🚨 UPDATE: My book FRIENDLY AMBITIOUS NERD is out! Buy it now: gum.co/FANbook
Hello! I’m @visakanv, my friends call me Visa. I’m a 35yo Singaporean “digital native” who grew up on the Internet, writing prolifically across many mediums. I’ve gotten a bit of a reputation for my Twitter threads – check out Aaron Lewis’s post The Spreading of Threading for some context on that. This is a work-in-progress post consolidating my often-revisited, often-shared twitter threads.
(PS: If you prefer audio, here’s a list of links to podcast episodes I’ve been on: visakanv.com/podcasts/)
Start Here
These are good threads to get a sense of my “operating system”, the beliefs and ideas near the core of my thinking, my ways of seeing.
- 2021 talking points reboot thread: this is the single best place to start
- “exploring my curiosity” threads – these are some of my all-time favorite threads, where I just pick some object or idea or concept and then start exploring and learning and tweeting as I go. (I’d love it if you did these too! Tag me in one, and I’ll add it to this list.)
- “RT for more takes” – I recently revisited this thread and was surprised by how well it captures many of my top-of-mind ideas.
- FAQs about cultivating taste and building a body of work – I’m very proud of these, I think I somehow managed to distill a lot of important points into a rather small space.
- FAQs I get about my threads themselves – how I think about them, how I do them, etc – particularly check out the thread about threading as a solution to fragmentation
- video snippets that have moved me deeply over the years – it would not be inaccurate to say that some of these videos are part of the reason why I’m still alive. It’s a significant part of why I do what I do.
- movies thread – particularly the Mean Girls thread, which has relevance even to geopolitics
- tv thread – don’t miss the Margaery Tyrell appreciation thread
- games thread – I enjoyed analyzing the addictiveness of Firaxis games
- 10 big ideas that have changed my life
- thread of my best one-liners
- weird-offbrand thoughts
- “half-joking” thread
- self authorship – a recurring, bleak conversation I’ve had with many friends
marriage/relationships
I never set out to be someone who dispensed relationship advice, but I talk about my wife and our marriage sometimes, and those tweets tend to popular + people are always asking me questions about her/us. The following threads are my most popular re: relationships, and I reference them a lot, so I wrote a “master threadpost” using them as raw material.
- my wife predicts divorce really well
- your spouse will annoy you more than anybody else – even if they’re the least annoying person you know!
- the project management of a relationship
- the necessity of being considerate
- “spicing up your relationship” is about being vulnerable
- my wife is funny – (warning, you may fall in love with my wife.)
make friends – peopling and socializing
This list was initially further down the page, but I’m starting to realize that these might be some of the most valuable things that I’ve written. It’s amazing to me how often I encounter smart, thoughtful people who tell me that they’re lonely.
- the most valuable thing I know is how to make friends
- different people have different models of reality
- fridge light theory – a way of expressing the idea that people underestimate how much of everything they observe is conditional on them being the observer
- people are bad at asking for help – you can get better at it! it’s life-changing
- the ROI on kindness is staggering
- how to build more intimate relationships with people
- how do you win the love and trust of others?
- Jokes perform social functions
- give specific and sincere compliments
- be sensitive and ask good followup questions
- Agreeing with people who think they disagree with you is the most fun conversation judo move
- “leaders are narcissists” is a self-fulfilling prophecy that deters non-narcissists from leadership roles
- play the long game when peopling
- the shadow world of social reality
- knowing when to stfu
- tactical agreement
- dating seems outdated
- modern civilization seems defined by loneliness, kids want to be youtubers & instagram hotties to stave off loneliness
- small group of people loosely-but-truly aligned, producing public-facing work that’s directed at each other = scenes
social media / interneting
My perspective on this is is intimately tied up with the above. I might write a book or something someday – maybe a series of blogposts – in the theme of “Making Friends In The Digital Age”. Social media to me is a wonderful thing, full of wonder and opportunity. But lots of people seem to struggle with navigating it. There are many layers to this.
- ** twitter_rpg_strategy_guide.txt
- the blending and smashing of contexts on social media
- I wish everybody could have the experience of going viral – it’s humbling
- ** **networking guide**
- the necessity of blocking – the more of a “public figure” you become, the more necessary it becomes to block people who violate your house rules. If you don’t have house rules, they will be established for you
- examples of behaviors I think merit blocking
- the game is rigged
- people who are really knowledgeable are publicly silent about the juiciest stuff, because the upside to talking about it publicly is minimal, and the downside potentially catastrophic
- googling is a superpower
- martyring yourself online
narcissism
Narcissism is a topic I find myself drawn to. I could joke that it’s because I’m a narcissist myself, though I sometimes also joke that I love myself too much to be a narcissist. I think narcissism is a convoluted but important concept. Actual narcissists ruin a lot of things for a lot of people, and the fear of being called a narcissist deters a lot of people from doing things that would be good for them and for others. So I think it’s important, if we want to build a better world, that we have some honest conversations about what we mean when we use the term narcissist, and we be clear about what behaviors are acceptable and what are not, and why.
- it can be sometimes be more narcissistic to be private than public, if you’re doing it to protect your self-image from scrutiny
- sometimes I want to celebrate myself the way I celebrate my friends, but I hesitate bc my gut tells me it would be too easily parsed as narcissism
- theory about loving your own writing – many people are wary of being self-promotional, because it might seem narcissistic – and they throw out the baby with the bathwater
Riffs
These are ideas that I return to over and over again, and find myself reusing in all sorts of contexts. You could probably kinda-sorta put together a VisaBot from these riffs.
- be kind
- have fun
- be prolific
- take notes
- be attentive
- fiddle with it
- make friends (AKA find the others)
- cultivate taste
- everything is a remix
- indulge your curiosity
- flirting is an OODA loop
- adults are in short supply
- it’s simple but we make it hard
- find out how you are fucked up and fix it
- be so prolific you don’t recognize yourself
- narcissists ruin self-love for the rest of us
- “I’m the real victim here” – every narcissist ever
- we are all born creative and it is socialized out of us
- people wanna be fuckable more than they wanna fuck
- the public is insufficiently educated on how to be a good public
- sensitivity underrated
Personal Development
These are threads about things I’ve learned about becoming a stronger and better version of myself.
- perfectionism and aversion to responsibility – the outdated fear of being at fault
- Visa’s memex (everything is connected)
- Visa’s rules for life [draft]
- How to compete with people smarter and more ambitious than you – you don’t!
- literally any decent piece of advice can be weaponized in some way to justify getting back on your bullshit
- The art of good reply game – most people get it wrong.
- People mis-distribute their seriousness – focus on the fundamentals
- Lessons from feral life
- make friends – everybody loves to make a great introduction
- Coping mechanisms – it seems easier to address symptoms than to correct the underlying issue
- **how do I develop taste?** (mentioned earlier but mentioning again)
- project management – possibly the most important skill, depending on how you look at it
- all-advice is context dependent to a degree most do not realize until they encounter a different context
Singapore
I’m a Singaporean. I was born here, raised here, did my mandatory military conscription here, got married here, bought a house here. Friends from abroad are often curious to hear more about Singapore from me.
- an oral history – master thread that contains most of the others
- Lee Kuan Yew quotes – non-Singaporeans are always asking me about LKY
- SG funny – you can learn a lot about a place by studying the humor
- my criticisms of SG – hate the way we treat our LGBTQ citizens, hate the way some of us are gleeful to wield the death penalty, hate that some of us have a “better than you” mentality towards our neighbours
- my old work commute – I really wanted to do this and I’m glad I did
- meatspace thread – just a bunch of pics I’ve taken now and then
- visiting Parliament
Marketing & Positioning
I’m a marketer by profession. I never specifically set out to be one, but I’m good enough at it that it pays the bills. Want to hire me as a consultant? DM me, let’s chat!
marketing thread / / doing SaaS marketing
- doing unpaid work
- How I edit email copy
- branding thread – this is pretty good
- Lazy marketing: “Why should I buy your book?”
- “What are you really trying to say?”
- Slingshot Theory
- lady gaga positioning – she knew how to use being weird to her advantage
- taylor swift is a religion
- sunny leone positioning
- Introducing setups
- the most important task for a marketer is to find the right product to market
Fashion & Aesthetics
I’ve always been curious about fashion and aesthetics intellectually, though it’s only been very recently that I’ve actually started applying it to my own life. This has been increasingly interesting and important to me as time has gone by. I’ve come to believe that men in particular are impoverished by simplistic, bland aesthetics.
- playing with aesthetics is a precursor to playing with worldviews
- Don’t be tacky
- refactored aesthetics thread – a distilled version of interesting aesthetics thread
- fashion thread – this was the OG thread
- indian men’s fashion
- my personal fashion thread – stuff I’ve bought
- tattoos
- desipunk
- aesthetics thread
- thread of beautiful things
- cultural cosplay – the broader frame for both appropriation and appreciation
- jesus aesthetics
- hendrix aesthetics
- slash aesthetics (jewelry)
book threads
Before the Internet I was a library nerd! I’ve always loved books, and I’d still like to write and publish books of my own.
- 2018 bookthread
- 2019 bookthread
- Debt, David Graeber
- The Courage to be Disliked, Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga. Several people have actually told me that they preferred this thread to the actual book.
- tribe, sebastian junger
- ogilvy’s confessions
- the body keeps the score
- Stuff matters
- books that mutuals want to read
frames
I think about a lot of things in terms of frames. How you frame something can change everything about it.
- a seemingly meaningless existence can become more meaningful just by thinking about it
- the frame is a useful constraint if you think beyond it
- context-dependent truths, dishonest truths
- misunderstandings (horses)
- child photographer – how different the world looks through different people’s eyes
- some people see patterns where others see isolated incidents
- quackposting and explaining the tao
- infinite-gaming is about playing with frames
find out how you are fucked up and fix it
Practically everybody inherits all sorts of bullshit that they don’t even realize. Life seems to get a lot better when we acknowledge this and address it.
- find out how you have been fucked up and fix that
- **ugh fields** – the idea that there are ideas that we subconsciously, actively avoid because they make us uncomfortable.
- leadership and limiting beliefs about responsibility – mentioned this earlier but repeating it
- empty your cup
- the trauma of migrant (asian) parents
- the actual importance of being honest – the way you think & talk about things with other people easily gets cross-contaminated with the way you think & talk about things with yourself
meatbag management
The body is the mind.
building and maintaining healthy communities
I am very passionate about building and maintaining good online communities. I have a blogpost with a set of links about it titled ‘How to build and maintain communities” that I share often with friends who are curious about this. I feel like I was raised first by books and libraries, and then the Internet. I’d like the Internet – or parts of it, at least – to continue to be a space where people can find kinship.
- safe spaces can be fantastic – people tend to imagine them as coddling spaces, but they should really be more like dojos or gyms where you can train to be stronger, smarter, more sensitive.
- my ethics is derived from my desire for good peers
- fast growing communities get diluted by fools, clowns, bandits and assholes
- we should not tolerate assholes
- contemplating the “innocent” sexism and homophobia I inherited from the culture around me
- **the art of replying** – I am openly happy to describe myself as a reply guy. The difference is that I’m good at it.
- blocking people – I never like to do it, but I believe that it’s necessary
- being a polytribal weirdheart
masculinity
These are threads that typically invite some of the most hostile and insulting responses that I get online. Which… is itself kind of revealing, if you think about it.
- I believe that school disincentivizes the development of confident, independent men
- menworld – the word ‘patriarchy’ can be quite loaded so I thought it would be interesting to re-imagine it from first principles
- The Bishan Gay – a critical part of understanding boys IMO is understanding the desire for glory at the expense of life and limb
- sensitive, smart and strong – the three fundamental principles in my model of masculinity
- being sensitive has made me smarter – we mostly appreciate that smarts and strengths are good things, but sensitivity is still too often derided as weakness
- trp thread – I spent a couple of years on TRP on reddit, actively reading, replying and even posting my own content. I actually got a couple of “points” from their system, which is s
- sexy forearms – as a general rule, women tend to prefer these to dickpics
- men cockblock themselves by being creepy
- krishna vibes
- the costs and consequences of overwhelmingly male POV in media
- boys playing video games at the expense of almost all else – why do they do it? what does it tell us?
- penises in comedy
- young boys trying to be cool
- i remember thinking rape couldn’t be a big deal
- male fashion
- on mansplaining
- a friend finds out that another man is trash
women & girls
I have always been interested in women and girls, which can be a surprisingly unusual thing for a man to say. I am interested in their inner lives, in their politics, their culture.
- women’s art
- dismissing fashion as “girly”
- moodboard for if I were a woman
- understanding “men are trash”
race, ethnicity, culture
As with many other things, I never set out to be someone who was interested in matters of race and ethnicity. But such matters have always been interested in me.
writing
I have always described myself as a writer. Even as a guy who does vlogs, I think of myself as a writer.
- I have strong feelings about words
- loving your own writing
- my goal in life is to be a word-artist-magician
- writing is jailbreak
memoirs
I’m slowly working on a book called Naughty Boy, a collection of essays about my childhood growing up in Singapore from 1990 – 2020.
- childhood media
- flunking out of the gifted education program
- local music scene days
- political blogging days
- army days
- helm of the arse gods
- my complicated relationship with privilege
- my relationship with money
- the four dominant media threads in my life
- school was a waste of my time
Fun – if you’re not having fun, what’s the point?
- salmon vending machine
- we already live in a boring dystopia
- pepsi rebranding slides
- travelling aunty cooking show
- the pee is stored in the balls
- I want to be a shaman
- dream about art school
- nice
Crowdsourced
Sometimes I ask people things and I get great responses that are worth going through.
- youtube videos people recommend
- interviews that people recommend
- books people want to read
- movies people want to watch
Personal history / old content
FB 2017 thread / twitter favs 2017
Unsorted
- conversation with 16yo MAGA kid
- people like to contribute to vectors but few people like to take ownership of one
- maps thread
- whoa thread
- wholesome thread
- how stuff works thread
- general funny thread
- insightful threads (other people’s)
- revealed beliefs
- my favorite essay of all time – naive techno-optimism, culture wars
- wwe model of reality
- journalism thread
- incentives thread
- NYC thread
- assemble the mindcity
- magical powers
- how my brain works
- ways in which I have been incepted
- relentless
- memes i’ve made
- i’m kinda into fengshui
- violence and abuse thread
If you’ve gotten any value out of my threads and would like to get ringside seats to my creative journey, support me on Patreon!
_____
2021 update: the following is the previous iteration of this post… left as some sort of weird vestige at the bottom… idk
2019 update: this blogpost is now quite outdated.
it is very possible to make a living hawking bullshit
I am a tall man
Against generalism (the way we are educated)
Unrealistic expectations and incorrect models of reality:
1. Thinking a lot lately about how much of life's frustrations are really caused by unrealistic expectations and incorrect models of reality
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) August 22, 2017
Low battery
😂 love this more than I can explain. There's an entire essay or novel to be written about this. Let's try some tweets? https://t.co/4c3u4psis7
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) July 16, 2017
A young boy’s idea of cool:
it's always fascinating to me to think about where young boys get this sort of idea of what coolness is, and how exactly they fudge it https://t.co/7SEdgSBpQL
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) June 15, 2017
My life through video games:
Let's do a thread about my life through video games! Always meant to write an essay about it but it's impt to me so I've been putting it off pic.twitter.com/OW4pGcM7KU
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) September 9, 2017
Best things I’ve written, off the top of my head
Just for fun + to see what happens, here's a list, off the top of my head, of the best things I've ever written:
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) June 16, 2017
The homophobia I inherited / the relationship between disgust and morality
8. I distinctly recall being both homophobic and transphobic as an adolescent, in a sort of idle, ignorant way. "Inherited from society"
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) July 10, 2017
Legacy issues in language
Language is full of interesting legacy issues. The pocket supercomputer I'm writing this on isn't really a "phone" or a "mobile"
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) July 27, 2015
Documentary ideas
I have a lot of oddball documentary ideas in the swirling around backstage. Let's try and articulate some https://t.co/wPjCV12xqi
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) May 28, 2017
Tattoos
I have an elaborate vision for a style system of tattoos that I find so intriguing I think I'm going to learn to draw so I can convey it
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) September 26, 2017
Indian men fashion
I have a Pinterest board called "Indian Men's Fashion". It began with the belief that Indian men can't simply dress like white guys: pic.twitter.com/PrmNp2ubHC
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) September 9, 2017
Fashion
I think a lot about fashion and weirdness. If this looks odd and funny now, consider moral, ideological, intellectual fashions pic.twitter.com/TYHWGqxsYY
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) September 25, 2017
Learning:
4/ If you want to learn ecommerce marketing, you shouldn't Google "ecommerce marketing". You should look for successful ecommerce businesses
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) June 6, 2014
Racism in SG
1/ the 1st important thing Chinese friends can do is to shut down overt racism when they witness it. Sucks that this needs to be said…
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) September 1, 2014
variations in tone when writing on the web
1/ Interesting realization about tone on the web. I (and others) use capitalization, punctuation + short sentences when I'm confident, angry
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) October 11, 2014
writing advice: Don’t forget about the reader:
1/ My heart smiles + aches when I see writers doing what I used to do: spilling tonnes of ideas, information, data onto the page
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) October 15, 2014
more writing advice:
1/ I think I've come a pretty long way as a writer, blogger, content creator. Most important lesson: Be purpose-driven. Know your end-goal.
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) October 26, 2014
mvp model of personal development
1/ It's very interesting and useful I think to apply the MVP model of product development to personal development. pic.twitter.com/ef1dY1UNr8
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) November 23, 2014
feature requests
1/ There shd be a way to text a person a todo list via IM. Would make grocery shopping easier for me+wife. Wld be gratifying. Cc: @jiggityk
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) November 29, 2014
Influencer marketing
1/ I have pretty strong opinions about the whole Gushcloud thing. Not sure if they're misinformed and ignorant, but here goes:
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) December 23, 2014
Narcissism travel
1/ "Has travel become another exercise in narcissism"? Sure. But so's any sort of public-facing identity performance, writing included
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) January 5, 2015
my writing process
1/ Had a really difficult time with some content recently. Feel like it's worth talking about, 1 instance of a broader problem worth solving
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) January 2, 2015
attempted summary of word vomits (stopped at 10)
9/ The best ideas get implemented w/ minimal resistance, b/c they reveal selves to be superior to the status quo. (We shd study success.)
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) January 18, 2015
on growing up
1/ On growing up: A man should be
sensitive (to inputs from reality),
smart (at making sense of reality), and
strong (to effect reality).— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) April 23, 2015
frustration
0144hrs. Was hoping to be asleep by now. Am not. Mildly troubling. I want to fix this. Will maybe post a few tweets to try to clear head.
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) January 17, 2015
echo chambers
It's interesting to witness how people throw the term "echo chamber" around to criticize others who are careful about curating information
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) November 11, 2015
list of truths
1. If you're not engaging with a fear, you're probably hiding from it
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) June 23, 2017
games and meta-games
I want to write a blogpost about games and meta-games, inspired by that last post I retweeted. But I'm feeling sleepy, so let's try tweeting
— Visa is doing marketing consults (see pinned!) (@visakanv) April 26, 2016
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