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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Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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 DonnellyRemote work & innovation
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyRemote work & innovation
Here are two interesting studies that explore the relationship between remote work (distributed teams) and innovation:
This one explores how distributed teams have impacted "disruptive scientific discoveries" from 1961 to 2020. To measure this they look at scientific discoveries that end up becoming widely cited, which they take to mean that the work has supplanted an existing body of knowledge. Here they find that distributed work is inversely correlated with disruptive innovation. It is fine for incremental improvements, but it is less than ideal for new foundational ideas. That said, they do note that new technologies -- stuff like Zoom -- have started to minimize the innovation gap by helping people communicate as if they were co-located.
But stuff like Zoom isn't perfect. The second study looks at the impact of virtual communication on idea generation. And what they find is that videoconferencing is bad for that, largely because it focuses people on a screen and "prompts a narrower cognitive focus." So if your job involves coming up with new ideas, Zoom may not be the best forum for that. But you probably already knew that.
Here are two interesting studies that explore the relationship between remote work (distributed teams) and innovation:
This one explores how distributed teams have impacted "disruptive scientific discoveries" from 1961 to 2020. To measure this they look at scientific discoveries that end up becoming widely cited, which they take to mean that the work has supplanted an existing body of knowledge. Here they find that distributed work is inversely correlated with disruptive innovation. It is fine for incremental improvements, but it is less than ideal for new foundational ideas. That said, they do note that new technologies -- stuff like Zoom -- have started to minimize the innovation gap by helping people communicate as if they were co-located.
But stuff like Zoom isn't perfect. The second study looks at the impact of virtual communication on idea generation. And what they find is that videoconferencing is bad for that, largely because it focuses people on a screen and "prompts a narrower cognitive focus." So if your job involves coming up with new ideas, Zoom may not be the best forum for that. But you probably already knew that.
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