As government embraced the internet as a tool for messaging to its citizens it was only a matter of time before it was infected by a particular kind of cultural rot. Governments and politicians, just like brands, hire savvy young professional influencers to run their social media profiles, and with
Recently I went into hospital for a routine endoscopy, allegedly.  I’ve had it done before, so this time I knew what to expect, but the first time was before I’d ever heard of “twilight anaesthesia.” For those who are as unfamiliar with hospital knockout drugs as I was,
One of the biggest problems with trying to build a career in something creative in a capitalist world is that the tools and platforms you need to use to achieve your goals are all adversarial to those goals. When some service or company insists that their success depends on your
As government embraced the internet as a tool for messaging to its citizens it was only a matter of time before it was infected by a particular kind of cultural rot. Governments and politicians, just like brands, hire savvy young professional influencers to run their social media profiles, and with
Last week I saw journalist Matt Taibbi launch himself face-first into the most embarrassingly incorrect and state-sycophantic take I’ve ever seen from him, and it inspired me to pick up a book that had been sitting in a pile next to me for a while now. It was on
One of the biggest problems with trying to build a career in something creative in a capitalist world is that the tools and platforms you need to use to achieve your goals are all adversarial to those goals. When some service or company insists that their success depends on your
It was bound to happen eventually: The Trump administration have painted themselves into a corner, having gotten elected partially on the promise that the government is in possession of the list of elite pedophiles who the conspiracy cookers all believe control the world. Now the cookers kind of want them
Last week I saw journalist Matt Taibbi launch himself face-first into the most embarrassingly incorrect and state-sycophantic take I’ve ever seen from him, and it inspired me to pick up a book that had been sitting in a pile next to me for a while now. It was on
Can we all agree finally that we will never, ever see such a thing as an “Epstein List?”  I phrase it like that because, if it ever did exist, we can say with close to one hundred percent certainty that it has been destroyed. If, the theory goes, that Trump
It was bound to happen eventually: The Trump administration have painted themselves into a corner, having gotten elected partially on the promise that the government is in possession of the list of elite pedophiles who the conspiracy cookers all believe control the world. Now the cookers kind of want them
Gore, gamers, and goons - early internet geek humor from shock sites to Seanbaby
A recurring thought that has occurred to me so many times over the past six months about events happening in the USA is just how incredibly American this fascism is.  And you know it makes perfect sense that these guys aren’t wearing Hugo Boss. Back in February Ronke Babajide
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Can we all agree finally that we will never, ever see such a thing as an “Epstein List?”  I phrase it like that because, if it ever did exist, we can say with close to one hundred percent certainty that it has been destroyed. If, the theory goes, that Trump
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If you’d asked me at two particular phases of my life, and my maturity, what my favorite book was, I would have told you either Life of Pi or American Psycho. You might think that’s a hell of a swing in literary taste, but then again, both books
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Deep in conspiracy culture they have this theory about something they call Project Blue Beam. It was proposed by a Canadian conspiracy theorist named Serge Monast back in the 90s, and the general thrust of it is that the shadowy They who exist as the antagonists of all conspiracy theories
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When Twitter was hijacked by a wealthy ideologue back in 2022 to amplify far-right voices and serve as a recruitment tool for the MAGA movement, the market did what the market tends to do and spat out a dozen alternatives for those who weren’t happy with the situation to
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Part of the genesis of this week’s piece came from getting briefly and unfairly chewed out by a prominent jazz historian, which isn’t something most people can say every day. And while this is probably the most important individual who’s ever had a go at me (Freddie
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The ideological foundations of early cyberspace, from WarGames to Wired
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Google has just released its newest updated cinematic-quality video AI software, and the results are pretty phenomenal. It’s impressive enough to have reignited the cheers of the online dipshit chorus who feel they are finally one step closer to permanently vanquishing human civilization’s greatest enemy: People who create
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My favorite TV show of all time was (and probably still is) The X Files.  Although there is an evil alien race involved and all the protagonists are feds, the primary antagonist—the Big Bad, the villain of villains—is the United States government. It’s a very frightening villain
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Well, Adam Conover just got himself cancelled, which is a shame. For those who don’t know, he’s a former CollegeHumor comedian who built a career off his myth-busting show Adam Ruins Everything. He’s also a prominent union activist, which is not something you typically suspect from a
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As well as general politics and pop culture I like to write about the goings-on of social media, and this week's piece is about Substack Notes. As subscribers to the Ghost version of my newsletter, you might have no idea what I'm talking about. If you&
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Paul Elam and the origins of an internet phenomenon known as the manosphere.
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I stumbled into one of the most deranged and sociopathic conspiracies I’ve ever encountered in all my time writing about oligarchs and I discovered it purely because I’m having some trouble figuring out why I’m supposed to hate Taylor Lorenz.  The blockbuster article everyone was talking about