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How Social Media Shortens Your Life
Art, Sol Price, Steel, and Pickleball
Peeyush Jain & Mohit Garg
August 20, 2025
In partnership with
Salutations, Olio aficionados! 👋
Midweek greetings to all, as we unveil the 179th chapter of Weekly Olio—a delightful concoction of laughter, insight, and a sprinkle of mystery. Within these pages, you'll discover a handpicked selection of fascinating finds from the vast realms of the internet.
Keep your eyes peeled for this week’s Publisher’s Parmesan, arriving this Sunday!
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The Quote 💭
“Art is never finished, only abandoned.”
The Tweet 🐦
Sol Price is the most influential retailer you’ve never heard of.
His legacy and lessons cover the entire landscape of modern retail from Costco to Amazon. It also explains the $1.50 hotdog combo.
13 Lessons from Sol Price:
1. Ignorance is a Superpower: Sol had never worked
— Shane Parrish (@ShaneAParrish)
1:21 PM • Aug 17, 2025
Sol Price is one of the most successful yet relatively unknown names who has transformed American retail. His model for a buyer’s club is what led to the idea of Costco and Sam’s Club. He himself restarted his entire career at the age of 60. Useful learnings from a stalwart of American retail.
The Infographic 💹
On many graphs of the physical world, China is in first place by a wide margin. But if you look more closely, India is a distant but real runner up.
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The Short Read 📝
How Pickleball Explains American Culture - by Derek Thompson
There is a pandemic called ‘pickleball’ that has been spreading across the world. Started off as an easier version of tennis for people with weak knees, it has become the default sport for most people. Pickleball clubs and courts have popped almost everywhere. This wonderful article chronicles the rise of this sport comparing it with how other sports became popular in America.
From pickleball to baby names, this piece ties to piece together how culture and fashion are intertwined. Most people like things that are optimally new without being so novel as to generate disfluency or confusion. Just like baby names, people want something that is novel but not too unfamiliar. Pickleball fits the bill for now but for how long, it is anybody’s guess. Highly recommend reading the full article. Read more…
The Long Read 📜
How Social Media Shortens Your Life - by Gurwinder Bhogal
This is one of the most interesting pieces we have come across in recent times. Social media makes time run faster making doom scrolling sessions seem short while they consume large chunks of time. Time perception expands with awareness and memorable events but social media feeds tend to the opposite. This is done using design elements such as infinite scroll and autoplay to keep users in a disoriented state, not very different from how casinos operate.
As users, can we do something to fix this? How do we take our time back? The only way to fix this is via deliberate action. To make life feel longer, choose experiences that are novel, intentional and emotional. In today’s day and time, it is incredibly hard to ensure these things but if we want to take charge of life, there is no other way. Read the full article for more insights. Read more…
Learn from this investor’s $100m mistake
In 2010, a Grammy-winning artist passed on investing $200K in an emerging real estate disruptor. That stake could be worth $100+ million today.
One year later, another real estate disruptor, Zillow, went public. This time, everyday investors had regrets, missing pre-IPO gains.
Now, a new real estate innovator, Pacaso – founded by a former Zillow exec – is disrupting a $1.3T market. And unlike the others, you can invest in Pacaso as a private company.
Pacaso’s co-ownership model has generated $1B+ in luxury home sales and service fees, earned $110M+ in gross profits to date, and received backing from the same VCs behind Uber, Venmo, and eBay. They even reserved the Nasdaq ticker PCSO.
Paid advertisement for Pacaso’s Regulation A offering. Read the offering circular at invest.pacaso.com. Reserving a ticker symbol is not a guarantee that the company will go public. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals.
That’s all for this week. If you enjoyed this edition, we’d really appreciate if you shared it with a friend, family member or colleague.
We’ll be back in your inbox 2 PM IST next Wednesday. Till then, have a productive week!
Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the text belong solely to the author, and not necessarily to the author's employer, organization, committee or other group or individual.
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