[SIC] 198: Brutalist Church

Volume 4, Number 42

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Hi all,

I’m in Cannes at the moment, which I mention simply to contextualize two things: #1: this weeks newsletter is (maybe mercifully?) shorter than normal because i’ve been running around and haven’t had my normal time each morning to read / set links aside, and #2: no special features this week (ie [SIC] Talks or 5 Questions With). For illustration, highly recommend 12-time Cannes veteran Brian Morrissey’s Cannes Rules on The Rebooting is an excellent overview of the climate here RN. I’ll get to submissions from friends and readers in this weekend’s [SIC] Sunday editions, but in the meantime plenty to ponder here. Ok, back to the Croisette. (and on to the links).

Direct from Cannes: a sneak peek at #horseforce #watchthisspace @horse____force

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Trends

• How ‘vice-signalling’ swallowed electoral politics / FT 

• Why conspiracy theories flourish in America / NYT via Nieman Lab

• Crypto enthusiasts are betting the house on creative destruction Despite the recent rout, private digital money seems more likely to mutate than die / FT

• The personal brand is dead. The youngest adult generation and the most online generation is frustrated with being surveilled and embarrassed by attention-seeking behaviors. This has instigated a retreat into smaller internet spaces / The Atlantic via After School

• The Rise of the 0.5 Selfie / NYT via Morning Consult

• The public library is the new WeWork / The Future Party

• From Piers Fawkes: Gadgets Were Hot. Now They’re Not. Not long ago, it seemed impossible to find a laptop. The pandemic has upended that, too. / NYT

• Gen Z has soured on remote work after years of Zoom school /  Fortune via Morning Consult

• Does Beyonce's new summer song channel the 'Great Resignation'? / Reuters

Style

• How Good Vibes Won Fashion / GQ via Blackbird Spyplane

• Fashion execs on Managing Gen-Z on the BoF pod/ BoF

• Ye is right to be frustrated with Adidas / Complex via Beats & Bytes

• Parade introduces its first “gender expansive” underwear range / Hypebae via After School

Entertainment + IP

• Bob Lefsetz put together a Brian Wilson 80th Birthday Playlist / Spotify

• And showed up on How Long Gone / Spotify

• The Future Of Entertainment Innovation Lies In Exclusive Experiences, Not Content/ Midia Research via Beats & Bytes

• Video games are revolutionizing the art world / Dazed via PSFK

Platforms & Influencers

• R.I.P. threads? Twitter is testing a new way for users to go over 280 characters / Twitter via Nieman Labs

• The social networks that didn’t make it . Remember Friendster? Google Buzz? Bebo? / Tedium via Nieman Lab

Marketing & Advertising

• Supreme teaches the kids about arborism / IG

• From Piers Fawkes: Meta’s weird advertising war with Apple—the musical / Fast Company

• Greenpeace Climate Protesters Scale Cannes Palais to Condemn Ad Industry's Fossil Fuel Links / Adweek via Morning Consult

Media Business

• It's TikTok's world. Can TV live in it? / Vox via Morning Consult

• Could Cable Come Back With a 'TV-Lite' Future Of Re-aggregation And Upselling? / Next TV via Morning Consult

• Ben Smith will interview Tucker Carlson and Taylor Lorenz at first event thrown by his new media company Semafor / Mediaite via Public Announcement

• Publishers grapple with younger audiences avoiding the news / Digiday via Morning Consult

• The Los Angeles Times gets a fully staffed “burner account” / Nieman Lab

Metaverse & Web3

• Web3 use cases today / Not Boring

• After Crypto: Yancey Strickler highlights three use-cases that have caught his imagination since beginning to learn about web3: declining platform lock-in, distributing ownership outside of organizations, and permanent agnostic archiving / FWB via Forefront

• Macy's Creates NFT Collection Tied to 4th of July Fireworks Show / Adweek via Morning Consult

• Protocol offers some advice for brands (that I disagree with personally) on Web3: Don’t do it. Key Quote: “The metaverse is still much more of a concept than a place, meaning that you’ll likely spend your money on a platform that won’t be around if and when the whole thing really starts to take off, they say” / Protocol

• Charli XCX On The Endless Possibilities of the Metaverse / Nylon via Beats & Bytes

• NFT apostle Noah Davis leaves Christie’s for CryptoPunks / The Art Newspaper

Food & Drink

• Mutation, grafting, and botanical breakthroughs: the Seedless Fruit Edition / WITI

• Is Root Beer the Next Frontier in Beer Drinkers’ Cravings for Nostalgia? / VinePair via Elevator

• Inside the colorful, campy, unapologetically horny world of erotic cookbooks /Eater via Jimmy

Miscellany

• The Top 5 Rules of the Skatepark / Monster Children

• Japanese city encourages daters to send love letters / The Guardian via PSFK

• Also direct from Japan: W. David Marx’s Vanilla, Peaches, and All the Other Lesser Smells / Culture: A Manual

Things to Do

• NYC, June 29th: Emily Segal will join Ottessa Moshfegh onstage at Dynasty Typewriter to talk about the new novel Lapvona (and more). For more info or to purchase tickets, go here / Eventbrite via Deluge Books

Book of the Week:

• I didn’t love Sloane Crosley’s debut novel “The Clasp”, but her collections of short stories have been past favorites, her short stories in OG Vice Magazine always appealed to me and her appearance on How Long Gone was a fun listen. Plus, we’re headed out for a week on holiday and my wife has been digging funny books - so I figured her new one Cult Classic would be a good one for both of us. Given how I’m progressing through last week’s book of the week, she’ll get to it before I do, so one or the other of us will report back.

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