[SIC] 225: Abstemious Youth

Volume 5, Number 17

Dec 23, 2022

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Hi all,

A day late. It’s the bomb cyclone, I swear…. Thanks for your patience.

One of my favorite parts of doing this each week is hearing from readers and contributors - sometimes it’s suggestions, sometimes it’s updates (like Danny launching his own newsletter, mentioned below), and sometime it’s broader ruminations on the shape of things.

One of my exchanges this week (with superstar contributor Celeste Blewitt) found me discussing how I’ve got three active viewing streams going at the moment - one with my wife, one with my son and the third with my daughter. The kids are old enough (16,13) that neither wants watch with the other, and Marcella and I aren’t quite ready to add Billions to the ‘family movie night’ docket. Too much ‘splaining.

Anyway - I was saying to Celeste I’m currently watching Atlanta with my son (s/o longtime [SIC] homie Richie Cruz for the suggestion). My son was resistant, in typical resistant teen fashion, but he’s gotten into it, and has even started started analyzing/critiquing the show. Not to equate Donald Glover with Eldridge Cleaver, but it’s giving me echoes of when my dad handed me Soul On Ice as a 16 year old (he’d overheard me bumping Brand Nubian’s first record, or something). A window to an acknowledged but unrecognized world. We’ll see what watching Wednesday with my daughter gives.

A funny corollary to that unrecognized worlds thought; the homies at Why Is This Interesting surprised me by republishing my WITI contribution The Skate Gaze Edition, from 2019, yesterday. World discovery for sure. Another corollary: what I’ve learned about the new era of communication from my Gen Z kids.

Ok, enough musings. Thanks again to Celeste and also to Eric, Iolanda and Danny for contributions this week. And once more thanks to you all for your patience. Back to regular Thursday delivery next week. Have a fantastic holidays / break in the meantime.

Lotta history behind this.

======[SIC] 225: Abstemious Youth======

Zeitgest / Gestalt

Highly recommended: Max Pain (A History of the Recent Past) / Nemesis
Why the internet is obsessed with nepo babies? / Mashable
We live in the era of mids / Blackbird Spyplane
The death of Silicon Valley style / Dirt
From meme fashion to gamified drops: The top consumer trends of 2022 / Vogue Business
Dan Frommer’s New Consumer latest Consumer Trends report is an 88-slide presentation that you can view and download for free / New Consumer
And A missive against trend reporting / Vox
From Celeste Blewitt: “An in-depth piece by Charlie Warzel on the 'decay' of the varying social media platforms with a focus on Facebook, Twitter and TikTok” / ['Welcome To Geriatric Social Media'] / Galaxy Brain/ The Atlantic
TikTok's new feature will tell you why a particular video appeared in your For You feed / TechCrunch
Twitter will be wild today: Unpleasant weather brings out unpleasant emotions on social media. ”Heatwaves and downpours sour attitudes on Twitter, it turns out. / The Verge
The DEA said it confiscated more than 379 million doses of Fentanyl this year—enough to kill every person in the US / NYT

World Order

How Big Food Companies Are Greening the Farms That Supply Them / Reasons to Be Cheerful
From Iolanda Carvalho: Regenerative Brands are a necessary evolution of “sustainable brands” and focus on making a net positive impact on people and the planet / BBMG
Hence: What Black Jello Says About the Power of Small Enterprise / Reasons To Be Cheerful
More ‘Regeneration’: The Chinese village that paints thousands of Van Goghs a year / YT
But is this the regeneration we want? FIFA President Has Plan for World Cup Every Three Years / Front Office Sports
How Amazon Uses AI To Automate Work In Its Corporate Headquarters / Big Technology
Washington Needs a Crypto Rethink / The New Yorker
New Jersey Beefs Up Physical Production Infrastructure Through Deals With Netflix and Lionsgate / Variety
But Is It Cheaper to Build or Buy a House? / Architectural Digest
Inside The World's Highest Apartment / Architectural Digest
Meanwhile at ground level: Coyotes aren't leaving New York City anytime soon / WNYC
Are electric scooter laws actually enforced? / Electric Scooter Guide

The Speculative Future

A New Chat Bot Is a 'Code Red' for Google's Search Business / NYT
We’re already on to Speculations about GPT-4 / Twitter
Meanwhile, #artbyhumans trends as AI takes off. The hashtag #artbyhumans is starting to trend in the world, hoping to differentiate the work of human artists with that generated by the raft of AI-art platforms that have popped up this year / Future Party
OpenAI launched Point-E, an AI system that can generate 3D models in response to a text-based prompt/ TechCrunch
Spatial, the metaverse experience platform, has launched the Spatial Creator Toolkit, which will allow digital creators to seamlessly design and publish immersive spaces and content/ VentureBeat
Gen Z is re-thinking college and career plans in post-Roe America / CNBC
Related? Tuition costs are expected to fall at around 100 US universities / The Hechinger Report
Vitalik Buterin on what interests him in Ethereum right now / Vitalik.eth
Who might become Twitter's new CEO if Elon Musk actually steps down? / Digiday

Pop Cultures

Jarvis Cocker on The Apology podcast / Spotify
Speaking of podcasts: The best podcasts of 2022, according to people who make podcasts / Vulture
Radiolab's Lulu Miller steals all her best ideas from her kids / WNYC
From Celeste Blewitt: A bit behind on the Wednesday trend, and the 'dark academia' TikTok subculture, a really interesting dive into these trends and cultures that spring up with time. A great read. 'Her Dark Materials: Tim Burton's Wednesday Sparks A Gothic Fashion Revival' /The Guardian
Related; Resort 2023 Trend: Goth / Vogue Business
This year's most scathing book reviews / Lithub
Also dark: Trump’s NFT collection hasn't held up well after the big weekend as the floor for the project is down nearly 70% / DeCrypt
Corollary: Jerry Gagosian’s Artsmack Podcast asks Did Trump End NFTs? / Spotify
Hence: That Sound You Year Is Donald Trump Screaming at the Mar-a-lago pool boys over the release of his tax returns and possible prison time / Vanity Fair
There's a new cinematic universe in town, and it's got an apartment for sale. Berlinale Announces Tár Universe Short Film 'The Fundraiser' /New York Mag
While “Kidults” are driving up toy sales. No such thing as being too old for a good set of Star Wars Legos / Quartz
A really excellent profile of the queen of Starface, the zit sticker brand that has “sold more than 77 million yellow Hydro-Stars / Bustle
Claire Koron Elat reminisces on the glamorization of art fairs with artist Naomi Fisher / 032C

Media Happenings

Media groups shed $500bn in value as shares head for historic drop / FT
Courier Mag Editorial Director Danny Giocopelli’s newsletter Desire Paths launched this week. First up: a visit to Le Provencal, a hotel on the southern tip of Presqu'île de Giens, the peninsula at the southernmost part of the south of France / Desire Paths
Old is gold: Sante Fe's exclusive vintage showroom. With its own team of sourcing experts, appointment-only clothing store Santa Fe Vintage lines its shelves with a thoughtfully curated collection of rare Americana treasures / Courier
Media companies start returning money linked to Sam Bankman-Fried / WaPo
Meanwhile, porn, piracy, fraud: What lurks inside Google’s black box ad empire / ProPublica
Paramount To Ditch Longtime Upfront Presentation At Carnegie Hall In Favor Of "Intimate Gatherings" With Ad Buyers / Deadline
Google and Meta, known together in the ad industry as the "duopoly," are expected to bring in less than half of all US digital advertising this year for the first time since 2014 / MediaPost
Doing Things Media, the parent company to several viral Instagram accounts, plans to acquire Overheard, a social media content brand that shares posts about funny or relatable things people say / Axios

Market-ations

How influencer Emma Chamberlain built a thriving coffee brand /AdAge
All creators want for Christmas is… the ultimate platform / Digiday
YouTube wants to cater to “multiplatform” creators / The Future Party
And Tumblr is launching a livestreaming feature. Tumblr has supported streaming in the past, but it did so by letting people share streams from other services like YouNow and YouTube. The new option is described as a native Tumblr streaming service powered by Livebox / / The Verge
Meta Is Shutting Down Experimental Livestreaming Platform Super / Insider
While Google Play isletting children send purchase requests to their guardians, Ivan writes / TechCrunch
And WhatsApp adds undo button for your message deletion mishaps. WhatsApp has rolled out a new feature that allows users to restore deleted messages on the platform / The Verge
From Eric Korsh: #FAIL: How TikTok Stats Fool Hollywood Execs, agents & marketers value stars based on followers. Data casts doubt on those numbers / The Ankler
SoundCloud’s revenues grew 19% YoY to $273m in 2021. Now it’s predicting that ‘fandom will be the next big format for the music business’. / Music Business Worldwide
Meanwhile Spotify’s grand plan to monetize developers via its open source Backstage project / TechCrunch
Everyone is getting in on Spotify’s year-in-review act” / Axios
While Netflix weaves real-life McDonald’s campaign into storyline of Emily in Paris / The Drum
Inside VF Corp's plans for The North Face, Supreme and a circular economy / Glossy

Superficial Interest

The Elfstedentocht. This “eleven city tour,” and is a 120-mile long ice skating race along the river and canal system that connects eleven lowland historic hamlets in Holland / Why Is This Interesting
You can train your brain for success by thinking like an athlete / Quartz
From Celeste Blewitt: Tatler really seems to delve into the ‘cores’ subcultures of late, but it’s always a little bit of fun!’ / ‘Decoding Santacore’ /Tatler
And… “TURN UP…” Trap Christmas is a thing / YouTube

Food / Drink

The hottest food trends from 2022 / Mashed
From Celeste Blewitt: “Great insight into attempting to find alternatives to smoked salmon, always much discussion here in Australia, although as the article suggests,the current alternatives are leaning towards watermelons and carrots. Still, some interesting companies are developing smoked salmon like products. [Faux Lox: A Smoked-Salmon Lover’s Hunt For A More Sustainable Alternative]” / The Guardian
Related: Cities Take on a New Front in the Climate Battle: Meat Eating / Reasons to Be Cheerful
And River Cafe’s Ruthie Rogers on Cooking as an Act of Imagination / Time Sensitive Pod
The Top 5 Inexpensive Restaurants in NYC / NYT
How old is the water we drink? It’s ooooold. / Discover

Mangan-esque