✪ From Curators To Explorers - #45
Maintaining credibility, authority and trust may require upgrading our present curation skills
Explorers open new trails into the jungle. And in doing so, uncover things and ideas that otherwise would remain unseen. They see beyond the surface of things, not because they’re smarter, but because they’re closer.
This is why explorers, even those with modest reach, often produce more original insight than industry influencers. Because they’re operating inside the friction, not just commenting on it.
If you're a creator, curator, or independent expert struggling to maintain a grip on your visibility and your audience appreciation of your work, there may be some new things to take into consideration:
a) There is a huge and rapidly increasing number of newsletters and social media channels that curate news, trends, tools and resources in their space / market / niche.
b) AI, especially in the form of agents, can rapidly be trained to automate most of the basic tasks needed in this type of work.
c) Finding and organizing information is still of value but there’s no scarcity of quality news, information and resources out there.
Thus, it is very likely that to maintain credibility and provide unique value in the near future those who curate today will need to upgrade their value-generation efforts significantly.
Critical analysis, contextualization, reframing, interpretation / sense-making, personal experimentation are likely some of the ways to realize this upgrade.
Those who are willing to go beyond simple reporting and commenting by challenging existing narratives, by uncovering non-obvious insights, and by shedding light on emerging trends may also be the ones who will be able to rise above the noise and consolidate their status as trusted authorities.
1. An abundance of "uncritical curators" leads to a scarcity of true experts
The rise in number content curators has created an illusion of expertise, when in reality, true subject matter mastery has become increasingly rare.
As we find more and more newsletters and social media channels that act as curators in specific niches, it may seem like there is no shortage of knowledgeable authorities in any given field.
However, if you think about it, the ability to find and share information does not automatically corresponds to expertise.
Curation remains a value-generating skill, but it is fundamentally different from the deep, hands-on understanding that comes from active critical analysis, direct participation and experimentation within a domain.
Consider the analogy of sports reporting versus athletic performance. A sports journalist may develop an extensive knowledge of the game, the players, the strategies, and the history of that sport. They may even become highly skilled at analyzing matches, predicting outcomes, and contextualizing the latest developments. But no matter how effective they are, they will never possess the same intimate, physical understanding of the sport as the athletes themselves.
Would you hire a sport reporter to teach you how to become good and effective at that sport?
The same principle applies in any industry or field of knowledge. While curators can provide a valuable service by surfacing and organizing relevant information, unless they themselves dip their feet deeper into whatever they focus on, they will always be one step removed from the practitioners who are actively shaping the landscape through their own pioneering work, failures, and discoveries.
As a result, the proliferation of curators may paradoxically lead us to a scarcity of true experts - individuals who have invested the time and effort to deeply immerse themselves in a subject, test new ideas, and develop unique insights that cannot be easily replicated or aggregated by others.
2. From signalling to sense-making
This leads me to think that to continue to create value and to maintain authority, one must develop an ability to critically analyze the data, ideas, and trends he uncovers, pr even to reframe and contextualize them through the lens of his own unique experiences, values, and principles.
This requires a shift in mindset, from being a curator / collector / aggregator to becoming an active sense-maker.
Instead of just collecting the latest headlines, or commenting on some interesting article in your industry, you now need to dig deeper. You question other people’s assumptions, you challenge the prevailing narratives, you explore alternative interpretations.
From this perspective, what separates an explorer from a non-critical curator is not access to better links but the ability to:
Make one’s own assumptions, principles and filters, transparent to others
Question what others take for granted
Reframe insights through one’s own values and experience
Connect disparate ideas into new mental models
Consider multiple frames of reference and diverse perspectives
Extrapolate from the past to envision plausible future scenarios
Integrate one’s own analysis with insights drawn from personal experiences
Your unique lens becomes the asset.
3. How?
Explorers document. Not just what succeeded, but also what didn’t. The missteps. The weird detours. The lingering doubts.
This is what can make your perspective irreplaceable: not the polish, but the process. Not just the what, but the why, the how, and the now what?
Some concrete examples:
Detailed case studies that walk through the full lifecycle of your explorations, including the rationale, the process, the results, and the key takeaways
Transparent "post-mortem" reports that examine both successes and failures, and the insights derived from each
Thought-provoking analyses that connect your experiences to broader industry trends and implications
Multimedia content and recordings (e.g. videos, podcasts, interactive visualizations) that bring your journey to life
This approach requires a willingness to be vulnerable and transparent, as you share not just your triumphs, but also the mistakes and challenges you encounter along the way.
This level of transparency turns you from a curator to a contributor.
It builds trust because it feels authentic.
4. The Mindset Shift Required
Transitioning from a being a typical curator to being an active explorer does require a fundamental shift in mindset.
The curator mindset is one of discrete detachment and objectivity. The goal is to gather information, synthesize it, and present it as neutrally as possible.
The explorer mindset, on the other hand, is one of immersion, curiosity, and a willingness to take risks.
As an explorer, I need to be comfortable with uncertainty, open to challenging my own assumptions, and eager to dive headfirst into uncharted territory. I must be willing to experiment, to fail, and to share those failures openly, using them as opportunities for growth and discovery.
Additionally, the explorer mindset requires a deep sense of personal investment and ownership over the work I do. I am no longer just a conduit for information, I now shape the narrative, I create new knowledge, I open new ground.
This shift in mindset has also profound implications for how I engage with my audience as well.
Rather than having a detached, impersonal relationship, with your readers, where you are the guru-filter and they receive your hand-picked selections, one could cultivate a sense of transparency, authenticity, and intimacy by using this explorer mindset, so frequently missing from the typical curated channels.
This attitude opens up the opportunity to see one’s own audience not just as passive readers of content, but as collaborators and partners in a journey, who are eager to provide valuable feedback, alternative perspectives, and ideas that can inform and strengthen our work.
This shift is not cosmetic. It’s foundational.
It requires letting go of the security and comfort of the average, non critical, non-explorative, curator’s role.
It redefines the value one has to offer — not as a source of information, but as a signal of what’s worth paying attention to.
5. Real Authority
In summary: The era of the uncritical curator who simply gathers and redistributes interesting content, trends, and resources within a niche - may be slowly losing some of the value we have come to appreciate in recent years.
No longer should we expect to differentiate ourselves and to provide true value to our audiences by merely compiling the latest headlines and industry reports when a thousand services, apps and AIs is going to do that better and faster than us.
To thrive on this new frontier, my feeling is that one should consider abandoning the role of the detached curator and add on top of it the mindset of the active explorer.
Critically analyzing the information we uncover, reframing it through the unique lens of pur own experiences and experiments, and contextualizing it through our own values, and principles.
Adopting this explorer mentality, coupled with a commitment to transparency about who you are and what you stand for, may allow us to build a closer and more trusted relationship with our readers.
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Everyone tells us that the magic of life is about the journey, not the destination.
But when we think of AI, we only think of the destination. Why is that?
Maybe because we are slowly forgetting about the importance of doing the dirty work ourselves.
You’re Being Lied About AI’s Real Purpose - Simon Simonek
“In the age of infinite information, the key competitive advantage isn't knowledge. It's wisdom.
Not those who know the most, but those who can discern what matters.
Not processing power, but purpose.
Those who can extract meaning, connect dots across domains, and make wise decisions despite uncertainty are more likely to thrive.”
Michael Simmons - “Information Singularity”
“… photographers and filmmakers may be seen as discovering images that already exist in the possibility space rather than creating something new.”
“The winner would never have thought of himself as a filmmaker, and he made a film that made you feel something, …”
“I feel that's very powerful. And the reason he could do it was because he had access to something that just wasn't possible a couple of months ago."
From the 3rd AI Film Festival - “Curated Realities” by Samuel Axon
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