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Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyAirbnb's predictive abilities
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyAirbnb's predictive abilities
I recently discovered and subscribed to Packy McCormick's "Not Boring" newsletter. So far it's quite good, and so here I am mentioning it to you all on the blog. In his latest newsletter, he makes the case for why Airbnb and Zillow -- the two largest residential real estate tech companies -- should merge. Naturally this new company would be called Zillbnb. You can read all about why he thinks this is a good idea over here, but I would like to point out one thing that I found interesting.
Packy makes the argument that "easiest-to-book, shortest duration reservations" are a leading indicator for changes in demand. In other words, platforms like Airbnb can start to tell you where people might want to live and platforms like Breather can start to tell you where people might want to work.
To support this argument he uses the example of his Airbnb rental outside of New York City. Sure, demand initially fell off a cliff at the beginning of lockdown, but then it started to surge as New Yorkers sought refuge outside of the city. And while I think that this particular change in demand will likely end up being short-term in nature, a similar trend is being reported around in the world. Did we hear it first on Airbnb?
I recently discovered and subscribed to Packy McCormick's "Not Boring" newsletter. So far it's quite good, and so here I am mentioning it to you all on the blog. In his latest newsletter, he makes the case for why Airbnb and Zillow -- the two largest residential real estate tech companies -- should merge. Naturally this new company would be called Zillbnb. You can read all about why he thinks this is a good idea over here, but I would like to point out one thing that I found interesting.
Packy makes the argument that "easiest-to-book, shortest duration reservations" are a leading indicator for changes in demand. In other words, platforms like Airbnb can start to tell you where people might want to live and platforms like Breather can start to tell you where people might want to work.
To support this argument he uses the example of his Airbnb rental outside of New York City. Sure, demand initially fell off a cliff at the beginning of lockdown, but then it started to surge as New Yorkers sought refuge outside of the city. And while I think that this particular change in demand will likely end up being short-term in nature, a similar trend is being reported around in the world. Did we hear it first on Airbnb?
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