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Random screen capture from a video interview. I look very sane and professional here.
Why the current tech backlash feels different. Issues of surveillance and police militarization date back at least to the Patriot Act and 9/11. Why didn’t most Americans care then, and why are they protesting now? On the Verge’s Decoder podcast with Nila Patel.
I’ve been listening to podcasts for more than 20 years. In the 80s and 90s, I recorded audio off the radio programs to listen to in the car. I’m a die-hard podcast listener. A big part of my podcast-listening is done while exercising, so I guess you can say podcasts have been lifechanging for me.
Industry Standard Tools: A list of tools of various trades that are “so entrenched that they’ve become the de facto tool that nearly everyone in that trade uses,” compiled “by the people who use them.”
“That sounds like a ‘you’ problem,” is so very often the appropriate response when communicating with a business.
Gloria Steinem Helped Transform the World for Everyone
Rebecca Solnit: “Much dismissiveness about feminism comes from ignorance about how profoundly feminism changed things that were so deeply entrenched, so normalized into invisibility, so ancient and customary that they first had to be denormalized, named, unpacked, and explained as to why they were incompatible with women’s status as people entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As news of Gloria Steinem’s death at 92 came in this morning, I saw a lot of this incomprehension.”
Do you wear shoes inside your house? If so, are they shoes you also wear outdoors?
I was out walking the dog when I got in a nice chat with a neighbor. When the chat was done, the woman noted the full poop bag I was carrying, and offered to take it from me and put it in her trash. “No thanks!” I replied, chipperly. “I’m good.”
That was years ago. I still think about it now and then and wonder what kind of message I was sending.
The US voted against a UN resolution to replace the standard Mercator Projection map of the world.
The new map accurately shows the size of land masses in relation to each other. In the Mercator Projection, designed in the 16th Century, Africa and Greenland are shown as about the same size, but in reality, Africa is 14x larger.
The US explanation for its vote is just plain stupid. I feel 14X stupider after reading it.
164 nations voted in favor of the resolution. The US was the sole “no” vote. We’re the stupidest country in the world now.
This kind of thing makes me angry in the way that greater abuses don’t. It’s just so goddamn petty.
Via jwz.org
1969 interview with Don Rickles by WMAR-TV reporter Susan White. “Rickles had a reparation for not letting reporters get a word in edgeways, so Susan decided to hilariously turn the tables…”
Rickles has a reputation for being kind, gracious and charming in his personal life and that shines through in this video.
Marco Arment: “If I learn today that my neighbors have political views that my ‘side’ considers unacceptable and unforgivable, should I be able to have dinner at their house, shovel their snow, or even greet them outside?”
Columbia House: The First 12 Cost A Penny, But … Columbia House was a great way to get 12 CDs, tapes or records for a penny. But its business model set the stage for a lot of bad e-commerce.
We Are Living in the Fantasy World of 13-Year-Old Boys
Many of the tech billionaires who built our world have taken the wrong lessons from their favorite science fiction. They regard “humanness, and Earth itself … as a burden to be sloughed off.” Gal Beckerman contemplates the new book “The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State” by Jill Lepore.
Like Musk, Thiel and Sam Altman, I grew up reading Heinlein, Asimov and Adams. I found the writing inspiring. But I stopped taking it literally a long time ago.
Romani-inspired “boho” and medieval European styles merged in 1960s hippie culture, with rock stars like Stevie Nicks, Mama Cass and Janis Joplin leading. “American youth were reading Tolkien, wearing their grandmother’s silk scarves, and dipping their toes in metaphysical philosophies.” By Avery Trufelman on Articles of Interest.
Chris Arnade rides the 22-hour bus trip from Darwin, Australia, to Alice Springs.
