Cut Through
Things I'm thinking about - and what they might mean for the rest of us
You’re doing what?
I blogged near constantly when I first moved to the U.S. eighteen or so years ago. Then a daughter arrived, and I stopped. A couple of years ago, I started writing incessantly on LinkedIn, and I’m still doing that today. But I’ve been missing the chance to write from the intersection of work and life. I have thoughts. It may be time to share them.
A Thing I Noticed
Apparently, Gen Z didn’t get the memo that retail is dead.
I spent a few days in New York with the family, and took my daughter shopping for a few hours. Between Soho and Chinatown, we passed at least five different stores with lines stretching down the block. Not clubs. Not cafés. Retail stores - the brick and mortar kind.
Glossier, Brandy Melville, Edikted - all packed. Long lines of young women, 12–18, waiting patiently to get inside on a Friday afternoon. Some of the lines stretched half a block. I hadn’t heard of half the brands, let alone imagine there would be queues for them.
Inside? Wall-to-wall people. Overworked staff. Thirty-minute waits for a fitting room. And yet only thirty-second waits to pay.
That juxtaposition stuck with me.
They desperately want to try things on.
They don’t seem to care about buying them while they’re there.
In some cases, the purchase might still happen online - maybe with a discount, maybe later that night. But the trying? That happens together among the dumped merchandise, in the mirrors, in the moment.
For a generation born into one-click, two-day (same day?) shipping, this wasn’t about efficiency. It was about immersion. A little chaos. A lot of vibes (as I am told).
Even Zara seemed to get it. Their Soho store had the largest digital screen I’ve ever seen. Not for ads. For ambience. A billboard turned monument.
E-commerce may be frictionless, but friction is apparently part of the fun.
At least when it feels like the right kind.
And whether or not the transaction happens in the store, the community appreciates the in-person opportunity.
A Thing People May Be Getting Wrong
Young people have no attention span.
At least, that’s the story we’ve told ourselves, and we’re constantly being told by others.
Gen Z can’t focus. Everything has to be short, fast and snackable.
But I just watched them wait thirty minutes to try on a top in a store that had a line around the block. Some of them were probably in that line for an hour.
It’s not that they won’t wait. It’s that they won’t wait for something boring.
If the experience is rich enough, and if it’s fun, social and aesthetic - they’ll give it time. They’ll document it. They’ll want to be part of it.
We keep optimizing for speed when we should be designing for meaning.
These people are not impatient. They’re just discerning.
So maybe the real question isn’t how fast we can deliver something, it’s whether the thing we’re delivering is worth showing up for.
A Thing That’s Stuck With Me
Black Mirror is back. And somehow still essential.
The first episode aired in late 2011. Since then, just 33 episodes (34 if you count Bandersnatch, which I try not to). That’s barely two seasons’ worth by traditional standards.
And yet, Black Mirror has managed to stay lodged in the cultural bloodstream for almost 15 years. Not because it floods us with content, but because of the storytelling. It’s one of the few fiction shows I still find myself thinking about years later.
My wife and I still talk about “The Entire History of You” where you can replay your memories like video footage. Usually in the middle of a disagreement, one of us will say, “If only we could roll the tape…”
We still reference “Metalhead” too - the one with the robot dogs - especially now that real ones are showing up in police departments and warehouses.
And the first episode… well, the less said about the Prime Minister and the pig, the better. But does it really feel that far away from reality these days?
I haven’t watched the new season yet. But I’m glad it’s there. Because some things don’t need to be constant to matter.
You don’t need volume to build a voice. You just need to say something that sticks.
A Thing You Might Want To Steal
The DOJ is circling Disney’s bid for FuboTV. While the headlines focus on antitrust, there’s a quieter lesson for CEOs:
If your deal takes a year to get approved, your message needs to last just as long.
I’ve been through those drawn-out regulatory waits, during my time at EMI and Scripps Networks. You can’t overpromise. You can’t say nothing. But you can give people something to hold onto, like what you stand for, what’s definitely not changing, and why their work still matters.
Uncertainty doesn’t break teams - silence does.
OK, that’s enough things for the moment. Until next time - keep cutting through.
— Dylan