[SIC] 122: New World Water

Jan 7th, 2021

Hi all,

Welcome to 2021, I guess. Can only get better from here, I hope. Not to ignore or minimize any of the contemptible, unacceptable, illogical and alarming developments of the past 24 hours in Washington - which I’m imagining you’re fully read up on, but this week I’m sticking just to recommendations. No [SIC] Talks today, but I’ll be back next Thurs with filmmaker, photographer and friend-since-the-90s @WilliamStrobeck, who’s best known as the auteur behind most of Supreme’s video content. More on that to come.

Speaking of recommendations, I’m grateful to friends like Michael Miraflor, Joy Howard and Jay Cox who recommended this newsletter to their audiences last week, resulting in a bunch of new subscribers. Welcome, if you’re new. And if you’re a regular reader, feel free to share and recommend [SIC] to friends and colleagues. It’s for everybody. And of course, thanks to Rob, Ben, Isaac, Tim and Fredrik for contributions this week.

Final thing; I posted an IG story about my reading list for Jan and Feb (below) and Rob Hubbert suggested a SIC book club. Any takers? LMK in the comments or DM @dietznutz. We’ll start there.

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Speaking of my reading list:

• I just finished the second “Vernon Subutex” book and recommend highly. Author Virginie Despentes was interviewed last year in 032c for a sense of the vibe. 

• Via The Slowdown: Formgivning, the Danish word for “design,” serves as both a thesis and a call to action in a new book, Formgiving: An Architectural Future History, by starchitect buddies Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) (Taschen)

Start this year with last year’s tunes

• Also from Rob: “You might enjoy this: [The Bleep 100 2020 tracks]” (Spotify) 

• And via Blackbird Spyplane: 2020’s 100 best rap songs here, according to Cocaine Blunt’s Noz. (Noz.agency) 

Elsewhere in Audio

• Shout out Tuawki: Inside Spotify’s surprisingly loud white noise business (Medium) 

• And via Public Announcement: Spotify has joined the ranks of streaming services like SoundCloud and YouTube as a hub for bootlegs of popular songs via a loophole allowing remixes and unreleased songs to hide in plain sight  (Variety)

• From 'Throwing Fits' to 'Crime Junkie,' Podcast Merch Has Become Big Business (Wall Street Journal)

• More on “elder millennials”: How Long Gone and the Rise of the Bro-cast (Vogue)

Meta-steez-sizing: Self-Publishing section. 

• Via Lean Luxe: The New Yorker drops a big piece about Substack. 

• Via Nieman Lab: Are newsletter internships the new foot in the door? (Substack)

• Via Lean Luxe: When brands become media, the rules change. (Highsnobiety) 

• One reason for Substack’s explosion? Specious corporate ‘blocklists’ of keywords advertisers don’t want their messages to appear next to mean media revenues are in decline. Boeing has “pop culture” on its blocklist, Microsoft has a blanket ban on “interracial.” JP Morgan is blocking “Taylor Swift.” For T-Mobile: the word “Florida.” (Branded). 

• Via Office Hours: Lessons about the Creator Economy from Twitch and Substack (PM Principles)

• Kyle Chayka has a new daily newsletter experiment called The Dirt (Substack)

• The Michael Williams Origin Story (Central Division) 

Print’s Not Dead: 

• S/o buddies Yolanda and Matt at Yolo Journal and Wm. Brown (neither of which launched last year, but still).  Via Nieman Lab: Sixty new print magazines launched in 2020 (NYPost) 

• Related, s/o Ferdi Verderi: The GOAT(S): Vogue Italia’s ‘Animals Issue’ (Instagram) 

Retail Foibles:

• Via Lean Luxe: The iconic orange Hermes box was an accident. (The Fashion Law)

• Also via Lean Luxe: In the post-pandemic world. Stores are going to be fun again. (Fast Company)

• From Ben Pruess: How Authentic Brands Group has positioned itself as the 2020 repo man (Modern Retail) 

Insightfulness: 

• More gold from Ana Andjelic: The new taste map. (The Sociology of Business) 

• Via Howard Lindzon: Zebra IQ’s annual Gen Z report is free and worth a DL. 

Brands Being: 

• Online pet story Chewy sends 1k+ free paintings of their pets to random customers each week, working with hundreds of artists around the country (AP News) 

• While Budweiser sent a beer to each of the 160 goalkeepers Lionel Messi scored past (The Drum) 

• Via Maekan: LEGO caters to adults with a new botanical series (Design Boom)

• Speaking of adults: IPG has launched a new consulting firm called Black Glass aimed at chief marketing officers trying to navigate the pandemic and evolving ad industry. (Business Insider Premium)

• Epic Games bought an 87-acre former shopping mall in Cary, N.C. to turn into its new campus.

• S/o Mendini. Via Lean Luxe: Supreme accessories as a new home decor trend. (Fashionista)

• Bottega Veneta abandoned social media (Jing Daily)

Fashions

• How Gorpcore won 2020. (Input)

• Corollary: my fave elevated Gorp brand’s noodle soup recipe for cold winter days. (Snow Peak) 

• As we start another year, still in isolation, our clothing choices are getting increasingly weird. (NYT) 

• Via Public Announcement: It’s 2021, But Should You Dress Like It’s 2011? (Vogue Business) 

• Fashion preps for the longest summer ever (Vogue Business) 

• Via Maekan: Move over NBA stars, the new sports-fashion elite are footballers. (Vogue Business)

• The “High Fashion Face” comes to China (Jing Daily)

• In new twist, fashion brands are persuading their customers to wear clothes they already own. Some are even paying them to do so. (Fast Company)

• 21 Luxury Projections for 2021 and Beyond (Jing Daily) 

When the East is in the House…

• Uniqlo’s quest for world domination. (Medium)  

• Via CCI: Bilibili could be the next internet company to launch its own mobile payment system (Pandaily)

Things On Your Phone

• TikTok's hottest 2021 trend is teens using enterprise software to go viral. (The Verge) 

• While Twitch Is Having a Political Renaissance (Wired)

• Via Beats & Bytes: Virtual concerts aren't a passing fad – we're at the dawn of a massive shift in entertainment consumption, and it's time to get on board, says  Roblox’s Jon Vlassopulos. (IQ Magazine)

• Via Beats & Bytes: The Metaverse is coming (Wired)

• Slack's Outage Was the Best Thing That Could Have Happened to the Company When it comes to branding moments, this accidental one will go down in the books. (Medium) 

• Via 1440: Explaining the top 50 internet memes of 2020 (Inside Hook)

• From Isaac Dietz: crate digger label Light in the Attic has a compilation name generator that’s strictly for the heads (Instagram)

Sneaker Freakers: 

• From Tim Nolan: "My main man Dan has a sick sneaker GAN [generative adversarial network, aka machine learning that makes sneaker designs..]" (Twitter) 

• S/o [SIC] Talks alum @matdvs: Nike’s got a little-known patent for “Cryptokicks” (US Patent Office)

VR / AR / XR

• Palace Museum has artist Cao Gio-Jiang’s first VR artwork. (Jing Culture Commerce)  

• While Lauren Halsey and Snap used Spectacles to make an AR BTS at her community center in South Central LA (Engadget) 

• Speaking of Snap; they’re partnering with fashion retailers to create Bitmoji versions of their products. (Social Media Today) 

• Via Protocol: Facebook is intentionally not calling its smart glasses "augmented reality (Bloomberg) 

Elsewhere in Art & Design

• Danny Lyon’s Visions of a New York That No Longer Exists (Hyperallergic)

• Concidence? Both KIA and CIA got new logos this week. (Dezeen / Creativebloq) 

• A Public Vulva Sculpture in Brazil protests violence against women. (Hyperallergic) 

Speaking of Talking About:

• Via Media Nut: The oral history of 12 Monkeys (Inverse)

• Related: The Oral History of Haçienda (VICE)  

• As seen here in the very underappreciated cinematic classic 24 Hour Party People (Youtube)

• Elsewhere, via Axios:  an oral history of the original Xbox (Bloomberg) 

Bigger Picture:

• S/o Mos Def’s “New World Water:” The latest Wall Street bet: water in the American West. (NYT)

• Corollary, via Public Announcement: For over a century, one of the most important salmon runs in the United States has had to contend with historic dams – and now four of them are set to be taken down. (BBC) 

• College athletes can be paid in Michigan under new law (Bloomberg) 

• Rap lyrics can now be used as criminal evidence  (Variety)

Final Feels:

• Scratch Perry’s 10 Rules to Live By (WeWork) 

• And some other suggestions from Ikki Kobayashi rendered as colorful graphics (It’s Nice That)

• From Fredrik Anderson: “I may just be able, finally, to contribute to your dispatch;” In 1979, ABBA released Happy New Year, their bittersweet ode to the closing decade. On NYE 2021, 20 Danish filmmakers captured celebrations as a reminder to make the new year #unlikeyesterday. (YouTube) 

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