Canned Dragons

Welcome to the eighth issue of Week on the Web. I hope your week has gone well. After just under a year of not being able to work, I went back to my job this week, albeit at a fraction of the hours I was working previously. While I started off with a lot of energy, as the week went on, that began to wane. It's tough working with chronic illness that threatens to pull you under. When disability works her merciless machinations in your life, you have trouble making solid plans. God willing, I will be able to get used to this new schedule and maybe increase my hours some. I've found out that I need a buffer of at least a couple of hours to actually get things done, outside what I've specified are my official "office hours."

I'm a bit older than a "geriatric millennial," which apparently means it will be harder for me to be a capable leader in today's workplace.

I sold my 1992 Data East Star Wars pinball machine a few months ago, partially so I could fund a new computer. My old iMac turns 10 this year, and it now sits in my son's room and has essentially become his. It's somewhat remarkable how long it has lasted and that it continues to be a good working computer (even without the latest two OS releases). My primary computer for the last 2 years has been an iPad, but I have to "borrow" my son's computer to do certain things. I've got my eye on a refurbished M1 iMac of the blue variety, to match my old pinball machine.

The Olympics are upon us, and with seemingly much less fanfare and publicity than have accompanied the games in past years (you could easily be forgiven for not having known they were being held). There are good reasons for the tepid response to these winter games, and most of them have to do with where they are being held: Beijing, China. The BBC has a solid summary of why that location is controversial. Chief among the complaints is the horrific treatment by China of the Uyghur ethnic and religious minority people.

There is also evidence that Uyghurs are being used as forced labour, and that women are being forcibly sterilised. Some former camp detainees allege they were tortured and sexually abused.

Beijing is also accused of restricting the freedom of people in Hong Kong through new legislation including the Hong Kong National Security Law.

In its 2021 annual report, Human Rights Watch said that "Beijing's repression - insisting on political loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party - deepened across the country".

German government ministers boycotting the Games said they were protesting against the treatment of Chinese tennis champion Peng Shuai.

The all-time best Olympics announcer, Bob Costas, who is now retired from the gig, calls the International Olympics Committee "shameless" for where they've chosen to hold the games.

You can bet I won't be tuning in.

I was just introduced to the idea of solarpunk via the Numeric Citizen Introspection newsletter. Wikipedia describes it this way:

Solarpunk is a genre and art movement that envisions how the future might look if humanity succeeded in solving major contemporary challenges with an emphasis on sustainability, climate change and pollution.

The images that portray the solarpunk aesthetic breath life into a vision of a green future. I love them because they stand in stark contrast to the onslaught of images that we have seen of dystopian futures where the planet lies in waste after humans have leeched it of its natural resources and beauty. Solarpunk is especially necessary now, when we are developing the capability of bringing these visions to life, but are also beset by the pessimism of current events. They remind us that we have to keep looking forward with optimism about how we craft a more human, organic environment, while still allowing the positive developments in technology to coexist.

Noah Smith works through what makes the vision of a solarpunk city work in his mind (beyond just having buildings with tons of foliage). He breaks it down into five components:

1. Open, walkable, multi-level retail.
2. River with low bank.
3. Walkable streets.
4. Varied architecture.
5. Shade.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Smith brings in conceptual and real-life images from Japan, but also from places like San Antonio (where a coworker of mine is temporarily living, making me jealous). Working within the framework of the five components he lays out, Smith is able to construct a compelling vision for what urban living can look like in the not-too distant future.

Over the past few years, I've read a handful of pieces on the rise and fall of Tumblr, but this one by Kaitlyn Tiffany was still worth taking in. One thing that stood out to me immediately was the account of former CEO Jeff D’Onofrio, who replaced founder David Karp, left under a cloud of secrecy in January. Matt Mullenweg of Tumblr owner Automattic says that he didn't announce the departure for D'Onofrio's "privacy and safety."

Whatever this means—whether Tumblr will shrivel in his absence, or if it’s still up for the challenge of fighting another, another day—many former users already talk about the site in the past tense. The sentiment “I miss Tumblr” circulates regularly on Twitter, where nostalgists tend to refer to the latest topics of conversation or styles of humor as “2013 Tumblr” or “Tumblr season 2,” as in, invented a long time ago … on Tumblr. Some have even gone back to Tumblr to live in its ruins. “i love how irrelevant tumblr is,” begins a Tumblr post that, ironically, went somewhat viral on Tumblr in February 2020. “no celebrities on here, no colleagues or family on here, no one’s famous off tumblr or making money, tbh no ones even updating the site like is there even any staff? who knows? it’s bliss.”

I knew that Tumblr was a pretty toxic place when the first user to try out a feature that lets followers pay for content got death threats. However, I didn't imagine the CEO would have to exit in such a clandestine manner. It's unfortunate that Automattic hasn't been a more capable steward of the service and that it's still seeing decline, but I definitely wouldn't want to be in the business of trying to satisfy Tumblr's hardcore fans.

I recently wrote a mostly positive post about the Disney+ series The Book of Boba Fett.

Here is a piece of feedback that I received.

@frostedechoes I agree, but it's a story I'm not interested in. Tatooine (in Episode IV) was supposed to be unimportant, out of the way, and a dead end for those who live on it, not the epicenter of the entire galaxy. I was not impressed that it was Anakin's home planet in Episode I or Rei's home planet in Episode VII (though that was basically a remake of the first Star Wars, which was also disappointing). The prequels and Episodes VII and IV were narratively terrible, but at least they introduced a bunch of new planets with cool stuff on them. The focus on Tatooine seems to be more about keeping the production budget reasonable than in service of telling a coherent or compelling story.

I can understand where Descy is coming from. Tatooine was supposed to be a backwater, and it has shown up in the various Star Wars properties more than any other location. Boring life on that planet was what caused Luke Skywalker to whine most unflatteringly when we first met him in A New Hope. Now as viewers, we find ourselves stuck there. I had never wondered if it played so prominently because it was cheap to film in a simulated desert setting. That might be taking too cynical a view, though, especially considering the formidable amount of resources Disney can surely contribute to a Star Wars project.

On the blog this week, I shared a post about the recent controversy with Spotify. I like to boost what other people have written about a given subject, and this is probably the most hyperlink-dense post I have written. I'll be interested to see how this situation plays out for Spotify.

Ultimately, it is up to the artists and the consumers if they want to engage in some sort of abstinence regarding Spotify. Whether the protest works with Spotify is up to the company. Folks can blast big tech for censorship, but in a case like this, Spotify is going to respond to what will be acceptable to their customers and also protect their investments in music and podcasts.

Will putting content warnings before all podcasts that contain discussions placate their critics? Somehow, I doubt it.

Of course, controversy is not new to Spotify, and the biggest ongoing controversy is the pittance they pay artists for streaming rights to their music. Many times, artists have no say in the deals, and couldn't pull their music from Spotify even if they wanted to because of the record label's level of control. Some would say this issue, so long contested, is bigger than the Joe Rogan controversy. There is also a strong argument that this topic is less divisive than a subject like Covid vaccines that has entered into the culture war territory. Theoretically, unless you are an executive at Sony or Spotify, you should be supportive of the artists (especially when you look at the data).

Jason Morehead had a wonderfully informative piece this week on what happens when fantasy tabletop RPG's bring in science fiction elements. Specifically, he profiles two new games, Starforged and Quest: Cosmic Fantasy Edition. Something that is particularly intriguing to me about Starforged is the ability to play without what they call a guide (what other games typically refer to as a gamemaster or dungeon master). This alleviates the need for heavy planning and allows for both co-op and solo play. I confess that the only way I can play D&D with my 9-year-old is to play an NPC to help guide him, so a co-op resonates with me. I also really appreciate the artwork by Joshua Meehan. The worldbuilding feels quite thorough. Morehead writes:

What I appreciate the most about games like Starforged and Quest: Cosmic Fantasy Edition is how they can fire up one’s imagination even before you play them. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a sucker for good worldbuilding — and for tools that empower others to build and explore their own imaginary worlds.

I can totally relate. I bought games like Mechwarrior (which was almost impenetrably difficult to play) when I was a kid because I wanted to live in that world, piloting one of those massive machines.

If you aren't up-to-date on why artists like Neil Young and Joni Mitchell are upset with Spotify's bankrolling of Joe Rogan and the potentially harmful content on his podcast, Robert Wright has a balanced take that's worth reading. Wright goes into the episode with Dr. Robert Malone, and the claims that were made by the doctor don't hold up well under scrutiny. Artists want to avoid being associated with a music service that also subsidizes content that could be detrimental to those who take it to heart.

I've seen some people decry criticism of Joe Rogan and his podcast as "censorship." These folks assume that holding a private company (Spotify) to account for what it is putting into the culture is the same as a government preventing access to certain materials that it does not like (as happens in places like China). Ben Werdmüller disagrees.

Activism and boycotts are a perfectly reasonable part of democratic society. You could argue that they’re a necessary part of a free market: businesses and customers have the right to make these decisions. To equate not wanting to financially support a toxic talk show with censorship is disingenuous at best.

I think Werdmüller is correct in his arguments. However, DHH from Basecamp makes the case that Spotify has laid down clear and reasonable rules about what is and isn't permissible on their platform regarding healthcare content.

Ultimately, it is up to the artists and the consumers if they want to engage in some sort of abstinence regarding Spotify. Whether the protest works with Spotify is up to the company. Folks can blast big tech for censorship, but in a case like this, Spotify is going to respond to what will be acceptable to their customers and also protect their investments in music and podcasts. As someone who has their music on Spotify and is a customer, Michael Donaldson from the 8sided Blog has some insight into the various dynamics at play.

Spotify paid Joe Rogan over 100 million dollars for exclusive rights to the podcast. That’s a lot. And artists and subscribers aren’t entirely wrong in feeling like they help pay for that by utilizing the platform. And, by paying this much for a single property, it’s in Spotify’s interest to relentlessly promote that property. In my experience, Rogan’s podcast is the top podcast recommendation on the Spotify dashboard a lot more often than it isn’t. I’ve never listened to a podcast through Spotify in my life but, almost without fail, there it is. Recommended for me and, I’m sure, recommended for you as well.

I want to make an essential distinction, though. When I use the word “customers,” I’m not talking about a minority of activists who are part of a special interest group. I’m referencing a plurality of actual subscribers and artists (and in this case, medical professionals) who have no particular agenda other than feeling like their money is going to subsidize a disinformation campaign.

Spotify Responds

Seeing customers and the medical community reacting seems to have pushed Spotify and Rogan himself to register and somewhat respond to the concerns regarding the content of the podcast. Unfortunately, as Dave Pell points out, adding content warnings to all podcasts that contain discussions of Covid-19 puts those that are factual and those that are non-factual on the same grounds. That lends legitimacy to the non-factual podcasts where there should be none. Pell also saves some space for a critique of Rogan's musical knowledge.

At one point during his video statement, Joe Rogan said, "I love Joni Mitchell," and then sung a brief line from a song … by Ricki Lee Jones. (Going with Joni's "A Case of You" was such an obvious pick!) Spotify better put a content advisory on Rogan's song knowledge, too. After all, they used to be a music service.

- Dave Pell, In Pod We Trust

Matt Poppe typically reviews the new Star Wars and Marvel shows for Christ and Pop Culture. He's now onto The Book of Boba Fett, though not reviewing every episode, as he has done with previous shows. So far, he hasn't been impressed.

And that’s because any guy who comes into town and thinks he’ll get it right where everyone else got it wrong tends to either fail miserably or become a weird, psycho cult leader. Whatever the outcome, this isn’t the type of person onto whom I want to project my hopes and cares as I’m munching down Little Caesars on the couch with the rest of the Poppe fam.

I get where Poppe is coming from, but I have also enjoyed the series more than he has. Unlike Poppe, I can see a legitimate character arc for Boba Fett that not only makes sense, but can make for compelling TV. To leave Boba Fett where he was when we saw him in the original trilogy would be doing the character a disservice and wouldn't be a good follow-up to The Mandolorian, either. His entry into the canon of crime bosses promises to tell a more interesting story.

When we came across Boba Fett in the 1980's, he was a quiet loner, who as Poppe points out, wasn't a boss. For him to become a boss, or even to have the desire to become one, he has to undergo a transformation. The Book of Boba Fett goes to great lengths to show us the steps in that transformation. First, he is ravaged by the Sarlacc, and very near to death, saved only by his protective beskar armor. When he escapes the bowels of the monster, unconscious in the middle of the unforgivingly arid Dune Sea, he loses that armor to itinerant Jawas, and we witness his rebirth, left almost as naked as he came into the world. The symbolism is easy to detect. When he is rescued/captured by a group of Tuskens, he begins to relearn how to live and even how to fight. We know all of this because the physical scars left by his experience leave him dependent on a bacta tank for healing and while he is in the tank, he has flashbacks of the past.

Fett's life with the Tuskens is anything but easy, as he gradually proves himself to a nomadic people hardened and distrusting from the harsh desert sands. As he builds himself up, he both learns from, and teaches the Tuskens. We witness a cultural exchange, and understand that the Tuskens have as much to offer Fett, as he, a man who has seen the far reaches of the galaxy and dealt with some of the most powerful people in it, has to offer them. What he has to give them, though, is not what we would expect from the Boba Fett of Empire Strikes Back. Sure, he's cunning, and his bravery scores him an early victory over a desert monster that impresses the Tusken tribe. As the days spent with the tribe wear on, though, he proves himself to be a masterful tactician and negotiator. As such, he becomes a de facto leader within the Tusken tribe. By the time he seems to have rid the sand people of two different groups of tormentors, he is well entrenched in the group.

You begin to see why Boba Fett now wants to lead rather than taking orders. The new situations he has lived through, and the experiences with which he has been gifted mark a different path for him. By the time he has gone full Dances With Wolves as part of the Tusken tribe, it's hard to believe he will ever leave. As viewers, though, we know that he moves on to become (or attempt to become) the crime boss we see in early scenes from the show. Fett's growth as character during his period in the Dune Sea not only makes him sympathetic, but also does something that no one watching A New Hope in 1977 thought would be possible: it humanizes the sand people that tried to kill Luke in that movie. The journey is a worthwhile story.

My main disappointment with the show is the killing off of the entire Tusken tribe early on in the season. The scenes set after Fett takes over Jabba's crime syndicate (what's left of it) are not as impactful as those set in the past with the Tuskens. However, future events have shown that was necessary to set Boba Fett on his current course. Boba Fett himself even admits he would have stayed with the Tuskens had they not been wiped out by a rival group. We know there is more in store for the once loner bounty hunter. I'm waiting for the rest of the show to catch up to the quality of the flashbacks with the Tusken raiders, but I'm pretty confident that it will. Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau have earned that trust, and it will be interesting to see where they take things in upcoming episodes.

The big news in the world of American Christianity this week seems to be the Vanity Fair profile of Jerry Falwell Jr. in which he admits to not being religious. What I found most interesting about this revelation is that it's not really one at all. I remember an interview with him on NPR in 2016 where he talked about then head of the ERLC for the Southern Baptist Convention, Russell Moore. Falwell accused Moore of being a "closeted liberal" and said that those who were scolding Donald Trump for his behavior should remember the woman at the well and not throw stones (conflating two different biblical accounts from the gospels). He picked up some religious references along his life's journey, but that seems to be about it. So the biggest surprise itself was that people were surprised by his admission.

Russell Moore's response was that the junior Falwell never really disguised who he was.

Falwell Jr. frequently spoke not in terms of the gospel or the way of Christ, even parenthetically, but in terms of decidedly Machiavellian political aims and objectives. When individuals questioned the cost to Christian witness of merging evangelicalism with populist demagoguery, he often dismissed them as though they were morally preening puritans, out of touch with the real world.

What are those people who believed in Falwell going to do when they find out Donald Trump is not actually religious?

Freddie deBoer wrote some thoughts after being told a book was "taken down" on Twitter. In this sense, "taken down" seems to colloquially mean something like "entirely refuted." deBoer takes a stance that is not expressed often enough: Something like a book refutation is not possible within a limited medium like Twitter.

There is no such thing as a damning review of a book in tweet form. Such a thing is beyond the affordances of the medium. A longform book review can do more, but has limits of its own. A book review can be cutting, if it’s rigorous enough - and yes, a certain length is a prerequisite for rigor. A book review can be informative and humorous and generative and entertainingly mean. I write some myself and hope to achieve such goals. But no review alone can rebut an argument expressed over hundreds of words. It might be better, or at least easier, if it were so. But we live in a world of irreducible complexity, and our efforts to wrestle it into digestible chunks to match diminishing attention spans - well, that last part is exactly the contentious issue at hand - don’t magically make life simple enough to understand through maxims or fortune cookies or tweets. It doesn’t work that way.

I wish more people understood the constraints of a platform like Twitter.

→ There is No Such Thing as a Takedown | Freddie deBoer

From Ross Douthat, an attempt to fuse together the themes of his two books, The Deep Places and The Decadent Society.

Both decadence and chronic ailments cut against the human tendency to imagine a crisis as something that either leads to some kind of fatal endgame quickly or else resolves itself and goes away. Being sick for a long period of time has a baffling effect on friends and family and acquaintances, not because they’re unsympathetic or unwilling to help, but because our primary image of sickness is something that comes and quickly leaves, or comes and threatens your life and needs to be treated intensely with the highest stakes — and it’s harder to know how to respond to having something that apparently isn’t life-threatening but also doesn’t go away.

I can sympathize with Douthat's attempt to draw parallels here. I certainly understand where he is coming from with regards to how people respond to chronic illness. Most people have difficulty understanding how to deal with illness that doesn't go away with some modern treatment option or, on the flip side, doesn't leave you dead. Many times, if people don't hear from you, they assume you are better. Similarly, I suppose, unless people are raising an alarm, a decadent society is thought of as getting better, as well.

→ Decadence is a Chronic Illness | Ross Douthat

🔗Via Alan Jacobs

The Political Lawyer

From David French, an analogy for partisanship in this country. He came to this after leaving the Republican party in 2016:

Since my political divorce, however, I’ve been able to see more clearly the nature of partisanship itself, including the way in which it distorts our view of the world. To use a legal analogy, at a fundamental level, partisanship converts a person from a judge (one who decides among competing arguments, hopefully without bias) to a lawyer (one who steadfastly and relentlessly defends their client, almost regardless of the facts).

The partisan is prone to act like a lawyer, and the party is their client. He or she picks a side, and then—convinced that the common good or social justice is ultimately served by their triumph—behaves exactly how lawyers behave. Are there facts that make your “client” (Democrats or Republicans) look good? Emphasize those facts. Do negative developments harm your case? Find a way to change the focus.

I love this so much. I've never thought about the subject using this framework, but it has long bothered me that people pick a side and then defend that side, no matter what. The paradigm that French, a former attorney, lays out is so appropriate, and so spot on. When you think about political issues, are you being a judge or a lawyer?

From the Blog

Some thoughts on the new Disney+ Star Wars episodic television show.

Tatooine Under New Management

The Book of Boba Fett on Disney+ has been met with mixed reactions but beyond being a credible addition to the Star Wars universe, it comes with a story worth telling.

Frosted EchoesRobert Rackley

Sometimes, I feel like I need to stop ruminating on the "deep cleavages in American society," as this piece from the Bush Institute refers to them. I wonder if it would be helpful to remember the turbulence of the sixties, just to have some frame of reference for comparison, but it doesn't seem to be doing much good for my mom's outlook. She's just as exasperated with our current climate as the rest of us.

While he doesn't offer much in the way of solutions, David Brooks presents the problems in a clear light, in this appropriately frighteningly titled piece America is Falling Apart at the Seams. He talks about the anger, the selfishness, the violence and the despair that are increasing in measurable ways. Perhaps most of us have heard this too much, lately. I wouldn't be bringing this up, though, if I wasn't comforted by reading an alternate perspective. There are actually those who, despite frustration, are trying to create a more virtuous cycle in a fractured environment.

Jamie Santa Cruz writes for Plough magazine about how she came to terms with the different perspectives of her friends on virus prevention and maintained close relationships that were threatened by strain. She relates the difficulty of reconciling herself to the beliefs of one of her friends.

Maddening, this gap between us. Symbolic of many other gaps between her and me – on politics, on faith, and on all things touched by those two. Gaps that didn’t exist last time I saw her but that have become far more obvious these last two fraught years.

It’s hard for me to justify bending to the consciences of people who object so strenuously to basic public health measures. Should I submit my moral scruples to hers? But my friendship with Eliza goes back almost twenty years, and it has run deep. I didn’t really want to throw it out and suffer yet another Covid loss.

So many prize being right over relationships. Ultimately, Santa Cruz chose a different path while on a vacation. She was to meet up with her old friend during her travels. When her friend "Eliza" didn't want to go caving in a place they required masks, she gave in and agreed to meet at alternate location. It was not without resentment that she changed plans, though. Then, Santa Cruz came down with Covid and Eliza was there to take care of her needs, saying nothing of the irony that her cautious friend was the one who ended up getting sick. She picked up groceries and refused to be reimbursed. Santa Cruz spent the rest of her vacation thinking about her friend's generosity.

The Covid story doesn't end at the kind deeds done by Eliza, though. After her own bought with Covid, Santa Cruz had another friend who was immunocompromised yet still refused to get the Covid vaccine contract the virus. Her first reaction was feeling like her friend had made her bed and needed to lie in it, but then she remembered how she was treated when she was sick and decided instead of gloating or frustration, she was going to take the giving path. She asked her friend if she could get groceries to help out. There, in the midst of deep divisions, was a way to pay it forward.

This week, I gave in to the hype and started playing Wordle and quickly became addicted to my daily fix of puzzling through scrambled letters. Matt Birchler has a list of the things that make Wordle great.

This is a play on some very old word game, I'm sure, but that doesn't diminish it. Wordle is great because of how its executed and all the little things it does right that add up to something many can't stop playing.

At the top of the list is that it's a communal game, because everyone is playing the same puzzle everyday. That's part of what makes it appealing to me. It gives my wife and I something fun to talk about. I'm trying to get my mom to give it a try, since she's particularly good at word games. Another reason Birchler gives is that there are no ads. I have to wonder, though, with as many people as are playing the game, how much a single, well-placed ad on the web app would be worth.

Discussions of cryptocurrencies seem to be on everyone's lips, these days. Most of the opinions I am reading are against crypto. Stephen Diehl has spent so much time explaining the problems with cryptocurrencies, that he's outlined them in a blog post called The Case Against Crypto.

Cryptocurrencies aren’t currencies and have no mechanism to ever become currencies. They are effectively unregulated securities where the only purpose of the products is price appreciation untethered to any economic activity. The only use case is gambling on the random price oscillations, attempting to buy low and sell high and cash out positions for wins in a real currency like dollars or euros. Yet crypto cannot create or destroy real money because unlike a stock there is no underlying company that generates income. So if you sell your crypto and make a profit in dollars, it’s exactly because a greater fool bought it at a higher price than you did.

I remember many times people have tried to tell me that buying stocks is just gambling. They simply don't understand the purpose of investment in a company that is creating value and being able to share a financial stake in that company's outcome. However, buying and selling cryptocurrency, as Diehl points out, does actually feel like gambling.

The always insightful Russell Moore writes in his latest newsletter about Insurrection Day. He came to a realization about another factor compounding our polarization after reading the Nonzero newsletter.

Over the Christmas holidays I read a fascinating account in Robert Wright’s Nonzero Newsletter of his epiphany about social media and political polarization. Wright had listened to a podcast in which psychology and political science professor Philip Tetlock “noted that once people have taken a position publicly, they have trouble abandoning it, even if evidence against it accumulates.”

The easy ability we all now possess to make our opinions public, without going through any gatekeepers, may be making us more entrenched in those opinions.

Years ago, I saw Henry Zhou give a keynote speech at The All Things Open. I left his talk with a more acute understanding of just how hard it is to maintain an open source project that has become popular. Zhou, who is a humble and giving individual, spoke about the unreasonable demands of users who would get angry if their messages didn't receive a response from the developer within 20 minutes. These developers are essentially volunteers, but they aren't given the treatment you would expect for donating their time and effort to the common good.

It comes as no surprise then, as Clive Thompson reports, many open source developers are burning out and abandoning their projects. As he notes in his piece, open source projects were supposed to be like Amish barn raisings, where many hands make light work. For most projects, though, it hasn't turned like that. He cites findings presented in Nadia Eghbal's book Working In Public.

Twenty years into the open-source era, it hasn’t worked out that way. Eghbal found that only a minority of projects, perhaps 3%, resemble true barn-raisings — or “federations”, as she dubbed them — with lots and lots of contributors pitching in. (Some examples are Linux, Node, or Rust.)

In contrast, the great majority of open source projects are run by tiny teams, and often only one lone person. Outside contributions are pretty minor, and limited to a tiny one-line syntatic bug fix. That’s not nothing! Those little contributions are great.

But the upshot is, those lone coders wind up doing the lion’s share of the work. “Open source inexplicably skewed from a collaborative to a solo endeavor” as Eghbal writes.

Thompson likens coders working on a project that suddenly gets popular to an solo entertainer who finds themselves playing to stadiums full of fans.

But if a developer suddenly finds themselves playing to a stadium — and swallowed up by the time-sucking demands thereof — then not getting paid can become a serious problem. There aren’t enough hours in the day. Plus, watching wildly profitable and highly-funded tech firms use their code without contributing anything back: That can just feel like a moral insult.

This trend should be worrying enterprises that rely heavily on open source software. A lot of big companies are using open source software in order to reduce their expenses. Once the open source components are integrated, they can sometimes be hard to extract.

Friday Night Video

Barrie “Darjeeling”

Barrie is another band that was recommended to me by the Apple Music algorithm. I immediately checked out their back catalog and noticed that they had a video for the song that I had discovered, “Darjeeling.”. I was particularly drawn to the video because it is set mostly at The

Frosted EchoesRobert Rackley

Barrie is another band that was recommended to me by the Apple Music algorithm. I immediately checked out their back catalog and noticed that they had a video for the song that I had discovered, "Darjeeling." I was particularly drawn to the video because it is set mostly at The Crane Estate. The Crane Estate is a sprawling piece of property in Ipswich, MA, where a young Cornelius Crane (AKA, Chevy Chase) spent his childhood summers.

I went to The Crane Estate in 2018 with my son, my sister and her boyfriend. The grounds look like what I imagine some rich Roman Senator's ancient villa would look like (complete with classical busts and statues littered throughout). The estate captivated my imagination. When I saw the video for "Darjeeling" was set there, I lit up with excited recognition. There isn't anything unique about the band's visit there. They seem like the same kind of tourists we were, taking in the grandeur of Richard Crane's vision and bringing their brand of hooky dream pop as a soundtrack.

Professor at a Christian college, Chad Ragsdale, has a blog post in which he embeds an episode of Joe Rogan’s podcast that featured Dr. Robert Malone. He writes about the episode in the first paragraph of his post.

This morning I finished listening to what is undoubtedly one of the most listened to podcast episodes in the history of podcasting. You can listen to it here. In fact, I would encourage you to listen to it not because I’m convinced that everything said is absolutely true, but because being exposed to ideas that run contrary to conventional narratives is helpful and even necessary for clarifying our own thinking.

PolitiFact just reported on the suspension of Dr. Malone from Twitter after spreading Covid-19 misinformation. The video of the interview was also banned from YouTube. I’m sure there are a certain segment of people who will think that means that the tech companies are trying to squash the facts.

The platforms’ actions against Malone represent the latest efforts from Silicon Valley to crack down on harmful COVID-19 misinformation. Days earlier, Twitter suspended the personal account belonging to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., on the same grounds.

What I find most interesting about this scenario is how Ragsdale admits that he doesn’t care whether what is being said on the podcast is the truth. He comes right out and states that to preface everything that follows. I think it’s sad that he and many others (Ragsdale spends quite a few words on how impressed he is that Rogan has so many listeners) are more interested in having a counter-narrative to whatever the mainstream view is than actually being presented with the truth. Ragsdale is so awed by the number of followers that Joe Rogan is able to generate, which in itself he seems to think is some proof that his voice is credible. Of course, we know how easy it is for masses of people to be manipulated my misinformation, so the number of people convinced by lies doesn’t then lead credence to the lies.

There’s a huge irony in the fact that Ragsdale spends much of his post talking about a lack of trust in mainstream media when he admits his own ideology biases him against whatever the mainstream media is promoting, even if it is the truth. This sort of obstinate stance has come to be characteristic of certain Christian circles and I know it damages the witness for Christ. As I’ve asked in the past, how are people going to believe the miraculous stories of a savior that transcended death if his followers can’t even recognize obvious truths in front of them?

I’ll let Hank Green close this post with a thought that seems to have some validity in thinking about the Joe Rogan phenomenon and why people cling to this type of media.

After reading Ragsdale's piece, that seems about right.

In our county, mask mandates in schools continue to be a hot button issue. There are parents who blame the enforcement of mask rules for deteriorating mental health amongst students. These parents are frustrated and seeing their kids struggling encourages them to want to do something.

“The dehumanization, isolation and fear mongering caused by all these mandates and COVID hysteria is literally killing our children,” Colleen Fleming, a parent, told the school board on Tuesday. “Understand this: Each and every one of you is complicit in the deterioration of our schoolchildren’s mental health and well-being and downfall of their academic success.”

Unfortunately, the parents in this case don't have a lot of evidence to back up their claims of a causation between wearing masks and mental health problems. Anecdotally, they have kids who struggle with wearing masks. That is challenging. However, there are plenty of people who wear masks and don't have mental health issues. It's also important to remember why people are wearing masks. According to this piece, when a state board member questioned the effectiveness of masks, the NC Health Director, Dr. Betsey Tilson, pointed to 21 studies that show the benefit of wearing masks.

The decline in mental health among children is an all-too-real phenomenon but it started before Covid even hit. Further decline was observed when Covid-19 came into the picture, but the possible causes for this are multi-factorial. When a society is faced with a pandemic, it causes additional stress to individuals (children and adults alike), for many reasons.

It's a lamentable human tendency to find a scapegoat for problems. In this case, it's a shame that those who are truly doing their best to keep our students, teachers and education staff safe are bearing the brunt of the anger for this pandemic.

Andy Nicolaides over at the Dent urges us to take it easy on ourselves when it comes to social media. Look around the interwebs and you will find no shortage of people berating themselves up for their time spent on social media or trying to concoct ways to curb their use of those platforms.

A big one is the use of Twitter. A huge amount of people are using this service multiple times a day, for various reasons. I’ve started seeing quite a few posts, or comments just as an aside in a post however, with the authors both figuratively and literally apologising for using the service. They beat themselves up for using it too much, or for wasting time ‘just scrolling’. I’m starting to question why that is. I mean, don’t get me wrong, if you’re leaving a dog or child to starve to death because you’re too obsessed with Twitter to feed them you’re most definitely an animal and you should be ashamed. If, however, you’re a hardworking individual that likes to utilise (not waste) your time flicking around Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, or whatever your service of choice is then you go for it.

Social media can be addictive and you don’t have to be Jaron Lanier to understand the ways those companies use psychological tricks to keep you coming back. However, if you can manage the urge and make reasonable use of Twitter or similar platforms, then you should give yourself a break and recognize that it’s an enjoyable activity for you. Just remember, “doomscrolling” became a well-understood and popular term for a reason.

→ Give Yourself a Break | The Dent

Twitter is serious about suspending the accounts of those who spread disinformation about Covid-19 or the vaccines for the virus. They have just shown, yet again, that they are willing to remove individuals from the platform, regardless of their popularity or government status. In these cases, they are enforcing terms of service that have already been set down, not being arbitrary or capricious.

Twitter has long banned users from sharing misinformation that could lead to harm. In rare cases, the company has permanently banned high-profile accounts, including the account of former President Donald J. Trump, over a risk of “further incitement of violence” after a mob of Trump loyalists stormed the U.S. Capitol last Jan. 6.

What is interesting is to see those who would label themselves as "small government" conservatives wanting the government to step in and prevent private companies, like Twitter, or in the case of the Parler deplatforming, Apple, Google and Amazon, from upholding their own terms of service. As I've written in the past, I believe companies should be allowed to set and enforce their own terms.

For those who aren’t aware, the Nationalist Socialist Party was another name for the Nazi Party in Germany and while I’m normally opposed to haphazardly calling your political opponents Nazis (see Godwin’s Law), Grossman lines this up quite well.

→ Twitter Permanently Suspends Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Account | The New York Times

It would be difficult to come up with a more precise and succinct description of our modern political predicament than this one by former religion advisor to Barack Obama, Michael Wear, from his new Substack newsletter. Sure, things are not exactly this simple, and there are so many dynamics at play, but at a macro level, this feels like it nails the current climate.

In an earlier post this year, I reiterated a basic dynamic in our social life that I am not the first to identify, but that I think generally holds: that conservatives have significant political power but feel embattled and resentful due to progressives’ cultural power, and progressives have significant cultural power, but feel embattled and resentful due to conservatives’ political power. That basic assessment requires significant explanation and caveats, but there’s a core truth to it that is helpful as you look out and try to make sense of our politics and broader public life.

What I like about Wear is his consistent optimism. Despite the seeming enormity of the problems that plague us now, he is always looking at how we can mitigate them. He frames problem solving in terms of developing virtues in a way that I rarely see elsewhere.

→ Power and Sacrifice | Reclaiming Hope

The following that Donald Trump has collected over the last few years continues to maintain a cult-like fervor. This has driven a wedge in many family relationships. Diane Benscoter is a former cult member who understands the ways in which people get defensive when they feel they are being attacked for their beliefs, and therefore cling to false narratives.

After decades of helping people get out of cults, she's now making something of a second career helping families apply those same strategies to everyone from hard-core QAnon conspiracy theorists to more mainstream MAGA enthusiasts who believe the election was rigged.

Benscoter’s advice is to tread gently with your loved ones who may be engaged in conspiracy theories because they incorporate those beliefs into their core identity. When the beliefs are attacked, so is their sense of self.

→ They believe in Trump's 'Big Lie.' Here's why it's been so hard to dispel | NPR

Wired Magazine comes out as non-binary in this letter from editor Gideon Lichfield.

When WIRED was founded in 1993, it was the bible of techno-utopianism. We chronicled and championed inventions that we thought would remake the world; all they needed was to be unleashed. Our covers featured the brilliant, renegade, visionary—and mostly wealthy, white, and male—geeks who were shaping the future, reshaping human nature, and making everyone’s life more efficient and fun. They were more daring, more creative, richer and cooler than you; in fact, they already lived in the future. By reading WIRED, we hinted, you could join them there!

If that optimism was binary 0, since then the mood has switched to binary 1. Today, a great deal of media coverage focuses on the damage wrought by a tech industry run amok. It’s given us Tahrir Square, but also Xinjiang; the blogosphere, but also the manosphere; the boundless opportunities of the Long Tail, but also the unremitting precariousness of the gig economy; mRNA vaccines, but also Crispr babies. WIRED hasn’t shied away from covering these problems. But they’ve forced us—and me in particular, as an incoming editor—to ponder the question: What does it mean to be WIRED, a publication born to celebrate technology, in an age when tech is often demonized?

Lichfields answer to the question of whether to take a tone of techno-utopianism or techno-pessimism is to reject the idea that tech itself is either the problem or the solution. He provides an example on a currently hot topic.

Yet debates about tech, like those about politics or social issues, still seem to always collapse into either/or. Blockchain is either the most radical invention of the century or a worthless shell game.

Instead of falling into false dichotomies, WIRED wants to be the source of information on people who are trying to make the world a better place and who are using technology to pursue those dreams.

In early December, I wrote about what I thought were overly optimistic predictions about the future as it relates to technology from WIRED’s founder, Kevin Kelly. Kelly’s track record off predictions is spotty and, while I think rejecting the binary that tech is either intrinsically good or bad, I also lack faith in the people who use the technology to do so responsibly.

I would love to believe this overall premise, but it hasn't been born out by the events of the last few years. Even scientific miracles like hastily created mRNA vaccines can't succeed if the people involved in ensuring their success don't perform their part in that process. It seems as if technological advances of the last few years have only served to shine a spotlight on our broken humanity. None of what Kelly brings up convinces me that's going to change anytime soon. I'm glad that my hope does not stem from technology or people.

I think we need to spend a bit more time on the ramifications of technology before rushing into its applications. Of course, I just finished reading 📚Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, so I may be especially primed to be thinking along those lines.

Friday Night Video

Geowulf “Saltwater”

Last week, I wrote about some musical favorites from 2021. This week, I’m posting the video from one of my favorite songs that isn’t from last year, but that I discovered last year. I think this one surfaced due to the Apple Music recommendation algorithm, which has gotten really good.

Frosted EchoesRobert Rackley