Mark Watkins

The Tempest and an Extraordinary Letter

Tue, 24 Feb 2026 11:00:35 -1000

Vegas Rules

Tue, 10 Feb 2026 15:13:55 -1000

Neuromancer 2026: AI, TV, Mirrorshades

Thu, 22 Jan 2026 16:34:28 -1000

Vintage Maps with MapLibre and Open Historical Maps

Wed, 21 Jan 2026 12:48:41 -1000

My Reading in 2025

Fri, 09 Jan 2026 14:44:19 -1000

New Year, New Look

Tue, 06 Jan 2026 09:52:30 -1000

Pirate rules

Sun, 07 Dec 2025 03:15:23 +0000

Alif the Unseen meets Midjourney AI

Fri, 21 Nov 2025 17:12:06 +0000

On the nature of historical fiction

Wed, 15 Oct 2025 14:29:57 +0000

AI, Art, Entertainment

Tue, 18 Feb 2025 21:32:49 +0000

Charles McCarry on writing

Fri, 14 Feb 2025 01:33:17 +0000

My reading in 2024

Wed, 18 Dec 2024 21:52:41 +0000

My first story

Fri, 01 Nov 2024 15:28:13 +0000

Víkingur Ólafsson @ Harpa in Iceland

Mon, 19 Feb 2024 22:25:42 +0000

Hélène Grimaud @ Jordan Hall

Mon, 22 Jan 2024 13:02:07 +0000

My reading in 2023

Sun, 07 Jan 2024 20:17:28 +0000

Links to books

Thu, 16 Nov 2023 00:00:57 +0000

My medieval writing

Thu, 28 Sep 2023 18:50:54 +0000

Medieval substack, Richard the Lionheart

Mon, 10 Jul 2023 19:06:42 +0000

Taormina, 51 Shades of Grey.

Wed, 19 Apr 2023 19:27:48 +0000

Brave New World

Wed, 22 Feb 2023 14:29:32 +0000

Exploring Richard the Lionheart

Thu, 01 Sep 2022 19:03:53 +0000

Introducing TBR

Wed, 29 Jun 2022 16:30:38 +0000

Can you hear me now?

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 21:07:35 +0000

The Medium is the Massage?

Mon, 06 Jun 2022 12:06:23 +0000

Rarer Monsters

Sun, 08 May 2022 14:58:39 +0000

My reading in 2021

Tue, 04 Jan 2022 16:29:24 +0000

My shoulder. The Obstacle is the Way

Wed, 15 Dec 2021 20:00:32 +0000

Madness is better than defeat

Sat, 09 Oct 2021 15:49:17 +0000

My ten books

Sat, 09 Oct 2021 15:32:22 +0000

Grettir and the UFO

Sat, 04 Sep 2021 21:27:10 +0000

My book projects

Thu, 26 Aug 2021 21:46:06 +0000

The paths of discovery

Thu, 05 Aug 2021 20:31:09 +0000

How to sound spontaneous when you pitch

Thu, 06 May 2021 19:04:14 +0000

What lasts?

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 12:50:15 +0000

My year in reading, 2020

Thu, 31 Dec 2020 17:14:00 +0000

The Art of the Fast Pitch

Fri, 18 Sep 2020 17:50:56 +0000

George Washington and The Rules

Tue, 15 Sep 2020 15:16:28 +0000

On politics

Mon, 20 Jul 2020 18:58:25 +0000

Martini thoughts, literary and otherwise.

Fri, 10 Apr 2020 17:35:18 +0000

On being coachable

Wed, 22 Jan 2020 19:52:19 +0000

Should I take that job? Ten questions.

Mon, 20 Jan 2020 09:25:00 +0000

Neil Peart, RIP

Thu, 16 Jan 2020 06:08:17 +0000

My 2019 in reading

Fri, 10 Jan 2020 20:36:22 +0000

Smile of the Wolf (review)

Fri, 10 Jan 2020 19:24:28 +0000

Reading my way to Iceland

Thu, 26 Dec 2019 17:59:54 +0000

Travels in Iceland

Mon, 09 Dec 2019 21:59:39 +0000

The Rules

Fri, 19 Apr 2019 22:53:51 +0000

The Art of looking Bigger Than You Are

Fri, 13 Oct 2017 16:37:56 -1000

Announcing Bookship, a social reading app

Wed, 02 Aug 2017 13:09:13 +0000

Hemingway’s Shotgun

Tue, 18 Apr 2017 12:57:07 -1000

Burning the Days, by James Salter

Mon, 09 Jan 2017 11:51:00 +0000

Dealing with Lilikoi

Fri, 26 Aug 2016 12:54:02 -1000

Havana Bay, by Martin Cruz Smith

Thu, 23 Jun 2016 15:55:26 +0000

Strawberry Coriander Gin & Tonic

Sat, 18 Jun 2016 12:50:49 -1000

Oh good lord

Thu, 16 Jun 2016 12:48:52 -1000

Smoked Sage Margarita

Sun, 12 Jun 2016 12:46:11 -1000

Ghosts of the Desert, by Ryan Ireland

Sat, 11 Jun 2016 13:37:12 +0000

Fred Harvey and his rules

Tue, 07 Jun 2016 07:57:00 +0000

Jumping Ions

Mon, 30 May 2016 12:43:25 -1000

Why does Gin & Tonic Taste so good? Science explains

Sun, 29 May 2016 12:41:02 -1000

If you’re going to eat shit, don’t nibble

Fri, 13 May 2016 16:49:16 -1000

The Hemingway Daiquiri

Wed, 11 May 2016 12:36:51 -1000

It’s all your fault.

Tue, 10 May 2016 17:55:35 +0000

Playing the long game

Tue, 10 May 2016 17:52:23 +0000

The Last Harvest

Sun, 08 May 2016 18:03:37 -1000

The etiquette for intros

Fri, 29 Apr 2016 16:51:42 -1000

A History of the New World in Ten Cocktails

Sat, 16 Apr 2016 12:22:22 -1000

So you’re thinking about a “things to do” app

Wed, 13 Apr 2016 18:28:01 +0000

You need Ceremonies.

Wed, 30 Mar 2016 18:40:41 +0000

Getting your startup’s first 500 users

Tue, 29 Mar 2016 14:11:00 +0000

The Travelers, by Chris Pavone

Sat, 26 Mar 2016 19:17:44 +0000

The Last days of Magic by Mark Tompkins

Fri, 25 Mar 2016 22:18:46 +0000

Your first Oahu hike

Thu, 03 Mar 2016 04:27:59 +0000

Your competition is the back button

Wed, 24 Feb 2016 19:12:49 +0000

Everything is practice

Mon, 22 Feb 2016 21:38:54 +0000

Another nail in the coffin of subscription book reading

Thu, 18 Feb 2016 22:16:28 +0000

Introducing Goodreads Import

Tue, 09 Feb 2016 23:45:49 +0000

Your first time UX IS your UX

Thu, 28 Jan 2016 19:27:24 +0000

The Never Open Desert Diner by James Anderson

Fri, 15 Jan 2016 21:21:17 +0000

Book Playlist featured on Product Hunt!

Thu, 14 Jan 2016 14:27:20 +0000

Anatomy of a Hack – Books, Music & CODEX

Wed, 13 Jan 2016 15:56:17 +0000

A few months with Scribd

Fri, 08 Jan 2016 16:55:16 +0000

A big redesign at The Hawaii Project

Tue, 29 Dec 2015 20:02:58 +0000

Spies of the Balkans, by Alan Furst

Tue, 29 Dec 2015 15:18:46 +0000

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

Mon, 28 Dec 2015 14:31:53 +0000

Death in Veracruz, by Héctor Aguilar Camín

Wed, 23 Dec 2015 20:39:16 +0000

Facebook finally gets serious about events.

Fri, 18 Dec 2015 15:00:37 +0000

Hiking the Kamiloiki Ridge Trail

Tue, 08 Dec 2015 04:33:18 +0000

How Twitter could monetize the entire Internet in one click.

Tue, 24 Nov 2015 15:07:49 +0000

Some great surfing books

Sun, 22 Nov 2015 21:12:14 +0000

The Far Arena, by Richard Sapir

Wed, 28 Oct 2015 15:35:53 +0000

And, in Viking news…

Mon, 12 Oct 2015 14:22:23 +0000

Whither the eBooks subscription model?

Wed, 23 Sep 2015 16:38:04 +0000

Thomas Del Watkins, II.

Tue, 15 Sep 2015 12:11:50 +0000

William Gibson, Startups and Verbs

Mon, 24 Aug 2015 18:15:28 +0000

Being in the Water

Mon, 10 Aug 2015 14:25:56 +0000

The Water Knife, by Paolo Bacigalupi

Tue, 21 Jul 2015 18:41:29 +0000

House of Rain, by Craig Childs

Tue, 21 Jul 2015 18:15:58 +0000

Introducing What Should I Read Next

Mon, 20 Jul 2015 15:22:43 +0000

The Limits of Social Discovery

Mon, 20 Jul 2015 11:55:49 +0000

Doing a consumer startup? You won’t make it without a daily use case.

Tue, 14 Jul 2015 15:16:29 +0000

The “Ratings & Reviews” model is broken. There’s a better way.

Fri, 03 Jul 2015 15:34:56 +0000

Launching Today. We find great books you’d never find on your own.

Mon, 29 Jun 2015 15:28:00 +0000

Pirate Hunters, The Search for the Lost Treasure Ship of a Great Buccaneer. By Robert Kurson.

Sat, 30 May 2015 17:31:25 +0000

Dying Every Day, by James Romm

Sat, 30 May 2015 13:26:38 +0000

It’s right under your nose…

Sun, 24 May 2015 20:09:41 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter: Postmortem, Part II. In which I open the kimono. Again.

Wed, 06 May 2015 16:37:35 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter: Post Mortem Part I. In which I open the kimono

Mon, 04 May 2015 20:39:20 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 30. Well, that was fun. And, a Bow Tie.

Sat, 02 May 2015 13:37:27 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 29. Working on Post-Mortems.

Fri, 01 May 2015 15:58:27 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 28. Facebook Ad campaign results.

Thu, 30 Apr 2015 15:36:54 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 27. In which I find a new revenue source.

Wed, 29 Apr 2015 14:18:05 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter Day 26. In Dire Straights, in more ways than one.

Tue, 28 Apr 2015 19:58:46 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter, Day 25. In which my wrist gets slapped.

Mon, 27 Apr 2015 17:25:00 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 24.

Sun, 26 Apr 2015 15:09:21 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 23.

Sat, 25 Apr 2015 17:08:23 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 22.

Fri, 24 Apr 2015 16:01:32 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 21.

Thu, 23 Apr 2015 15:04:01 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 20.

Tue, 21 Apr 2015 16:24:53 +0000

Europe is slowly losing it’s mind. At least, in regards Google.

Fri, 17 Apr 2015 16:36:49 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 15.

Fri, 17 Apr 2015 14:35:39 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 14.

Thu, 16 Apr 2015 15:08:45 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 13.

Wed, 15 Apr 2015 12:37:31 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 12.

Tue, 14 Apr 2015 14:47:40 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 11.

Mon, 13 Apr 2015 14:26:41 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 10.

Sun, 12 Apr 2015 15:11:04 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter – Day 9

Sat, 11 Apr 2015 17:22:00 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter – Day 8

Fri, 10 Apr 2015 14:39:23 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter. Day 7

Thu, 09 Apr 2015 22:36:08 +0000

The subscription books model starts to break down

Wed, 08 Apr 2015 12:42:56 +0000

Diary of a Kickstarter – Day 1

Thu, 02 Apr 2015 23:01:54 +0000

And in Viking News, The Vikings traded with the arab world

Mon, 16 Mar 2015 12:47:24 +0000

“This Isn’t Good Enough”

Sat, 14 Mar 2015 16:30:15 +0000

The Snow Leopard, by Peter Matthiessen

Sun, 16 Nov 2014 20:44:53 +0000

The Bone Clocks, by David Mitchell

Thu, 30 Oct 2014 21:38:26 +0000

And in viking news, interesting thoughts on a Viking war game / board game

Thu, 02 Oct 2014 11:56:16 +0000

The Conquest of Gaul, by Julius Caesar

Tue, 16 Sep 2014 15:02:02 +0000

Do more than is required of you

Mon, 14 Jul 2014 20:09:53 +0000

Get The Thirst for Digging (more lessons from a long-lost book)

Fri, 11 Jul 2014 15:42:07 +0000

Are you having fun?

Thu, 10 Jul 2014 21:46:25 +0000

A Spy Among Friends, by Ben Macintyre

Mon, 19 May 2014 19:47:56 +0000

1356, by Bernard Cornwell

Sat, 29 Mar 2014 14:12:22 +0000

And in Viking news….

Mon, 24 Mar 2014 12:51:00 +0000

My favorite books of 2013

Mon, 30 Dec 2013 23:13:59 +0000

A Weekend trip to Monterey, Carmel and Big Sur

Sun, 15 Dec 2013 21:09:17 +0000

A day in Marin county and the Palomarin trail

Sun, 27 Oct 2013 14:46:20 +0000

The Dark Labyrinth, by Lawrence Durrell

Sat, 26 Oct 2013 15:46:26 +0000

And in Viking news…

Fri, 17 May 2013 22:00:28 +0000

A quick look at Twitter Music

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 23:06:22 +0000

This is cool, another literary bookmap

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 13:16:06 +0000

New Desk / Office space…

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 21:59:29 +0000

The Crook Factory by Dan Simmons

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 13:20:12 +0000

It’s been awhile.

Fri, 14 Dec 2012 01:20:57 +0000

Tippling Rock, and finding Ford’s Folly

Sun, 01 Jul 2012 20:22:16 +0000

Clockwork Angels, a new cd from Rush

Sat, 23 Jun 2012 15:57:39 +0000

Mission to Paris, by Alan Furst

Sun, 17 Jun 2012 17:18:23 +0000

Hiking Pu’u Manamana Solo

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 19:04:23 +0000

Hide Me Among the Graves, by Tim Powers

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 03:48:20 +0000

Daily playlist

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 19:55:25 +0000

My favorite music of 2011

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 01:49:02 +0000

Leadership lessons from the ancient Greeks (Part II of II)

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 14:49:32 +0000

Leadership lessons from the ancient Greeks – Part I of II

Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:59:37 +0000

Thack materials

Thu, 15 Sep 2011 14:29:37 +0000

Some quick reactions to Trap.It

Wed, 22 Jun 2011 15:18:30 +0000

Hiking Chocorua

Sun, 19 Jun 2011 17:53:14 +0000

boston music this weekend

Fri, 01 Apr 2011 17:38:14 +0000

the future of local search

Tue, 29 Mar 2011 18:17:14 +0000

A week in a life of a startup

Sat, 26 Feb 2011 19:55:34 +0000

Judging the MIT Venture Capital competion, and, Term Sheet Basics

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 00:17:51 +0000

music this weekend in boston

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 21:21:05 +0000

Cool Icelandic Music documentary, and Boston music this weekend

Wed, 02 Feb 2011 15:19:07 +0000

The real problem with Quora

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 15:25:09 +0000

There’s been a blizzard of social media chatter about Quora recently. Robert Scoble loved it, then hated it. Vivek Whadwa doesn’t get it. Arrington thinks Scoble’s nuts. All of this is focused on whether or not Quora is a great blogging platform, how the voting system works, and so on.

Here’s the real problem with Quora, and why it’s going to struggle, until it solves it.

There’s no information architecture. It’s just a huge pile of unorganized content. The value in a Q&A service is the ability for people to process the answers and find useful information, or at least predict where they’re going to find this information. Hunch suffers from a similar problem – it’s hard to know which ‘Hunch’ is going to answer your question. Until Quora finds a way to put some normalization onto the questions, the pile is just going to get bigger and harder to sift through. And this normalization is a hard problem, particularly for subjective questions, which is what currently predominates in Quora. It won’t be an easy thing for them to fix. Wikipedia (to which many comparisons are made relative to Quora) has a pretty clear information architecture, and a dis-ambiguation mechanism, and it’s data model elements are primarily (simple) nouns (Places, People, Topics) – whereas Quora’s primary content are usually (complex) subjectively phrased questions.

Music visualization

Thu, 27 Jan 2011 20:31:24 +0000

and in Viking news….apparently the Scots discovered Iceland before the Vikings!

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 22:10:55 +0000

My favorite music from this year

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 16:13:18 +0000

a trip to Phoenix

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 16:04:03 +0000

Crossers, by Philip Caputo

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 23:17:01 +0000

Boston music this weekend

Thu, 04 Nov 2010 14:01:38 +0000

When to hire a designer (hint: now!)

Mon, 25 Oct 2010 18:30:31 +0000

goby announces new funding!

Fri, 22 Oct 2010 17:49:12 +0000

Boston music this weekend

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 19:25:35 +0000

a startup I’d like to see

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 22:45:27 +0000

Empire, by Steven Saylor

Fri, 10 Sep 2010 22:24:44 +0000

Ping = Lame

Sat, 04 Sep 2010 19:35:01 +0000

Tijuana Straights, by Kem Nunn

Sun, 08 Aug 2010 02:48:37 +0000

The 60s are back, but this time they’re just Carbon Neutral.

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 12:09:54 +0000

Some quick thoughts on Google’s acquisition of ITA

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 13:18:30 +0000

Joining the board of Styleta!

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 16:40:02 +0000

Documentary and new music from Rush

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 16:06:02 +0000

Microsoft takes a shot at what Apple should be doing.

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 20:49:38 +0000

Goby gets covered by Scoble!

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 12:42:44 +0000

Apple, Search, Task & Context

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 00:17:56 +0000

The future of Blog Search

Wed, 26 May 2010 19:11:37 +0000

An African music sampler

Sun, 23 May 2010 00:38:48 +0000

Some thoughts on the convergence of Search, Travel, Local & Social

Mon, 10 May 2010 16:34:29 +0000

Apple buys Siri – quick thoughts on how Google is being flanked….

Wed, 28 Apr 2010 20:09:43 +0000

TV

Tue, 27 Apr 2010 18:47:13 +0000

Search Insider Summit & presentation

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 16:47:12 +0000

Startup I wish someone would build: TheNextOne.com

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:28:24 +0000

There’s more to maps than Google maps…

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 20:51:23 +0000

Angélique Kidjo at the Somerville Theater

Sun, 04 Apr 2010 05:37:27 +0000

Is Apple building a search engine? Should they?

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 14:16:58 +0000

What’s Goby all about anyway?

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:22:41 +0000

New & Improved…

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 14:50:40 +0000

about me

Mon, 04 Jan 2010 22:53:04 +0000

Goby

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:30:00 +0000

The Angel’s Game

Mon, 25 May 2009 20:01:00 +0000

Another lucky score from Early Reviewers

Sat, 09 May 2009 16:28:00 +0000

Gladiatrix, by Russell Whitfield

Sun, 21 Dec 2008 17:35:00 +0000

Yikes!

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 13:53:00 +0000

Pics from Bahamas

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 21:12:00 +0000

Bahamas

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 19:07:00 +0000

The White Mary, by Kira Salak

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 19:06:00 +0000

The Gargoyle, by Andrew Davidson

Fri, 09 May 2008 01:21:00 +0000

A thing of beauty….

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:38:00 +0000

Hat Trick

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 12:01:00 +0000

The intersection between Maps & Books

Sat, 29 Mar 2008 15:56:00 +0000

Christine Falls, or, CSI: Dublin

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 01:51:00 +0000

Codexmap news

Mon, 07 Jan 2008 13:04:00 +0000

The Greek Islands

Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:09:00 +0000

Books, Maps, and more..

Thu, 06 Dec 2007 22:46:00 +0000

Mt Monadnock

Thu, 18 Oct 2007 13:35:00 +0000

And in viking news….

Wed, 12 Sep 2007 12:40:00 +0000

What I’m listening to…

Thu, 06 Sep 2007 16:52:00 +0000

Off to Philmont….

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 14:40:50 +0000

Back from Philmont

Fri, 24 Aug 2007 15:25:00 +0000

headed to Philmont…

Wed, 01 Aug 2007 20:57:00 +0000

Hingham to Scituate

Sat, 28 Jul 2007 18:15:00 +0000

Another Philmont warmup….

Sun, 08 Jul 2007 19:50:00 +0000

Warmup for Philmont

Tue, 22 May 2007 19:26:00 +0000

Hiking, San Francisco

Fri, 30 Mar 2007 15:45:00 +0000

Ysabel and Labyrinth

Sun, 25 Feb 2007 01:38:00 +0000

Traveling

Sun, 25 Feb 2007 01:08:00 +0000

Land Ho!

Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:43:00 +0000

books I’m reading

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

projects

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

writing

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000