Hi, there! I’m Dan Benjamin, and this is The Unusual Newsletter, where I’ll share notes and thoughts about work, creativity, industry, productivity, photography, writing, podcasting, and entertainment.

That’s Terrific, But I’m Very Busy As I Can Imagine You Are

This is fair. Which is why I’m sending out just one issue per week. Something you can hopefully look forward to, a distraction from the mundane. Maybe if I do very well at this, I’ll share something you’ll find valuable.

You Didn’t Sign Up for This

But why are you here? That’s a valid question. Most of you probably didn’t sign up to receive this specific newsletter, though you did sign up to receive one of the newsletters I wrote (or intended to write) in the past for a project or podcast I was developing. And because I save pretty much everything, I included your email address in the distribution list in the hopes that you’ll stick around.

What’s This Going to Cost?

Nothing. Your Unusual Newsletter subscription is free.

You can support this project if you’d like. If you do, you'll be helping me offset the costs of self-hosting and sending this newsletter, which isn’t free. You’ll also get additional, so-called premium content like the podcast version of the newsletter, and some other surprises along the way.

If You Will It Dude, It Is No Dream

Starting something new like this is a bit of a risk, or at least it feels that way to me. I’m going to do my best job here at writing this, finding links and topics worth sharing, and maybe being a bit more personally revealing than I’ve historically been on my podcasts.

We’ll have to see how it goes, but I do hope you’ll stick around here with me to find out.

Let’s begin.

The Unusual Newsletter #1

Leaving Austin

After over 15 years in Austin, Texas, we have moved to Colorado. Austin was an amazing place to have worked and lived, and being there lead to many great friends and experiences. But a lot had changed for me in the time. My mother moved back to Florida. My ex-wife wanted to move out of state. Most of my friends had also either moved or were so busy with work and home life, actually connecting in person meant scheduling three months in advance.

Combined with astronomical property taxes and cost of living, terrible traffic, overcrowding, limited direct flights, my son’s goal to attend college in Colorado, and my personal distaste for the Austin climate (it’s always humid and weird, making hot days hotter and cold days miserable), it was time to go.

Reconnecting with Photography

We’ve been having a great time in Colorado so far, exploring, hiking, visiting the state parks as the leaves turn, and enjoying being outside without the mood-ruining humidity and unpleasant stickiness of Austin.

Surrounded by so much natural beauty and so many interesting sights, I’ve started taking my camera with me everywhere I go. It’s been a refreshing change for me, having been away from photography for quite a while. Re-learning old skills is a fun challenge for me, and I’m excited to share the results with you… somewhere. Do people still use Flickr? Is it 500px? Glass.photo? Where do we go for this in 2025?

Thoughts About Sora

OpenAI’s Sora app is fascinating to me because I believe it’s a bit of a Trojan horse for AI. In Sora, all content is AI generated, so there’s no guessing about its origin or nature. It’s fun to doomscroll and see what people are thinking of. The constraints and guardrails make creating just what you want both interesting and challenging.

For example, consider this Sora video of me as Wolverine. Compare this to the famous “berserker rage” scene from Logan (a bit violent for those of you knitting at home).

The prompt I first tried was @danbenjamin runs through a forest in jeans and a white tank top as he screams with berserker rage eventually making fists and revealing that he has three metal claws on each hand similar to a famous superhero.

This prompt failed because of Sora’s third-party-content guardrails. Yet removing similar to a famous superhero allowed the video to be generated, and it’s clear that Sora still knew exactly the scene I was going for.

But this is curious to me. How exactly did Sora know the scene I was going for? I asked ChatGPT how Sora goes about figuring this stuff out, and here’s what it told me:

Sora is trained on massive amounts of publicly available video data, licensed datasets, and synthetic clips. It learns patterns — how light, motion, texture, and perspective behave — not specific copyrighted movies.

So if you describe “a man running from a boulder in a cave,” it’s not recalling Indiana Jones, but generating what it predicts that scene should look like based on general cinematic and physical patterns it has learned.

ChatGPT assured me that Sora cannot and does not have the ability to access or watch YouTube, Netflix, TV, or movies of any kind. Yet the results are fascinating to me, and I suspect there’s more going on here that is being shown. More to come on this topic.

Stuff

I have a bunch of recommendations across several categories this week.

• David Bars are amazing. I’ve been lifting for about a decade, and in all of that time, I have tried almost every protein bar in existence. Most of them are terrible. Some of them are awful. A few of them are good. But David Bars really are amazing. They were created by the founders of the RXBAR (who waited until the day after their non-compete expired to make David Bars). Their macros are perfect, the ingredients are understandable, and they actually taste great. My favorite flavors are Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and Fudge Brownie.
• Ninja Crispi is a different kind of air fryer. It’s basically a shock resistant glass container with the heating element and tech in the “lid”. Put the little tray into the container, put your food in, and press the button, and you’re done. Unlike other air fryers, I’ve found you don’t have to turn or shake the food in these at all because of the nature of the tray and the way the air flows inside. Put the storage lid on the the glass container and put that right into the fridge. And when it’s done, put the container right into the dishwasher. Genius.
• Clever Supply Camera Strap is something I’m trying out. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been back into photography again hard, and the kind of photography I like most means carrying a small rangefinder around my neck or crossbody and having it ready at a moment’s notice. This camera strap is well made, affordable, and will hopefully last a long, long time. You can get them with the Peak Design anchors too, if you want (I prefer the standard strap with split rings).

Entertainment

• I feel kind of dumb for enjoying aka Charlie Sheen on Netflix as much as I did, but there you go.
• The Perfect Neighbor, also on Netflix, is a fascinating but tragic story told through body-cam and confession-room footage rather than traditional interviews. It’s been #1 on Netflix for a while, and it’s no wonder.
• Let’s just celebrate 44 years of Tempest, the second best arcade game ever (after Robotron)?

I’m all out of sorts this year with my Austin-to-Colorado move and living in AirBnBs for too long, so my Halloween game isn’t really up to snuff, but I can’t ship this issue without at least sharing one Halloween-inspired link:

• 1924 is a fun, creepy Australian-based branding studio that makes some really fun Halloween-inspired merchandise. My girlfriend got me this beautiful brass lighter which I carry every day. They also make cool clothing and tons of other gear.

Creepy Trivia

Without looking this up, can you remember the 1980s TV show that ended with the line “Until next time… try to enjoy the daylight.” I’ll share the answer next week.

We Abide

That’s all I have for this week. Actually that’s not true, I have a lot more, but I’m trying to pace myself here.

I hope you enjoyed this first issue. Catch you later on down the trail.

Happy Halloween!