The first 5% is indexed by Google and other search engines, so you can easily find it. The remaining 95% requires passwords to access. The dark web isn't indexed at all and can only be accessed with specialized tools. In my introduction, the person guiding me first created a virtual machine. When exploring the dark web, you might get explored yourself. To avoid exposing my computer to this world, we used a virtual machine that could be deleted afterward if attacked.

We then used a Tor browser, part of the Onion Network. The kind of things we saw were astonishing: lots of drugs and what they call men's health products like Viagra. There was also an abundance of fake currency—euros, sterling, dollars—sold at about a fifth of their face value. Guns were plentiful too.

Credit cards were another major item for sale. They sell white cards with numbers written on them; for instance, you could buy ten cards each containing between $5,000 to $20,000. You use them until they're caught and blocked. These criminals collect millions of numbers and sell them in small batches to minimize their risk.

Fake IDs and passports were also common. When I asked about hiring someone for nefarious activities like framing or even killing someone, they showed me places where you could pay for such services. It's incredibly cheap because the dark web reduces the risk significantly.

Despite these horrors, my host mentioned some positive aspects of the dark web: whistleblowers can communicate with journalists without being identified, and people in oppressive countries can speak their minds safely.

I visited hacker websites as well. They don't have titles like mainstream sites but are numerous nonetheless. Hackers boast about their exploits—breaking into places, defaming entities, collecting ransoms—and sell lists of passwords among other things.

Fascinating yet deeply unsettling. Before my tutorial, I asked my host if they could find hackers willing to talk to me anonymously about their work and motivations. Although they tried hard and received many service offers, no one agreed to speak with me.

But I'm persistent. One day soon, I hope to talk to some hackers from the dark web and share those insights with you. For now, wishing us all more luck than I thought we'd need given what I've learned about the dark web.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/29/opinion/write-your-own-obituary.html

Given my recent experience with the end-of-life Doula course (I just learned that a male Doula is a Doulo), and in general my interest in how to make the last chapter of life better I just did this exercise and wrote my own obituary, and I am highly recommending that you try as well.

Here is what I wrote:

**Dan Ariely (April 29, 1967 – [Date of Passing])**

An often surprised, and always curious traveler, Dan Ariely had a taste for adventure and a thirst for knowledge that was almost endless.  He took life in a not-so-serious way and deeply cared for and loved people.  His main life lesson was to suggest that we should all take more risks, try more things that we don’t think are good ideas and take life less seriously.  He found joy in his research, deep satisfaction in helping others, and resilience in his endless romantic love.

I next asked Chat GPT to write my Obituary, and here is what it came up with:

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**Dan Ariely (April 29, 1967 – [Date of Passing])**

Renowned behavioral economist, author, and indefatigable explorer of the human condition, Dan Ariely passed away at the age of [age at passing]. Born in New York City and raised in Israel, Ariely's endless curiosity about why we behave the way we do propelled him to the forefront of psychology and behavioral economics.

His life was a testament to generosity and an unwavering willingness to help anyone in need. After surviving a severe burn injury as a teenager, he became deeply interested in understanding pain, adaptation, and the complexities of human behavior. This personal journey not only shaped his professional pursuits but also left him with his distinctive half beard—a symbol of resilience and individuality that he wore with his characteristic adventurous and playful spirit.

Ariely's half-beard became a hallmark of his identity, reflecting his openness about his experiences and his commitment to embracing life's imperfections. It was a visual representation of his belief that our unique traits and stories enrich the human tapestry.

As a professor at MIT and later as a Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics at Duke University, Ariely captivated students and colleagues alike with his innovative experiments and engaging lectures. He had a unique talent for making complex psychological concepts accessible and relatable, often infusing his teachings with humor and real-world applications.

A prolific writer, Ariely authored several bestselling books, including *"Predictably Irrational," "The Upside of Irrationality,"* and *"The Honest Truth About Dishonesty."* Through his writings, he invited readers on a journey of self-discovery, encouraging them to question their assumptions and explore the hidden forces that shape their decisions.

Beyond academia and writing, Ariely co-founded multiple companies and initiatives aimed at applying behavioral economics to improve everyday life, from financial decision-making to health and well-being. His generous nature and eagerness to help others were evident in his hands-on approach to mentorship and his contributions to various charitable endeavors.

He is survived by his family, friends, colleagues, and the countless individuals whose lives he touched with his wisdom, kindness, and zest for life. Dan Ariely's legacy is one of endless curiosity, generosity, an adventurous spirit, and a distinctive half-beard that reminded us all of the beauty in embracing our true selves.

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Here are some final reflections …. (see attached video)

And I just realized that for males the right term is Doulo and not Doula ;)

What would you want to do with your social media?

And how much of the planning is for the person dying and how much of the planning is for the people left behind?

And what about being an end-of-life Death Doula? Is it something that increases the quality of life? I think it is doing a bit of both but on balance being near death and thinking about it more often looks like it is increasing mortality salience and with it also the motivation to live better.

In any case, another fascinating day.

And here is the link for the video that I mentioned: it is from Shall We Dance? (2004) ‘Witness to Your Life’ - Susan Sarandon and Richard Jenkins

Here is an LLM version of the recording of my thoughts — it is not exactly the same as the recording, but it captures the essence rather nicely.

here are some of my reflections about my internship at Ogilvy. First of all, I was incredibly grateful that the people at Ogilvy were so open to give me such. gift of spending so much time with them, to explain to me what is going on and how they work and so on. I deeply appreciate that generosity and I don't take it for granted.

My first observation is that the people who seem to work in advertising, or maybe it's just Ogilvy, are very young, very attractive and dress in a very interesting way. In fact, taking a coffee break from time to time and just watching people around was fantastic. I also think that they thrive on creativity and that they very nicely challenge each other to be more creative. It doesn't feel like a competition of who is more creative. It feels more like a team sport of trying to get people to be more extreme, think more creatively, and have more and better ideas.

The collaboration seems very interesting. People seem to have lots of time for discussions. They seem to truly enjoy brainstorming. I was in multiple sessions. There was never a sense that the hour or the two hours are ending and we have to come up with a solution. In fact, it felt more like a process of getting marinated in the ideas and that the marination was for its own sake. In a few cases, people went back to ideas that were floated before. In any case, it seems like they valued the creativity, they enjoyed the creativity, and they were not rushing themselves to come up with a creative process. I'm sure that there are many other aspects of the work in which they rushed themselves very much, but in the creative process, they didn't seem to rush themselves very much.

My next point is that the whole process of the agency is very different than the process that I do when I go to companies and try to get them to adopt some behavioral change. When I usually come to companies, I usually start the day in a workshop, and the workshops look like this. I spend 45 minutes discussing a general framework for behavioral economics with a few main points, and then I turn to the audience and I say, how would you apply these specific points to the current things that you're currently doing? In other words, I'm asking them to think about how they would look differently in what they're doing if they took the behavioral economics perspective.

People come with all kinds of ideas and they start to understand the value of behavioral economics within their framework, within their daily business. Then I say, okay, now let's move to another topic. Let's talk about the psychology of money or motivation or loyalty or trust or a topic. And then I give the lecture and then I say, and now how would you apply that principle? So we just learned some things about trust. We just learned some things about loyalty. Now that you understand trust and loyalty a little bit better,

What would you do with it? And then we move throughout the day, and usually, we end the day by saying, okay, up to now, everything we did was to say, how would you do what you're doing currently? Slightly better with these principles from behavioral economics, but now let's do the last session and let's think about how would you approach your business from scratch? If you have all of these principles in mind. The idea, by the way, is to create some tangible ideas, but also, of course, mostly a hypothesis that needs much more work before they are applied.

Okay, so I have my process in mind in general, and of course, when I was exposed to the agency model, I looked at that in contrast to my model. The agency process is very different because the creative, people in the agency, when they approach a problem, they approach it as a tabula rasa. They say, okay, we don't understand this problem with X. Let us listen to customers. Let us get data from the company that this is their project. Let's understand what they understand, and what they don't understand, and let's do some primary research and so on.

I really value their approach because they come to a new situation, they don't come with preconceived notions, they don't come with specific ideas, and they're open to interpreting it. And I'm sure that the right model is to do probably both. But I started wondering why don't they do it all, my model? Why don't they take everything they've done so far on trust? And why don't they take everything they've done so far on pricing or reputation management and so on? And why don't they start with something that they know already?

It struck me that there are some good reasons, of course, to come tabula rasa and not be involved and so on. But it struck me that one of the reasons for this is the hourly model. The hourly model basically says there are things you get paid for and there are things you don't get paid for. And when you get paid for, you get paid by the hour, not by the quality of the idea or not by the impact.

In this particular case, what it means is that if a company spent time deeply understanding a topic, like trust or loyalty, and then they went to a client with that, under the hourly model, they couldn't charge them for it. This work could serve lots of clients, but if they start with, here is what we know already, they wouldn't be able to charge a client for it. And in fact, the whole work process might take shorter and actually give them less money.

So if you think about the hourly model, it means that they don't get paid on research that they came up with early, before the engagement. In my case, I'm an academic. This is not part of the feature. I'm there about creating learning. But an agency, if they put 30% of their effort into creating this generalized understanding of these important topics, nobody would pay for it. And not only that nobody would pay for it, once they pitch it to a client and

The client says yes, and it cuts the duration of the project by, let's say, 30%, the agency would make 30% less money. So the incentives are actually quite against creating generalized knowledge and create against spending effort to understand the topic in a general sense, not in a specific sense, but in a general sense.

Then it also made it clear to me that this hourly model has other downsides. For example, it makes companies, agencies, less incentivized to spend time on proposals. Nobody pays for proposals. So eventually proposals are probably not as good as they could have been.

Now the companies who are asking for a proposal probably think it's a great deal. They say, oh, you know, I'm asking for five companies to all give us proposals and they all give us proposals and it's all for free. Yes, but are these the best possible ideas? Do we just pretend that we got five proposals for free or is it in fact the case that we got five not so great proposals that are all for free but are not really giving us even an indication of what these people could do if they spend real time on this?

I'm guessing that the assumption is that if we got the free proposal, it's a really good indication that the correlation between the quality of the free proposal and the final paid work would have been a correlation of one. It's a predictive element that the free proposal is predictive of the real quality, but I don't think it's necessarily the case. So it could be that companies who are using this strategy of getting free proposals and using those to judge, to predict the quality of the real effort when it's getting paid for are making a mistake.

By the way, in nothing the correlation is one, but it could be the correlation is not even that high and that the correlation between the free proposal and the real work is not that high. To do this study would be complex, but I think it's worthwhile thinking.

And then I kept on thinking about other elements of the hourly model and it became clear that it also reduces collaboration. The goal of having a research lab in my case with many different people with many different skills is to get lots of people to be involved and to work together. The goal of an agency is to get lots of people with different creativity to work together, but if the model is a billable hour model, it is less likely that people would help each other.

In fact, the structure is to say, hey, I want 15 minutes of your time. Let's say I came to you and I say I want 15 minutes of your time and you say, oh, that's billable. And now you also have an incentive to say, well, this will not take me 15 minutes, it will take me three hours. The moment you move for a billable hour model, you get people to be less incentivized to help each other and you have lots of things that are wrong.

Finally, I would say the following. Creativity is very magical. Creativity is very magical. And I understand why clients want control and billable hours seems to give clients control.

Trol. And I understand why agencies would want to portray to people a process and work and what we call operational transparency. What we call operational transparency is the idea that we want to show people effort. We want to show people effort because that increases willingness to pay. So I understand all of those things.

I understand why we might want the reasons for billable hours and control. I understand why the agencies want to show a process and value per money and so on. But I think that these things might also hurt creativity. And it will be useful to think about maybe a hybrid model where maybe we don't throw away completely the hourly model, but we have some of it that is not in that model. And maybe we have a more controlled process for creativity, but not everything is controlled creativity.

Anyway, I had an amazing time. I learned a lot. And I'm looking forward to visiting again.

And here are a few pictures