Introducing Charted A new way to share data A year ago, the Product Science team at Medium created the first version of Charted , an internal tool to help us easily share charts. It has since become indispensable to the way we analyze data and communicate our findings with the team. Now we’re…

Caleb Wilde is a sixth-generation funeral director who wants to reacquaint us all with the uncomfortable, eye-opening realities of death. It’ll make us more human, he says. If it doesn’t kill him first. By Eric Puchner Photographs by Matt Eich I was in the crematory with two fresh deliveries when my…

It all started with the moon face emoji. We’re big fans of the moon face emoji. It’s by far the most used emoji in the Need/Want Slack channel . The cheeky look on its face makes us crack a smile every time it comes up. It can be relevant to almost any situation. Just made a sale? :moonface: Can’t…

In February 2013, we blogged about emailtransparency at Stripe. Since then a number of other companieshave implemented their own versions of it (which a few have talked about publicly). We often get asked whether email transparency isstill around, and if so, how we've scaled it. Email transparency…

Photo: Leah Millis, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 23 Caption Close Image 1 of 23 Buy photo Dave Dueblin, 37, waits for a meeting in a themed room in the Pandora office Nov. 18, 2014 in Oakland, Calif. Dave Dueblin, 37, waits for a meeting in a themed room in the Pandora office Nov. 18, 2014 in Oakland,…

How to E-Mail a busy person. While I don’t really like to consider myself as a busy person, but with an average of 200 E-Mails I receive a day (not counting social/promo emails), I do have troubles catching up with everyone while still trying to get work done at the same time. I pride myself in…

Inside the The Psychology of the Start-up World http://t.co/uPIjpgZlRD

Taylor Swift says she doesn't agree with the perception that 'music has no value and should be free'. Photograph: Lucas Jackson/Reuters A fter more than a decade of declining sales, the music industry believes streaming services like Spotify offer a path to a return to growth in the future. But not…

In 2000, a Stanford Ph.D. named Avery Wang co-founded, with a couple of business-school graduates, a tech start-up called Shazam. Their idea was to develop a service that could identify any song within a few seconds, using only a cellphone, even in a crowded bar or coffee shop. At first, Wang, who…

I cannot tell you how happy I am that the conversation about Taylor Swift and Spotify is happening. Maybe people will start listening to what independent artists like me and my peers have been saying for years now. A little background for those who don’t know me: I’ve been an indie musician by…

Message from Chris Lavergne: Mahbod Moghadam requested the article be removed from Thought Catalog because of communications with the Whole Foods legal department. Although we strive to support freedom of expression, we also strive to support writers on their own terms and in this scenario we don’t…

Exactly right. This was the vision for Boom.fm (RIP) » Apple Will Use Curation To Beat A Path To Mainstreaming Music http://t.co/Bqa8pAl8tF

Oh man, I wish I'd written this. @sachagreif's brilliant piece on the pricing potential for different product types http://t.co/WtZCa87Eir

People have been signing up for Cluster for almost two years now. We’ve watched dozens of new users sign up during live user tests , and we’ve analyzed our signup data and answered countless support inquiries to glean a pile of insights. When we first launched in February 201 3, we offered one…

Radio broadcasters have made much fuss about Seth Godin’s post this past week titled “an end of radio.” In it, Seth referenced the conversation he and I had eight years ago about the future of radio and how it would likely be impacted by access to unlimited online radio alternatives. It’s hard to…

FLUX is a new music app from King Crimson’s Adrian Belew that never plays the same thing twice (@FACTmag) http://t.co/jilS9KfNdO

SoundCloud , the user-created audio streaming platform currently used by 175 million unique listeners each month, confirmed today that it has inked its first licensing deal with one of the major record labels: the Warner Music Group — whose roster includes David Guetta, The Flaming Lips and Sheryl…

In the early days of web publishing, commenting sections were a fast, easy way to facilitate "engagement" around stories. At the time, it was downright revolutionary -- real-time feedback to stories was impossible in the print era. But that was before Twitter and Facebook. Today, it makes much less…

Gimlet Media & The Future of Podcasting Update: Appropriately, you can now listen to an audio version of this essay. Thank you Kristin Myers for the dramatic reading: A podcast network focused on narrative storytelling. Journalism. This is not a “typical” investment for betaworks, nor for many other…

I sat contemplating whether or not to write this down but I’m pretty sure typing it is the only way to really sort through it. That, and hopefully it’s a helpful reminder to other founders and also to people on my team as well. Startups are hard. They’re hard on everyone around you. They’re hard on…

"SaaS Startup Balance Sheets: How Much Cash & How Much Debt to Raise" http://t.co/AYjzJKNKMc by @ttunguz

One of the best pieces on Silicon Valley culture I've ever read. So much respect for @sarahcuda http://t.co/KSG4XPv3S4

Top story: Uber C.E.O. Travis Kalanick’s Warpath | Vanity Fair http://t.co/mszsF7LVmu, see more http://t.co/mWVjp7qF1X

A Month After Pandora’s CFO Was Hired, His Boss Got Fired — Then He Saved... (@nichcarlson - @businessinsider) http://t.co/h8B7mklUag

One year after pressing pause , I'd like to reflect on the journey: what's worked, what hasn't and the changes in-between.<...> You'd think that this would merely be an exercise in going over my notes and charting the route my year took, but it's seemingly not as simple as that. I can't even create…

[Image: Flickr user Ed Uthman ] The question will likely be timeless: How do you discover new music? Some companies have bet on human editors, while others put their weight behind clever algorithms. One company thinks the solution is actually more like a pendulum that swings back and forth between…

Vevo, the Giant Music Video Site, Tries to Fix Itself Before It Sells Itself (@pkafka - @recode) http://t.co/NzWs4A9lFh

What Streaming Music Can Be Getting past the breadth of Spotify’s catalog to more meaningful connections with the music One gift that I won’t be giving to loved ones this holiday season is music, sadly. In the age of streaming services like Spotify and Pandora, music has become so readily available…

More evidence that sensible work hours = more productive people. “Shorter, Better, Faster, Stronger”— http://t.co/mq0awZH3rA /via @jcolman