Super8: Eight intriguing articles from May.

The year has sprinted from the starting gates and we’ve already reached the half-way mark. If you feel like time is flying…take a few moments to hit pause, read, and relax. You may have heard the phrase ‘mindfulness in May’? Well, this month, the August team have found their inner Zen.

This month, I’ve curated a selection for reflection. Whether it’s pondering the impact of developing technology, insights into living 24 hours a day, or taking a trip down tech-memory lane, slow down and savour the spread. It’s Super8 in May.

1. How to be more productive by working less.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by Mark Manson.  
• Contributor: Emily Duckham.

Yes, you read that right. All work is different, and we work hard in different ways—productivity tips for watercolour artists are probably less useful for filing your tax return. Creative work is not linear, and more time doesn’t always translate to a better outcome. Taking a moment to reflect on your process can save you time and effort in the long run.

Productivity is a deeply personal thing. We all have different brains and, therefore, different preferences, perspectives, and situations where we feel most effective.

The most challenging, brain-intensive work is not a matter of time—but mastery. Mark Manson shows us why productivity is personal, and how you might benefit from the occasional lazy Thursday.

2. The implications of Neuralink.

• Read the article here.
• Written by Nathan Bashaw. 
• Contributor: Athalia Foo.  

Want to stay connected to the latest in tech? With Elon Musk’s Neuralink, you can—mind, body and soul. The company aims to close the gap between humans and computers, predicting interactions from mind to machine simultaneously. We share, chat, like and tweet across platforms, both onscreen and off. What will happen when we bring this clutter into our headspace? Nathan’s article details how tech giants like Google, Microsoft and Apple will fare with Neuralink. This is one case where there isn’t time to take it easy.

3. The story behind Nike’s ‘Breaking2’.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by Angela Natividad. 
• Contributor: Steph Little.  

Nothing clears the mind like a run. Or, in the case of Nike’s Breaking2—a marathon live-streamed to millions. Like most people, I found myself glued to the progress of the three runners, as they attempted their enormous feat—what a run! Behind the slick promotion, content and branding, is a team going above and beyond. Angela Natividad takes us behind the scenes of a campaign that was expertly curated from start to finish—and why, despite falling short of their goal, Nike’s innovation will pay off.

4. The homepage is dead: a story of website personalisation.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by Cara Harshman.  
• Contributor: Rowan Barnes.  

This piece by Cara Harhsman is part knowledge-share, part case study. It hits pause on generic homepages and calls for personalised web experiences. Right from the landing page, a tailored experience asks you to take it easy and get comfortable.

It’s time we start extending this persona-driven, personalized marketing to our websites, and specifically the homepage. The homepage is the proverbial front door of our brands; often a landing page, it’s the first page you’ll go to find out who a company is and what it does.

Cara guides us through this important evolution in homepage design and development—helping us understand how to engage audiences looking to make themselves at home.

5. How to live on 24 hours a day.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by: Shane Parrish.
• Contributor: Daniel Banik.

‘We shall never have more time. We have, and have always had, all the time there is’. Powerful words by Arnold Bennett, author of the book this piece is named after. In this article, Shane Parrish plays on the fragility of time, and encourages readers to make the most of it.

The idea that you can reinvent yourself each hour of the day is liberating. We get stuck in ruts and tell ourselves that we cannot change because we are too old, too young, too poor, too tied down. These are only excuses.

We all have 24 hours a day—we can all do more with our time. This piece draws parallels between Bennett’s writings and how our modern day struggles with work, social media, and money can be reframed to make each minute count.

6. I review thousands of resumes—here’s what I’m really looking for.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by: Nadia Abouzaid.  
• Contributor: Sarah El-Atm.

I couldn’t compile eight articles for May, and not include a piece that looks at how you can improve your resume. This piece by Nadia Abouzaid is a great read with some tips you can action right away. An awesome resume is never finished—it is always evolving to reflect your skills and the industry you work in. If you’re on the hunt for a job, we encourage you read this piece in full. And if you’re keen to work at August, take your sweet time with the last point.

7. Curious contraptions of yesterday’s workplaces.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by: Eric Barton.  
• Contributor: Zoe Warne.

When Zoe shared this piece with the team, she observed that Super8 often looks to the future, or gets us up to speed with the ‘now’. Keeping with this month’s theme, take a moment to reminisce and enjoy Eric Barton’s tech recap of a world gone by. One of my favourite contraptions on this list is Francoise Lambert’s typewriter—a tale of a beautiful product but with an inventor who waited too long to manufacture it. Eric Barton’s recap of gadgets and office tech is more than a walk down memory lane. It offers insights into when to act on a good idea, when an upgrade might be due, and when to bide your time for the next big thing.

8. Google’s AI invents sounds you’ve never heard before.

• Read the full article here.
• Written by Cade Metz. 
• Contributor: Mike McCusker.

Shhh…. can you hear that? It’s the sound my mind blowing. Google’s Magenta project is a team of AI researchers building computer systems that make their own art. The NSynth is their latest project—it mixes musical instruments never before combined. The NSynth can create music that is part clavichord, part hammond…but it’s not a mixture of the two, nor is it a layered sound—it’s entirely new.

The hope is that researchers can generate a much wider array of tools for any artist, not just musicians. The trick will lie in finding the balance between here and the infinite.

Art and music suddenly become bigger than we ever imagined. Could we start seeing colours we’ve never seen before, too? Only time will tell.