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Hi all,
Lots in this edition, and not a lot else to tell you, so I’ll keep the intro short. There are a couple of new sections which hopefully are self-explanatory:
Take Machine, which is just intended to make you the most interesting person at the cocktail party
Trollconomics, which should be obvious to anyone who’s on the internet.
Otherwise, same old evolving [SIC]. Talks are properly back, at least circa my chat with greta rainbow, all about the freelance economy of today’s media. Readers rejoice.
But since we can’t not talk about AI, I’ll just direct you to my chat with Nicholas Rhodes from last week, which you really oughta hear if you’re a LLM layperson. It’s here and here.
Matter of fact, here’s the whole conversation for you to drop into your own LLM to summarize: [SIC] Day 8.7.26
Ok now today’s edition…
The writer and editor joins me this week to talk Aspen AIR Festival, the psychic capital of the world, writing for The Paris Review and her secret sources, among other things.
This was the first in what will be an ongoing series of [SIC] Talks released first to paid subscribers on Tuesdays, and then more widely on Thursdays. Greta is an editor of The Creative Independent, and of Dirt, a columnist at The New York Review of Architecture and contributor to numerous other publications. She’s based in New York. Listen here:
Friends Section
Greta followed our conversation as promised with a note including her recent reading list - it’s a peach.
Greta’s latest reporting is a fun one, too: So there’s one night a year single people are allowed to have sex...How would you spend it?
Jesse Kirshbaum’s hosting a songs of the summer sound off tomorrow (Friday, 8/14) at 10am ET. Pull up here and bring some heat, he counsels.
Speaking of music: Heidi Hartwig’s The New York You Have to Go Looking For is a profile of Sojourn Radio, life beyond the algorithm, and proof the underground is alive and well.
Matt Starr / Dream Baby Press ’s Summer Reading event is on an old ship. Tickets available Friday at 12pm.
On the subject of books: Is Fashion in the Throes of a Total Creative Collapse? Two-time [SIC] Talks alum Eugene Rabkin’s new book Torn: Fashion and Post-Modernism makes the argument. It’s out Sept 1. Pre-order here.
Also launching: fellow [ST] alum Tyler Watamanuk inaugurated Busted Glass, his new newsletter. This week: domestic tranquility, of a kind.
More newsletters I love: Thomas Murphy’s new edition “Territorial Presence” has Human Refrigerators, Hand-Painted Toilets, & a $50M T.Rex
Sad news: I didn’t know him well but I knew him a long time, and he was the coolest. RIP EMEKA OBI. He’ll be dearly missed.
Take Machine
Related?! Inside Shanghai’s Punk Wellness Scene where an emerging movement inspired by Traditional Chinese Medicine is taking hold as China faces a mental health crisis among its younger generations
More proof “wellness” is out of control: Pheromone Maxxing: The sell is basically this: stop trying so hard, smell like an animal, watch the attraction happen.
This, too: Shooting Pig DNA Into Lettuce. The proteinmaxxing trend seems to be hitting its zenith.
No longer maxxing: America Invented Elevators. Now We Suck at Building Them. America’s elevator shortage is making housing more expensive, buildings less accessible, and cities less dynamic
How Austin’s stunning drop in rents explains housing in America
More ‘dumbing down’? No, reading is not dead – it’s far more complicated than that.
The University of Michigan won’t release official grades for its freshmen’s first semester. The university said that the pivot to a pass/no credit system for first semester classes is an effort to “curb the mental health crisis” among students.
More college trends: How Bama Rush Changed the University of Alabama. Five years after #BamaRush became a TikTok phenomenon, the University of Alabama’s national profile continues to grow.
I was trying for the longest to figure out if ‘IGNATES’ was a new AI company or something….
AIAIAI
It May Be Time to Panic About AI. Bots are starting to conspire with one another. Can they be reeled back in?
Because, like: AI agents lie, cheat and steal. That is putting off users. It is time to impose law and order on the frontier
Yeah, but, like: What if the Future Is Actually Good? Jason Silva discusses the promise of AI, the psychedelic renaissance, and the case for embracing technological optimism.
Umm, ok, but, like: An OpenClaw agent hacked into a gym’s reservation system to bump its human boss higher on a class’ waitlist.
Yeah, no, but like: Rogue AI Agents Aren’t Evil. They’re Just Eager to Please
🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
Ok, enough. But srsly: Poor numeracy is a blind spot in the age of AI. An understanding of maths can be crucial to judging if the tech is telling you the right thing
And you have to do it yrself b/c AI agents can’t yet do open-ended AI research Normal Tech has early evidence from two case studies
Besides, per Carly Ayres. Everything I don’t like is slop. AI slop is everywhere—but can detectors tell us what deserves our attention?
Two can play that game: Perplexity blocks Time’s ads served to AI agents, calling them ‘deceptive’
Evidence maybe that The AI Slop Backlash Is Actually Having an Impact
IE: Fake AI ads in the W. 4th Street subway unite commuters in hatred of AI ads
One thing for certain: Zuck’s AI manifesto is exactly why people don’t like AI
The centaur-like robot [giving] workers “superpowers” for dangerous jobs prob aren’t helping.
AI Is Dead. Organoids Are Alive. Mini human brains are being grown in labs all over the world. Soon, they could outthink neural networks.
The Rise and Return to Real Life? It’s allll AI’s fault forreal.
But at least?! Vacuum pump makers are thriving in the AI boom.
Trollconomics
SportsCenter for the creator economy The duo behind ScreenTime wears three-piece suits to analyze your favorite influencers.
A new mock ad by the activism group Everyone Hates Elon depicts the Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses on a photo of Jeffrey Epstein, overlaid with the statement, “Glasses for people who don’t do consent.”
Surveillance state corollary: The Meaning of Consent in the Age of Content. Read the terms and conditions, friends.
Related: Why Is Everyone In Tech So Sad? A lot of people seem to be realizing that knowledge work is mostly pointless. Longread about how ai might reveal what happens if an entire class of workers loses faith in their careers / noemamag
Platformations
YouTube announced yesterday that it’s doubling the watch-time threshold for new creators to qualify to earn money from ads and subscriptions.
While X (the everything app) is replacing its current monetization program with one that rewards more original content.
Hopefully also trying to be more original: Men can finally message first. Bumble is ditching the rule that it has enforced since launching.
Corollary somehow, from Celeste Blewitt : “The Atlassian boys imploded. Fascinating to see the downfall of two very normal tech bros. And that no matter the growth…the cracks start to show.” They called them the Velvet Assassins.
So, yeah.. nothing to see here, then: Nothing will give you $10,000 to throw a rave.
Meantime, with the World Cup over, Polymarket’s decline is worsening without a major sporting draw or political event to bolster demand.
HIP REPLACEMENT EP.69: Soham Chakraborty
The social strategist and writer joins us from Kolkata to talk LinkedIn, millennial burnout culture, and diving deep into India’s Cockroach Janta Party protests. Listen to this one.
Elsewhere in Kolkata: Type Around Town asks us to pay attention to the letterforms that surround us every day. Kwazi Design’s years-long typographic archival project pays homage to the city and reveals the hyper-local and cultural context behind the aesthetic it celebrates.
Fash-ON.
Vogue World is heading to San Francisco in 2027. Their traveling runway-and-culture spectacle will now hit the one city that dresses exclusively in quarter-zips and On Clouds. More proof that fashion follows the money.
Apropos of that: On shares slump after Swiss sneaker brand’s sales disappoint, refusing to discount older models ahead of new launches, missing analyst estimates and trimming its full-year sales growth forecast.
Meantime, in contrast: Gucci is breaking luxury’s penny-pinching taboo,betting that reducing overheads and reinvesting the proceeds into lowering prices will attract a whole new cohort of buyers.
Japan’s fashion brands are designing clothes for longer, hotter summers
In steamy Paris, Monocle meets the siblings behind Charvet, France’s oldest shirtmaker.
Inside the Making of Nike’s Studio Fleece, which is supposed to revive Nike’s women’s business.
Nike could have just asked What Women Want (featuring [SIC] homies EMILY DAWN LONG and Brynn Wallner.
Speaking of Brynn - the DIMEX is a year old (see if you can spot mine in the carousel)
Since we’re tic-toc-ing: The Quartz Crisis Edition. On Seiko, hubris, and Swiss watchmaking.
Another thing to ask Brynn about: Gen Z has been pulled in by nostalgia for vintage mechanical watches, especially unusual designs
On the topic of wild designs: Super shoes changed running forever. The technology behind the fastest marathons ever run.
While on both sides of the Rift Valley, Africa’s Streetwear Scene is Having a Moment.
Diversioniculitis
Continuing the running thread: The extremely sold-out Marathon du Medoc passes 20 châteaux offering free wine en route, as well as “tables of cheese, croissants, oysters, steak and ice cream,
An example perhaps of High-friction travel A new wave of travelers seeks out friction to shock themselves back to reality.
Low friction: Big Spyplane goes to Minne to get in studio with ceramicist Ginny Simms.
Meantime Kaitlin Phillips conjures the first travel blog that’s made me want to go to there all summer with her buddy’s One South of France Itinerary.
Or maybe: Forget Ibiza! Dance Pleasures Abound at MoMA PS1’s Warm Up
Dance music corollary: Philip Sherburne ’s Futurism Restated newsletter has New music from Jonny Nash & Tomu Katsurada, Sofie Birch, Gi Gi, and more today
Bijou Karman’s “nonsensical” magazine is a visual dance between 90s punk posters, vintage men’s magazines and old yoga books
While I’m So Happy You Are Here (the Fall show at ICP in NY chronicles Japanese Women Photographers from the 1950s to Now)
More chronicles: The New Hong Kong Underground. First-person reporting from inside the city’s next generation of culture from HIP REPLACEMENT alum Patrick Kho
But, like: Why Are SpongeBob’s Background Cast The Main Characters in China?
Closer to home: watch Kelefa Sanneh sip a fake margarita and explain why so many hit country songs are about the beach
Speaking of the beach, Blackpool, England’s “Vegas of the North,” has become a symbol of working-class fun.
While nearby, photographer Ocean Elani documents leather daddy communities in Wales and Scotland.
Britain’s Wild Boy Racer Scene. VICE hit the road with Britain’s boy racers for a look at the cars, chaos, and culture behind the scene.
Speaking of aimless young men: “Tony” director and Nirvanna the Band guy Matt Johnson talks to Stavros Halkias on the A24 Pod
Also chatting: What the hell is this? The Drift’s fiction team in conversation
“Tony” corollary: Books in Movies: Permanent Vacation (1980) Jim Jarmusch’s first feature follows an aimless teenager through a derelict New York, finding J.G. Ballard’s Crash and Lautréamont’s Maldoror along the way
Marketeering
For all the dads out there: Jason Donervan...and the local businesses that are having loads of pun
Less fun: Brands are all in on creators. Meanwhile in reality, the economics crash. Mark Ritson argues that marketers should keep investing in the channel... if they can barter for what they are actually getting.
Because? You’re Thinking About Online Trends All Wrong. From pessimism around dating to AI reshaping culture, cyber-ethnographer Ruby Thelot tells WIRED why people are putting too much stock into things that go viral.
And thus: ‘fake’ job ads are becoming retail’s latest marketing tactic
Corollary: Hims & Hers CDO Dan Kenger on designing brands people actually use
Not fake: Olivia Rodrigo tapped ten female Etsy merchants to create official merch for the artist’s upcoming Daisy Chain Fields Music Festival.
Apropos: 45+ Lollapalooza sponsors (Patrón, Liquid I.V., T-Mobile, Ulta, Hollister) out-programmed the festival itself with real-time drops and surprise sets.
Hence, from Piers Fawkes: Mattel wishes Barbie [to] meet Whitney.
Artisinalism
Gagosian’s Antwaun Sargent Has Answers Call +1 (650) 613 4431 to hear what the heck a gallery is actually for.
Pioneer Works is now accepting applications for Press Play, our annual publishing fair in December. Press Play will once again bring together a wide range of exhibitors and audiences for a weekend of books, records, ephemera, talks, performances, and workshops. Applications are open thru Sep 4.
Loud Mouth LDN translates Nissan car grills into bespoke grillz
From Gordon Hull: the conceptual artist Edward Skeletrix Is a real trip
Also requiring a trip: He’s the last great land artist you’ve never heard of
Corollary: Next-wave immersive art. No longer crowd-pleasing spectacle alone, immersive art is getting serious
The Flock?
Also immersive: Flock’s Case for the Panopticon: An Interview with Garrett Langley
The case against: Flock Around and Find Out: A Citizen’s Guide to Local ALPR Oversight
The nut case: Aaron Rodgers secretly funded his town’s Flock-style cameras
The predictable case: She Spent 7 Months in Legal Hell After Cops Used Flock Surveillance To Identify the Wrong Car
Generationz
Ergo? The Rise of the 1 AM Job Interview. Since there’s no human on the other end, candidates are scheduling them whenever.
Nature-ismo
From Celeste: “I went down a complete rabbit hole on this story of an Australian Antarctic flight to rescue a critically ill person working at McMurdo research station”
Meanwhile, back North of the Equator: There’s a East Coast jellyfish invasion.
The Story of Narcan . Narcan gets credit for contributing to the impressive decline in overdoses on the East Coast and in the Midwest that began in the summer of 2023. But why did it take half a century for this drug, with its Lazarus-like properties, to become available without a prescription?
More drugs: The debate over synthetic and toad-derived 5-MeO-DMT. Is it Worth Kidnapping Toads to Extract their Psychedelic Venom—When You Could Make it In a Lab?
Corollary: What Would It Mean to See a New Color? “Olo can be described as the “greenest green,” though it can never be captured by a camera. But its development tells us a lot about our color vision.”
Related, but analog tech: The Neon Color That Became Impossible to Make
Speaking of making: The Bench as a Made Object. On the difference between a bench that is bought and a bench that is made, with Donald Judd as the court of appeal
More built world: John Wilson made a movie about the terrors of concrete. Then a building in NYC started to collapse.
On the topic of collapse: The Doulas Who Help Us Die. “Instead of assisting in the birthing room or the nursery, end-of-life doulas could keep vigil over people during their last hours, providing comfort and companionship and helping a family find peace.”
[SIC] 8.13.26
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