15:25 I compared searches
0:15:26 for the metaverse
0:15:28 to something random.
0:15:29 Crocs.
0:15:32 Those ugly foam shoes
0:15:34 consistently outpaced
0:15:35 metaverse searches
0:15:37 even at its peak hype moment.
0:15:40 If more people were Googling Crocs
0:15:42 than the supposed future
0:15:43 of human interaction,
0:15:45 maybe the metaverse
0:15:47 wasn’t as inevitable
0:15:48 as everyone claimed.
0:15:51 I started calling this
0:15:52 the Crocs test.
0:15:54 It’s held up surprisingly well.
0:15:56 The Crocs test
0:15:57 correctly predicted
0:15:59 the collapse of Quibi,
0:16:00 NFTs,
0:16:01 and Virgin Galactic.
0:16:06 Stories exist to be shared.
0:16:08 We tell them to entertain,
0:16:09 teach,
0:16:10 connect,
0:16:11 and move other people.
0:16:14 Storytelling is a service,
0:16:15 a way of charting a path,
0:16:16 yes,
0:16:17 but also a mechanism
0:16:18 for generating the hope
0:16:20 needed to sustain us
0:16:21 on our journey.
0:16:23 A well-told story
0:16:24 creates a bridge
0:16:25 between storyteller
0:16:26 and audience,
0:16:28 unlocking emotions
0:16:29 in all directions.
0:16:31 Scott,
0:16:32 who the New York Times
0:16:33 likened to Howard Stern,
0:16:34 always sharp,
0:16:35 sometimes crass,
0:16:38 gets surprisingly emotional
0:16:38 on stage
0:16:39 during his presentations.
0:16:41 He almost cried
0:16:43 while giving his TED Talk,
0:16:44 and I almost cried
0:16:45 reading the comments
0:16:45 on YouTube,
0:16:46 not because we were
0:16:47 receiving praise,
0:16:50 but because we’d given hope.
0:16:53 Good stories help us
0:16:54 recognize feelings
0:16:55 we couldn’t name,
0:16:57 experiences we believe
0:16:58 no one else shared,
0:17:00 and insights we knew
0:17:01 but couldn’t articulate.
0:17:04 As Walt Disney said
0:17:05 of storytellers,
0:17:07 we instill hope
0:17:10 again and again.
0:17:11 Thank you.
0:00:08 I think that justice is a direction rather than a destination.
0:00:10 I don’t think you would achieve it.
0:00:12 I think you’re constantly striving for it.
0:00:18 I’m Preet Bharara, and this week, former dean of Harvard Law School Martha Minow joins me on my podcast,
0:00:25 Stay Tuned with Preet, to discuss the limits of law, the role of forgiveness, and why justice is always a work in progress.
0:00:28 The episode is out now.
0:00:32 Search and follow Stay Tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts.
0:01:15 One query I often get is, what class or skill would you suggest our kids take and learn to compete in the modern economy?
0:01:23 A few years ago, people expected me to say STEM, or make the contrarian case for a liberal arts education.
0:01:25 Today, the expectation is AI.
0:01:29 But my answer remains unchanged.
0:01:33 To be successful, master storytelling.
0:01:42 Communities with larger proportions of skilled storytellers experience greater levels of cooperation and procreation.
0:01:48 Storytelling equals efficient transmission of survival-relevant information.
0:01:56 Among men, being skilled in storytelling increases attractiveness and perceived status to potential long-term mates.
0:02:00 The arc of evolution bends toward good storytellers.
0:02:06 In the business world, the flow of capital concentrates around good stories.
0:02:17 Entrepreneurs, a.k.a. salespeople, a.k.a. storytellers, deploy a narrative that captures imaginations and capital to pull the future forward.
0:02:25 Valuations aren’t a function of balance sheets, but of the stories that give those balance sheets meaning and direction.
0:02:30 Every business I’ve ever started was based on a compelling story.
0:02:33 Prof G Media is no different.
0:02:35 Those stories are our product.
0:02:41 Mia Silverio, our research lead, plays a key role developing the stories I tell.
0:02:47 This week, I asked her to write about the art and science of effective storytelling.
0:02:56 See What Others Miss, the Prof G Storytelling Playbook by Mia Silverio, as read by George Hahn.
0:03:03 I’ve been on hundreds of Zoom calls with Scott, not an exaggeration.
0:03:08 Over the past five years, I’ve learned how he crafts powerful presentations.
0:03:12 This is how we think about business storytelling at Prof G Media.
0:03:18 Scott will often stop me when we’re reviewing his decks to call for more drama.
0:03:24 Infusing a narrative with drama and emotion separates an exceptional storyteller from a mediocre one.
0:03:27 A good storyteller is simply a good entertainer.
0:03:31 Am I discounting the importance of underlying content?
0:03:32 Somewhat.
0:03:38 But the unfortunate truth is that even if you have revelatory information to share,
0:03:41 it’s not going to have an impact if no one’s paying attention.
0:03:45 As writer and podcaster Derek Thompson observed,
0:03:51 there’s something overlapping in the Venn diagram between what is demanded of stand-up comics
0:03:54 and what is demanded from public intellectuals.
0:04:07 Research tells us that experiences that elicit emotions are more memorable than ones that don’t.
0:04:14 Your story doesn’t need to make your audience cry or laugh, but it should inspire thoughtfulness or surprise,
0:04:19 promote introspection or curiosity, or evoke longing or guilt.
0:04:25 At the very least, you need to be self-aware enough to make a deprecating joke about a dull topic.
0:04:30 Two ways to inject emotion into your presentations.
0:04:37 Number one, lean into provocative, contrarian takes that surprise your audience or challenge their assumptions.
0:04:42 The first slide of Scott’s 2024 TED Talk asked,
0:04:43 do we love our children?
0:04:47 The question begs an obvious answer, yes.
0:04:55 But it sets up the next slides, which show irrefutable evidence that young people today have been handed a sour deal.
0:05:01 If we’ve elected officials who have let the American dream and the promises of capitalism die
0:05:04 in the service of older generations in Richmond,
0:05:10 Scott asked, how does that behavior square with really loving our children?
0:05:13 Powerful stories surprise us.
0:05:19 Harry Potter running into a brick wall and not getting head trauma is so delightfully perplexing
0:05:23 that it prepares you for the magical new world you’re about to enter.
0:05:26 Scott is well known for his surprising takes.
0:05:28 Young people need to drink more.
0:05:30 The era of brand is over.
0:05:32 Tesla is dramatically overvalued, etc.
0:05:38 But provocative statements only work when they’re anchored in evidence.
0:05:42 If you don’t have the evidence or creative leeway with your content,
0:05:45 you can still deliver surprises through how you present.
0:05:49 Hide half a chart in PowerPoint and reveal it at a key moment.
0:05:52 Drop in a video or audio clip.
0:05:54 Bring in a guest.
0:05:55 Move, literally.
0:05:59 Scott has worn wigs, lip-synced on stage,
0:06:02 and jumped up and down shirtless at South by Southwest.
0:06:06 No one expects these stunts, which is why they land.
0:06:10 Surprise gets attention and draws your audience into the story.
0:06:16 I never thought I’d use the words accounting and viral in the same sentence,
0:06:20 but a professor at the University of Oklahoma changed that.
0:06:24 Instead of droning on about balance sheets,
0:06:28 Jonathan Kern runs around his classroom singing about depreciation
0:06:31 and leading chants about cash flow.
0:06:36 Viral TikTok videos show lecture halls full of engaged students.
0:06:41 He made the most boring subject in business school unforgettable
0:06:46 by doing the exact opposite of what everyone expects from an accounting class.
0:06:49 Number two.
0:06:52 Use engaging data.
0:06:54 Be selective with your data.
0:06:56 And by selective, I don’t mean stingy.
0:07:00 Any persuasive story should include quantitative evidence.
0:07:07 What I mean is, select quantitative data that has an outsized qualitative impact.
0:07:09 Use the wow test.
0:07:15 If a data point, sentence, or slide doesn’t challenge or surprise you, cut it.
0:07:18 Dig for the good data.
0:07:20 Don’t settle for the bland stuff.
0:07:32 For example, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft will together spend $364 billion on capital expenditures this year.
0:07:34 I could leave it at that.
0:07:41 Or I could make that data dramatic and meaningful by telling you that for the same amount of money,
0:07:47 you could build another international space station, reinvent the nuclear bomb,
0:07:50 construct six nuclear submarines,
0:07:54 dig the channel tunnel between England and France,
0:07:57 run Japan’s military for an entire year,
0:08:04 and still have enough left over to buy everyone in Manhattan and the Bronx an iPhone.
0:08:11 I believe there’s wow factor data in every field, no matter how boring.
0:08:13 Consider this dull data point.
0:08:20 The IRS processed over 266 million tax returns and other forms last year.
0:08:22 To add drama, try this.
0:08:30 Cumulatively, Americans will spend 7.9 billion hours doing taxes this year.
0:08:34 That’s equivalent to about 900,000 years,
0:08:38 or three times the amount of time Homo sapiens have been on planet Earth.
0:08:43 Okay, maybe that’s a bit too dramatic, but you get the idea.
0:08:51 Good stories teach us something new.
0:08:56 Good storytellers cultivate the ability to see what others don’t.
0:08:58 I call this zooming out.
0:09:02 Most people analyze events as if they’re looking through a camera lens,
0:09:04 only seeing what’s in focus.
0:09:10 Skilled storytellers pull back to capture the wider landscape,
0:09:12 revealing potential causes and effects
0:09:15 that were invisible in the close-up shot.
0:09:20 Put differently, zooming out requires moving from the
0:09:22 what-happened layer of understanding to the
0:09:27 so-what, what-made-it-possible, what-happens-next layers.
0:09:33 Zooming out is most helpful in the analysis and brainstorming stage,
0:09:35 when you’re deciding what story to tell.
0:09:41 That’s how I arrived at my prediction that GLP-1s will supercharge the medical aesthetics market.
0:09:47 Most GLP-1 news covers how the drug will affect the food and beverage industry.
0:09:48 That’s the obvious story.
0:09:50 What’s a more interesting one?
0:09:52 I zoomed out and asked,
0:09:57 what exactly happens after a patient loses 50-plus pounds?
0:10:01 Rapid weight loss can create beauty problems.
0:10:04 Excess skin and ozempic face.
0:10:07 The gaunt, aged look you get from losing facial fat too quickly,
0:10:10 often fixed with filler.
0:10:14 I wondered if this was already fueling demand in medical aesthetics.
0:10:24 The numbers are striking.
0:10:30 Surgical lifts and tucks are up 20% to 40% since 2019.
0:10:36 Facial fat grafting jumped 50% in the past year.
0:10:39 The American Society of Plastic Surgeons found
0:10:43 that two in five GLP-1 patients are considering surgery
0:10:46 and one in five already went under the knife.
0:10:49 Now zoom out further.
0:10:55 Probably more than 40% of Americans qualify medically for GLP-1s,
0:10:58 but only 2% are taking them.
0:11:03 As adoption scales and insurance companies expand coverage,
0:11:06 we’re looking at massive demand for cosmetic procedures
0:11:10 to address the unwanted byproducts of weight loss.
0:11:13 Zooming out works in investing too.
0:11:19 In 1900, betting on the automobile probably seemed smart,
0:11:23 but U.S. automakers delivered mediocre returns
0:11:26 thanks to competition and consolidation.
0:11:31 The real windfall came decades later from the ripple effects.
0:11:33 Cars enabled suburbs.
0:11:37 Suburbs fueled demand for big-box retail.
0:11:44 And Walmart stock returned 1600x between 1980 and 2020,
0:11:48 roughly 70 times better than Ford over the same period.
0:11:51 When everyone spots the primary trend,
0:11:55 zoom out to spot the causes and effects.
0:11:58 When Scott presents in a different country,
0:12:01 I adapt his deck with region-specific data.
0:12:03 Even small details get tailored.
0:12:07 People pay more attention when content is personally relevant,
0:12:10 so frame your message in a way that makes them care.
0:12:13 Great storytellers do this.
0:12:16 Ruth Bader Ginsburg advanced gender equality
0:12:19 by taking on cases where men, not women,
0:12:21 were harmed by gendered laws,
0:12:24 forcing male judges to confront bias
0:12:26 in a way that felt personally relevant.
0:12:29 Personalization is only half the battle.
0:12:31 The other half is context,
0:12:35 framing numbers, concepts, or jargon,
0:12:37 so their meaning is instantly clear.
0:12:41 When Elizabeth Warren protested Trump’s tax bill,
0:12:43 she told Congress,
0:12:46 no baby should lose health care
0:12:49 so Jeff Bezos can buy a third yacht.
0:12:53 She could have cited the revenue loss in billions,
0:12:55 but that wouldn’t land as hard.
0:12:58 By putting the cost in human terms
0:13:01 and tying it to a vivid image,
0:13:04 she gave a dry budgetary trade-off context
0:13:07 and made it impossible to ignore.
0:13:10 You can do the same with business data.
0:13:14 NVIDIA is worth $4.5 trillion
0:13:17 is just a statistic.
0:13:20 But saying NVIDIA is worth more
0:13:22 as a percentage of global GDP
0:13:26 than the UK, France, and Germany’s stock markets
0:13:28 provides the context needed
0:13:30 to understand the company’s scale,
0:13:32 just like Warren’s yacht line
0:13:34 and made people feel the trade-off.
0:13:40 Context also makes complex topics accessible.
0:13:41 Take this stat.
0:13:45 Living next to a nuclear power plant for a year
0:13:50 exposes you to 0.1 microsieverts of radiation.
0:13:52 That sounds terrifying
0:13:55 until you learn that eating two bananas
0:13:57 gives you nearly twice that dose.
0:14:01 TikTok creator Becca Bloom nails this
0:14:03 by explaining finance terminology
0:14:05 using colloquial Gen Z language.
0:14:07 She defines market cap
0:14:10 as the total value of a company’s shares,
0:14:13 a.k.a. checking someone’s hinge profile
0:14:15 and instantly knowing if they’re high effort
0:14:17 or still figuring life out.
0:14:21 You can supercharge the power of context
0:14:23 through visualization.
0:14:26 Data visualization is a defining feature
0:14:27 of our work
0:14:29 and core to the Prof. G. Media brand.
0:14:32 It also leverages a basic fact
0:14:33 about comprehension.
0:14:35 The human brain processes images
0:14:39 60,000 times faster than text.
0:14:42 Scott’s presentations reflect this.
0:14:47 His AI Optimist talk features 13 text-based slides
0:14:49 and 104 slides filled with charts,
0:14:52 images, and videos.
0:14:54 Back in 2021,
0:14:57 when everyone was losing their minds
0:14:58 over the metaverse,
0:15:00 Scott was famously bearish.
0:15:01 Quote,
0:15:03 Headsets are nothing more
0:15:05 than wearable sex repellent.
0:15:05 Unquote.
0:15:08 I was putting together slides
0:15:10 to back up his position,
0:15:12 so I pulled Google search data
0:15:13 for metaverse.
0:15:15 The chart looked okay in isolation.
0:15:17 A big spike
0:15:19 followed by a higher baseline.
0:15:23 But here’s why context is so important.
0:15:24 For fun,
0:15:25 I compared searches
0:15:26 for the metaverse
0:15:28 to something random.
0:15:29 Crocs.
0:15:32 Those ugly foam shoes
0:15:34 consistently outpaced
0:15:35 metaverse searches
0:15:37 even at its peak hype moment.
0:15:40 If more people were Googling Crocs
0:15:42 than the supposed future
0:15:43 of human interaction,
0:15:45 maybe the metaverse
0:15:47 wasn’t as inevitable
0:15:48 as everyone claimed.
0:15:51 I started calling this
0:15:52 the Crocs test.
0:15:54 It’s held up surprisingly well.
0:15:56 The Crocs test
0:15:57 correctly predicted
0:15:59 the collapse of Quibi,
0:16:00 NFTs,
0:16:01 and Virgin Galactic.
0:16:06 Stories exist to be shared.
0:16:08 We tell them to entertain,
0:16:09 teach,
0:16:10 connect,
0:16:11 and move other people.
0:16:14 Storytelling is a service,
0:16:15 a way of charting a path,
0:16:16 yes,
0:16:17 but also a mechanism
0:16:18 for generating the hope
0:16:20 needed to sustain us
0:16:21 on our journey.
0:16:23 A well-told story
0:16:24 creates a bridge
0:16:25 between storyteller
0:16:26 and audience,
0:16:28 unlocking emotions
0:16:29 in all directions.
0:16:31 Scott,
0:16:32 who the New York Times
0:16:33 likened to Howard Stern,
0:16:34 always sharp,
0:16:35 sometimes crass,
0:16:38 gets surprisingly emotional
0:16:38 on stage
0:16:39 during his presentations.
0:16:41 He almost cried
0:16:43 while giving his TED Talk,
0:16:44 and I almost cried
0:16:45 reading the comments
0:16:45 on YouTube,
0:16:46 not because we were
0:16:47 receiving praise,
0:16:50 but because we’d given hope.
0:16:53 Good stories help us
0:16:54 recognize feelings
0:16:55 we couldn’t name,
0:16:57 experiences we believe
0:16:58 no one else shared,
0:17:00 and insights we knew
0:17:01 but couldn’t articulate.
0:17:04 As Walt Disney said
0:17:05 of storytellers,
0:17:07 we instill hope
0:17:10 again and again.
0:17:11 Thank you.
Written by Mia Silverio. As read by George Hahn.
See What Others Miss: The Prof G Storytelling Playbook
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