Image via Wikipedia

I received a newsletter from Hunch this week.  I signed up to their newsletters because I often appreciate the posts and comments made by Chris Dixon, Hunch’s founder, amongst the digerati and I believe in supporting people who are interesting, even when I don’t quite ‘get’ their business.  Plus, Hunch has the added bonus of falling into my interesting diversion category and is a nice break from the other stuff in my inbox.

There’s lots of cool things about Hunch.  Beautiful imagery, great ideas, strong perspective.  And the newsletters nearly always have at least one thing inside that intrigues me … today it’s roll-less toilet paper.  (something that is a great invention once your kids outgrow the desire to make things out of paper, cardboard, and other household scraps.  we could never get enough toilet paper rolls in our house).

However, I increasingly find myself thinking “what’s the point?”  Is this the modern day and more attractive version of the advertising fliers that grocery stores and consumer products companies used to put in our mailboxes as kids?  The books section always fascinated me and the evolution of product range suggests that they continue to build traction.  But I still find myself asking why?  What would I get from “adding my own recommendations and ratings” as they implore me to do with each newsletter.

Do you know someone who is using this service effectively and finding benefit from it?  I heard a group of university students pitch a similar concept at a recent hackathon event.  Perhaps I’m not the right age group or demographic to understand.

Here’s the newsletter (with some additional text as I’m using a free Chrome plugin)