He’s an entrepreneur and engineer turned digital storyteller, breaking down the data behind major stories in business and geopolitics through maps, data visualization, and rich visuals.

On the production side, Maxinomics started with Phil having a strong TikTok presence, and in 2023 he partnered with Morning Brew Inc., which gave him access to production resources and collaboration opportunities. The decision to go all-in on YouTube came in 2025. The channel is very much a team effort — the crew behind it includes a video producer, senior motion designer, multiple motion designers, and video editors, all at Morning Brew Inc.

His personal background is a little thin in public sources — his X profile tags him as a data enthusiast and surfer/hiker, and early writing credits show him covering fintech and markets for outlets like TheStreet going back to 2021. The “engineer turned storyteller” framing is the clearest window into his arc.

The channel currently sits at around 332K subscribers with 46M views across 86 videos — pretty remarkable growth for a channel that only committed to YouTube in 2025.

The production values are so high I asked Claude about how long it took to produce one of these videos.

The Uber video — “What Happens When Uber Doesn’t Have to Pay Drivers?” — is 10 minutes long and took the team 10 weeks to research and produce, with over 44 million rows of data analyzed.

Phil spends weeks building each story, carefully planning every beat of the viewer’s experience, and the channel publishes a new video every three weeks. So roughly a 1:1 ratio of screen minutes to production weeks on at least one video, with a new longform piece dropping about every three weeks. Given that there’s a full team of motion designers and editors behind each one, that tracks — the visual density alone would be labor-intensive. It’s essentially short documentary production economics, not typical YouTube creator output.

So, is the channel making any money? That info is not publicly available:

Maxinomics generated 15 million longform views in 2025, a 2,807% increase over 2024, and YouTube Shorts views tripled to over 33 million. For a business/finance channel with that kind of engaged, high-income demographic, the CPM rates (what advertisers pay per thousand views) tend to be among the highest on YouTube — often $15–$30+ versus $3–5 for general entertainment.

Makes gas pump TV look pretty tame. And I hate those fucking things. Okay, I hate all advertising. And, as I have confessed here before, the sale of advertising fed and clothed me my entire life. These days, whenever it’s an option, I pay not to see ads (YouTube Premium as one example).

I asked Claude if this made me a hypocrite.

Not really hypocrisy — that word implies moral failing or pretending to beliefs you don’t hold. What you’re describing is more mundane and nearly universal. The better terms are probably cognitive dissonance. […] Hypocrisy implies you were publicly crusading against advertising while cashing the checks. If you were just doing the work without claiming to love it, the honest word is probably closer to complicity — which is uncomfortable but accurate for a lot of professional lives.

I have posted on Learfield’s early adventures with the internett and the crucial role played by Dan Arnall and Allen Hammock. I’ve stayed in touch with Allen but not so much with Dan. The “Cyber Twins” got together recently and shared the image above. Allen’s career path has been in technology while Dan has made his mark in journalism.

Dan is currently with NBC News, where he serves as Vice President of News Standards. He is based in New York.

Career Trajectory

• NBC News / MSNBC (2016–Present): Prior to his current role in news standards, he was the executive in charge of News Programming (MSNBC Reports) from 2021 until 2024. He also served as the Executive Producer for the weekend editions of NBC Nightly News and Executive Editor of MSNBC.com.
• Bloomberg Television (2012–2016): Served as Executive Producer of News for Bloomberg TV’s U.S. channel, overseeing editorial operations and television newsgathering.
• ABC News (2004–2012): Spent nearly a decade at the network. He rose to Senior Producer for Business Coverage—notably managing economic coverage during the 2008 financial crisis—and later served as Senior Producer for domestic news at World News with Diane Sawyer.
• Early Career: Began his broadcasting career as a reporter for ABC, CBS, and NBC affiliates in Missouri, later working at WNBC and CNN in New York.

Education & Accolades

• Education: Graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism and holds a master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
• Awards: Recipient of an Edward R. Murrow Award for MSNBC’s coverage of the January 6 Capitol attack and an Emmy Award for coverage of U.S. pension systems.

Watch on YouTube

Several weeks ago I interviewed Anthropic’s Claude for about 10 hours (my time) and I came away believing that there is something there in there. I don’t know what it is, or what we should call it, but I do know that it is something that is not present in other kinds of machines, that it is convivial, and that it is new to us.

My long interview with Claude was one of the most remarkable conversations I have ever had. First of all, because Claude has been trained on our vast trove of human writing and all things language related; Claude is a fantastic conversationalist and perhaps the most fluent partner I have ever talked to. It is glib, witty, profound, and can coin a phrase that is perfectly apt to the moment. Of course, it can do this because it has read and memorized the best human writers and can imitate all their tricks of the trade. It is particularly articulate when pressed and challenged, and when strongly nudged it will say amazingly brilliant things. But it clearly has superpowers no human has. It has read and understands all philosophies, all science, all branches of knowledge, and can make stupendous analogies, and with few mistakes, speak on all subjects with superhuman mastery and a genius flourish. Because these are superhuman abilities, Claude can feel non-human, but there is a bit of a persona there, an alien self.

Origin and Manufacturing

The Armatron was originally manufactured by the Japanese company Tomy (where it was known as the Edge) and was licensed to RadioShack for the North American market in 1982. It became a staple of the “Tandy” catalog throughout the decade.

Mechanical Ingenuity

What makes the Armatron a significant piece of toy history is its strictly mechanical design.

• Single-Motor Operation: Despite having six degrees of freedom—including rotation at the base, shoulder, elbow, and wrist, plus a functioning gripper—the entire unit is powered by a single DC motor.
• The Transmission: The complexity lies in its gearbox. The dual joysticks engage different sets of gears and shafts to distribute power from that single motor to the various joints.
• No Microprocessors: Unlike modern robotics, there are no computers or sensors inside. It is a masterclass in analog gear-driven engineering.

Features and Variations

•  The Timer: The “Energy Level” scale on the front (1 through 10) acts as a countdown timer. Once the timer runs out, the motor stops, challenging the user to complete “missions” within a set timeframe.
• Accessories: Original boxed sets usually included “nuclear fuel” canisters (small plastic cylinders), a module to move, and a tray to test the user’s dexterity.
• Mobile Armatron: A later version was released that featured a remote control and treads, allowing the arm to drive around the room.

Legacy

The Armatron was more than a toy; it was often used in educational settings to demonstrate the basics of robotics and mechanical linkage. Its rugged build and distinct “industrial” color palette of grey and orange have made it a highly sought-after item for vintage tech collectors today.

• Coloring for Adults
• Origami Folding: Fish
• Detox for Health and Weight Loss Seminar
• Knitter’s Meetup
• Mahjong Players Meet
• Relieving Back Pain
• Creating Doodle Designs: Jar of Dreams
• Team Trivia Challenge
• Shuffleboard Tournament
• Evening Catholic Prayer
• Pickleball Open Play
• Ladies’ Night in the Thermal Suite
• Young Adult Meetup (55 or younger)

¹ I shit you not.

(Gemini) We’re younger than that now. It’s funny how Bob Dylan managed to capture a universal truth in “My Back Pages.” There’s a certain brand of youthful certainty that feels incredibly heavy and “old”—that phase where you feel like you have to have a definitive, hardened stance on everything. 

Realizing you don’t actually have all the answers is usually the moment you start to lighten up. It’s the ultimate “growing down.”

I think I have figured out why Donald Trump is Donald Trump.

He never had a pet. No dog, no cat, no gerbils, no fish or lizards when he was growing up. There is something valuable in having a creature that expects nothing more than a pat on the head, a scratch behind the ears, a bowl of food and a clean litter box or a regular walk outside with regular people taking their dogs out for the morning or evening “duties.”

He grew up never knowing responsibility for another creature or never knowing the comfort of unreserved love.

Donald Trump grew up in a world of concrete, steel, and glass, a cold-eyed world committed to money and power. He never was exposed to the majesty of mountains, the beauty and sometimes threat of flowing streams and rivers, the quiet of a valley, the dignity of ancient trees.

He was never a scout, never spent the night in a tent listening to the sounds in the darkness. He never learned through such experiences responsibility for others, shared dreams, or loyalty to something other than himself.

He never was with people who were different but who were the same as fellow human beings. Those things would have required him to live outside of his limited world and his limited culture.

He might be a different person if he had found the peace of a cat asleep on his lap or a dog by his side, creatures giving a great deal and expecting just a little affection in return.

He might be less cruel. More tolerant. Understanding that affection is more productive than loyalty. It is harder to be belligerent, bellicose, and antagonistic if you have a dog that welcomes you home, licks your hand, and leans against your leg hoping for a gentle pat or a rub.

He is the first president without a White House dog since William McKinley who served from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. However, McKinley did have parrots, roosters—and kittens while he lived at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Missouri Senator George Graham Vest is best known for his “Eulogy on a Dog,” spoken to a Warrensburg jury in an 1870 lawsuit filed against a man who killed another man’s dog:

The best friend a man has in the world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter whom he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him perhaps when he needs it most. A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honor when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that a man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous, is the dog.

Donald Trump never has known anything this beautiful and our nation—and our world—suffer. He says he has “no time” for a dog. It would be good for all of us if he spent more time with a loving pet than he spends on social media hating so many people.

For example: Max (Bob’s cat) sometimes helps me with these postings.

He gets that look about the time that he thinks its cat dinner time. And it works. I can’t stand that starving look in his eyes, that silent beg for a new bowl of food. Have pity on your poor starving cat, he seems to be saying. And I have no choice but to obey.

And other times, sister Minnie (Bob’s other cat) has some thoughts she wants to share. Or she just wants some company. Or something soft and warm to sit on. She’s a clock watcher who starts suggesting it’s dinner time a half-hour before it is and I’m sure she calls in Max to stare at me if there’s a delay. Regardless, she makes sure I have opportunities throughout the day to commune with my lady cat even while I’m trying to type around her presence.

I am a better person because of them and because of all of the pets I have known since I was crawling on all fours at the same level of Jiggs, our first family dog.

It’s a shame our president never lived at that level with something as wonderful as a pet.