What even is the optimal number of links or images or miscellaneous things to share with others in one go? Laura Olin’s newsletter, one of the better sources of *nice* internet things out there, always contains 10 items. At some point in the last couple years she started the practice of ending with a poem as the tenth item, which is a pretty nice tradition. Crème de la Crème contains one item on Wednesdays and a couple dozen on Saturdays, a large proportion of which are in-depth long reads. This results in me sitting on the couch for a good chunk of early Saturday afternoon, and then feeling rather guilty that I missed part of the few warm/sunny hours of the weekend. The majority of newsletters I subscribe to discuss one idea or subject of interest per issue, but I don’t think I want to make you read 2000 words on what I believe to be the future of social media, etc. I also don’t have any kids, so go-to sources for tragic-funny anecdotes that illustrate the complexity/banality of life are, apparently, lacking.
I think I’ll just share as many things as seem appropriate at a particular time! After all that preamble. Here are some things I’ve had bookmarked for the last while since I started thinking about keeping a record of these kinds of things.
How to become a Silicon Valley intellectual (Baffler)
Like most people with a brain, I am deeply skeptical of Silicon Valley and surrounding ideas. The culture, the problems it chooses to tackle, the values it espouses, the bro-y-ness, the endless self-congratulation, the inability to use the solutions to solve (in my view) real societal problems, the lack of sartorial sensibility, the list goes on and on. I think this piece was from last week. Like many humorous bits of writing, it highlights the problems with a particular thing in a way that a serious critique wouldn’t quite manage.
Related: remarks on the moral economy of tech (Idle Words)
I don’t know much about Maciej Cegłowski but I guess he’s a programmer in SF. This is from 2016. I think most of it rings more true than ever now.
Music for horse and rider - DJ Earl Grey
Ideal for evenings or early mornings
Tavi Gevinson on Britney Spears but more about young women and girls and sexuality and how they get sexualised (The Cut)
This was the most impactful thing I’ve read on the internet in the last couple months. I wasn’t a reader of Rookie, even though in principle it was very dope. I have found, however, that anything Tavi Gevinson writes is extremely clear-eyed and honest. This piece contains very direct, very compelling observations of how sex-positivity and ‘women’s empowerment’ can be used to coerce (primarily younger) women into acts they don’t want to be doing; the high currency of youth that ultimately != real power; and about how Britney was not the feminist icon that some are trying to position her as now! I’m not an expert at anything Britney-related, although the conservatorship does seem extremely wack, but let’s not pretend like she wasn’t THE mainstream. Anyways, if you read anything here please read this one.Free Form (a label?/brand? from Okanagan Crushpad) Blanc de Noir, 2017
If I may quote myself: “Dis was wonderful. Had it at a tasting at OKCP this summer, had to cop. The perfect amount of slight toasty. Crispy and balanced and peppy. Dry. Must drink again.”
So there you have it. Tell me your vivino so I can see what you’re drinking and copy you!
Confession, confessional societies, why do we continually confess by Eda Gunaydin (Sydney Review of Books)
Epidemiology article of interest: “Rethinking COVID-19 test sensitivity” by Mina, Parker, and Larremore in NEJM.
Because my research mostly focuses on TB diagnostic tests, I spend a lot of time thinking about testing. Testing has been pushed to the forefront of the literature thanks to COVID, which means that, much more than before, good articles are being published that actually address the ~philosophy~ of testing. This has really made me think a lot more deeply about what exactly we want a test to do in a particular scenario. In fact, this question should always be at the forefront when we’re designing tests and studies on diagnostic tests - but it typically isn’t!
A frequent refrain in TB is that we need to use the tools that are available now - I am really only starting to fully internalise that, and am considering how different testing strategies could be useful, a change from my previous wishful thinking that we need tests with higher accuracy alone.Recent phenomenon that I could do without: One-year pandemic anniversary think pieces.
Of course the mortality and morbidity caused by the pandemic is tragic and should be acknowledged. But imo we don’t need retrospectives on ~how everything’s changed~: it is still our collective reality!
Interview with art historian Prof Darby English re: contemporary Black art and why it may not be all it’s hoped to be (Artnet)
What are some of the biggest changes you’ve seen in the study and participation of African American studies and African American art history in the past 20 years?
The single biggest change is a narrowing. When I think about where these fields were 20 years ago, from, say, 1999 to 2003, the comparatively wider range of activity staggers me. The art and the ideas were so much more challenging. There was so much more nuance in the conversation. There was more comfort with discomfort.
Obviously I am not a scholar of African American art history, but I thought this was interesting because it seems like there may be a couple insidious forces playing a role here. 1. Art markets are mainly interested in hearing about one sort of idea/narrow range of ideas from Black artists (i.e., exploration of Black identity, as English explains earlier in the article), and thus are only willing to support those kinds of narratives; and 2. External forces/the system we exist in/white supremacy are forcing Black artists to re-state and re-assert their identity and inherent value over and over again, which is not leaving a lot of space to do anything else. Obviously, both phenomena are harmful, limiting, and deeply unfair.
Take-out item I cannot endorse enough:
Sade but make it garagey ok!
Ok that’s enough! Here’s hoping the take-out as mix of things analogy makes sense…