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  • Good designers, bad websites: a proposal

    Good designers, bad websites: a proposal

    I want to discuss accessibility because it is the most important thing for making websites. Other A List Apart articles give you innovation and insight. This article will give you homework. These are just my personal views, but they’re pretty good.

    I want to start off with a couple of statements, and you will agree:

    1. Designers are good people. I have never heard a designer say, “I don’t care if somebody can’t read this text”, “Not my fault if somebody can’t use this device”, or “Who cares if this is confusing?”
    2. Some designs exclude people. You have seen people unable to read the text on a website or app that somebody designed. You’ve seen people unable to use a physical device that somebody has designed. You’ve seen people utterly bamboozled while trying to use a service that somebody designed.

    So what?

    The first question is, “Is this life-or-death stuff?” The answer is, “Yes.” In my favorite essay, This Is All There Is, Aral Balkan makes the point that pretty much everything that we design can affect life events and death events. Aral gives the example of how even a straightforward bus timetable app can affect life and death events, if we design it badly:

    • somebody might miss a life event, such as their daughter’s fifth birthday party; or
    • somebody might miss a death event, such as the chance to say goodbye to a dying grandmother.

    The next—and frustrating—question is, “Why do some designs still exclude people?” After all, we know that:

    • not everybody can see perfectly;
    • not everybody can hear perfectly;
    • not everybody thinks the same way; and
    • not everybody moves the same way.

    I think the answer is that there’s too much to recall. Consider, if you will, the wide variety of topics that A List Apart articles cover. Designers are expected to remember all of that guidance, plus all of the accessibility guidance, plus so much more. It is too much.

    Recognizing accessibility issues while designing

    I’d like to point toward one possible solution, starting from Jakob Nielsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design. These are from the mid-1990s, and—although there’s a good chance that you, gentle reader, are a lot younger than that—please bear with me. 

    Seeing as the problem is that there’s too much to recall, I want to look at heuristic № 6, “Recognition rather than Recall.” Jakob Nielsen said that for users, information required to use the design should be visible or easily retrievable when needed. I suggest we tweak that to make life easier for designers. Let’s say that the information required to produce the design should be visible or easily retrievable when needed. In other words, let’s make it easier to recognise accessibility issues while we’re designing.

    How are we going to do that? I really like the book A Web for Everyone—Designing Accessible User Experiences by Sarah Horton and Whitney Quesenbery. I really like this book not only because it includes a quote from me—actually two quotes, but I don’t like to boast—but because it includes personas that are perfect for helping us to recognise accessibility issues. That’s the good news. The even better news is that these personas are available now for free on the companion website to the book What Every Engineer Should Know About Digital Accessibility, again by Sarah Horton, with David Sloan this time.

    Meet your users

    I’m going to introduce you to these personas now:

    I want to throw one more persona at you now, because, well, A List Apart readers are overachievers. One of my favorite authors, Cennydd Bowles—who literally wrote the book on Future Ethics—says to create Personas Non Grata. In other words, every time we design something, we have to think about what a bad guy could do with that thing, and whom that might affect.

    To actually use these personas while designing, I like what Eric Meyer and Sara Wachter-Boettcher in Design for Real Life call the Designated Dissenter: for each project that you work on, one of your teams should be responsible for asking, “Will this work for Vishnu?”, “How’s Trevor going to get on with this?”, and so on. 

    Then, once you’ve used the personas to recognise the accessibility issues, you can look up the guidelines for whichever platforms you’re designing for: 

    Your mission, should you choose to accept it

    I told you in the introduction of this article that I would give you homework. You thought I was joking. So, here’s your homework: I want you to grab the personas from the Know About Accessibility website, and use them throughout every design project to help you recognise accessibility issues while you work—and reclaim design for everyone.


    NOTE: This article is based on “Recognise,” my five-minute presentation from Interaction Design Association (IxDA) Dublin’s Defuse (Design for Use) event in 2025.

  • Designed for a Dead Language

    Designed for a Dead Language

    Every language app in your pocket inherited a teaching method built for Latin. Understanding why that happened is a more useful design lesson than anything the apps themselves will teach you.

    In 1788, Prussia introduced the Abitur, a standardized national examination required for entry into universities and the civil service. To pass it, students needed to demonstrate measurable, gradable knowledge. The system needed to teach language to large classrooms, produce consistent outcomes, and do it with one teacher and thirty students. The educators responsible for designing this system reached for the only teaching template they had, one that had been used in European schools for two centuries: the method developed to teach Latin.

    Latin, by 1788, was a dead language. Nobody needed to speak it. The scholars who studied it were reading Cicero and Virgil, not conducting conversations. The method built around it, memorizing grammar rules, constructing translations, analyzing written texts, reflected that reality exactly. Oral skills were irrelevant. Comprehension of written form was everything. The method was not designed to produce speakers. It was designed to produce readers of texts in a language nobody spoke.

    When Prussia applied this template to French and German, living languages spoken by living people, the premise did not change. Johann Valentin Meidinger’s textbook Praktische Französische Grammatik, published in 1804, ran to 37 editions across Europe by 1857. Karl Plotz formalized the approach into what became the dominant model for teaching modern languages across Europe and eventually the United States, where it became known simply as the Prussian Method [1]. Each institution that adopted it trained teachers in it, who trained students who became teachers. The constraint that created the method, how do you grade language at scale with limited resources, became invisible inside the method itself. What remained was the assumption: language is a body of rules to be learned consciously and measured. It was a design decision dressed up, over time, as a pedagogical truth.

    The observation that should have ended it

    There are people in the world who cannot read or write a language and speak it fluently. There are children who hold full conversations years before they can read a single word. There are immigrants who arrive in a country knowing nothing of its language and come out, years later, speaking it naturally, not because they studied it, but because they lived inside it. Literacy and fluency are separate things produced by entirely separate mechanisms. The Grammar-Translation method, as it became known, assumed they were the same thing. That assumption was inherited from a method designed for a language nobody needed to speak, and it was wrong the moment it was applied to a language people actually used.

    The evidence against it accumulated slowly. In the mid to late nineteenth century, reformers including François Gouin in France and Maximilian Berlitz in the United States argued independently that language should be taught the way it is actually acquired, through immersive exposure to real communication in the target language, not through analysis of its rules. Berlitz built an entire school network around this principle. The reformers were correct. They were also largely ignored by mainstream education systems, because the Grammar-Translation method had one decisive advantage that direct immersion did not: it could be graded.

    In 1982, the linguist Stephen Krashen gave the argument its most formal articulation in what he called the Monitor Model of second language acquisition. His distinction was precise: language acquisition, the unconscious process through which children absorb their native language and through which adults succeed in immersive environments, is categorically different from language learning, the conscious study of grammar rules and vocabulary that classrooms deliver [2]. Acquisition produces fluency. Learning, at best, produces the ability to pass a test. The evidence supporting this distinction, and the observation that immersive exposure to real native-speaker communication is the mechanism that produces genuine fluency, has only grown since.

    I went to Brazil without a word of Portuguese and came out speaking it. I studied French in a classroom for years and cannot hold a conversation in French today. This is not an unusual experience. It is the expected outcome, and it has been the expected outcome for as long as we have had formal language education.

    The same decision, made again in a different medium

    Prussian educators faced the question: How do you deliver language learning at scale, measure progress, and retain users over time? The answer it arrived at was structurally identical to the one arrived at in 1788. Duolingo gamified the grammar drill into a streak. Anki formalized the translation exercise into a spaced-repetition flashcard. Babbel organized grammar lessons into structured modules. The interfaces were new. The underlying assumption, that language is a thing you study rather than an environment you inhabit, was not.

    This was not a failure of design skill. The products that emerged from these decisions are, in many respects, genuinely well-crafted. Duolingo’s retention mechanics are sophisticated. Anki’s spaced repetition is grounded in real cognitive science. They are excellent at what they actually do. The problem is what they actually do: produce measurable engagement with a proxy for language rather than the conditions that produce language itself. A streak is measurable. A vocabulary score is measurable. The moment a user walks out of an app and holds a real conversation in another language, that happens in the world, outside the product, and cannot be instrumented.

    When the outcome a user needs is difficult to measure directly, the design process tends to reach for something that can be measured. The proxy becomes the goal. The interface optimizes for it. The gap between what the product delivers and what the user actually needed grows. This is not a pattern unique to language learning. It is a pattern that repeats across product categories whenever a design constraint—the need to measure, the need to scale, the need to produce a grade—gets built into a system so deeply that it stops being visible as a constraint and starts being mistaken for a truth about the problem itself.

    What happens when the constraint changes

    The constraint that made the Grammar-Translation method necessary in 1788 was real and rational. One teacher. Thirty students. A standardized exam. You cannot grade a conversation at scale. You can grade a translation exercise. The method was not chosen because it produced fluency. It was chosen because it produced a score.

    That constraint no longer exists in the same form. Technology has made it possible to deliver immersive, real-time conversation practice to anyone with a smartphone, at a cost that continues to fall. The design problem is no longer how to make language learning gradable at scale. It is how to make the conditions of genuine language acquisition accessible to people who cannot move to another country or afford a native-speaker tutor.

    The products that are now closest to solving the actual problem are not the ones that invented a new pedagogy. They are the ones that removed the access barrier to an old one. Praktika builds AI conversation partners with distinct personalities, regional dialects, and cultural context, replicating the specificity of a real native speaker rather than a generic language-learning voice. Langua clones native speaker voices so that the interaction feels like a real conversation rather than a lesson. Rosetta Stone’s foundational methodology, image association in the target language with no translation, was built on the same insight Berlitz arrived at in the nineteenth century: language is acquired through immersive exposure, not through analysis of its rules [3]. A 2025 meta-analysis of 31 studies found that AI conversation tools produced a statistically significant improvement in language learning outcomes, a result that no amount of flashcard optimization has consistently matched [4].

    None of these products invented a new theory of language acquisition. They translated an existing one into something more people could reach.

    The design question this leaves

    The Grammar-Translation method persisted not because educators were wrong about design, but because a design decision made under a specific constraint became, over two centuries, indistinguishable from the thing itself. The constraint, how do you grade language at scale, was forgotten. The method it produced was inherited as if it were a description of how language works, passed from Prussia to Europe to America to the App Store, from the grammar drill to the streak.

    Every time a design team optimizes for a metric because the actual outcome is hard to measure, they are making a version of the same decision. It is often the right decision given real constraints. The question worth asking is whether the constraint that made it necessary still exists, or whether it has simply become invisible inside the system it originally produced.

    Before reaching for what can be measured, it is worth asking what the user actually needs to do, and what stopped them from doing it before. Sometimes the answer is a new solution. More often it is an old one that was always out of reach.

  • Where AI Belongs in Your Business

    Where AI Belongs in Your Business

    Where AI Belongs in Your Business written by Jordan E read more at Duct Tape Marketing

    Catch the Full Episode: Overview This one’s back from the vault. AI tools keep piling up, so the question John Jantsch and Ryan Levesque take on here matters more now than when it first aired. Where should AI save you time, and where does a personal touch let you charge more? Levesque runs AI every […]

    Where AI Belongs in Your Business written by Jordan E read more at Duct Tape Marketing

    Catch the Full Episode:

    Overview

    Ryan Levesque, founder of the ASK Method, smiling in a light blue plaid shirt on a navy background beside the Duct Tape Marketing logo. Episode: What Should You Automate With AI, and What Should Stay Human? featuring guest Ryan Levesque and host John Jantsch on the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast.

    This one’s back from the vault. AI tools keep piling up, so the question John Jantsch and Ryan Levesque take on here matters more now than when it first aired. Where should AI save you time, and where does a personal touch let you charge more?

    Levesque runs AI every day inside his own company. He explains how he decides what gets automated (the back office comes first) and what he won’t hand off. He and Jantsch also get into why work that doesn’t scale can set you apart and how letting customers see your process supports higher prices. Levesque also shares a 30-second morning habit that shapes the rest of his day.

    Running a consultancy, an agency or a growing business? You’ll walk away with ideas you can test this week.

    Guest Bio

    Ryan Levesque has built and exited 2 companies with a combined value of more than $100 million, and he’s made the Inc. 5000 list 7 times as CEO. He wrote Ask, a No. 1 national bestseller and Inc.’s marketing book of the year, and he founded the ASK Method. His latest book is Return to Real: The Last Human Advantage in an Age of Artificial Everything. In it he argues that the things our bodies and spirits are hungry for are the same things customers will pay a premium for.

    Key Takeaways

    • Point AI at the back office first, the work that sits furthest from your customer. The email sequences and social posts that make your first impression need a human voice.
    • Choose a few moments that won’t scale and handle them yourself. A voice memo to every new customer or a handwritten note to every new client shows a kind of care software can’t fake.
    • Show your work. Let customers see how things get made and who makes them. The story behind the work is part of what they pay for.
    • Make something before you scroll. Use the first minutes of your day, while your head is clear, to write or build before email and social media pull you in.
    • Publish your own thinking on a schedule. For nearly 2.5 years Levesque has sent a weekly email, often 2,000 to 4,000 words long. He credits it with bringing in more opportunity than anything else he’s done in 20 years of business.

    Great Moments

    • [04:19] Having a website used to set a business apart. Now, Levesque says, people are surprised when they reach a live human on a customer service call.
    • [05:27] Two photos of his sons taken 7 years apart, a $70 million deal that collapsed at the last minute, and a summer spent living in a tent on a Vermont farm.
    • [09:45] His “touch earth before touching a screen” routine: walk outside barefoot, put your feet on bare ground and take one deep breath.
    • [12:57] The morning he read an email sent under his name, hated it and slammed his laptop shut. That led to “The Embarrassing Confession” and his comparison of freshly squeezed orange juice to the canned kind.
    • [16:39] A painting bought for about $10,000 sold for $450 million after it was attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. Levesque ties that story to Steinway’s documentary and to the time-lapse video he made of hand-illustrating his book.

    Memorable Quotes

    • What doesn’t scale for you also will not scale for your competitor. And therein lies the competitive advantage. Doing the things that your competitor will not be willing to do.” – Ryan Levesque
    • “It’s not about being anti AI or being pro AI, it’s about finding the right places to put AI into your business.” – Ryan Levesque
    • “What the world is craving is what I describe as the freshly squeezed version of orange juice that you get at Sunday brunch in a world where everybody else is serving the watered-down stuff that comes in a can.” – Ryan Levesque
    • “When you combine those two simple practices, touch earth before you touch screen, and create before you consume, it’ll shift your day, which will shift your week, which will shift your month, which will shift your year.” – Ryan Levesque
    • “For those of us who are knowledge workers, for those of us who spend time in front of a computer, we have to find an outlet that reconnects us to our body, that reconnects us to the analog, that reconnects us to the physical world.” – Ryan Levesque

    Resources

    John Jantsch (00:01.276)

    So AI can write your emails, run your ads, clone the sound of your voice, even. But at least for now, it cannot fake a hug, a hand-tied knot, or the crack in your voice on a hard sales call. The entrepreneurs with the biggest edge over the next decade are the ones who find what technology can’t touch and build their whole business around it. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Ryan Levesque. He is a seven-time

    Inc. 500 CEO who’s built and exited two companies worth more than $100 million combined. He’s the number one national best-selling author of Ask, named Inc.’s marketing book of the year and founder of the Ask Method. His new book we’re going to talk about today, Return to Real, the last human advantage in an age of artificial everything, argues the same thing your body and spirit are starving for is exactly what your market will pay a premium for. So, Ryan, welcome to the show.

    Ryan Levesque (00:59.832)

    John, it’s great to be here and it’s great to reconnect.

    John Jantsch (01:02.896)

    Yeah, so I would suggest that this is a different book than Ask. however, I I’ve gotta believe that there’s a thread of your work in Ask and the work you did with the company that sort of informs this book, but I’ll let you speak to that if that’s accurate at all.

    Ryan Levesque (01:22.018)

    Yeah, you know, great questions. My first book Ask was all about figuring out what your market wants and giving it to them. And and I think it I remain proud of that work to this day. It’s a methodology to listen to the voice of your customer and use that to inform your messaging, your marketing and your products and services, so on and so forth. But what that book failed to explain and explore is how to listen to the most important voice of them all.

    Which is what I describe as the voice inside or the contrarian voice of your heart. And I think the age that we live in here today is one where, and there’s tremendous evidence to suggest this, we are drowning in artificial everything, from the food we eat to the content we consume. And Adam Maseri of Instagram, I think said it best when he said, We spent the last decade trying to figure out what makes something perfect. We’re gonna spend the next decade figuring out what makes something real.

    John Jantsch (02:20.08)

    Yeah. So yeah, you know, I I think the entrepreneurial world though is sort of naturally I I don’t want to say it’s against that, but it’s you can eat it’s easy to see why people get pulled in directions. It’s like, there’s an opportunity over here. I you know, AI is a great example. you know, I can make my agency an AI agency so that I can go in and like take advantage of what’s there, even if it’s not in your heart. I mean, how do you guard against that?

    Ryan Levesque (02:20.908)

    And I that’s what the world is craving is real.

    Ryan Levesque (02:47.32)

    Well, what I would say is this, look, I am not like I’m not one of these AI, anti-AI you know, apostles. I use AI on a daily basis. We use AI in my company. I I think the the truth is in the tension, the devil’s in the details. And I’ll give you a few examples. So I think one of the biggest mistakes that people make with AI is they use AI to abdicate parts of their business that touch the customer.

    John Jantsch (02:52.241)

    Yeah, yeah.

    John Jantsch (03:12.07)

    Yeah.

    Ryan Levesque (03:12.896)

    Instead, what we should be doing is thinking about the proverbial back office of our business, the parts that are furthest away from what touches the customer, and use AI to automate those pieces of the business. Not to automate the email sequence that we send to our customers or to write the social media posts that’s the first point of contact with our brand, or to use AI to replicate your voice and create some sort of AI avatar that you’re trying to pass off as you, but the reality is it’s just a machine.

    And when someone figures that out, they feel foolish for having been humiliated and they associate that with your brand forevermore. So I think it’s not about being anti AI or being pro AI, it’s about finding the right places to put AI into your business.

    John Jantsch (03:57.201)

    Yeah, it’s funny. I th I think you know, a lot of people are starting to say, you know, the businesses are gonna win are the ones that are more human or that put that human element out there. And I think that there’s a double-edged sword on that, in that I think some people are saying, okay, I’ll put my human avatar out there. And I think you actually get whacked twice for that. It’s like you were trying to be human and you were actually less human, you know, for doing that. Yeah.

    Ryan Levesque (04:19.626)

    It’s the hypocrisy of humanization. It’s a hypocrisy of humanization. It’s people are giving lip service to it, but they’re not willing to do the things that it really means. Like when you first came into the business world, you probably remember an era where having a website was a new and novel thing. Like it was a competitive advantage to be on the internet. That was a big deal. Now everybody’s on the internet. The pendulum is swung in the opposite direction. Now it’s actually a big deal. When you pick up the phone and call customer service,

    John Jantsch (04:26.343)

    Yeah.

    John Jantsch (04:35.909)

    yeah.

    John Jantsch (04:39.548)

    Yeah. Yep.

    Ryan Levesque (04:48.652)

    And you actually get an English speaking human being who picks up the phone on the other side and you say, my gosh, like are you, are you AI? Are you a robot? Are you an automated message? No, I’m a real human being. That is where the zig has become the zag.

    John Jantsch (05:04.668)

    So you I I think I read it with the figure was seventy million dollars, a deal to sell your company fell apart. not long after that, you moved to where I assume you are sitting today on the two hundred year old farm in Vermont. w w are those two connected? Like did you have a moment where you said, I gotta get out of here, I gotta point at something different.

    Ryan Levesque (05:11.086)

    Sure. Yep.

    Ryan Levesque (05:27.916)

    Very much connected. So spent the a better part of a decade building and scaling a company. literally started it, you know, with a laptop and an internet connection, kitchen table story. Seven timing 5000, fastest growing company, and had this moment where I I looked at this photograph of my two boys, and at the time they were three and five years old, my sons, they were wearing rain boots, holding hands and a path ahead of me. The boots were way too big for them. And I just remembered to take a photo of that moment. And

    Fast forward seven years later, and I had a similar experience where my two boys were walking down the path. They’re much further ahead of me now. They were not holding hands. and they were teenagers at the time. And it was like a heartbeat between those two moments. And I recognized that I had maybe just a few years left with my two boys at home before they grew up and they were gone. And I kind of asked myself, after we’d tried to sell the company twice, took the company to market, had a deal.

    John Jantsch (06:05.138)

    Yes.

    Ryan Levesque (06:27.306)

    Ended at the 11th hour, took the company to market again, had a $70 million offer, collapsed at the last minute. do I want to spend another decade or even half decade in this mode? Or do I want to maybe reoptimize my life for something else? And and the answer was very clear. I want to suck the marrow out of this season of life while my boys are at home. And and on that journey, when my boys were away at summer camp one summer, I decided to do something that was pulling at my heart. And I decided to.

    take take some time to live and and work on a farm in the Mad River Valley of Vermont, literally living in a tent, bathing in a pond, learning how to raise and grow food with my own hands. And John, it was on that farm that I had this awakening that I just felt like in this next chapter of life, this is where I was meant to be. And then that sparked a whole grand adventure that led to me exiting the company and starting this farm and moving my family and

    Crazy, crazy family adventure.

    John Jantsch (07:27.539)

    So I’m getting a throw vibe all of a sudden.

    Ryan Levesque (07:31.662)

    Throw is is referenced in the book. Throw is one of my heroes as a young man and and as a as a much older man today.

    John Jantsch (07:40.455)

    Yeah. So one of the things you write about is contrarian shifts. And the first thing is that the best things in life don’t scale. That sort of runs counter to like traditional business advice. I think a lot of people get that. I don’t think many people would actually argue, but like the whole deal is to scale, right? I mean, so how do you balance that?

    Ryan Levesque (07:57.987)

    Yeah. Well, look, I I think it’s again, truth is in the tension. I think there’s a modern exception exception with scale. Whenever I bring up the ideas behind return to to real, the inevitable objection that comes up is but does it scale? How do you scale that? And the the argument that I make is look, the best things in life don’t scale. You know, a hug with your kid, a sunset with your sweetheart, these things don’t scale. but we somehow think that the rules in business are immune to that universal truth.

    John Jantsch (08:02.641)

    Yeah.

    John Jantsch (08:13.799)

    This is

    Ryan Levesque (08:27.746)

    So the question isn’t do I create a business that doesn’t scale? It’s what are the parts of my business do I do in spite of the fact that they don’t scale? Because what doesn’t scale for you also will not scale for your competitor. And therein lies the competitive advantage. Doing the things that your competitor will not be willing to do. It’s sending a personal voice memo to every new customer, yourself.

    Not using some AI, 11 lab software or an assistant that’s doing it for you. It’s you. It’s it’s handwriting a welcome note to everyone who becomes a client. It’s not doing all the things, but it’s picking and choosing these moments that demonstrate to your market, to your customers, to your clients that wow, you really care. You really, really care about who it is that you’re serving.

    John Jantsch (09:24.006)

    So if there’s a listener out there that’s saying, look, I I’m I’ve got this business and I’m feeling the tension and I want to make some change, but I’m kind of shackled with a few things, right. I can’t just like, you know, take off tomorrow and and ch blow up everything. So what’s a small real version of, you know, returning to real that somebody could make?

    Ryan Levesque (09:32.59)

    Mm-hmm.

    Ryan Levesque (09:45.987)

    Yeah, so I’ll give a personal one and then I’ll give a a business one. So on a on a personal level, there’s a practice that I learned to adopt from a colleague of mine. And it’s the simplest thing in the world, and it’s something that I would encourage you to try yourself. The idea is this when you wake up in the morning, first thing, touch earth before touching a screen.

    So instead of doing what you normally do, where you check your phone, you check your messages, you check your email, whatever, put your device far away from you, walk outside your front door, find the first piece of actual bare earth, not pavement, not concrete, but grass or dirt or something in front of you. Take your shoes off, your socks off. And whatever time you wake up, I don’t care how cold it is, I do this in the winter in Vermont, you step outside, bare feet, you touch the ground just for a moment, take the deepest breath that you can, and just remind yourself that you are.

    A biophysical being in a biophysical world. And before you get sucked into dashboards and dopamine loops and all the demands of the day, that you are human and you’re deeply connected to the natural world. It’s a super small thing, like it’ll only take you 30 seconds to do this. But what it does is it sets the tone for the rest of the day. Like you become calmer, you become kinder, you take all the fires that show up in your business in stride, you put things in perspective in a way that’s sort of unlike anything else.

    so that’s a super simple personal move. Professionally.

    John Jantsch (11:08.658)

    Well, and that that that could actually be enough for some people. Yeah.

    Ryan Levesque (11:12.122)

    And that absolutely can be enough. That can be the bite-sized version of Return to Real to just before I get sucked into the digital vortex of the day and social media scrolling and all the things. It’s like I’ve got this moment and it’s 30 seconds. I do it at at sunrise. Or I stare off into the sunrise in the mountains in the distance on our farm. And I just take this moment. And for me, it’s like it just sets the tone for the whole day. so that’s the personal side. Professional side, I would combine that.

    With a principle that I describe in the book as create before you consume. There is a tendency, first thing in the morning, that we get into consumption mode. We open up our emails and we consume the emails that are sent our way. Or we go on social media and we read the headlines. We actually are consuming what’s showing up in our world. I would challenge you to use that moment in the day when the chalkboard in your brain is clean. There’s nothing on it. It’s just a clean slate. You use those precious moments to create.

    For me, I use that time to write email. I will write an email to my audience with a clear head based on what it is that I’m thinking, what’s showing up in my heart, the ideas that I’m thinking about, how it relates to my market, but I do it with a clear mind. And when you combine those two simple practices, touch earth before you touch screen, and create before you consume, it’ll shift your day, which will shift your week, which will shift your month, which will shift your year.

    John Jantsch (12:38.546)

    Okay, this is a perfect segue to a questi or a a a a thing that you have talked about. you told your own list that team of writers had ghostwritten your content under your name for seven na years.

    What did it feel like to send that confession emailed to your list?

    Ryan Levesque (12:57.15)

    Yeah.

    it was not easy. because I felt like in some ways, even though this is standard practice in the industry, you have a team of writers. If you’re the CEO of your company, it’s not uncommon that you’ve got a team of writers that are writing content in your name, they’re ghostwriting that content, and they’re signing that content with your name. And for me, it became this sort of this death by a thousand paper cuts, where at first I was reviewing every email that went out with by my name.

    And then of course there’s a time where things get a little too busy and you’re like, all right, it’s probably fine. And then you get into the habit of you don’t even review anything. And then one day I remember waking up and I opened up my laptop and I read an email that we sent out that was in it was in it was we positioned it as it was something that I wrote and it came from me. And I was so disgusted with what we put up, I slammed the laptop shut. And I think for me that was the breaking point where I said, no more, this is not happening.

    and so on a whim, I wrote this email. I titled it The Embarrassing Confession and basically said what you described. I have an embarrassing confession to make. this may come as a shock, but every single email that you have read with my name signed to it has not actually been written by me, but it’s been written by a team of writers and more recently written by AI. and this has been true for the last seven years. I’m not proud of this fact, but it’s the truth. And I basically said, what I’ve realized is that

    What the world is craving is what I describe as the freshly squeezed version of orange juice that you get at Sunday brunch in a world where everybody else is serving the watered-down stuff that comes in a can. Can you feel the difference between what’s real and what’s not? Can you feel that this was written by a real human being with a real beating heart? Can you feel it? And when I sent that email out, I had no idea what was gonna happen, John. I got

    Ryan Levesque (14:51.38)

    More response from that email than anything that I’d sent in probably months, as long as I can remember. And it was the full range. Some people applauded it. Good for you. That’s amazing. I want to do this. some people used it as a way to blackmail me, you know. Hey, well, if that’s the case, then I want a refund for everything that I’ve ever bought, you know, years and years into the past, like crazy things like that. People said some things that I’m not gonna repeat out loud.

    You know, but way the way I describe it is people will confuse vulnerability with weakness and they will weaponize shame and guilt to coerce you to crumble. They will try to get you to fold. Oftentimes because it’s because it’s something that they’re dealing with internally themselves.

    John Jantsch (15:37.658)

    I was gonna I was gonna say my mom used to always say, Well, that’s probably more their problem than yours.

    Ryan Levesque (15:42.683)

    It’s very perceptive. When you’re in that moment, though, it is still hard when you’re people are telling you to crawl in a hole and die for what it is that you’re doing. but I’ll tell you, it was the mo the most liberating thing that I’ve done. And this was all almost two and a half years ago. And every single week since then, without missing a single week, I’ve personally written by hand myself an email, often two to four thousand words, deeply researched, very transparent, that’s come directly from me.

    And I’ve had more opportunity come from doing just that one thing than anything else I’ve done in my business in the last 20 years.

    John Jantsch (16:19.899)

    So back back to the book. the book’s core claim is that the market will pay a premium for real. but I can hear a lot of business owners say, Okay, that’s great. What’s the mechanism? Like, you know, real’s a word that everybody banters around, but like what’s the mechanism? You know, is it trust? Is it scarcity? Is it something else?

    Ryan Levesque (16:39.202)

    Yeah, there are a few different dimensions at play. And we’ve got look, we’ve got a short amount of time, and I want to try to unpack this as much as I can. I’ll give you one thing to really anchor around. It’s a concept that I describe in the book as the provenance premium. So provenance is a fancy word that comes from the art world. It basically is a way to trace back a piece of work to the creator of that work. And there’s a story I tell in the book about a painting called Salvador Mundi, which was purchased at an estate sale by a consortium of art dealers for something like $10,000.

    They did a bunch of research on the piece of art and found out that it was actually created by Leonardo da Vinci. And a few years later, they brought it to auction at Christie’s. And the same piece of art that they bought for $10,000 from an anonymous artist, once it was attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, sold for $450 million. And I that’s an extreme example, but it illustrates the point and hopefully is a memorable story that you’ll remember after this conversation.

    That when you can attribute the work that you’re doing to a real life that’s actually been lived and work that’s gone into it, it elevates the value of that work. It’s in part the reason why Steinway pianos sell for the what they sell for. Because Steinway has done a fantastic job, not only creating a great product, but documenting. There’s a whole documentary that Steinway put out where you can see what goes into making the piano. And you think, well, gosh, it’s, it’s, it’s, of course it’s worth that.

    It’s why people will pay a premium for food that’s raised by actual farmers down the road as opposed to buying it at the grocery store. Because they know the farmers, they know the farm, they know the story behind it. So the practical move here for all of us, no matter what type of work you’re in, if you’re in a white-collar profession, a blue collar profession, if you do work with your hands, if you do work with your mind, is to build in public, to document your process, to document your thinking about what you’re actually thinking about. Because people care not just about the what that it is that you’re selling.

    They care about the how in terms of how it’s made and the who. Who is the person behind that? And by telling the right story and sharing this, divulging this, taking people behind the scenes, people will pay a premium for that thing. In my book, I’ll give you one last example. I decided to hand illustrate every illustration inside the book. And I know that some people were gonna doubt that I actually hand illustrated the book. And here’s just a like a page inside the book with some of the quotes.

    John Jantsch (19:01.527)

    Mm. Beautiful.

    Ryan Levesque (19:02.732)

    And so what I did is I put a camera over my desk and I did a time-lapse video of drawing every illustration by hand. When people see that, it just is a proxy, an indicator that care and love and attention went into the making of this thing. And just that data point alone, doesn’t it make you believe that wow, a lot of effort went into creating this? And people value that.

    John Jantsch (19:10.854)

    Yes.

    Ryan Levesque (19:29.518)

    So when people see the provenance where something comes from, they will pay a premium for that product. So ask yourself, how can you document your process? How can you take people behind the scenes what it is that you do? How can you show the parts that nobody else, no other competitor of yours, shows how the sausage is made, so to speak? So people see the value in what it is that they’re actually getting.

    John Jantsch (19:51.826)

    All right, I’ve got one final question. This one’s more of a personal interest question. And this doesn’t really show up in your book, but I suspect you have an opinion on this. How important do you believe it is, particularly for entrepreneurs that might spend eight, nine hours a day just on a computer, you know, in the digital world, you know, doing all the stuff that we do today in businesses? How important do you think it is for them to have an analog outlet to do something with their hands to

    you know, build furniture to whatever, play the guitar, whatever it is that that that is is more analog thought.

    Ryan Levesque (20:27.596)

    Yeah, it’s Rabbi Heschel has this line that if you work with your mind, Sabbath with your hands.

    John Jantsch (20:38.363)

    Yeah.

    Ryan Levesque (20:39.852)

    And I think for those of us who are knowledge workers, for those of us who spend time in front of a computer, we have to find an outlet that reconnects us to our body, that reconnects us to the analog, that reconnects us to the physical world, because that’s exactly what we’re losing. as I write in the book, there are trillion dollar technology companies that will not stop until every moment of human attention has been consumed and monetized, including yours.

    John Jantsch (21:04.517)

    Yeah. Yeah, I I I marvel at the aggressiveness of Facebook to try to get me to come back to the platform. I mean it’s unbelievable. and it’s yeah, I’m glad they’re I’m glad they’re facing some some blowback. we’ll see we’ll see if it, you know, does anything or if they’ll find another way around that.

    Well, Ryan, I appreciate you taking a few moments to stop by the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. is there any place you’d invite people to connect you to connect with you or to certainly to find out more about Return to Real?

    Ryan Levesque (21:37.154)

    Yeah, the the best place to learn more about the book, Return to Real, is return to RealBook.com. when you go there, you’ll see all the different formats and cool bonuses that you get access to. And I’m excited to share this with the world. I think it’s an incredibly practical book for anybody who’s sort of been in this tension of how much of my business do I abdicate to AI? What do I keep real? How does this affect my personal life? How does this affect my kids?

    And how does this affect my business and the work that I’m putting out into the world?

    John Jantsch (22:12.721)

    Well we I look forward to depending upon when you’re listening to this, the book will be out and available everywhere. We we have ordered copies ourselves to give give to my team. Awesome. Well I appreciate you stopping by and hopefully we’ll run into you one of these days out there on the road.

    Ryan Levesque (22:28.151)

    Awesome. Thanks, Sean.

    powered by

  • 15 Fun Movie Facts That Could Make a Film Worth a Rewatch

    15 Fun Movie Facts That Could Make a Film Worth a Rewatch

    Sometimes knowing a little behind-the-scenes information completely changes the way you watch a movie. A seemingly ordinary scene might hide a clever detail, an actor might have improvised a moment that made it into the final cut, or a tiny background element could reveal something you completely missed the first time. Filmmakers love hiding little surprises for attentive viewers, and some of the most interesting details only become obvious once you know what to look for. These movie facts are particularly fun because they give familiar scenes a new meaning and might make you want to revisit the films immediately.

    The post 15 Fun Movie Facts That Could Make a Film Worth a Rewatch appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

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    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • 15 Times an Actor Hurt Themselves On Set

    15 Times an Actor Hurt Themselves On Set

    Movie sets aren’t always as glamorous as they look on screen. Between demanding stunts, complicated choreography, heavy props, and physically exhausting scenes, accidents can happen even when everyone is doing their best to stay safe. Some actors have walked away with broken bones, others needed surgery, and a few accidentally turned their real injuries into some of the most memorable moments in their movies. What’s particularly surprising is how many of these incidents actually made it into the finished film. These stories prove that sometimes the pain behind a performance is very real.

    The post 15 Times an Actor Hurt Themselves On Set appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    cnx.cmd.push(function() {
    cnx({
    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • 15 Things That Were Normal in the 1990s But Would Seem Strange Today

    15 Things That Were Normal in the 1990s But Would Seem Strange Today

    Growing up in the 1990s meant accepting things that would probably confuse anyone born in the smartphone era. Getting directions from a printed map, waiting several days for photos to be developed, and calling someone’s house without knowing who might answer were all perfectly ordinary experiences. Technology was changing quickly, but everyday life still involved plenty of little inconveniences that nobody thought twice about. Some habits were genuinely fun, others were downright ridiculous, and a few would probably cause serious complaints if they suddenly came back. Looking back, it’s amazing how much of ordinary life has changed.

    The post 15 Things That Were Normal in the 1990s But Would Seem Strange Today appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    cnx.cmd.push(function() {
    cnx({
    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • 15 Companies That Fixed Their Biggest Issue, But Nobody Cares

    15 Companies That Fixed Their Biggest Issue, But Nobody Cares

    Sometimes a company makes the changes customers have been demanding for years, only to discover that its reputation hasn’t caught up. Old complaints stick around, online jokes keep circulating, and people continue avoiding products that may have improved considerably. Nissan has spent years refining its CVT transmissions, while Hyundai and Kia have introduced anti-theft measures after their cars became infamous targets. Those stories raise an interesting question: how many brands are still paying for problems they’ve already addressed? Some fixes are well documented, others remain imperfect, but the gap between a company’s progress and public perception can be surprisingly difficult to close.

    The post 15 Companies That Fixed Their Biggest Issue, But Nobody Cares appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    cnx.cmd.push(function() {
    cnx({
    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • 15 People Share Their Biggest Secrets to Looking Young

    15 People Share Their Biggest Secrets to Looking Young

    Looking young is something plenty of people seem to figure out without making a big deal about it. Some swear by simple skincare habits, others credit their lifestyle, and a few have surprisingly unexpected explanations for why people think they’re younger than they really are. The interesting part is that many of these habits don’t involve expensive treatments or complicated routines. Sometimes it’s about consistency, getting enough sleep, or making small changes that actually stick. People have shared the little things they do to keep looking fresh, and some of their answers are genuinely worth trying.

    The post 15 People Share Their Biggest Secrets to Looking Young appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

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    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • The Biggest Creepypasta Stories From All Over The Internet

    The Biggest Creepypasta Stories From All Over The Internet

    Folk tales were the legends of old, giving rise to many mythological creatures that now plague popular media. Urban legends are a more modern take on that, having people explain the strange sounds of a city’s night time with ghosts, haunts, and other supernatural interpretations.

    Well, the internet has its own version of this, the Creepypasta, called as such due to how it is copy-pasted to be shared, instead of it being an oral tale. These are the most memorable Creepypasta stories; none of them were meant to be taken seriously, but they manage to unsettle nonetheless.

    The post The Biggest Creepypasta Stories From All Over The Internet appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    cnx.cmd.push(function() {
    cnx({
    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

  • 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending

    18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.

    When you watch a film, you’re not just in it to experience the ending. After all, you could just look up how it ends online, if that’s all that you cared about. The reality is that a movie is an experience where every part of the story is meant to be significant, that means not just the end, but the beginning and the middle as well.

    The selection we’ve brought for you today is made up of movies that nail that beginning and middle parts, only to fumble the endings. They’re still worthwhile experiences to go through, even if their endings leave a lot to be desired.

    cnx.cmd.push(function() {
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    playerId: “106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530”,

    }).render(“0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796”);
    });

    IMDb

    Sunshine

    This gripping sci-fi thriller about a crew trying to reignite the Sun falls apart in the final act. It suddenly shifts from a thoughtful space drama into a completely different, slasher-style movie that ruins the earlier tension.

    IMDb

    Signs

    This is a M. Night Shyamalan thriller that built masterclass tension only to stumble at the finish line. The famously silly twist revealing the invading aliens are incredibly weak to water left a bad taste for many viewers.

    IMDb

    Now You See Me

    This heist movie features a widely criticized twist revealing FBI agent Dylan Rhodes as the mastermind. The unforeshadowed ending was deemed profoundly insulting and mind-bogglingly stupid, ruining the fun illusion of the entire film.

    IMDb

    Lucy

    The setup of a woman unlocking the full capacity of her brain is highly entertaining. The finale, though, becomes far too abstract, leaving behind the grounded action elements for a bizarre conclusion that lacks clear resolution.

    IMDb

    Law Abiding Citizen

    This vigilante action thriller directed by F. Gary Gray built a fascinating moral conflict. Then, the final outcome completely contradicts the tension developed earlier, simplifying a complex story into a very conventional and disappointing resolution.

    IMDb

    Wonder Woman

    The first DC Comics feature for this iconic superheroine was widely praised for its emotional weight. Unfortunately, the final battle devolves into a generic, CGI-heavy brawl that completely undercuts the thoughtful anti-war themes established earlier.

    IMDb

    Knowing

    This atmospheric thriller built genuine dread as a catastrophic event approached. Ultimately, the film received mixed-to-negative reviews, with major criticism directed toward heavy-handed implausibilities and a polarizing conclusion that felt like it belonged in a different movie.

    IMDb

    The Abyss

    James Cameron’s 1989 science fiction adventure offers breathtaking underwater visuals and intense isolation. Sadly, the theatrical cut wraps things up with a rushed, overly preachy alien encounter that deflates the incredible human drama that preceded it.

    IMDb

    Source Code

    This tight, inventive thriller about reliving the same few minutes on a train had a perfect, bittersweet stopping point. Instead, it pushes past that moment into a confusingly happy resolution that breaks its own established time-travel rules.

    IMDb

    10 Cloverfield Lane

    This 2016 science fiction thriller directed by Dan Trachtenberg is a masterclass in claustrophobic psychological tension. Then, the protagonist escapes the bunker only to suddenly find herself in a ridiculous, over-the-top action battle against literal alien ships.

    IMDb

    Downsizing

    This science fiction comedy-drama directed by Alexander Payne had a clever premise about shrinking humans to save money. Unfortunately, the narrative abandons its fun concept entirely in the final act for a heavy-handed environmental message.

    IMDb

    Glass

    The conclusion to this grounded superhero trilogy resolves major character arcs incredibly quickly and with minimal emotional impact. It reduces the weight of a story that took nearly two decades to build, leaving fans feeling completely empty.

    IMDb

    The Devil Inside

    The ending of this horror movie was singled out for mockery upon release. It literally cut to black and told viewers to visit a website for more information, prompting articles discussing whether it is cinema’s worst ending.

    IMDb

    Savages

    This action thriller directed by Oliver Stone builds to a violent and tragic climax, only to pull a massive fake-out. The story abruptly rewinds itself, offering a much safer and less satisfying resolution instead.

    IMDb

    Identity

    A clever whodunit structure keeps this thriller engaging for most of its runtime. However, the final explanation relies on a psychological twist that erases the stakes entirely, making the previous hour of murder mystery feel totally pointless.

    IMDb

    Baby Driver

    Edgar Wright’s action film about a getaway driver is a stylish, music-driven thrill ride. The final moments, however, abandon the kinetic energy for a drawn-out, highly conventional courtroom wrap-up that drags down the film’s incredible momentum.

    IMDb

    The Wolverine

    This standalone superhero film offered a fantastic, grounded look at a beloved mutant dealing with mortality in Japan. Sadly, the introspective journey concludes with a cartoonish battle against a giant robot suit, ruining the serious tone completely.

    IMDb

    The Forgotten

    This psychological thriller starts as a gripping mystery about a grieving mother whose memories are being erased. The fascinating setup is entirely ruined when the culprit is revealed to be a ridiculously absurd alien experiment with zero foreshadowing.

    The post 18 Movies Where We Might as Well Just Ignore the Ending appeared first on Den of Geek.