Canned Dragons

Alex Nowrasteh writes for Arc Digital on why there is so much culture war commentary ("from encoded presidential insults to drag queen story hour, Netflix comedy specials to baby books"). In short, because it's easy and cheap and pays big dividends. People love to read it for that confirmation bias rush and you don't have to be an expert in anything, such as science or politics. You don't even have to do research or risk getting called out for being wrong.

This makes cultural commentary especially tempting for politicians. It saves them from actually having to talk about the details of their jobs or what they are doing for their constituents.

Complaining about culture wars is easy for politicians because there’s little for them to do so they can’t be blamed for inaction. When Congress was debating the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion spending bill, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) were busy reading Dr. Seuss because of a controversy over some of his books being racist and the publisher deciding not to publish them anymore. Writing mean tweets or hosting podcasts filled with culture war commentary counts as a substitute for “doing something,” whereas legislators used to be judged based on their lawmaking.

Politicians aren't the only ones engaged in the cultural hot take trend, though. Journalists of all stripes, writing for a full spectrum of different audiences, have really taken up the format. Nowrasteh describes one particularly popular style of article that has been around for the last few years.

Journalism and commentary also thrive on unconventional narratives that cultural commentary is well suited to produce. “This culturally innocuous thing is actually evil” is so ubiquitous that it should be its own genre with a specialized name.

This genre (whatever you want to call it) has me wondering what this Christmas season's version of Don't Subject Your Kids to Rudolph is going to be. These stories are another version of the man bites dog aphorism in journalism.

The phrase man bites dog is a shortened version of an aphorism in journalism that describes how an unusual, infrequent event (such as a man biting a dog) is more likely to be reported as news than an ordinary, everyday occurrence with similar consequences, such as a dog biting a man.

It's not hard to write and back these pieces, because all they require is a knowledge of the cultural artifact, the shared accepted meaning behind that artifact and a different opinion. Some may roll their eyes, but it's hard to really contest such a piece in any real sense.

Given the low-cost at which these articles can be tossed out, and the high rewards of readership, don't expect them to disappear anytime soon.

Facebook has been outed in the US for its dishonorable practices, but what it’s done in this country is nothing compared to the damage it has caused in other parts of the world. One the places where it has helped to create a perfect storm of violence by radicalizing users against the minority Rohingya is the country of Myanmar. The platform spread information and hate speech that cost the lives of a targeted group of people. In 2018, Facebook essentially admitted to its role in the attacks carried out against the Muslim minority.

Meta (Facebook) is now facing class action lawsuits in the US and the UK for its part in amplifying the violence in Myanmar. The total damages being sought by the plaintiffs are > $150 billion.

“To maximise engagement, Facebook does not merely fill users’ News Feeds with disproportionate amounts of hate speech and misinformation; it employs a system of social rewards that manipulates and trains users to create such content,” the plaintiffs wrote in the complaint.

“At the core of this complaint is the realisation that Facebook was willing to trade the lives of the Rohingya people for better market penetration in a small country in Southeast Asia.”

Facebook is an incredibly powerful tool and, in the hands of bad actors, can be a weapon against human flourishing. Too often, Facebook has refused to accept their power and chased profits over safety. Punitive monetary damages will send a message in a language that the company can understand.

→ Meta sued in excess of $150 billion for its role in Rohingya genocide | ZDNet

Via @leo

The other night, I was reading through the cover story for this month's issue of The Atlantic, The Bad Guys Are Winning by Anne Applebaum. I got to the part about Russia helping to provide the autocratic guidebook to Belarus' dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, in order to crush the protests in the country. I got this feeling in my core that I was at my limit of bad news for the day. This month's Atlantic is full of depressing material, including even a story about a boxer that killed another boxer in the ring and then resumed his career boxing (and was even directed by a Christian pastor to do so).

I went upstairs and got on my iPad to check my email. I had a weekly article roundup message from the Matter service. The first story being promoted was called "The Case for Optimism." It struck me that this was exactly what I needed to be reading. I saved the article to Pocket to read later on my Kobo. It turned out the article was written by Kevin Kelly, the founder of Wired Magazine, and a technology optimist. Kelly is also just a glass half-full guy in general. In the piece, that he wrote for Warp News, a few months back, he lays out his case for looking on the bright side. While I was reading the article, and before I had realized who Kelly was, I had a little skepticism about what he was writing. His projections for a better future were highly speculative, although they were based current and very possible upcoming technological advances. It reminded me a bit of those who predicted that the rise of computers and automation would give us humans more leisure time only to be proven not only wrong, but wrong in the completely opposite direction. As many an article has explored recently, we've mostly taken automation and efficiency and filled up whatever time it's given us often times with more ways to be available for work (though I am blessed to work for a company with a good culture around work/life balance).

When I got to the end of the article, I read the bio and realized who it was that had written the piece. I wrote a blog post earlier this year about a wager that Kevin Kelly made years ago, based on similar technologically-driven optimism. When examining Kelly's claims now, it's important to remember that, after 25 years, the outcome of the wager was barely decided in Kelly's favor, despite the fact that his opponent, neo-Luddite Kirkpatrick Sale, had predicted nothing less than societal collapse. If that doesn't make you wary of accepting Kelly's claims uncritically, I don't know what would.

Kelly makes prognostications such as ubiquitous AI replacing jobs that humans don't want to do, while humans are left for "innovation, entrepreneurship, art, caring, hospitality, science and discovery." We don't value those who make art, provide care and hospitality services now and I'm not sure how advances in AI are going to change that dynamic and mentality. He also mentions universal connectivity enabling cooperation at a scale never before possible. If something like Facebook is to be taken as an example of universal connectivity (and it probably should be, since it has the largest user base of any communications platform), then greater connectivity will lead to greater division and deception.

I hate to be a downer and feed the stereotype of the pessimist that Kelly creates. It's hard not to be, though, because the techno-utopian dreams that have been constructed have gone so wrong. In the end, though, Kelly thinks we'll be able to solve the problems that have arisen from technological progress.

We should be optimistic not because our problems are smaller than we thought, but because our capacity to solve them is larger than we thought.

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.

Around this time of year, people are always buzzing about their Spotify Wrapped playlists. They post screenshots of what songs are in them and discuss their year in music. I have to admit, as an Apple Music user, I get a bit jealous. The cool designs that go along with the Spotify Wrapped playlists are really well done and make you feel like this year-end ritual is something special.

Chaim Gartenberg writes about Spotify's yearly celebration of your personal year in music for the Verge.

2021 is no exception, with Spotify offering what feels like its most lavish recaps yet. My wife (who is a Spotify user) spent the morning showing off her bespoke playlist to me, which included (among other things) specially curated songs for specific moods, rankings of where she placed among global Doja Cat listeners, a color-changing “audio aura,” and an interactive quiz. All of it is designed to be shared and shown off on other social media platforms.

Gartenberg's tweet shows how left out he feels when he sees everyone else showing off their playlists and stats on social media.

He goes into how easy it would be for Apple to do massive marketing for their music service by copying Spotify.

Spotify in the Terminal

Another reason I've been a bit green with envy for Spotify users: you can run Spotify in the terminal.

Spotify around here, today…

Thanks to Spotify TUI.

The bare text rendering looks fantastic with the Rigel theme.

Apple Music

I still love Apple Music, particularly for the way I can incorporate music that is not in the catalog from my own library. With some fairly esoteric music in my collection, this feature is invaluable. I can't help but look over the hedge at my neighbor's house, though. Especially since my son, who has Apple Music with our family subscription, still chooses to use the free version of Spotify with ads so he can see what his friends are listening to and display his "now playing" in a Discord chat. When someone prefers the free tier of one service over the premium tier of another, that's saying something.

Work Drugs bring their smooth yacht rock to this video of a girl wandering around a city. There are trips to the zoo, rides on public transport and shopping excursions. The full city tour culminates in a pleasant snow as the subject walks around with headphones on. She's in her own world with so many people around. It's the perfect picture of how everyone being lost in their heads makes a city so open to unimpeded ambulatory exploration. Pedestrians are just going about their business.

The chorus is strong on this track, with the male/female vocals harmonizing really well. I love the way the female vocals trail those of the lead singer by just a bit. The lyrics are relatable, with "it's been another nervous night" capping out the chorus. Everyone knows how those nights feel.

Over the years, I've had three eBay ID's. eBay used to allow logins from a single-sign on provider at some point (though I can't remember which) and I used that. Then they removed that feature and I had to change my ID. I made several transactions under the new ID. Now, a few years later, eBay will no longer recognize that ID and I had to create a new one. What is the problem with a new ID, you ask?

New ID's start with a 0 rating. I didn't think that was such a big deal, until I started to trying to sell with it. The first offer I had on a camp stove popped up for the asking price as soon as I listed it. Needless to say, I was pleased. Once the sale occurred, the buyer messaged me that he had questions and wanted me to text him. I thought it was strange, because normally questions are asked before a purchase. However, the buyer had a good rating, so I reached out over text. He asked me about the condition of the item (it was brand new, as the listing indicated). He also wanted more pictures but there was really nothing more to give him. He said he was going to pay via PayPal, but wanted the item shipped to his cousin as a present. I was willing to ship the item wherever. Then he started asking me to buy $400 in gift cards to put in the box and that he would cover the expense plus extra for gas and hassle. Red flags were going up all over the place. I told him no and contacted eBay. They did an investigation. It turned out the legitimate account had been hacked and someone was using it to scam people.

The account was returned to its rightful owner and I was told that the transaction had been canceled. I had to go through and relist the item again (I was surprised eBay didn't do that automatically). The next time I listed the item, it went through a week without any bids, at which time eBay automatically lowered the price a bit (which is a cool feature). Almost immediately after it was lowered, I had a bid for the asking price. I accepted right away. Almost as quickly, I had a message from the buyer that he had a question and wanted me to text him. I replied that I would answer any questions over the eBay messaging system. I got another message that was the same as the first. I let a couple of days go by, and with no other word, called eBay. They told me to cancel the sale and confirmed my suspicion that scam artists were on the lookout for sellers with low ratings. I asked how I’m supposed to sell in that environment, but the support rep had no response to my question.

I’m not sure how people would get started selling on eBay at this point, being at the mercy of successive scammers. I’ve heard Craig’s List referred to as “Flake’s List,” so I’m not sure things are better over there. Where are people selling online these days, I wonder?

Thank you to all of the people who left helpful comments when I originally posted this on Micro.blog.

Bathe Alone recently recorded a series of videos at The Standard Electric Recorders Company. These kind of high fidelity, live studio performances make for some of my favorite music videos. There is an intimacy that feels like it's almost pulling you into a room with the performers.

"Limbo" is one of the standout tracks on Bathe Alone's debut long player, Last Looks. The band's sole member, multi-instrumentalist Bailey Crone explains the dark meaning of the song in an interview about the sessions.

Crone says of the track, “Limbo is actually a super morbid song. The first line is “crawl out of the window, you don’t know where you’re walking”. I like how it sounds like a person crawled out of a window and literally started walking. But in my head, that person killed themself. Like they fell to their death. I hint at this in the second verse with “you faced your fear of falling”. I’m not sure if anyone would’ve picked up on this, but that’s what I love about writing a bit cryptic.

Despite the bleakness of the subject matter, the song is wrapped in a soothing haze, like a fuzzy blanket during a cold winter.

Paul Kingsnorth kind of lost me on his anti-vaxxer rant this week. He is particularly worried about the increasingly stringent measures in Austria and Germany to get everyone vaccinated. Historical events in these countries give him particular cause for concern.

Kingsnorth's rant does make me think about history, as well. Did George Washington's troops complain this bitterly about authoritarianism when he had them inoculated for small pox upon entering the Continental Army? My guess is that they probably didn't, because they were fighting to be freed from actual authoritarianism. They had stared raw state power in the face and knew what it looked like and it wasn't getting a jab (not this kind, anyway).

The whole, long think piece is predicated on the assumption that getting the vaccine is about so much more than the vaccine itself. Going beyond the medical advice, which is hardly ever exactly perfect, and really getting at core divisions.

Often, in an argument, what people think they are arguing about is not the real subject of disagreement, which is deeper and often unspoken, if it is even understood. So it is here. The divisions that have opened up in society about the covid vaccines are not really about the covid vaccines at all: they are about what vaccination symbolises in this moment. What it means to be 'vaxxed' or 'unvaxxed', safe or dangerous, clean or dirty, sensible or irresponsible, compliant or independent: these are questions about what it means to be a good member of society, and what society even is, and they are detonating like depth charges beneath the surface of the culture.

Kingsnorth reveals he remains proudly unvaccinated. He works to layer meaning on top of meaning to get to his point about how dangerous a situation we are in (this article is labeled part 1, so there's more coming). I have to wonder about this perspective, though. What if this isn't encroaching authoritarianism (history of Austria and Germany aside)? What if it's not even particularly egregious paternalism? What if it's really just about getting a vaccination that gives you a better survival rate against a deadly disease? What if it's just about coming together to mitigate a public health crisis in the best ways that we know how?

I remember a time, not long ago, when we laughed at the introduction of Space Force from then-president Donald Trump. It was easy to jest, with the name that itself sounded like a parody, coming from a president that never could quite get anything real done. Of course, some of us remember "Star Wars," the space missile shield that president Reagan made up to psych-out the Soviets. Decades of science fiction speculation haven’t quite turned out the way they were depicted. None of us are using jet packs to get to work and we haven’t colonized the moon or Mars. We’ve been conditioned to be skeptical about outlandish sounding initiatives involving space.

A lot has gone on in space in the last 50 years, though. Despite that progress, not the least of which has been the incredible proliferation of satellites that we've quickly come to depend on, the last rules of engagement were set in the sixties, according to this cover story in Harper's, which makes predictions about the coming battle for space.

The Washington Post reports on the recent destruction of one of their own satellites by the Russians.

Russia’s Ministry of Defense confirmed in a statement that it “successfully conducted a test, as a result of which the inactive Russian spacecraft Tselina-D, which has been in orbit since 1982, was hit.”
But the ministry said the test “did not and will not post a threat to orbital stations, spacecraft and space activities.”
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday that the U.S. claim “that Russia poses risks to activities for the peaceful use of outer space is, to say the least, hypocrisy.”
He said it’s the Americans who have ignored proposals from Russia and China on arms regulation in space.

That hardly sounds like a friendly exchange. It makes you think we may need a Space Force sooner rather than later. The risks are not all military, though. Clive Thompson writes about a prediction, called Kessler Syndrome, made over 40 years ago about orbiting debris (the kind made by the Russian strike).

Back in 1978, the astrophysicist Donald Kessler made an alarming prediction: Space junk could wreck our ability to keep satellites aloft.

The Russian action created 1500 detectable pieces of debris and many more smaller pieces. With this kind of junk piling up, Thompson notes, we could end up with a planetary ring of garbage like the one depicted in Wall-E. That situation would be very dangerous for satellites because even small debris hurdling through space at high velocity can cause significant damage. If satellites were taken out, civilization could have a serious and rapid regression.

It looks like it’s time to start paying sustained attention to space again.

On the Weezer appreciation scale, I’m at the end next to Leslie Jones’ character in the infamous SNL dinner time fight skit. I appreciated the first two albums, went to see them on those tours and then they lost me after their return from hiatus. However, I do consider them to be an amazing cover band. Their “Teal Album” of takes on the classics brings me joy. I especially like how the vocals are handled on “Take On Me.”

The video stars Finn Wolfhard as a young Rivers Cuomo, rocking out in his living room. It’s chock full of clever 80’s nostalgia and also manages to fit in a proper homage to the animation from the original video.