Hey, remote work fam! This is Remote Insider your favorite spot to get up to speed on what's going on in the world of remote work and digital nomadism. In today’s email, we talk about...

• how remote work is creating a brand new economy

• why digital nomads are leaving Portugal

• what is “rent on standby”

• why mainstream media wins Lumbergh of the Week

Before we jump into that, last week we covered the GPT-4, but one thing we didn’t discuss is why it could 10X your daily journal practice…

💡 TIPS & TRICKS

Why GPT is The Best Daily Journal & How to Use It

As we just covered in our last post, GPT-4 is here and it’s melting our brains, but using it to increase the benefits of journaling is truly next level.

Here is the tl;dr - Dan Shipper is the co-founder and CEO of Every and writes a great newsletter about AI. One of his AI experiments was to actually use Chat GPT-3 as a journal

Unlike a regular journal where you simply write down your thoughts, you can tell GPT to take on the persona of a famous thinker, for example Socrates, and ask you follow-up questions to what you write in your journal to help you uncover detrimental patterns in your life.

In some ways, this mimics the relationship you’d have with a therapist or coach:

Thankfully, Dan wrote up a step-by-step guide on how to build your own “Socrates in your pocket” journal to get as much out of your daily journal practice as possible.

🔬 DEEP DIVE

Golf at 3pm on a Thursday? Sure, Welcome To The Afternoon Fun Economy

While mayors are complaining about the lack of office workers in downtowns, remote work has created a new economic trend - the afternoon fun economy.

A recent Stanford used geolocation data and found that compared to 2019 there has been a 278% increase in people playing golf at 4pm on a Wednesday afternoon.

Similarly, there are 83% more golf games played on weekdays.

“We call them the remote guys,” said Steve Mills, manager of Skyway Golf Course in New Jersey City.

“These were guys we used to see running to the golf course after work. Now they’re able to come out leisurely and get their golf done, instead of changing in the parking lot.”

And the golf industry is not alone in this, it extends to all of fitness & cosmetics.

At CutLoose hair salon, in Brooklyn, New York, the stylists now watch their clients take Zoom meetings from the salon chairs.

Similarly, people who once had to squeeze in a workout during lunch breaks can now use their flexible schedules to spend more time at the gym during the day.

But where is this flexibility coming from?

Evenings.

According to a report from Microsoft, people are working 28% more after the traditional work hours of 9-5, trading free time at 7pm, for free time in the middle of the day.

As more businesses adopt a more flexible work schedule for their employees, this new shift could play a key role in economic development in the remote work era.

🧑‍💻 OFFICE OF THE DAY

🚨 WORD ON THE WEB

📆 4DWW: 92% of companies that trialed a 4-day workweek decided to keep it, what happened at the 8% that decided not to continue? Basically, it comes down to your industry and the service you offer.

🇸🇬 Singapore’s Golden Visa is very likely the most expensive purchasable residency in the world, but if you’re UHNW & want a home base in one of the most stable countries in the world, it’s not to be overlooked!

🌆 Underrated cities: Already been to London, Paris, and Berlin? These incredible (but less visited) European cities should be on your list for this summer.

🇵🇹 Portuguese exodus? After the government’s announcement that it will close the popular Golden Visa program, and increased competition from other countries, digital nomads & expats are leaving Portugal for greener pastures

💸 Renting on standby: Landing allows US-based digital nomads to pay $1,295 per month and get access to over 20,000 apartments in over 375 cities, but you may get booted with as little as 3 days’ notice.

💬 IMPORTANT TWEETS

Balaji Bets $1m That The Dollar Collapses

Balaji Srinivasan is a famous Silicon Valley investor, entrepreneur, and a long-time supporter of cryptocurrencies and decentralization.

On Friday he bet economist James Medlock that thanks to inflation and the recent SVB banking collapse in the next 90 days we will see a mass devaluation of the US dollar and that the price of Bitcoin will hit $1m.

For context, if the price of a BTC hits $1m, the overall market cap of Bitcoin would be $19.3 trillion, larger than China’s GDP of $17.73 trillion.

What do you think, does Balaji have a point or is this a marketing stunt? Let us know your thoughts below 👇

👔 LUMBERGH OF THE WEEK:

SVB Leadership & Mainstream Media

Well it had to happen, SVB is now blaming its collapse, at least partially, to working remotely 🙄

According to a Financial Times article, leaders at SVB flagged in a report last month that employees “may experience negative effects of a prolonged work-from-home arrangement.”

In the report, SVB leadership also said that employees may struggle with work-life balance while remote, which could lead to “reduced productivity and/or significant disruptions in our business operations.”

This of course is a silly argument, and overlooks the actual root cause of the problem which we covered last week.

This has not stopped dozens of publications to publish articles with titles like “Is remote work the reason SVB collapsed?”

Sure, all the articles eventually acknowledge that remote work very likely had nothing to do with SVB’s collapse but many people don’t read the articles, seeing the titles is already doing plenty of damage.

We all know remote companies that are absolutely crushing it, so remote work in itself can’t be the cause for a lack of productivity or bad management.

So, today’s Lumberghe of the Week award goes to both SVB’s leadership for bad management AND mainstream media’s coverage of the story.

📆 UPCOMING EVENTS:

April 25-26: Running Remote [📍 Lisbon, Portugal] - Largest remote work conference in the world for enterprises and SMEs

May 24-28: Vivel [📍 Multiple Locations, Turkey] - networking meets music at this one-of-a-kind conference for location-independent professionals

June 16-19: Camp Indie [📍 Kent, Connecticut] - adult summer camp & conference for digital nomads & those living an unconventional life

June 25-July 2: Bansko Nomad Fest [📍 Bansko, Bulgaria] - for digital nomads, freelancers, and founders in the mountains of Bulgaria

⭐️ This Week’s WFA Jobs:

I've teamed up with THE remote job coach Jordan Carroll to provide you with handpicked work-from-anywhere jobs right here in this newsletter:

⭐️ Client Success Team Manager @ Imapolania

⭐️ Data Science and Machine Learning Matching Specialist @ Andela

⭐️ Blockchain Engineer @ Polygon Technology

Want help finding the right remote job for you? Join the Remote Collective and get introductions to dozens of remote companies looking to hire people like you!

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That's it from us this week, hope you have an amazing day!