[SIC] 115: Exuberant Electro Maximalism

November 19, 2020

Hi all,

I’m excited today to talk to friend of [SIC] Jeff Carvalho on IG Live; Jeff’s a fellow rabbit-hole diver and pop-culture polyglot, not to mention a neighbor of sorts. As co-founder of Highsnobiety he’s also induced plenty of professional jealousy from time to time, on account of his strong bonds with the culture industry’s best and brightest. We’re live at 4p ET today over at @dietznutz. Come hang (or check out in my grid thereafter).

Meantime, plenty to dive into here this week, including a bunch of great podcasts and playlists to put on with your ambient TV (EinP is 🔥🗑, btw). Shouts out to John, Ricky, Kevin and Justin for contributions - they’re invited and appreciated as always. Send away. Also – next Thursday’s Thanksgiving. Do you want a T-day edition of [SIC] Weekly? Or do you want the week off? LMK in the comments here. And irrespective of the answer, here’s wishing healthy and low-stress holiday to you and yours, from me and mine.

Ben

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Trends and Futures Stuff

• Chad Kitsch is my homeboy: 8Ball’s Trend Cycle diagrams are fascinating. (Substack) 

• Aspiration is spelled with a K from here on out (The Business of Aspiration) 

• Via 1440: The top 10 emerging technologies of 2020 (Scientific American) 

• There are currently no smart cities, by 2025 there’ll be 26. (TheNextWeb)

• Related: via Future of Transportation: The '15-minute city' is the new value proposition for urban designers. 

• The qualities will make the marketer of the future, according to The Drum’s “Future 50” 

• Blackstone CEO Schwarzman says America’s teachers shouldn’t be taxed making educators a “valued class.” (Quartz)

• Which jibes with The Work of the Future: Building Better Jobs in an Age of Intelligent Machines (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

Growing Stuff

• Hermés is growing its own alligators (Hypebeast)

• While, via Future Party: The Chicken is a Tel Aviv restaurant that serves lab-grown meat (Live Kindly) 

• But fear not: Ouroboros Steak’s grow-your-own human meat kit is "technically" not cannibalism (Dezeen) 

Brand Extension Stuff

• Group Nine’s new marketplace Swipe.Shop takes mobile-first aim at creating physical merch around their media brands (Digiday) 

• Related, Dotdash’s decor website The Spruce is launching its own organization product line in every Lowe's store in the country (Axios) 

• Via Lean Luxe, running brand Tracksmith made a “Turkey Trot” collection

• In parallel, Uber Eats and Popeyes Introduce The "Churkey Special" Meal Ahead of Thanksgiving (Hypebeast) 

• And discount supermarket Lidl made meme-ready sneakers (The Dubrovnik Times) 

• Meanwhile, there’s a Pizza Hut pepperoni Gravity Blanket (Adweek)

• And, of course, Buzzfeed’s launching sex toys (Digiday)

Ads & Advertising Stuff 

• Super smart: Cameo Wants to Be Among the 'Largest Ad Makers in the World’ (Adweek) 

• Speaking of ad makers, S/o Sam, Diallo, Ana & gang: Beats By Dre’s new spot is a bold (if divisive) one. Watch. (YouTube)

• While on a more celebratory note: Burberry’s “Singing in the Rain” is pretty great, has to be said. (AdAge) 

• Artist/hype cool guy Daniel Arsham is the new creative director of the Cleveland Cavaliers (Instagram)  

DTC and Commerce Stuff 

• Is the DTC brand aesthetic bad for business? Even Gin Lane’s founder is sick of it, at least. (Retail Dive)

• Because, because: In A Digital World, First Impressions Can Make Or Break A Luxury Brand (Jing Daily)

• Elsewhere in China, shots fired: CCI says Shopify will fail in China, even with Alipay.

• Also, via Lean Luxe: Are skincare brands the new denim brands circa 2009? (Input)

• How The Nugget Couch Became A Supreme Drop for moms (Buzzfeed)

• 'A whole new baseline in digital shopping': Orders from social media sites increased 84% in the third quarter (Business Insider)

• IRL responds: PSFK’s Retail Innovation Week is coming back Jan 11-15 with themes including Next-Gen Digital Commerce, The New Role of the Store, Retailing with Purpose,  and Winning the Modern Marketplace. Free tickets (til Dec 1) are here.

Platforms and App Stuff

• Too little too late? Instagram is mulling plans to pay publishers on its platform as it grows as a news and information source (Axios) 

• And IG expands new ‘Guides’ feature to all users (Techcrunch) 

• Meanwhile, The Battle Over Facebook’s Top 10 List (a must follow on Twitter, btw) (One Zero) 

• Via Music Redef: The Music Industry’s Hottest Club Is Clubhouse. What Happens When the App Goes Wide? (Billboard) 

• Speaking of Clubhouse, Twitter rolls out disappearing 'Fleets,' to all users; will also test a Clubhouse rival  (TechCrunch)

• Meanwhile, Yubo is the new hot chatroom type app with the kids (Morning Brew) 

• YouTube targets music fans with new audio ad format designed to help marketers reach YouTube visitors who are doing more listening than watching. (TechCrunch)

• While via Axios, Fortnite added built-in video chat powered by chat platform Houseparty, rolling out first to PC, PS4 and PS5 players (The Verge) 

• And Chinese video streaming Bilibili is investing big in content (Jing Daily) 

The Now Normal Stuff 

• Everybody’s mad at this article about wooden stools, apparently. Key Quote: “‘Buying less, better things,’ is effectively the millennial cri de coeur, its superficial virtuousness banging on like an unending TED Talk in high-minded drag, shaming us for owning cheap, mass-produced furnishings.” (Ssense) 

• Curbed explains stool-gate further. 

• Related: via Maekan: Fighting the groupthink that happens when we work virtually (Fast Company)

Newsletter Stuff 

• The Stackerati: Did a newsletter company create a more equitable media system—or replicate the flaws of the old one? (Columbia Journalism Review)

• Related: Squarespace is getting into the paid-newsletter game. (Nieman Lab)

Things You Can Wear Stuff 

• Via Jing Daily: Lacoste collab’ed with National Geographic, launched a limited-edition clothing line printed with the skin patterns of endangered wildlife on its WeChat online shop. (GQ UK) 

• Can farm-to-closet work for fashion? (Vogue Business) 

• While Korean Streetwear label Peaches is Reigniting Car Culture (Ssense) 

Streaming Stuff

• From Kevin Johanessen: “Watched the [Cheryl Dunn-directed] Dash doc over the weekend -- it's amazing. Loved everything about it, and the music in particular….” (Doc NYC) 

• Streaming Sales Provide Bright Spot for Indie Studios (The Hollywood Reporter)

• Netflix's latest experiment is a TikTok-like feed of funny videos (TechCrunch)

• Fresh off "American Utopia," Spike Lee’s making a musical about viagra (Hypebeast) 

• Via MusicRedef: the numbers are in and 65-80% of music creators’ income will be lost as a direct consequence of Covid-19 in 2020. (UK Music) 

• Hence, Bandcamp launched a very necessary ticketed Livestreaming service. Support your favorite artists. (Hypebeast) 

Tunes & Ear Stuff

• From John Rough: “This is a topic you and I should have arrived at long ago during one of our tangent-crazed conversations.” [Trapital on the influence of ringtones on hip hop]

• Tremaine “Denim Tears” Emory on the BoF podcast (Spotify) 

• Kevin Kusatsu’s new label Tuawki Virtual is ambient 🔥🌈💧(Instagram) 

• Bone Soda’s Isolation Therapy playlist is like Pollen but less predictable(Spotify) 

• From Ricky Engelberg: Spotify’s autoplay feature is turning indie-rock obscurities into 21st century indie-rock hits. (Stereogum)

• Dan Colen talks Shifting Perspectives Through Farming and Art on the Slowdown Podcast

• Noah’s Fukuoka pop-up playlist (Instagram) 

• And via WITI: “Ghostly: At Work” playlist is Ghostly’s constantly refreshed compilation of tunes for the workday (Spotify) 

Gaming and Sports Stuff 

• Via Axios Sports: Gen Zers are about half as likely as millennials to watch sports often, and twice as likely to never watch, per a recent Morning Consult survey.

• Via Nieman Lab: An esports correction: ESPN is shutting down all esports editorial operations (Esports Observer)

• Unified Goods Has Sourced Over 50 Vintage PlayStation 2 Pieces for Its Latest Drop (Hypebeast) 

• Why video games are the next retail frontier (ModernRetail)

Prints & Printed Stuff

• Our buds at Franchise mag are re-issuing the legendary “The Basketball Article” as an art book.  Pre-order link above isn’t public yet, use it or lose it! 

• HighSnob’s “High Tech” magazine is here.

• The Book of Homelessness is the first graphic novel made by homeless creatives (It’s Nice That) 

• The new Buffalo Zine was curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist. Pre-order the physical version or scroll the digital version.

• Printed Matter’s selection of publications related to mail artists such as Ray Johnson, Aaron Krach and Emily Dunne in combination with some innovative book forms to inspire you to make your own. 

Art & Performance Stuff

• “I don’t want to do anything about dying anymore”: Marina Abramović on why she’s had enough of death (It’s Nice That) 

• The limits of online auctions (The Art Newspaper)

• Our buddy Atiba Jefferson teamed with Baker Skateboards to release 4x special edition decks to benefit Watts Community Core (Instagram) 

Birth of the Cool Stuff

• What “cool” originally sounded like (Quartz)

• And a general theory of coolness as a research paper you can buy for $6.25 (SSRN) 

End of Year Stuff

• Via 1440: The year in photos, from Reuters

• The National Book awards were announced (NBC News) 

• While The New Statesman’s books of the year is a giant and meandering list of top picks from a gang of notables. 

=====[SIC] 115: Exuberant Electro Maximalism=====