[SIC] 112: A Brutal Ballet

October 29th, 2020

Hi all,

No reminder to vote for the Americans in the audience, because if you haven’t gotten the message from everyone you know by now, you’re not reading this anyway. But I will link here to a fun little video Cameron Cuchulainn sent, encouraging skaters to vote (Vimeo). Make sure your slack friends join you at the polls, one way or the other.

Otherwise, you know the drill: lots of interesting stuff this week. The “start here” section is particularly strong IMO. Thanks to Cam, Kevin and Ruba for contributions, to the other Kevin for the title suggestion, and to Larry and Ed for the books!

My guest this week on [SIC] Talks has been a long time coming; I finally nailed down an hour with Jon Wexler, an old friend who recently shook the sneaker culture world by departing Yeezy / adidas to join Shopify as its VP Influencer Program. Wex is a great vibe and it’ll be fun to catch up. We’re live at 5p ET today @dietznutz and thereafter in my IG grid.

=====[SIC] 112: A Brutal Ballet=====

Start here:

• Why Is This Interesting’s Roblox Edition. If you don’t have kids 7-12 y/o, chances are you won’t of heard of Roblox. Read up immediately. It’s massive, and massively important.

• Related: via Future Party: The rise of “no code” software —software tools that don’t require builders to know how to code — is rewiring Gen Z. (TechCrunch)

• And via Office Hours: the homie Jarrod Dicker of WaPo on Breaking the Fourth Wall: The Business of Media Subculture (Substack)

• My trusty Content Commerce Insider explains the history and foundation of Ant Financial (biggest ever IPO) and Chinese Fintech. Vital background.

• T Magazine’s piece on the artist, wordsmith and provocateur Barbara Kruger is a must. (NYT)

• Corollary to Kruger’s ouevre: A brief history of disinformation (Frieze)

Subverting the Paradigm:

• Friends Mythology launched “Project Mercury”, an initiative that will impact Black ownership and economic freedom, and set out to build a new, diverse, and inclusive generation of brands. (Instagram)

• Via Quartz: Activists are using facial recognition to identify cops. Frustrated with law enforcement officers who hide their identities and use unmarked vehicles, some protesters are turning the technology against police (Mic)

• Via Future Party: Royalty Exchange turns artists into publicly-traded companies; auctioning rights to future proceeds to receive a large upfront payment in exchange for the residual rights. (LA Times)

• Via Future Party: Bioo built a battery using microorganisms that come up from the soil when it rains as its energy source. The organisms feed on organic matter inside the battery and end up creating the protons and electrons that make energy. (Fast Company)

• Starchitect Bjarke Ingels is drawing up a masterplan for the Earth to "prove that a sustainable human presence on planet Earth is attainable with existing technologies”. (Dezeen)

• Corollary: Via WITI: Nigerians don’t trust the government to respond to emergency calls. So they created apps instead. (Rest of World)

• Via Music Redef: The popular free software project “youtube-dl” was removed from Github on Friday following a legal notice from the Recording Industry Association of America claiming it violates copyright law. The tool is widely used by journalists for various reporting purposes. (Freedom.press)

• Via Morning Brew: Kazakh Tourism released a series of 12-second video spots that use Borat's famous catchphrase (“Very Nice”) to describe the central Asian country's attractions. (YouTube)

Fash with an F:

• SSense’s newest trend report predicts we’ll alternate between looking like Sonny Crockett and Busta Rhymes circa “Gimme Some More” next spring.

• The naked truth about apparel's future. The segment was in free fall even before the pandemic. But a bleak 2020 could give way to new opportunities. (Retail Dive).

• High Snobiety got together with the Newport Jazz festival for a capsule collection and a live (virtual) festival. (WWD)

• Fashion big dogs Alessandro Michele x Al McKimm in conversation. (i-D)

• Macy's introduces virtual, in-person stylist appointments for the holidays (Retail Dive)

• Menswear Is The Hot Womenswear Trend In China (Jing Daily)

• Oh and SWEATPANTS ARE GREAT BUT PEOPLE STILL WANT BOUGIE HANDBAGS [their cap] (High Snobiety)

Mags Mags Mags:

• Davido talks protests in Nigeria and ending SARS with The FACE

• Buy less, buy better: Display Copy and More Or Less mag are doing it (again) with vintage and sustainable fashion.

  

Writers and Writing:

• Via The Future Party. Ron Howard and Brian Grazer are trying to bring the search for screenwriters into 2020 with a new app called The Creative Network to help democratize the film and TV industry (LA Times)

• Continuing on Brian Morrissey’s thoughts from last week: his former pub writes that while some Substack creators are out in market hustling up their own ad partnerships, the platform’s most popular writers now routinely get cold pitches by everything from cryptocurrency startups to media brands. (Digiday)

• The writer Sloane Crosley on missing movies (Criterion Channel)

• David Byrne on the complicated world of Staten Island (Reasons to be Cheerful)

  

Brands Going Big:

• Phone home: NASA gave Nokia $14.1 million to build a 4G network on the moon as part of its plans to establish a human presence there by 2030. (Business Insider)

• Chinese skincare brand Chando launched its “The Branch Stream University” (支流大学, literally, “tributary” or “non-mainstream” university) with the release of a video featuring popular Bilibili creators that encouraged young women to be themselves including makeup tutorials, vlogs, and advice on beauty and skincare routines. (QQ)

• And via Kouch Culture: TMall x The Louvre allows customers of the Chinese ecomm giant to buy various art-inspired items in collaboration with brands, from Venus de Milo eye shadow to satchels bearing the Mona Lisa (Alizila)

• Becoming increasingly active in US politics, Nike tells voters you don't have to be a sports star to change the world in 'You Can't Stop Our Voice' campaign. (The Drum)

• Related: Reddit had planned a big branding campaign, its first ever, for the beginning of this year. The pandemic screwed that up, so Reddit turned it into an election-related campaign called Up The Vote, putting up billboards all over saying things like "This bread stapled to a tree got more votes on Reddit than it took to decide the 2000 presidential election." (Protocol)

• More IRL: via The Future Party; Walmart is moneying up, but scaling down on experiential marketing to bring back some “special moments,” like an immersive trick-or-treat experience for a single family. (Digiday / Instagram)

For Yr Ears:

• Via Nieman Lab: Netflix is apparently testing audio only (Protocol)

• Fashion talk: Five decades of the legend Sir Paul Smith on the Business of Fashion podcast (Spotify)

• Regular readers know I love HyperPop any time, but this week the Altar playlist is working for me. (Spotify)

• S/o Kevin Tachman: “Plant Man” by Original Pavement drummer Gary Young is the ear worm we need. (YouTube)

Music Bizzers:

• Marc Geiger’s Save Live: He Helped Create Lollapalooza. Now He Wants to Save Live Music (NYT)

• Our buddies Wilbert Cooper and Mark Hunter connect with pandemic boo Charli XCX for Red Bull Music (Instagram)

Art Ting:

• Guatemala City has a Museum inside an Egg (Frieze)

• The Other Art Fair Online Studios is proud to present Detroit as the first in our new ‘Other Art Cities’ series to spotlight undiscovered art cities and the emerging artists that live and work there.

• Editions/Artists' Books Fair Launched Its First Online Edition (Hyperallergic)

• And the Beyond the Streets art show is going virtual (Instagram)

• From Queen Ruba: WHERE DID EVERYBODY GO AND WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO DURING COVD-19? combining footage from the summer with Doc Rivers voiceover is currently on show Museum of Fine Arts Le Locle. (Instagram)

• anonymous gallery launched of a new website that borrows from the visual language of big tech to balancing commentary and commerce, “becoming a performative piece in itself” and poking some fun at an ever-globalizing artworld.

• New York’s Coalition for the Homeless—the nation’s oldest advocacy organization helping homeless men, women, and children—has teamed up with 50 renowned artists to create limited edition porcelain plates to raise funds to feed NYCers in need. Big names, highly collectible, great cause. (Hypebeast)

• Set on the summit of the Hochjochferner glacier in the Italian Alps, the latest artwork by artist Olafur Eliasson – a giant astrological instrument – invites visitors to see manmade climate change from wider "planetary and glacial perspectives". (Dezeen)

Self-ness:

• Empathy Is a Muscle You Build A system for turning “they” into “we.” (Reasons to be Cheerful)

• These are the colors of quarantine. Kyle Chayka writes: “I discovered the Quarantine Palette: house paint brands are booming during the pandemic as everyone gets bored of their walls, and buyers are turning toward specific colors like soft blues, greens, and beige, perhaps to calm anxiety.” (Art News)

Watch these soon:

• The march of the sneakerheads rolls on: Complex is making an interactive TV show on Twitch (The Wrap)

• New doc alert: our friend Cheryl Dunn’s “Moments Like This Never Last,” about the late artist Dash Snow and “American Rap Star,” directed by the homie Justin Staple. Get your tickets to stream them both now. (IFC)

• 5Boro boss and soul of NYC skateboarding Steve Rodriguez gets the “Skatehoarders” treatment. (Instagram)

• Hot take from the Contagious Smashing Stereotypes on gaming chat: “Your brand doesn’t need a esports strategy” - because it’s just your mass strategy. IE gaming is gigantic, duh. (Zoom)

Books I’m checking out this week:

• Haring-isms from @nomorerulers - edited by Larry Warsh

• The Adventures of Darius & Downey as told to Ed Zipco, whose Superchief Gallery is bringing the wild and weird back to SoHo

• The Business of Aspiration by [SIC] Talks #14 guest Ana Andjelic

  

Finally: Support your local!

• Starting Friday, NYC-based ground-floor businesses with storefronts that want to use the nearby space on the sidewalk can apply online. It’s an obvious fit for retail shops, but the city said that repair stores, personal care services and dry cleaning and laundry services can use the outdoor space for seating, the “display of dry goods” or as a place customers can line up. (NYT)