Hi! I'm Adam, the founder of Mr. Edutainment. I write daily on edutainment, building and spreading ideas, and leading a creator-led business for over 20 years. Artist at heart. Family man in rural England. Subscribe to my newsletter, GrowthCandy, where each issue shares one idea to help build and spread your work, delivered as a short comic.
Mum taught me to fight for — and dream of — the the world you want to live in. Every day. Until your very last day.
If you love what you do, play with it sometimes. Like to sketch? Play with pens. Different nibs, different inks, feeling how they behave on paper, to see how they influence your sketches and my ideas. A mechanical HB pencil and a wooden 2B make you sketch differently. A fine nib and a brush nib make you ink differently. Different inks make you layer differently. Try and see what happens for you. Like to write? Play with keyes. Different boards,...
Ever feel guilty for going the extra-extra mile when making things for those you serve? I used to. I’d hear a voice in my head saying, “It’s done, the customer will be happy with that, you need to move on to the next item on your list or you’re only going to slow you and your team down, it’s done, what are you doing, get on with it already.” Listening to that voice is likely no bad thing. But choosing...
Everyone talks about promotion. Promotion promotion promotion. How you should be doing more promotion. Promotion is important… But why must we assume it must be you doing all the promotion? Path 1: Make something good, then promote it forever. Path 2: Make something great, designed to be spread, and let those you made it for promote it for you forever. Its a choice.
Humans care a lot about status and affiliation. Humans are very good at spotting both in each other. Humans are very bad at realizing how little all this matters, until they witness the end of someone’s live — be it theirs, or someone very close to them. Then, they sometimes notice the futility, and turn to the things that matter. Their craft, contribution, courage, wisdom, and temperance. Then, in time, they forget again, reverting back to status and affiliation. You...
Google Maps will take you straight “there”. You’ll never really learn where anything is, but it’ll always take you “there”. You’ll not notice the details on the road, the trees, the signs, the changes, but it’ll always take you “there”. You’ll not discover the side roads and country paths that give you ideas for other journeys, but it’ll always take you “there”. You’ll not encounter the opportunity to get lost, pay closer attention, correct your course, and learn so much...
When you’re about to lose someone, the pain is the point. The real tragedy would be to not feel pain. When you’re wrestling with your art, the pain is the point, for the same reasons. It shows just how very much you care. Maybe we don’t want these things to be easier, more efficient, more productive. Maybe the pain is the point.
Most of the thoughts I share in this journal never get posted on social media etc. Because the objective of these words isn’t to get likes or attention. The objective of these words is to help me discover what I think, and to share the journey of those thoughts with those who care in the future. Perhaps future-me, looking back on past ideas. Perhaps my son, getting to know what I was thinking about when he was too young to...
We love learning in my household. We’re planning to build a small library into our home once we clear the room out planned for it, and carve some time to carve some wood to make it how we envision it. But it’s not just books (though there are a lot of books). There is also comics. Videos. Little toys that remind us of lessons learned. Pictures we’ve drawn. Photos we’ve taken. Learning is a vibrant, exciting, fulfilling-for-its-own-sake passtime. Something to...
Talk to almost any freelancer. They’ll tell you about the difference between the opportunity, and what shipped. A wonderful, vibrant, exciting possibility, and what shipped. A novel new approach that customer interviews revered, and what shipped. A huge part of making great work is having CEOs that don’t ruin it.
I saw a quote today that tickled me: “The reason RAM prices went up 4x is that a massive amount of not-yet-manufactured memoryh was bought with money that doesn’t really exist to be put into GPUs that haven’t been made yet, to be installed in data centers that haven’t been built, powered by infrasttructure that may never exist, to satisfy demand that isn’t actually there, in order to generate profies that are mathematically impossible.” Fascinating. A fun reminder to not...
We don’t like when big tech talks about what their products will do to writers, or artists, or musicians, because they’re not writers, or artists, or musicians. Artists want to work together to push art forward. We do it all on our own, and we enjoy it intensely. Same for writers. We do it all on our own, and we enjoy it intensely. Same for musicians. I’m not a musician, but I adore watching musicians collaborate and advance their genres....
My team uses Basecamp because all of the work is in one place. Our marketing uses Brevo because all of the email and customer data is in one place. Our animation pipeline uses Toon Boom products because everything from storyboard through to compositing is ine one place. Our codebases use standard syntax and structure because every developer who touches it finds it easy and familiar. Our scripts are written in .fdx files because every scriptwriter knows what to do with...
The funny thing about the list of things on your mind right now… Is if you were to write them all down… And cross out the ones that don’t directly impact the heart of your work or those you love… You may just find that the list reduces by 90%. Just from asking one question. Isn’t it better to focus on just those things, then?
Agencies love interns and junior talent because they have fresh eyes with fresh ideas, unburdened by memories of what got shot down, what clients won’t go for, and what the market “expects nowadays”. What they overlook is, we should all remain that way anyway. What use is your contribution if you’re happy to be neutered by every negative experience along the way. If you can, try to be like a junior with experience, not like a war veteran afraid of...
Great artists don’t draw all day. They draw a lot. When they’re tired of that, they read about drawing. When they’re tired about that, they think about drawing. When they’re tired of that, they do something else. All in service of their craft, for its own sake, and for those they toil for. It’s okay to put the pencil down so long as the fire keeps burning.
Lean into your craft for long enough… and you’ll find you disagree with every one of your heroes on at least something. This can feel disheartening at first. Lonely, even. Then you realize it’s your voice taking form. Your point of view. An expression perhaps worth sharing, a by-product of your tenure in the space. Lean into it — it makes you our brethren, instead of merely our fans.
The things you’re deliberating over… Reading reviews about online… Umming and arring about… Do they make your family meaningfully happier or your art meaningfully better? If not, why not ditch the evaluation and just focus on making your family meaningfully happier or your art meaningfully better?
If a toddler draws a picture, then AI “improves” it by generating a lifelike version of the drawing… does that make the drawing better? Or does it steal a gift from that child away from you. Or rewrite history as we lose evidence of their growth, perspective, and effort. Or remove the desire to improve in a skill that computers “will just do better anyway”. What if the generated lifelike version of the drawing removed the art, by removing the...
What do you do when there’s zero feedback? The best thing I’ve found is to… just not care about the size of the response. Most of the things I’ve made that did well took a minute for others to understand. They were novel… different… and that means less competition (good) but also slower time to “get it” (bad). So we have to either make peace with periods of zero feedback, or make peace with grueling, never-ending, fierce competition. No right...
Life is too short to merely follow all the rules, do your job, pay your taxes, and pass away. Much too short. Forget the rules. Forget the status games. Forget the comparisons and trinkets and nonsense. Make your thing, love your people, and forget those still caught up in the nonsense. Life is simply way, way, way too short.
What makes a great tool? A premium notebook that’s so pretty you daren’t write in it… or a cheap notebook so quick to scuff that you enjoy using it and throwing it around? Software that’s slick and minimal, but does half the things you need with bugs to fix… or software that’s old and clunky-looking, but does everything you need with bugs long fixed? An e-reader that holds thousands of books but needs replacing as the tech ages… or a...
What do we do when “new and improved” isn’t working? When videogames get ridiculous prices and bloated with in-app purchases, enthusiasts produce gems like “Goldeneye X” to add their favorite improvements to their favorite old games. When car manufacturers pepper their new offerings with subscription extras and annoying beeping features, enthusiasts turn to renovating their old rides and sharing an appreciation for vintage. When big tech offerings become ad-laden, ai-stuffed and pricier without any improvements actual customers want, enthusiasts turn...
I was fortunate enough to be laughed at by some of the kids, back in highschool, around 2002. It meant I learned to do my thing (back then it was making comics, videogames, animations, and card games) and putting some of them on my website for free, and others in my backpack to sell on the schoolyard. Some laughed, said they were lame, thought it was silly, and questioned why they’d buy things from me when they could go and...
If you make your price cheap because you think it’ll win more customers, beware. The moment someone else is cheaper, they’re gone. Because they bought you on price. Do you want to be bought for price? Or do you want to be bought for value, novelty, relational equity, contribution, status, or any number of other reasons? Most of them are a race upwards, to provide more value, more novelty, more contribution, etc. Only price is a race downwards, to zero....
One of the gifts AI has given real artists, is the ability to see our art more clearly. Before generative tools existed, we just thought of art as the whole thing - the process, the product, the person, all kind of mixed together. We never questions the component parts, or their relation to one another. Why would we? But now generative tools exist, widely rejected as artists in favor of “making our own art”, we get to question what exactly...
We should write more. Draw more. Make more. Not because it’s for a project. Just “because”. For the hell of it. Because when we’re gone, it’s all that remains. And those who love us might really thank us for leaving more of ourselves behind for them to cherish.
One of the things my mum taught me, was how to enjoy today while fighting for tomorrow. Live today like it’s the last one, don’t sweat the things others sweat. This is all thats guaranteed, so enjoy it and be happy. And Fight today like you’re going to fight and fight and fight for many many years to come. As more problems come, fight those too. You’ll know when it’s time to stop. I don’t know if she knows she’s...
Life’s long until it isn’t. For every craft you pursue, remember to enjoy it for what it is today. For every project you work on, remember to enjoy what it looks like today. For every client you work with, remember to enjoy the work as it is today. For every recruit you hire, remember to enjoy them as they are today. If you can’t do that, maybe they’re not for you. Because life’s long until it isn’t.
Mascots are back on the rise. Duolingo’s participatory, contextual expressions that transcend the app to the icon itself. Pepsi bringing back Coke’s polar bear to anthropomorphise rivalry. Apple’s ‘Little Finder’ to promote the Neo to Gen Z. They’re back. Because they’re full of personality, let people direct relational equity to that personality, form bonds and feel like they’re entering a world, not just buying a product. I’ve been advocating for mascots since forever. This isn’t an “I told you so”,...
I create a newsletter called GrowthCandy. Each issue shares one idea to help build and spread your work, delivered as a short comic. Fast to read. Easy to apply. Hard to forget!