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Results for tag: media

The Medium Really Is the Message.

Hungry. That was the word that hooked me. That’s how my brain felt to me, too. Hungry. Needy. Itchy. Once it wanted information. But then it was distraction. And then, with social media, validation. A drumbeat of: You exist. You are seen.

This really hit home: Ezra Klein, echoing Marshall McLuhan, on how the medium does shape us, not just the message.

Linked on the 11th of August, 2022 Details

The new pornographers.

A long read, but worth it, on how technology reviews have pretty much turned into design fetishism rather than proper evaluation of functionality. It's true that bad reviews have become exceedingly rare.

This report argues that consumer technology reviewers have failed their basic nominal purpose of critiquing tools. Instead, inspired by values introduced by Apple in the late 1990s, the tech review industry prioritizes aesthetic lust as the primary critical factor for evaluating objects. The reification of these values in their scoring system is transmitted to consumers and manufacturers alike. Like other prurient things, the objects designed within this paradigm are optimized not for usefulness but for photogenic and telegenic properties, a framework that finds its fullest realization in YouTube reviews and unboxing videos.
Linked on the 16th of February, 2022 Details

Appholes and Contracts.

Fantastic article by Craig Mod on the implicit contracts we enter into when giving our attention to digital media. He refers to this as a lack of edges which is the best description I've seen of the issue to date. Read it.

Linked on the 14th of October, 2019 Details

Nearly every media story concerning the current heatwave and climate breakdown is illustrated by photos of people playing in fountains or on beaches like it's some kind of fun holiday. Pictures of dead crops, forest fires or old people suffering would be closer to reality and might help give a few more readers a nice big kick in the ass about our future. It's irresponsible.

Noted on the 25th of July, 2019 Details

No, Asparagus Won’t Give You Cancer

Mainstream media continues down the clickbait-laden path of laziness.
Linked on the 9th of February, 2018 Details

JG Ballard’s daughter on her father’s prescience

Reality is now a kind of huge advertising campaign, selling television’s image of what life is about.

Published on the 20th of November, 2016 Read full post