January 2023 - A New Future 🚀

Nathan Thomas

Feb 2, 2023

Introduction

Hey fam.

I know, I know - I’m one day late. My b.

I’ve been so busy. I’m working on a new project at work that’s really tough for me. It turns out they give you harder projects when you get promoted. It’s a trap. Don’t fall for it. However, times like these are when you tend to grow the most in life. I’m grateful for that.

While driving home from San Francisco today, I specifically decided I wanted to make this introduction a “thank you note.” That means specifically to you; you, the person reading this right this second. I want to thank you sticking with me and my newsletter through a year of emails.

I have big plans for the coming years, and I’ll be keeping this newsletter around for that journey. I expect it will slowly morph over time as I also change. I’d love to have you here for it.

Thank you for supporting me. Thank you to those of you who reach out to talk about the contents of this newsletter. You’ve made the last year a bit more awesome because of your friendship.

Thank you.

—

Nathan ☕️

Books

A Common-Sense Guide to Data Structures and Algorithms

(I know. I cheated. This is a code resource in the books section. Sue me.)

I learned about this book from a tweet from Madison Kanna (Twitter). Despite the fact that I have been studying this stuff for years already and knew enough to get a job at both Twitter and Loom, I’m still learning a lot. I like this book specifically because of its clarity, a characteristic sadly lacking from a lot of computer science resources.

Code

ByteByteGo Videos

This YouTube channel is run by the same people behind the famous Grokking the System Design Interview course. I’ve talked about them before in this newsletter.

I wanted to specifically call out several videos they released this last month:

StatQuest

This YouTube channel is a great resource if you want a review of statistics. I know this isn’t technically code-related, but I’m not going to make a math section just for this one link!

Games

Tiny Towns

Tiny Towns is a unique and fairly quick game that finds you and your friends constructing your own small towns. Different buildings combo with each other for more points, and the game is different each time you play since the buildings you play with are based on random draws from a deck of cards. Warning - I know people who love this game and some that also hate it. Enjoy.

Gizmo

Gizmo really caught me by surprise by how fun it is. You build up combinations of “gizmos” that allow you to convert resources back and force, give you perks, and ultimately build up victory points to let you win. It’s one part Catan, one part deck builder game, and all parts awesome.

Music

“Chicago Loft” by Nathan

I put this playlist together (which I feel like has the vibe of a Chicago loft) the other week. I want to share it with you (Apple Music link and Spotify below):

“the record” by boygenius

boygenius is a supergroup formed by Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus, all incredible musicians in their own right. Their original supergroup album was great, and they just released initial songs for an upcoming album which sounds awesome too (Apple Music link and Spotify below):

Videos

Pep talk from Doc Brown just because

I love this scene (and the Back to the Future movie series). This clip gives a lot of hope for your future, something everyone can use right about now:

“How to Succeed With a Startup” by Sam Altman (from Y Combinator)

Sam Altman is the CEO of OpenAI who you all might know as the company that brought you ChatGPT and Dall-E (which have been in the news for the last half year for their AI-generated content). This video is a great watch on how to succeed at building a startup:

A financial pep talk from In The Money (YouTuber)

I have a lot of distrust for financial YouTubers. I think they’re mostly influencers first and foremost who are in it for all the reasons other than to help you.

In The Money is the big exception. This guy battles encephalitis to bring solid, laid-back financial takes. This video is a pep talk that you should probably not be listening to the news right now to make your investment decisions. Be informed. Make your own choices.

Anyways, this isn’t financial advice from me. But you should definitely watch this: