[SIC] Weekly 221: The Bright Lights Tonight

Volume 5, Number 13

Nov 24, 2022

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Hi all (and happy Thanksgiving, for those in the US).

Another short intro, owing to requisite family time. Hope you’re getting some in, too.

Title this week comes from Richard & Linda Thompson’s “I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight,” which my Discover Weekly served up on Monday; it was new to me. What a jam.

Also served up: contributions from my stalwarts Iolanda and Celeste, plus a first time contribution via LinkedIn from Ben , which I appreciate. At the risk of going down the “things I’m thankful for” route, I really do value all the ideas that readers and friends send along for consideration, so if you have anything that [SIC] readers might find useful, please send it along. Likewise catcalls, critiques and requests.

Last thing before I dive into the vegetarian stuffing: a special shout out to [SIC] homie Lee Baler for his LinkedIn post about the Army major who helped stop the Colorado Springs shooting. The post has got levels to it, and you should read it.

And then the links, after that.

Ben

Detail from wallpaper by the late Lance de Los Reyes at the Wythe Hotel in Brooklyn

======[SIC] Weekly 221: The Bright Lights Tonight======

Zeitgest / Gestalt

The East Village Is Getting Its First New Rock Club in Decades, courtesy of [SIC] homie and Breakfast Club regular Nick Bodor / Curbed
Also new: TikTok is inventing a new language / NYT
In the court of Mar-a-Lago, ‘King’ Trump still reigns supreme. How friends, frenemies and superfans at the private club drive the former president / FT
Related: Donald Trump is allowed to tweet again—so what’s he waiting for? / Quartz
How to make sense of any mess is a book, but the author has also made the entire text available for free online / How to Make Sense of Any Mess
Also messy: Belgium’s incinerators cannot keep up with the amount of illegal cocaine being seized, officials say / The Times UK
Corollary: activists are installing Narcan vending machines in cities, universities, and other places around the US / WSJ
Elsewhere in activism: Respecting Pronouns Is Now Part of Emily Post's 100-Year-Old Etiquette Handbook/ Teen Vogue
No more very allows you to combine the over-used "very" with a simple adjective and get a more concise adjective. Do it / No More Very

World Order

From Celeste Blewitt: “Great piece, the crypto status car is also tumbling given the latest developments of FTX and bitcoin. Cult status no longer.” [The Great G-Wagen Sell-Off] / NYMag
On the other hand, emerging markets ride out the financial squeeze. Developing economies have fared rather well considering the strength of the dollar/ FT
Budweiser says it will give unconsumed Qatar beer to the World Cup winner / MarketWatch
Speaking of World Cup winners … Dubai is benefitting from Qatar’s World Cup Shortcomings / Front Office Sports
And … losers? “What the Hell Are We All Doing Here?”: Media Confronts Moral Dilemmas and Coverage Quirks at Qatar World Cup / Vanity Fair
Also losing: Dimming the Sun to Cool the Planet Is a Desperate Idea, Yet We’re Inching Toward It / The New Yorker
So Why aren't more brands speaking out on social issues? “Only 18% of brands are very likely to speak out on any social issues,” according to a new study... and more than half (55%) were unlikely to disseminate a point of view on social topics. At the same time, “two-thirds of comms executives feel it is important to their employees that the CEO communicates a position on such issues.” / Institute for PR
In contrast: PETA launches $1 million design competition to create vegan wool / Dezeen
While Futurevvorld sat down with Luke Haverhals, CEO and Founder of Natural Fiber Welding (NFW), known for plant-based materials MIRUM® and CLARUS®, and used by the likes of Ralph Lauren, Allbirds, Camper and PANGAIA to talk efficiencies of engineered materials, to the hard economic truths of next-gen material production, and how to be “compatible with the Earth.” / Futurevvorld
Corollary: The road to low-carbon concrete / Ars Technica
And every large parking lot in France will soon be covered with solar panels / Electrek

The Speculative Future

The incredible shrinking future of college. The population of college-age Americans is about to crash. It will change higher education forever /Vox
From Iolanda Carvalho: "Here’s [the] annual Activate Tech & Media Outlook which forecasts the key trends and presents the most important insights in the technology and media industries in the year ahead." / Activate
Apropos: Where do culture and Web3 meet? / Rolling Stone
Related: Fortnite, Minecraft and Meta Too: is the future of touring virtual? / Music X
Speaking of touring: hotel chains such as Marriott International and startups such as Black Platinum Gold have been experimenting with ways to infuse NFTs into the travel sector / EuroNews

Pop Cultures

From Ben Whitla: “Just gonna leave this here” [Riding the Subway With Anna Delvey] NYMag
Also a grift? Variety believes Avatar 2 will have to “become the fourth or fifth highest-grossing film in history just to break even.” / Variety
Memo: Disney and that one Atlanta episode / 2PM
On the subject of departures: Why Alessandro Michele Is Exiting Gucci / BoF
While Raf Simons to close namesake label after nearly 3 decades / Retail Dive
Because? From ‘Celeste Blewitt: “Forget Mad Men, Our Style Inspiration Comes Straight From Yellowstone” / GQ
Corollary: Are the Men of The White Lotus Okay? / Vanity Fair
And BTW when did TV series get so complicated? / FT
Luxury Gets More Unaffordable As Prices Hike During Crisis, Inflation, And Looming Recession / Jing Daily
And yet… When did customers of luxury brands get so young? /Quartz
Related: Traversing Chengdu, China’s New Luxury Capital / Jing Daily
While elsewhere, Young Spyplane visits a newly reopened Tokyo / Blackbird Spyplane
Vacation’s Palm Report GIFs archive isn’t all gifs, but it has all the holiday design vibes you need for the group chat / Are.na
Fave artist Cyprien Gaillard’s Portrait of a Lost Paris / Frieze
Related: an interview with Cyprien Gaillard. How the artist connects the ruins of Modernist urbanism with the monuments of ancient civilisations / Frieze
Elsewhere: talking Sex Work With Pussy Riot's Nadya Tolokonnikova. A conversation about art, activism, and how they converge in her OnlyFans sex work / Hyperallergic
Corollary: Leftovers, the Unsung Food Porn of Art History. From Dutch vanitas paintings to Laura Letinsky's contemporary photographs, artists have long paid homage to the crumby aftermath of big meals /Hyperallergic
Texas Techno: What’s fueling this hot moment for Texas’ rave explosion? / Rave New World
Also Tejas: The Largely Unknown Story of Women, Abstract Expressionism, and Texas / Hyperallergic
Willow Resurrected: The Hard-Fought Story of an Epic Comeback. How one screenwriter’s determination and lifelong fandom brought the ’80s fantasy favorite back to life / Vanity Fair
Elsewhere in reincarnation: Owen Wilson Is channeling Bob Ross in New PAINT film / Hyperallergic

Media Happenings

From Iolanda Carvalho: “The social media universe - today, of course, tomorrow probably not the same 🙂 Visualizing the World's Top Social Media and Messaging Apps” / Visual Capitalist
Meta’s advertising business is still reeling from Apple operating system updates rolled out last year that enable users to opt-out of cross-app tracking / The Drum
Hence: We can’t depend on platforms anymore “Please, for the love of everything, do not get me started on Mastodon. This is not going to become a new source of traffic for anyone.” / A Media Operator
Twitter alternative: how Mastodon is designed to be “antiviral” - A solid overview of what makes Mastodon different from Twitter / UX Collective
What Fleeing Twitter Users Will—and Won’t—Find on Mastodon / The New Yorker
While Twitter alternative Hive hits 1 million users after surge of sign-ups / TechCrunch
How social media managers are coping with the Twitter debacle. Once a trusty workhorse, it’s now the most wildly unpredictable social platform in the marketing arsenal/ Digiday
Also, why journalists are so desperate to find a Twitter alternative / Simon Owens
From Celeste Blewitt: “Where to next for platforms, celebrity and influence” [Can Twitter Hold On To Its Celebrities?] / WSJ
Corollary: Some of Bullish Studio’s favorite FinTwit accounts / Trade Secrets
Elsewhere: the threat of a long-tail cull looms for the music world/ Music Industry Blog
And yet … 10 years ago, Warner Music’s Top 5 superstars generated 15% of its revenue. Today, that number is down to just 5%.. Year-on-year, this phenomenon is dramatically diluting the concentration of total music listening claimed by a handful of the world’s biggest megastars / Music Business Worldwide
While Warner Music Group generated $92m from ’emerging platforms’ in calendar Q3 / Music Business Worldwide
Related: Universal just launched its own streaming service for classical music/ Music Business Worldwide
Also building: The Athletic will double its women’s sports coverage / Axios
While conversely [SIC] homies The Drunken Canal is ending its run in December / Semafor
How the Harvard Business Review, at 100, turned its own business into a case study / AdWeek

Market-ations

How retailers are reshaping the advertising industry. They’re barely noticeable, but promoted items on digital sales platforms are at the vanguard of an industry worth tens of billions of dollars / FT
For shopping, phones are common and influencers have become a factor - especially for young adults / Pew Research
Hence: Shopify is testing a new universal search feature. Google may have a new shopping competitor on its hands / Searchengineland
While Pinduoduo's sister shopping app Temu tops US App Store. Temu, a shopping app operated by the parent firm of China's e-commerce giant Pinduoduo, has risen from obscurity in the last few months / TechCrunch
A decent write up using Drake to illustrate the fundamentals of Why Brands Grow / Snobhop
Corollary: how a Minecraft influencer is bringing advertisers to the platform / Digiday
While rapper Lil Durk got caught selling NFTs on Grand Theft Auto Online / DX
And Ludacris made a Fresh Track for Google's Black-Owned Friday —the initiative from Google and the U.S. Black Chambers / Muse By Clio
Across the pond, KFC opened their first-ever pub called The Colonel's Arms in London / Hypebeast
While Clouds gather for Ticketmaster despite apology to Taylor Swift fans / Music Ally

Superficial Interest

Explore and learn about every single tree on the street in NYC. I discovered the tree in front of our place is a Sweetgum / Tree Map
Meanwhile, a man caught a 67-pound goldfish in a French lake / The Guardian
And in New England, The Return of the Wild Turkey. Once hunted nearly to extinction; now they’re swarming the streets like they own the place / The New Yorker

Food / Drink

Domino’s is going electric. adding 800 Chevrolet Bolts to its pizza-delivering fleet / WSJ
At This Grocery Store, Shoppers Pay What They Wish. In St. Louis, a pay-what-you-can grocery store stays in business thanks to some customers voluntarily paying more than the sticker prices / Reasons to Be Cheerful
Death of the dragon: A new research paper suggests that Bruce Lee's sudden death in 1973 was due to his drinking too much water / Variety

Friends Section

[SIC] homie and podcaster Syd Allen Ash’s film for On Running is really good/ IG
While [SIC] homie Jesse Pearson continues his great podcast streak with author David Means on The Apology Podcast / Spotify

Useful Diversions

Read:
Laura Reilly from Magasin google sheets-ified her Black Friday shopping directory / Google Sheets
Your Guide to Gifting NFTs This Holiday Season Gifting an NFT isn’t quite as simple as buying an object, wrapping it, and setting it under the tree, but it can still be done in three simple steps / NFT Now [Disclosure: I am an advisor to NFT Now]
Listen:
Eric Idle On with Kara Swisher / Spotify
Do:
Meet me at Vacation’s extremely Corporate Miami Basel party / Vacation

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