[SIC] 171: Clutch of the Suntoucher

Volume 4, Number 14

You don’t have to support [SIC] with a paid subscription. Everybody gets the same content. 

But you CAN pay, if you want to. It helps. Monthly or yearly, or founding support (which includes dinner at my house, if you’re in / can get to NYC).

You can even expense it, before the fiscal year ends - or budget it in for fiscal 2022. And feel free to share, too.

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Hi all,

I’ll keep it brief this week. We’re almost there. 2022 in sight. Exciting.

That said, the new year is always a time of change - and given the great resignation, maybe some of you might be—shall we say—thinking of updating your email contacts. More power if you are. Just don’t forget to add your personal email to the [SIC] list. And if you’ve made a jump recently, don’t feel any hesitation in sharing this with new colleagues, friends, anybody who’ll enjoy. And welcome to everybody who joined us courtesy of Ana’s latest Sociology of Business post. Glad to have you here.

To that end, thanks Ana for the love, and to Navaz, Erik, Celeste, Iolanda and Murphy for submissions this week. Contributions are always appreciated.

No [SIC] Talk this week - but by all means check out all the fun from past chats over @dietznutz in my grid. More guests to come soon.

Now, them links.

Ben

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Trends

• Bruh. Gen Z is done with the pandemic / Atlantic via After School

• Meanwhile the 'average American' is a white female, between 30 and 34 years old, named Jessica, who drives a 12-year old Toyota Camry / SEP / Census via Future of Transportation

• More on cars: the biggest problem with [auto] traffic is nothing at all / Nautilus

• And yet 40% of San Francisco’s traffic deaths are from left turns / Fast Company via Future of Transportation

• From Iolanda Carvalho: “Drinks anyone?” 😉 Bacardi’s 2021 cocktail trends report / Bacardi PDF

• Unrelated but fascinating: 40% of teens and young adults expect to see more video game trends in 2022; interest in buying virtual-only goods has increased 50% from 2021, per the 2022 Instagram Trend  Report / Instagram via After School

• The rise of the $9.99 creator subscription economy / Music Business Worldwide

Style

• From Navaz Batliwalla: “Hi Ben, this [RAFTM Rachel Tashjian on Demna’s dreams of 90s] is amazing writing. Have you had Rachel on a Live? / GQ

• Speaking of amazing: how Trueys, Juicys & Ed Hardys came back /Vogue Business

• Last week’s John Wilson episode “How to Find a Spot” fittingly meandered to my discovery of this charming tour of NYC by [SIC] homie Mordechai Rubinstein for The Elder Statesman. Brand content done fantastically well / Instagram

• Uniqlo’s owner will source 50% of materials from recycled sources / Sourcing Journal via RIW

• But who actually owns your clothes?! Takedown notices are threatening online thrift shops just as business is exploding. The Verge via After School

The Arts

• Substack spotlights what to read (and says it’s Blackbird Spyplane) / Substack

• A brief history of MTV IDs and the impact they’ve had on the creative world / It’s Nice That

• The old Ottessa Moshfegh Can’t Come to the Phone Right Now / Observer

• Wynton Marsalis on Jazz as a Tool for Understanding Life  / Time Sensitive

• From Celeste Blewitt: “This is fascinating, off beat and so intriguing as to where this piece of history, The Amber Room, has ended up, if it still exists. I think I find this even more fascinating because it is so far removed from the metaverse and all the discussions of tech, yet the links between the two are similar, whether it is something Gen Z or shipwreck hunters are searching for, people are always looking for that elusive piece of history.” The Hunt for the Romanovs Greatest Lost Treasure' / Town & Country

Entertainment + IP

• From Erik Lavoie: “Creative noodling courtesy of our man Cam [Farelly].” [Amazon Music’s got an LCD Soundsystem mock-sitcom coming starring Eric Wareheim] / Rolling Stone   

• Which reminds me of the 2014 Innernet classic “Too Many Cooks,” which you should definitely revisit (and watch thru the end) / YouTube

• Monster Children’s worst songs of the year / Monster Children

• NFT Now’s Top 21 Music NFT Moments of 2021 / NFT Now

• In Praise of the Junk-Drawer ’90s Alt-Rock Movie Soundtrack Ringer via Public Announcement

• And on that topic, special shout out to the De La Soul x Teenage Fanclub leftfield classic “Fallin” from the “Judgement Night” OST / YouTube

• From Jacquline Bosjnak: Mach1 is our patented (disrupts dolby etc) universal audio delivery format that unifies a very busted multi-channel and spatial audio pipeline in preparation for interoperability and futureproofed for future mediums like web 3.0 and metaverse. First up: artist Eli Keszler chose to release a Mach1 Spatial first album. / Wikipedia

• The story of J. Grant Brittain’s ‘the push’ - the most famous skateboard photo ever / Monster Children

  

Platforms & Influencers

• Here’s to thinking small: Scott Galloway Wants to Be “the Most Influential Thought Leader in the History of Business” / The Information

• Meanwhile is Galloway bete-noire Elon Musk practicing “troll philanthropy?” (NYT)

• Netflix has started its own editorial site, Tudum, that will curate stories and news that are algorithmically-curated to what users watch on the service / Hollywood Reporter

• Entirely unrelated: Pin-Up Magazine head Felix Burrichter’s media diet swings wildly and i like it / The Slowdown

• Apropos: TikTok is adjusting its algorithm to avoid showing users the same types of videos too frequently / Axios

• Unrelated: dead roombas, stranded packages and delayed exams: How the AWS outage wreaked havoc across the U.S. / CNBC

• The dark side of 15-minute grocery delivery / Bloomberg via Future of Transportation

Marketing & Advertising

• The most important ideas are those that apply to multiple fields. The Useful laws of the land Collaborative Funds via Strat Scraps

• A unique subculture has sprung up around discount grocery chain Aldi's middle aisle / Atlas Obscura via 1440

• From Thomas Murphy, Miller high life is selling gingerbread 'dive bar' kits (with sticky-floor maple syrup) / Elite Daily

• The best comedy writing of 2021 was retail's S-1s / Retail Dive

Media Business

• Brands and Creators See the Benefits of a Like-Free Instagram / Adweek

• How FaZe Clan transformed into much more than just a gaming company in 2021 /  AdAge

• The ‘Paradigm Shift’ Remaking China’s Fashion Ad Industry / BoF

Metaverse & Web3

• This post posits that social community-based brands like Friends with Benefits, Bored Ape Yacht Club, CryptoPunks and Nouns DAO, are driving the concept of ‘brand’ as something more fluid, valuing authenticity over control, consistency, and centralized management. OnterInternet via PSFK

• Three Web3 principles that will permeate online culture in the next 10 years. Music X via Motive Unknown

• Related: Nike’s take on why they bought RTKFT / Nike

• And from Iolanda Carvalho: This very cool Ipsos report has lots of interesting stuff on wealth & luxury, metaverse, NFTs, and an interview with Benoit Pagotto, cofounder of RTFKT.

• Fractal wants to be the OpenSea of Solana, bringing NFT games to the forefront — specifically, “play-to-earn” games that allows users to shop for avatars and digital goods / TechCrunch

• Ergo: Animoca Brands and Yuga Labs to develop a blockchain-based Bored Ape Yacht Club game expected to feature a GameFi, play-to-earn model . / The Block Crypto via Inside Cryptocurrency

• Related: Decimal-ation. A Bored Ape holder mistakenly sold a 75 ETH (~$300,000) Ape for 0.75 ETH ($3,102) / CNET via Inside Cryptocurrency

• Dapper Labs, the team behind the NBA Top Shot NFT series is back with its next product called The Warehouse, an ambitious NFT storefront that will serve as a hub for web3 digital identity, allowing users to create animated avatars and outfit them with crypto accessories.” / TechCrunch

• Meanwhile, a creative duo built “Adland” in the metaverse – and you can have an office if you hire them / The Drum

• “Meet your new A.I. best friend” / Fortune via Garbage Day

• Inside crypto exchange FTX’s push to become a household name / AdAge

• Ubisoft made a big splash in the world of blockchain gaming this week with the announcement of its Quartz platform for in-game NFTs / Protocol

• Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam’s talk on crypto and NFTs / Fehrsam via Marginal Revolution

• Her IG handle was 'metaverse.' Last month, It vanished / NYT

Food & Drink

• Paging Matt Bruhn: The scientist with the plan to make food out of air / FT

• Snaxshot’s yearbook of f&d brands they vibes with… / Instagram

• Silicon Valley’s still trying to ‘solve’ dinner / FT

Miscellany

• Finland's prime minister apologizes for clubbing. BBC via 1440

• The (SFW) Doublekoek Doggy Style Calendar is exactly what it .. sounds like?! / Doublekoek

• Also animals: phys-ed with Bears / NYT

• Cheese Myths debunked / Guardian via Motive Unknown

• The 13 memes that defined 2021 Mashable via Elevator

• While skateboard memelord and fave artist Kevin ‘Spanky’ Long gets the Chromeball interview treatment / Instagram

To Do:

• Dance Dance Dance at [SIC] homies Friends From New York’s clandestine holiday bash on Roosevelt Island (flyer above)

• More NYC: Join the the Internet culture festival at Caveat in the East Village.

• Check out Herb Sundays #26 from Leo Fitzpatrick, with starts weird and noisy and gets cool and jazzy then turns 90s boom bap then takes a hard left into heavy thrashy shit before droning through synth classics, pop garage rock, psych, deep roots and dub, more jazz and experimental jams. It’s a mood, it’s a million moods, it’s a history lesson, it’s a beautiful Sunday. Damn. Put it on and let it play, no matter how tempted you feel to turn it off at any given time. Let it play and live through it. You’ll thank me, promise.  / Spotify

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