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Is YouTube Really Taking Over Hollywood?
Julia Alexander hopped on the Vergecast for a very good conversation with David Pierce about whether YouTube’s taking over Hollywood, or at least whether the VidCon crowd is nosing into the movie theatre market. On one hand, I’m inclined to agree with the concern from outlets like The Ankler that traditional media outlets have reason…
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Marginally Better S01E19: The Employee Experience Paradox
Your customer experience can never rise higher than your employee experience. The research that measured it, the Costco case study, and a two-question test you can run on your own company.
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When Customer Experience Becomes a Literal Dumpster Fire
My first job out of college was covering town hall meetings. Borough councils, commissioner’s meetings, small events in township halls all over Delaware County, Pennsylvania. It’s a grind — I did it for about four years, and I kept doing it part-time even after I’d landed a full-time job as a radio producer. I’m glad…
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Marginally Better S01E18: The True Cost of Bad Customer Experience
What do a billion-dollar retail collapse, a broken app, and an abandoned shopping cart have in common? They’re all part of the same hidden bill, and most companies don’t realize they’re paying it until it’s too late. In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. breaks down the true cost of bad customer experience. Not as isolated mistakes, but as a slow, compounding erosion of trust…
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Everybody’s Cindy Nowadays
Billy Bragg introduced me to Cindy Sherman. Not personally, of course. He wrote a song about the photographer on his 1991 album, inspiring me to visit the library (pre-Internet!) to learn everything I could about someone who created imaginary, cinematic worlds for characters to roam around in, then cast herself in those leading roles. At around…
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Marginally Better S01E17: The Repair Relationship Revolution
A century ago, companies deliberately made products that wouldn’t last. Today, that model is being dismantled—by regulators, by consumers, and by a new generation of businesses built around repair, not replacement. In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. explores the repair relationship revolution—from sweeping right-to-repair laws reshaping global manufacturing to companies like Framework…
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Marginally Better S01E16: The Community Currency
A productivity app on the brink of collapse rebuilt itself in a small apartment in Kyoto—and a decade later became an $11 billion company with 100 million users. What changed? Not the product alone, but the people around it. In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. explores the rise of community as currency—why…
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35 Years of Posting Things Online
The “what were you like in the 1990s” meme crested on social media this month. I’ve watched some folks claim it’s because “that was the last time before we had social media.” But I think my GenX cohort has hit a milestone—many of my friends’ kids are somewhere between heading off to college or coming…
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Marginally Better S01E15: The Transparency Tax
In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. examines the transparency trap: how brands learned the hard way that revealing everything can erode trust, fuel criticism, and even cost millions.
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Marginally Better S01E14: The Senior Surge Opportunity
In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. breaks down the trillion-dollar gap between who has the money and who businesses design for—spotlighting winners, common “youngsplaining” mistakes, and simple UX fixes that boost conversions for everyone.
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Marginally Better S01E13: The Waiting Game Winners
Americans spend 37 billion hours a year waiting—about 118 hours per person—but smart brands are turning that dead time into delight. In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. breaks down the psychology of waiting (why underpromising and overdelivering works, why occupied time feels shorter, and why fairness matters), and shows how Disney, Trader…
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Marginally Better S01E12: The Ghost Kitchen Customer Catastrophe
Ever ordered from three “different” restaurants and gotten the same fries, same sticker, same address? This episode of Marginally Better digs into the ghost-kitchen gold rush—and the trust crisis it sparked. Joe Taylor, Jr. unpacks how virtual brands multiplied behind a single line, why customers feel duped when the story doesn’t match the kitchen, and…