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🔒 How Geeks Ate the World: Something Old, Something New, Something Rotten, & Something Awful

Gore, gamers, and goons - early internet geek humor from shock sites to Seanbaby

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A Very American Fascism

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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Nobody Cares About Truth, Only the Better Story

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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Captive Gods: How Tech Companies Are Turning AI Into a Dangerous Cult

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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Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Bluesky?

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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Contra Gioia: Political Neutrality in New Media is a Dangerous Illusion

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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🔒 How Geeks Ate the World: The Californian Ideology

The ideological foundations of early cyberspace, from WarGames to Wired

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AI Probably Won't Kill Hollywood

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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Conspiracy Culture Catches the Car

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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Is It Ever OK to Mock People's Appearance? (Even If They're Bad?)

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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Relax, You'll Never Make a Living on Substack

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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🔒 How Geeks Ate the World: Backward Male

Paul Elam and the origins of an internet phenomenon known as the manosphere.