[SIC] 210: Metal Brand Management

Volume 5, Number 2

Sep 15, 2022

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Hi all,

Fashion week ended, now it’s climate week, apparently. Apropos that, how’s this for an intro: while the just-completed Ethereum merge (which will reduce the protocol’s energy use by a hard-to-fathom 99%) was in progress, I made a guest appearance at the WNYC/ The Greene Space’s inaugural Wanderlust Wednesday, talking about everybody’s favorite bete noire: NFTs (I join around minute 54 of the video).

For the record, I’m long NFTs, though short term I get the concern / confusion/ consternation. I think my fellow panelists Toni Thai Sterrett and Jordan Muthra and I acquitted ourselves reasonably well, but I’d love to hear your thoughts. Thanks to the whole Greene Space team, and especially Toni for inviting me.

Speaking of climate week - lots of stories this week about what we eat and how it’s messing things up. As somebody who’s got his annual ‘sober/vegan’ October coming up, I read them with great interest…and am now rushing off to get more drinks in while it’s still September….so excuse the brief intro.

Thanks before I go to all of you for reading and especially to Casey, Matt, James, Iolanda, Celeste, Piers and David for suggestions this week. Love you and really appreciate it. My DMs are open, all.

Ben

My DALL-E buddy Bojana

======[SIC] 210: Metal Brand Management======

Zeitgest / Gestalt

Is Anything Cool Anymore? W. David Marx, whose new book Status and Culture explains why coolness is such a tricky concept these days / GQ
Apropos: how did mid-1960s English mod culture manage to establish itself in Japan and survive for over 40 years? / Sabukaru
Back in the present, it’s Adobe’s Emoji Trend Report season / Adobe
Experts estimate that as much as 90% of online content may be synthetically generated by 2026 / Europol
The Ethereum Merge may not ‘fix everything,’ but it could boost institutional adoption / TechCrunch
Also in medium good news: The Times evaluated 14 economic indicators and found that most pointed to a good economy / NYT
But the buying mania for old songs has come to a sudden and ugly end / An Honest Broker
Related: Longtermism is influencing billionaire philanthropy and shaping politics. Should it guide the future of humanity? / Future Perfect
Meanwhile, Gen Z is the most materialistic generation / Fortune
And their compulsive buying is bad for shoppers and bad for companies / Fast Company
But encouragingly?! .. One of the biggest trends on the Chinese version of Instagram, is “America core.” / VICE

World Order

Now is the best time in human history to be alive (unless you’re a farm animal) / Future Perfect
Accordingly, a Dutch city has banned meat advertising from public spaces in a bid to curb greenhouse gas emissions / BBC
IE: In 2021, food production contributed 30% of total global carbon emissions / Forbes
Related: Save the whales: Stop eating lobster? / NYT
Which begs the question: What If We Were All Vegans? / The Carbon Almanac
And also: Why Greeks live longer / Monocle
In contrast, from Celeste Blewitt: 'Fast Food Took A Gamble On Fake Meat. It's Not Paying Off.' / Bon Appetit
Evidence of?! The High cost of living is making sustainability a luxury/ The Drum
Hence: “We’re in a worse place than I expected”: Bill Gates talking about the progress on poverty, hunger and climate / NYT
But help’s on the way?! There’s a New Cop on the Banking Beat: Chief Climate Risk Officer” / NYT
And Wyoming will soon be the home of the largest carbon-renewal project in the world / Fast Company
Plus, Floating Solar Farms Are a Game Changer / Reasons to Be Cheerful
And now Clothing, cars, watches and headphones are being powered by solar energy / Dezeen
S/o to my gulf states: FastCo breaks down how water desalination may be key to surviving an expanding water crisis / Fast Company
Interesting: A new pilot will pay 2,000 artists and creatives in Ireland to basic income of $330 per week / Music Business Worldwide
Similar: Hospitals sell their patients’ debt to collection agencies for pennies on the dollar. RIP Medical Debt buys it up — just to forget all about it / Reasons to be Cheerful
But elsewhere: From @TheTechnorati: The Hunter Biden laptop data breach imaginable is a political scandal Democrats can’t just wish away / NY Mag
Important! Peter Zeihan on the ‘WHYS’ of Russian Disinformation / YT
Equally: Women in college are moving left, politically— but men are migrating to the right/ Newsweek
And also: Disinformation via text message is a problem with few answers/NBC News
Then again? From nuclear armageddon to climate change, fears over doomsday scenarios have a long history. But where does this obsession come from and what does it reveal about real-world politics? / Monocle Pod

Speculative Futures

Roblox inches toward a deeper, more mature vision for the metaverse / TechCrunch
Related: FT podcast interview with a16z’s Chris Dixon on web3 / FT
Also ‘in defense of Web3’?!: A weekend on mushrooms with a whale art collector/Superrare
Hence: from Casey Lewis: Crypto investors still think they're going to get filthy rich, study finds / Input
Web3 Social: A booming space with an identity crisis/ Forefront
To wit; Model agency Photogenics has a new avatar division for brands to hire virtual avatars for events, marketing, or product drops / The Future Party
And AI allows dead woman to answer questions at her funeral / Futurism.ai
But Fur Affinity, the largest website for furry art, announced that they were banning A.I.-generated art from the platform / Fur Affinity
And either way AI-generated images open multiple cans of worms / Axios
IE: Loab, the Internet’s Latest Urban Legend, Is Worse Than Anything / Hyperallergic
Roblox will give a handful of game developers $500,000 each to build its future / TechCrunch
Google’s Area 120 unit seems to be crumbling / Bloomberg
Jack Dorsey & Jay-Z airdropped $1000 in Bitcoin to students at their new Bitcoin Academy. / Bitcoin.com

Pop Cultures

True Stories From the Armory Show / Hyperallergic
And the Clio Art Fair, Where Artists Represent Themselves / Hyperallergic
The era of eyebrow democracy is upon us / i-D
But “Is There Personal Style In The Era Of TikTok Aesthetics?” / R29
Is TikTok Turning Fashion Week Into Pure Chaos? Vanity Fair
because…? Gen Z fashion critics are ripping up the rulebook/ Vogue Business
Meanwhile: Meet the Man Behind TikTok’s Most Influential Fit Account / GQ
From Piers Fawkes: Anna Wintour staged a commercial extravaganza with one eye on global domination / NYT
Another extravaganza from Piers: Tommy Hilfiger's big American extravaganza / i-D
And another: The Technicolor world of David Bowie/ Monocle on Culture Pod
Meanwhile, Alex G Is Building a Mystery pitchfork
Julia’s Box: Where the legend of the Fox began / Paper Mag
Billy McFarland is out of jail and planning a comeback / NYT
The Kid Mero on being the “GORP Similac Robin Hood, his “mad abrupt & weird" split with Desus Nice, and what's next / Blackbird Spyplane
The Good Spirits of 'Drink Champs'/ The New Yorker
And bad spirits of Fear of a Black Hobbit / The Atlantic
Which begs the question: Is fandom a cult? The religious fervor fueling Star Wars, Marvel, and more /Inverse
Related: Marina Abramović, Mobs, and the Cult of the Hero / Hyperallergic
Related to That: Is art censorship on the rise? How freedom of expression is being curbed across the globe / The Art Newspaper
Meantime, A way of seeing Wolfgang Tillmans’s Ways of Seeing / Frieze
And A Good Movie to Watch is a freemium service that rates and recommends movies and shows / A Good Movie to Watch
From James Friedman: Is Tim Robinson the only #emmy winner who can tre flip? / Twitter

Media Happenings

Disney+ is evolving into a platform that will blend physical and digital experiences / The Future Party
Oh also, Disney could combine Hulu with Disney+ into a single streaming service / Fox Business
Therefore, Paramount is discussing folding Showtime programming into Paramount+ / Variety
Corollary: Former Disney CEO Bob Iger explains why he passed on Twitter / Vox
Even tho For media publishers, Twitter still dominates on social / Axios
Meantime, Teens still love Snapchat. But its business is struggling to grow up. / WaPo
Related: After six ad-free years, The Athletic is now selling its first ads. Oddly, Chanel was the launch partner/ Adweek
A sign that the era of ad-free publishing is over / Simon Owens
So, as ad budgets are slashed in the absence of cash, marketers are 'bartering' influencers / Digiday
While Tiktok responds to Kylie Jenner’s new “relatable influencer aesthetic / Glossy
Btw: NPR's Planet Money has done a really good job of adapting its content for TikTok / Teen Vogue
And from Iolanda Carvalho, here’s an “Interesting report from Reuters Institute (qualitative, on the idea of "News" for young people) / Reuters
To that end: Digiday editors recap summer 2022's top trends in media.
Update: Semafor will reinvent the newsroom “to attack information overload” / Press Gazette
While tech media charges back to the future / Axios
Ergo?! Why Are Podcast Studios Suddenly Obsessed With Video? / NY Mag

Market-ations

GOAT: Patagonia Founder Gives Away the Company. The profits will now be used to fight climate change / NYT
Especially notable since selling coats and jackets online isn't easy. How are new outerwear brands making it work? / Thingtesting
It’s essentially The game of luxury. Luxury brands don't build worlds. They build games / The Sociology of Business
Corollary: Rachel Comey on Meeting Her Customers Right Where They’re At / Time Sensitive Pod
No, Most Books Don't Sell Only a Dozen Copies / Counter Craft
Another corollary: Amazon is the Least Understood Company in Hollywood / Bloomberg
Meanwhile, Advertising agencies ask 'where are all the people?' in battle for talent / FT
Oh and Ryan Reynolds broadcasts his colonoscopy to spotlight cancer prevention / The Drum
Brands aren’t surprised about Instagram’s commerce about-face / Modern Retail
Even if McKinsey sees 'commerce media' as the go-to media and marketing investment channel of the future / Digiday
But Marketers Still Aren't Sold on Social Shopping / AdWeek
Yet … Yellowstone is so popular that the TV show is now spinning off a hard seltzer brand / Fingers
And from David Bloom: “Even investment bank Morgan Stanley can do a fashion mashup. This one is particularly interesting, given its roots.” [Morgan Stanley and Rebecca Minkoff have a new banker bag] / Fast Company
In platform news: Adobe to acquire Figma, taking out one of its biggest rivals in the realm of digital design / TechCrunch
While Discord adds Reddit-like Forum channels for chatting about specific topic / Latestly
Meanwhile, Discord is becoming the most harmonious place for music fandoms / Pitchfork

Superficial Interest

A Robot Dog Is Painting Self-Portraits at the 2022 Spring Break Art Fair / Hyperallergic
Meanwhile, the late, great William Klein’s Pictures Will Still Knock You Out / New Yorker
The oral history of Jane’s Addiction / Pitchfork
How Music Loops Help Me Feel More Present / NYT
Related: Is music on TikTok a different kind of art? / Music In Africa
Also, even more feels found in Amsterdam’s last Shroom Lounge/ Rave New World
Funky Bags! / Tough Traveler

Eats / Drinks

More chefs are embracing tasting menus, while rejecting the grandiose conventions and price tags that usually accompany them / NYT
But?! A 14 course tasting menu? Don’t. Just Don’t / FT
Instead, check out the 100 Best Pizzerias in the World / Robb Report
Elsewhere, Cultured meat startup Prolific Machines unveils its “Henry Ford approach” which doesn’t sound weird, at all? / TechCrunch
Also weird: Chris Paul launches a new vegan snack brand/ Fast Company
And Hendrick’s Gin rescued a cucumber from extinction / Quartz
But don’t forget: Japanese Candy is America’s Future / The Takeout

Friends Section

Troy Young and Brian Morrissey have a new People vs Algorithms weekly pod about patterns in media, business and culture/Spotify
CEO John Martin assures the Village Voice that the newly relaunched CREEM will “definitely offend people” / Village Voice
Drew Millard on The Baffling World of MAGA Rap / Gawker
Jessica Coen Joins Media Startup The News Movement / The Observer
Jack Greer talks on the Say You Swear pod / Say You Swear
Andrew Kuo’s show at Tanya Leighton is up now in LA/ IG

Useful Diversions

Dive In: Are you an Oatly drinking vegan libtard or a red-pilled edge-lord chugging goat milk with yr raw deer heart? The Rainforest Inside Us is for you / Dis.Art

Listen: Five design and visual arts podcasts for keeping up with the creative industry / It’s Nice That

Do: NYC, on Friday from 4-7p meet me at the Snowpeak Community cookout / Snow Peak

Or Saturday at the J&J Closet Cleanout at Leisure Center /IG

After which I’m going to the free live screen printing at ESPOs Art World / IG

Mark your calendars: Sept 22, The Steve Keene Art Book opening party out at ChaShaMa, 360 Furman Street, Brooklyn

This made my whole week. #worldclique

Links this week via:

Web3 Newsletter / Vogue Business / After School / Morning Consult / Recomendo / Public Announcement / Milk Road / Upstream / Motive Unknown / Nieman Lab/ Garbage Day / Ben-Evans / The Rebooting / Context Collapse/ Music Redef/ Marginal Revolution / The By-Product / The Future Party / Protocol / Contagious / A Continuous Lean / Elevator / Retail Dive / Serving the People / Understanding TikTok / Simon Owens