[SIC] 187: Cognoscenti Hereabouts

Volume 4, Number 31

Hi all,

This newsletter was once described (to my delight) as a “round-up of weak signals, emerging trends and 'Huh? Interesting’”, which both captures what I’m trying to do and also maybe what ends up happening in spite of my efforts, too. (S/o Chris Kent for the quote, btw)

I mention because while I try to organize according to categories generally, this week it’s been difficult to parse and separate all the “web3 / metaverse” stuff, which is truly infecting every vector of the culture-communications-brands landscape.

That’s not to say we’re at a point of saturation, or even a point of inflection. It’s just that it’s probably useful to start thinking of W3/MV as table stakes for every category, not unlike “digital” or “social” before it. That’ll doubtless make some of you cringe, but I think we just gotta get used to it and use it to our collective advantage.

Beyond that observation, I won’t delay your progress to the links. Thanks to James, Celeste, David, Kevin, Jeremy, Iolanda, and Craig for suggestions this week. More, more, more, please.

Lastly, no “Five Questions For” or [SIC] Talks this week as I get used to my new work / life cadence, but they’ll return soon. There’s always the [SIC} Talks archive in the meantime.

Sorry for the food porn. It’s one of my biannual sober vegan months and I’m missing these guys RN.

=====[SIC] 187: Cognoscenti Hereabouts=====

The World

• Peter Zeihan’s warning of global famine fomented by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It’s not pretty, but you really should read it. The Return of the Third Horseman / Zeihan

• Hence, How Russia/Ukraine Will Upset Markets / Ritzholtz

• What happens if you pay Fox News viewers to watch CNN instead? They change their minds/ Bloomberg via Nieman Lab

• From James Frey: Boston Dynamics' Spot Is Being Tested as a Robotic Security Guard Protecting the Remains of Pompeii. / Reddit

• Amazon will launch rockets 83 times over the next five years to build a service that delivers the internet from space / The Verge

Trends

• A new Axios-Momentive poll found that people under 25 are very pro-tech / Axios via Future Party

• But (maybe because they already live there without thinking about it), most teens are “either unsure of or uninterested in the so-called metaverse” / EResearch

• Also teens are worried about the U.S. economy, but they're still spending on Nike and Lululemon / CNBC

• But why are young athletes so damn miserable? / House of Strauss via Lean Luxe

• Elsewhere in the youngs: Gen Z has embraced Slow Dating / Fortune via After School

• From David Bloom: FOMO olympics. A new app called BeReal has caught fire on college campuses. Every day, at a random time, the app sends every user a notification that they have 2 minutes to post a picture from their front and back camera (the app doesn’t have access to a user’s camera roll) / Protocol via The Future Party

• Meanwhile Epic Games announced Unreal Engine 5, which basically renders people. Also per David: “Notable too is that they’re making available to developers the urban landscape used in their jaw-dropping “The Matrix” demo (see link in story).”/ The Verge

• Related: how Epic Games is changing gaming—and maybe the metaverse / Fast Company 

• But optimists beware: Web3 'contains the seeds of a dystopian nightmare' / The Register via Motive Unknown

• Ergo ‘Will’, the first person experiencing homelessness in the metaverse / The Drum

• Probably related: How Everyone Got So Lonely (also, sex with robots) / New Yorker

• Hence Goblin Mode or Esmé Patridge’s “The Death of Ideals” / The Critic via 8Ball

• Definitely related: Hot Takes and Cobrasnakes - On indie sleaze and Carles / ScaryCoolSadGoodbye via The Unskippables

• Separately and more cheerfully from Celeste Blewitt: “Great piece, between sourdough and ceramics, the pandemic certainly brought out everyone's creativity streak.” The Glazed Age: The Year Everyone Became A Ceramicist' / Town & Country

Style

• Meet Poizon, China’s Latest E-commerce Platform / Jing Daily

• How to Compost Your Clothes / Ecocult via Blazer

• Is Hugo Comte the Fashion Creative of the Future? / BoF

• The problem with KITH And overdosing on collaborations. Sprezza via Lean Luxe

• Forget Logos, Fashion Houses Are Clamoring for Colors / WSJ

The Arts

• The Photographer Daniel Arnold is on the Apology Podcast / IG

• Corollary: some ideas on how Web3 will revolutionize photography / Fast Company via Future Party

• “Marvels of Media” highlights Media-Makers on the Autism Spectrum / NYT

• Prada Group has debuted a new project with Chicago-based artist Theaster Gates: a three-year programme to support creatives of colour / Monocle

• Bitchcoin in brief. Fascinating story of an archetypal NFT project/ Dirt

• Navajo Artists Weave New Histories /Hyperallergic

• World’s major museums resist the TikTok surge—with a few notable exceptions / The Art Newspaper

• How Harper Levine Became an Under-the-Radar Art World Powerhouse. The former rare bookseller now runs a mini-empire of six galleries / Town & Country via Public Announcement

Entertainment + IP

• Per Ryan Broderick: “A goofy show they [HBO] probably greenlit at gunpoint due to Taika Waititi’s clout and gave a minimal budget and an abridged shooting schedule to is now outperforming everything else on their network. Suck it, Zendaya! Gay pirates!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” / Twitter via Garbage Day

• Related: is streaming just becoming cable again?, The Verge

• Hence: why Netflix Should Sell Ads / Stratechery

• Unrelated: Could a Podcast Make Itself? / Hoffm-medium via Public Announcement

• From Kevin Kusatsu: “21st century New Age music for gamers….someone had to do it !!!”/ Spotif

• How Deaf DJs are revolutionising the club experience / Mixmag via Motive Unknown

• From Jeremy Toeman: “I must’ve forgotten to tel you - we did a “Wordle for Movies” [Moviedle] also and launched this past week!  :) / Moviedle

• Says Goldie: ​“The ​’90s had everything!” / The FACE

• How to talk to cool and beautiful strangers aka streetcasting Fezco/ Blackbird Spyplane

Platforms & Influencers

• Meta / Facebook is reportedly exploring creating virtual currency — referred to as "Zuck Bucks" by employees / FT

• Meanwhile Google is offering employees a free Unagi escooter subscription to bring them back the office.  / The Verge via Micromobility Report

• Unsurprising: Tiktok sugar-highs the brain, especially in teens / The Future Party

• Anime may be Netflix’s secret weapon / The Hollywood Reporter via The Future Party

• While Substack launched a dating service called “LoveStack” / Substack

• From April 11-18, Etsy sellers will go on strike, putting their shops on “vacation mode” to protest of fee increases / Buzzfeed via Morning Brew

• TikTok Has a Problem. Why is the app so focused on abusive "investigations," and is there any way to make it stop? / The Atlantic

• Meanwhile, Playhouse is TikTok meets Zillow for the next generation of homeowners / Techcrunch via After School

Marketing & Advertising

• Tiktok is Wild West of Brand Deals. How Do We Navigate the Unknown? / Adweek

• In response: TikTok launches new program to help creative agencies reach its audience / TechCrunch

• How Call of Duty League teams are using the return of in-person events to generate brand interest / Digiday

• While conversely, E3 is completely canceled / Variety

• Eames Institute of Infinite Curiosity looks to Inspire the Future Generation of Problem-Solvers / Hypebeast

• And Hulu gave a bunch of artists the chance to rework their logo into a modular identity system / The Drum

• From Iolanda Carvalho: “This is also cool: Anheuser Busch Translates Gamers' Real-Time Chats Into Sign Language | Muse by Clio

• While Coca-Cola announced “Zero Sugar Byte,”which launched first in the metaverse — specifically, Fortnite — before it appears in physical form in May. / Venture Beat via Probably Nxthing

Media Business

• Condé Nast, BuzzFeed, and the ever-growing media labor movement cjr via Public Announcement

• Ruh roh. “CNN+ has Quibi vibes”/ NY Mag via Nieman Lab

• Big up to Hats Richardson pranked the Guardian into pranking the Guardian with her “Blue Semen” piece / IG

• Hypebeast’s going SPAC / WSJ

• Related: A Media Operator analyzes the Hypebeast plan / Amediaoperator

• Also from Iolanda Carvalho: “A lot of talk about attention metrics lately (in agencies mainly I would say), but some interesting developments on the gaming arena as well” / Exchange Wire

Metaverse & Web3

• Where the Web3 Concept Stands - It should come as no surprise that most people are clueless about Web3, Blockchain, what effect it will have on their daily lives, much less how they bank, etc. / Civic Science via The Web3 Newsletter

• Also “you could do worse than reading this critical annotation of a recent NYT article called “The Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto.” / via Music Ally

• And from Iolanda Carvalho: ‘It isn't the real thing until it's seamless and one-avatar-fits-all(platforms) 😉 .” The “Open Metaverse” would be community-owned, community-governed, and a freely interoperable version that ensures privacy by design.” / CitiVelocity

• But also (conversely?!): The Future Of Brand Experiences [is] In The Metaverse / Mediapost

• Hence, Starbucks' CEO, Howard Schultz says the company will be in the NFT business by the end of 2022 / VICE via NFT Now

• And Adidas to create metaverse avatars for fans inspired by new shoe collection / Ad Age

• Related, from Craig Emeliah: “Love your newsletter and thought you’d love this [DAO and the Art of Web3]” / Campaign Live

• But will we still want a metaverse when the pandemic is over? / Fast Company 

• Some ideas about where NFTs are going next / Coinbase via Future Party

• While NFTs Are the Next Mega Segment in Luxury. / Jing Daily

• But Roblox is not into NFTs. Non-fungible tokens would add nothing useful to Roblox, per the company’s VP of Product/Avatar / Wired via Protocol

• Behind the Drop, sits down with FEWOCiOUS / YouTube via NFT Now

Food & Drink

• Plant-Based Meat Alternatives Face Another Challenging Year / MediaPost

• David Chang-backed Meati is the first to market to sell mycelium, grown in big tanks using 3 - 4 day fermentation to create chicken alternative. / Fast Company

• This Charming Naan has gone all-out with its (mainly Smiths-themed) dish-name puns / This Charming Naan via Music Ally

Miscellany

• Unsurprising: Men Consistently Overestimate Their Own Intelligence, Scientists Find / Futurism via Elevator

• Psychedelics Show Promise as a Treatment for Alcoholism / Reasons to Be Cheerful

• This is a fun way to go for a walk /Wander Prompts via Strat Scraps

Things to Do

• Again, the Steve Keene show at Public Access in NYC opens tonight and runs through the weekend / IG

• There’s a Garbage Day meetup in Brooklyn this month! It’s on April 21st, at a bar called Logan’s Run. There’s an Eventbrite page for it. / Eventbrite via Garbage Day

=====[SIC] 187: Cognoscenti Hereabouts=====