[SIC] Weekly

Share this post

[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits

sicweekly.substack.com

[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits

Volume 5, Number 8

Oct 27, 2022
2
Share this post

[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits

sicweekly.substack.com

The [SIC] newsletter on Thursdays is free, and will be forever, unless I change my mind. Unlikely.

But you
CAN pay, if you want. I’m into it. Monthly or yearly, or founding support. Paid subscribers get an additional [SIC] Sundays newsletter each week. And founding supporters get invited to a dinner at my home in NYC with special guests.
Meantime, enjoy. Feel free to share, too. Here’s a button:

Share

Corollary sources this week (all worth your review):
Vogue Business / After School / Morning Consult / Morning Brew / Quartz / Garbage Day / Marginal Revolution / The Prepared / Semafor / Axios / Exec Sum / Motive Unknown / Forefront / Understanding TikTok / People Vs Algorithms / Nieman Lab / Lean Luxe / Simon Owens / Milk Road / Micromobility Report / Music Redef / Brendan’s Communications Miscellany / The Unskippables

Also, feel free to read this on the web instead.

Hi all,

Austin was emotional; the prevailing sentiment was ‘I’m so glad to see you. I wish it wasn’t for this reason.’ Still, I think Matt would appreciate the idea that he brought us all together. Gonna try and do more convening myself.

To that end: next Tues, November 1st, I’ll be at [SIC] Talks alum Cheryl Dunn’s screening of her film “BEYOND i wanna go,” a doc she made about Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland, California - lmk if you want to meet up. Tickets are $20 and benefit www.creativegrowth.org - they’re available at the site.

A different kind of convening: s/o [SIC] Talks alum Diallo Riddle for the second season premiere of Shermans Showcase last night. As the NYT wrote: “Spaceship? Check. Trap nursery rhymes? Check. “Sherman’s Showcase,” a musical comedy tribute to Black culture, is back.’

I got a smile out of the (widely maligned) What the ‘Cool Kids’ Are Super Into article this week, mainly because what the kids are mostly into is … the things they’re working on themselves. Nice to know some things never change. And s/o Gutes for her new sideline as a weather reporter!

I also really enjoyed seeing the return of Cyprien Gaillard, “the prodigal son of French contemporary art”, a fave artist I was introduced to in the early aughts via an artist series of flyers curated by [SIC] homie Gordon Harrison Hull for the the legendary nightclub APT (where I DJ’ed badly for a while) - and from whence the “cool kids” article from 2003 would definitely have emanated. Thanks Todd Krieger for that contribution, and thanks to my stalwarts Iolanda and Celeste for theirs this week.

Finally, and apropos of nothing, Pulp’s “Common People” video is pure fire / YT

Now, the links.

Ben

West Village Scene

======[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits======

Zeitgest / Gestalt

  • TikTok and Instagram are the only social networks that are growing as news sources for Americans / Nieman Lab

  • In fact reliance on TikTok for news has tripled -since 2020, defying a larger national trend, as fewer Americans are looking for news on social media, especially Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and Snapchat/ Quartz

  • How TikTok’s algorithm made it a success: ‘It pushes the boundaries’ / The Guardian

  • TikTok's livestreaming business is exploding. In the last two years, TikTok’s online ads revenue has grown by 500%, while its livestreaming revenue has increased by 900% / Gizmodo

  • eBay: is going after the 're-commerce' industry and taking on re-sale platforms StockX and the RealReal. eBay said the re-sale of luxury goods can make up ~50% of its sales volume by 2024 / Pymnts

  • TikTok denied it could use location information to track US users / CNBC

  • Meanwhile, Square sells access to your inbox, and no one seems to know if the law cares / Protocol

  • Hence, from Iolanda Carvalho: The Trust in Tech Report says “increasing geopolitical challenges, a growing divide between developing and developed markets and a lack of societal leadership in the sector are putting Tech’s high trust at risk." / Edelman

  • To that end: A reminder even the inevitable isn’t inevitable: Can Anyone Catch Nokia? / Ritzholtz

  • Corollary: how a Jewish Teen’s Kanye West Obsession Echoed His Dad’s Own Hip-Hop History / Variety

  • But Ye is never coming back from this / Yahoo, Rolling Stone

  • Which is … ok?! Because he reportedly plans to create "Yecosystem" of mini-cities / Dezeen

  • Gap’s real Yeezy problem The struggling brand is left with garbage bags full of clothes from a collab meant to revitalize its fortunes / Retail Dive

  • But should Kanye West's Music Be Banned? / Variety

  • And barring that, can he find refuge, or money, in music? / NYT

  • Related: the days of cheap music streaming may be numbered / Hot Pod

  • Also related: How Artists Can Win When Music Is The Loss Leader / Trapital

  • Is Hollywood regressing on "Me Too"? / NYT

  • Everyone Wants to Be a Hot, Anxious Girl on Twitter: on the rise of 'gradient accounts' which post "little snippets of language with mass appeal." / The Atlantic

  • Can comedy help us make sense of tech’s calculated tragedies? / Spike Art

  • And Why did comedy die? / Substack

  • Also dying? Live Music Is falling apart / Music Business Worldwide

  • Unrelated but pertinent: the fantasy of instant delivery is imploding / Bloomberg

  • Non-linear workdays are changing productivity / BBC

  • ‘Human Upgrading’ Is The Ultimate Luxury From oxone therapies and oxygen bars to high-end gyms, the ultimate luxury changes the way people feel about themselves and promotes wellness and longevity /Jing Daily

  • Silicon Valley rethinks the corporate conference for the post-pandemic age. Mental wellbeing is now near the top of executives’ agenda / FT

  • Cash rich start-ups are filing scores of patent claims on hallucinogens like magic mushrooms/ NYT

  • Burned Out on Your Personal Brand? / NYT

  • Related: Everybody wants to be a LinkedInfluencer. And the biggest power users are turning to ghostwriters / Vox

  • To that end: dozens of new agencies are popping up in India as thousands of young writers freelance as ghostwriters to help executives build their personal brands, earning up to $8,500 a month, juggling clients across the world / The Ken

World Order

  • The Economics of Rising Temperatures. The world stands to lose more than 10 percent of total economic value by mid-century if climate change stays on the currently-anticipated trajectory / The Carbon Almanac

  • The world’s energy situation is not as terrible as you might expect / Ars Technical

  • The state of California is about to become the world’s fourth largest economy, leapfrogging Germany / Ground News

  • A Bleak Future Ahead For Chinese Tech Companies? Chinese tech stocks including Alibaba and JD.com are taking the brunt of the panic selling as investors fear a renewed crackdown on private firms / Jing Daily

  • ⚽️ Soccer can transform the African cultural and creative ecosystem / Quartz

The Speculative Future

  • The generative AI application landscape / Sequoia

  • Sequoia’s Sonya Huang says the generative AI hype is “absolutely justified” / Protocol

  • Tyler Cowen on How AI will change everything on the internet / Marginal Revolution

  • Because generative ML video is on a path to get very very good / Twitter

  • Ergo: The golden age of AI-generated art is here. It’s going to get weird. How software that can create almost any image from a few words will change human creativity / FT

  • But actually, the real Stable Diffusion “art” is the genius of failure / Twitter

  • Welcome, then, to the age of digital mysticism / FWB

  • But, apropos of that, is AI Art just Soft Propaganda for the Global North? / Hyperallergic

  • What Does AI Dance-Pop Sound Like? Documentary film The Computer Accent follows the pop-dance band YACHT as they use AI to help compose their 2019 album Chain Tripping / Hyperallergic

  • What Call of Duty says about the future of gaming / Protocol

  • Word on the block is Twitter is neckdeep in developing their crypto wallet / Twitter

  • The most popular web3 social platforms, including Lens, Farcaster, Urbit, and more, across dimensions from their data layer to native privacy to active users / Twitter

  • Lost in Roblox’s Fifa World – everything wrong with the metaverse in one place / The Guardian

  • Fashion’s Metaverse Obsession Has Cooled – But Don’t Count the Virtual World Out Yet / BoF

  • The artist John Mack on Why Reality Cannot Actually Be “Augmented” / Time Sensitive Pod

  • Related?! Kodak recently tripled its film production operations / Petapixel

Pop Cultures

  • Is Taylor Swift the last pop superstar? / FT

  • Either way, she is extremely close to creating a true metaverse / The Atlantic

  • Even if “This is not a great Taylor Swift album” / NYT

  • Also metatarsal: how digital signatures and NFTs are creating a market for intangible art / The Art Newspaper

  • And Nude Art NFTs Combat Censorship and Destigmatize Women’s Bodies/ NFT Now

  • Maury! Maury! The visual legacy of tabloid talk shows / Dirt

  • Twitch was the big name in livestreaming – now it’s at a crossroads / The Guardian

  • S/o P.O.D.: TikTok, Boom premieres Monday on ITVS. The film is about the complexity of tech and social media / ITVS

  • Phoebe Bridgers Talks Depp-Heard and Transphobia / Teen Vogue

  • How Richard Quinn Became The Designer Every Brand Wants / Jing Daily

  • In Germany, climate activists throw mashed potato at most expensive Monet painting sold at auction / The Art Newspaper

  • While Lil Nas X responds to Just Stop Oil’s recent tomato soup action with a hilarious meme on social media / Hyperallergic

  • Corollary: Meet fashion's Gen Z meme lords using satire to stand out / Vogue Business

  • The show Atlanta’s brilliant Afrosurrealism / YT

  • The 100 Best Songs and Albums of the 1990s, according to Pitchfork readers / Pitchfork

  • Not ‘90s but: True Royalty Stories: New Order's Blue (and very expensive) Monday / Infinite Catalog

Media Happenings

  • Jimmy Finkelstein, the media entrepreneur and former owner of The Hill, has raised $40 million for a new digital news platform that he’s billing to would-be hires as a combination of the Washington Post and Daily Mail / Semafor

  • Apropos of this new wave newsroom: How can major media brands better engage young readers? / Wunderman Thompson

  • An idea: You should be surveying your audience more / Simon Owens

  • Ergo: The Financial Times published a recent case study on how it convinced 80,000+ readers to participate in its surveys / FT

Market-ations

  • Mermaidsleaze is what Disney’s Little Mermaid’s Live Action needs to smash box office records / Decode

  • TikTok doubles down on live-stream shopping / The Verge

  • BeReal is challenged to keep marketers' attention with robust advertising offerings. Will BeReal soon BeGone without ads? /Digiday

  • Related: Inside Shake Shack's push to BeReal and cater to its surging user base / Digiday

  • Prioritizing TikTok, agencies move away from creating content for YT and IG. It’s time to rip up the rulebook on polished content if marketers want to succeed on TikTok / Digiday

  • While elsewhere, YouTube and TikTok Creators Are Tearing Up Netflix’s Streaming Rulebook / The Information 🔏

  • YouTube mega-star MrBeast seeks 10-figure valuation / Axios

  • TechCrunch wonders if content creator MrBeast is actually worth $1.5 billion / TechCrunch

  • From Celeste Blewitt: “’This is fascinating, McDonalds have clearly focused on the collector's market, focusing on the generation of the moment, Gen-Z, cult streetwear labels and aiming for status and nostalgia.” [With Adult Happy Meals, McDonalds Has Sparked A Collecting Frenzy’] / WSJ

  • Every time McDonald's relaunches the McRib, the [stock] markets pump. Just check it out… / Twitter

  • So should we worry that McDonald’s bringing back McRib for a “farewell tour"? / Axios

  • Beyond Meat: How Vegan Brands Found Their Sense of Humor / Creative Review

  • While Citi Bike’s “Bike Angel” program incentivizes people to rebalance ebike inventories at docking stations across New York City / Bloomberg

  • And Claire’s hopes to vibe with Gen ‘Zalpha’ in new Roblox experience/ The Drum

  • Ad Age Podcast on how On Running plans to gain on big rivals / Spotify

  • While focusing on everyday runners has helped Tracksmith become America’s Cult Running Brand / Forbes

  • The North Face is straddling a crevasse in branding around diversity with a belay from Jimmy Chin/ Fast Company

  • While Chloé plots supply chain progress and a circular future / Vogue Business

  • And Telfar retains value at higher rates on resale platforms than legacy brands like Chanel and Hermès / Highsnobiety

  • Then again, now you can add an Hermès Birkin to your Amazon cart /Highsnobiety

Superficial Interest

  • Plastic packaging isn’t really ‘recyclable’ in the US, Greenpeace report says / The Verge

  • What does Goodyear Welted shoes mean? And why does it matter? / Sid Mashburn

  • Cream-colored dachshunds seem to be emerging as the "hot" new dog on the Upper East Side/Axios

  • From Celeste Blewitt: “What an interesting piece about the history of flowers, giving and meaning. A really great read into how art, culture and writers have used flowers to tell stories.” [The Emojis Of The 19th Century] / BBC

  • The National Audubon Society recently released a stunning, first-of-its-kind interactive map showing the annual migratory patterns of more than 450 bird species / Audobon

  • “Rebranding is hard but there is no excuse for disemvowelling.” / FT

  • Bug splats on windshields are becoming less common. The decline may be a symptom of a larger ecological problem / WaPo

  • Bees may be able to affect weather. Hives can electrify the air to the same degree as a thunderstorm / Live Science

  • Some people really do attract more mosquitoes. Scientists think it has to do with how they smell  / WaPo

  • ‘Pay-to-play’ galleries—which charge artists thousands to exhibit—are on the rise / The Art Newspaper

  • [SIC] homie Tyler McCauley says ‘I’m obsessed with tracks where the song, album, and band are all the same like Bad Company’s “Bad Company” off Bad Company. I’ve collected a bunch on this playlist solely because it brings me joy.’ / Spotify

Food / Drink

  • Investments are pouring in to chains that offer sports, arcade games and elevated menus — think Dave & Buster's but with chef-driven cuisine, Instagram-worthy decor and modern pursuits. / Axios

  • How cottage fries became NYC’s most elusive potatoes / Grub Street

  • A new crop of food influencers are getting known by posting scathing video reviews to TikTok / Bon Appetit

  • Why we’ll vote for more humane meat, but won’t pay for it / Future Perfect

  • From Iolanda Carvalho: Almost all of the items and ingredients Whole Foods predicts will be trending throughout 2023 are organic, locally sourced and health-conscious, according to the grocer / Grocery Dive

  • Inside the fantastical, pragmatic quest to make ‘hybrid’ meat / Vox

  • Beyond Meat’s steak substitute hit grocery store shelves this week / CNBC

  • The populations of tuna and other migratory fish have increased in waters near a protected area of the Pacific Ocean, a spill-over effect of the marine reserve, which is nearly 4x as large as the US state of California / The Guardian

  • Cell-cultivated, sushi-grade seafood is a thing. If Leonardo DiCaprio funds it, fishless fish must taste OK, right?!/ The Guardian

  • Beyond fish, Leo is stepping into his newest role: shoe scion. The noted environmentalist has become a “strategic investor” in British vegan shoe brand LØCI / The Hollywood Reporter

  • Corollary, but food-related: How 'Pig' Became Nicolas Cage's Cash Cow / Hollywood Reporter

Friends Section

  • Apropos of Cheryl Dunn: here’s How You Will Win Monter Children’s 2022 Photo Comp. What she's looking for in as a judge, from victorious entry / Monster Children

  • While long-lost [SIC] Inspiration Steve ‘Pav’ Pavlovic’s 90s retrospective opens soon / Monster Children

  • With an (excellent) accompanying playlist / Spotify

Useful Diversions:

  • Listen: Cosi Fanni Tutti on the Apology pod / Spotify

  • Do: Tonight: Sade Night in LA / IG

Accidental Halloween Scene

======[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits======

Share this post

[SIC] 216: Mis-Shapes, Mistakes, Misfits

sicweekly.substack.com
Comments
TopNewCommunity

No posts

Ready for more?

© 2023 Ben Dietz
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start WritingGet the app
Substack is the home for great writing