internet explorers club | interesting reference questions
All right. This is the new year! I love this advice that Martha Graham gave to Agatha de Mille:
In terms of praising ourselves, Vulture wrote a piece on whether or not retweeting praise for ourselves makes us monsters. The article is quite a bit more nuanced than just the title, so do give it a go. It did give me a complex, briefly, because I have absolutely done that.
The New York Public Library found a box called "Interesting Reference Questions" and they began to post them online. Some of them are top-notch.
In terms of worst-reads of 2014 (I'm still recovering) may I present this New Yorker piece on self-proclaimed "virologist" Emerson Spartz, who basically just creates websites of clickbait. Let me be clear, though: you must hate-read this. It is compelling and horrifying, all in one.
I had met Spartz a few weeks earlier, at a dinner during a tech-industry conference in Manhattan. When I asked him what he did for a living, he replied, “I’m passionate about virality.” I must have looked confused, because he said, “Let me bring that down from the thirty-thousand-foot level.” The appetizer course had not yet arrived.
This article about the creation (and demise) of The Racket, makes me so sad that some things never came to be:
Another good read is Adam Rogers's What 800 Nerds on a Cruise Ship Taught Me About Life, the Universe, and Snorkeling. It deals with what it means to be a nerd in this day and age (where nerd is not so much a separate identity as it is normalized), and having "nerd cred" but still not feeling included. Fascinating.
Etcetera: How we refer to our bros (or is it dudes?). The discussion around updog has been great, but this is my favorite iteration. Draw with emojis.
--Emily
p.s. Guess who forgot links in last week's newsletter? Here is Round 2 of the Jay interview, as well as Round 3. If you want to read what the prosecutor for the case said, go here, but it will make you angry. Also here's the lovely piece on Makers by Deb Chachra.
