Month: June 2022
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Jason Brassard Spent His Lifetime Collecting the Rarest Video Games. Until the Heist. | Vanity Fair
Jason Brassard Spent His Lifetime Collecting the Rarest Video Games. Until the Heist. The porn trilogy for Nintendos. Atari games from the 1980s. Pristine nostalgia, potentially worth millions, gone in a night. via Vanity Fair: https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2022/06/rare-nintendo-atari-games-stolen On the rainy evening of November 6, a man and a woman arrived in a beat-up car. The man was wearing a…
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The Eliud Kipchoge Ripple Effect: Sub-7 and Sub-8-Hour Triathlons – The New York Times
The Eliud Kipchoge Ripple Effect: Sub-7 and Sub-8-Hour Triathlons Kipchoge’s sub-two-hour marathon in 2019 inspired efforts to reach previously unimaginable times for men and women in the triathlon. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/28/sports/sub-7-and-sub-8-hour-triathlons.html “We want to see what’s an impossible target,” McCormack said.
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The Accidental Media Critics of YouTube – The New York Times
The Accidental Media Critics of YouTube One of the most popular genres of videos online is to comment on other videos online. Are they comedians or media critics? Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/29/magazine/youtube-critics.html Kolodziejzyk and Miller and others like them — YouTubers like Drew Gooden and Danny Gonzalez — don’t just inform you about internet ephemera; they also…
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How China Is Policing the Future – The New York Times
‘An Invisible Cage’: How China Is Policing the Future Vast surveillance data allows the state to target people whose behavior or characteristics are deemed suspicious by an algorithm, even if they’ve done nothing wrong. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/25/technology/china-surveillance-police.html They can warn the police if a victim of a fraud tries to travel to Beijing to petition the…
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Abortion Ruling Poses New Questions About How Far Supreme Court Will Go – The New York Times
Abortion Ruling Poses New Questions About How Far Supreme Court Will Go The decision overruling Roe v. Wade exposed internal divisions among conservative justices about reconsidering other rights. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/25/us/supreme-court-abortion-contraception-same-sex-marriage.html “One of two things must be true,” they wrote. “Either the majority does not really believe in its own reasoning. Or if it does, all…
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What a Disturbing New Film Reveals About Modi’s India | The New Yorker
What a Disturbing New Film Reveals About Modi’s India “The Kashmir Files” depicts the decades-old exodus of Hindus from the Muslim-majority region. For nationalists, it’s perfect propaganda. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/q-and-a/what-a-disturbing-new-film-reveals-about-modis-india “The Kashmir Files” is a soft, emotional film. “A soft, emotional film.” Is that what you said?
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Ukraine War Deaths: A Special Report – The New York Times
Death in Ukraine: A Special Report From battlefields pockmarked by artillery shells to basements and backyards filled with civilian corpses, the war has exacted a staggering toll in lives lost. New York Times reporters who have covered the war present accounts of the many ways that death a Link: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/06/18/world/ukraine-russia-news-deaths
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What Hundreds of Photos of Weapons Reveal About Russia’s Brutal War Strategy – The New York Times
What Hundreds of Photos of Weapons Reveal About Russia’s Brutal War Strategy A New York Times analysis of visual evidence from Ukraine showed widespread use by Russia of cluster weapons banned under certain international treaties. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/06/19/world/europe/ukraine-munitions-war-crimes.html The Times examined more than 1,000 pictures taken by its own photojournalists and wire-service photographers working on the…
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The Shameless Farce of Boris Johnson’s Attempt to Send Refugees to Rwanda | The New Yorker
The Shameless Farce of Boris Johnson’s Attempt to Send Refugees to Rwanda A plane was on the runway when the European Court of Human Rights interceded. Now Britain may leave the court. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-shameless-farce-of-boris-johnsons-attempt-to-send-refugees-to-rwanda The European court ruling prompted a wave of emergency appeals from the other six passengers. At around 10…
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China’s Surveillance State Is Growing. These Documents Reveal How. – The New York Times
Video: China’s Surveillance State Is Growing. These Documents Reveal How. A New York Times analysis of over 100,000 government bidding documents found that China’s ambition to collect digital and biological data from its citizens is more expansive and invasive than previously known. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/asia/100000008314175/china-government-surveillance-data.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage§ion=World%20News A Times investigation analyzing over 100,000 government bidding documents found that…
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The Rise of the Internet’s Creative Middle Class | The New Yorker
The Rise of the Internet’s Creative Middle Class Fourteen years ago, Kevin Kelly famously proposed that an artist could make a living online with a thousand true fans. Has time proved him correct? via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-rise-of-the-internets-creative-middle-class The recent history of the Internet, however, warns that we shouldn’t necessarily expect the endearingly homegrown nature…
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Saudi Arabia Astroturfs the Golf Course | The New Yorker
Saudi Arabia Astroturfs the Golf Course Mohammed bin Salman has bankrolled a new rival to the P.G.A. Tour. What’s behind it? via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/sports/sporting-scene/saudi-arabia-astroturfs-the-golf-course The clubs’ names were created by an advisory group of fourth-grade boys, apparently: Crushers, Fireballs, Hy Flyers, Iron Heads, Punch, Torque, Smash.
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NFT Prices Drop as “Crypto Winter” Descends
NFT Prices Drop as “Crypto Winter” Descends Bloomberg reports that the popular Bored Ape NFTs saw a 25% decrease in average price along with other “blue-chip” tokens. via Hyperallergic: http://hyperallergic.com/740883/nft-prices-drop-as-crypto-winter-descends/ Referring to “expensive digital images of monkeys” as “100% based on greater fool theory,” Gates drove home the point that assets like NFTs are entirely…
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January 6th Hearings: Bill Barr Calls “Bullshit” on Trump’s Election Lies | The New Yorker
Bill Barr Calls “Bullshit” on Trump’s Election Lies On the second day of public hearings on the January 6th attack, the former Attorney General and other members of Trump’s inner circle revealed the extent of their hypocrisy. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-bidens-washington/bill-barr-calls-bullshit-on-trumps-election-lies This made for compelling congressional testimony. I cannot think of any other instance…
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Opinion | Donald Trump, American Monster – The New York Times
Opinion | Donald Trump, American Monster (Published 2022) A man of pure narcissistic psychopathy feels no guilt and has no sense of the damage he does. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/11/opinion/trump-january-6.html The hearing drove home the fact that Trump was deadly serious about overthrowing the government. If his onetime lap dog Mike Pence was strung up on the…
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Saudi Arabia’s LIV Golf Series Upends Genteel World of Golf – The New York Times
‘This Is Uncomfortable’: Saudi Arabia Upends Genteel World of Pro Golf By promising top players multimillion-dollar paydays, the kingdom moved beyond investing in a sport and made a play to control one. Then the PGA Tour struck back. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/09/sports/golf/liv-golf-pga-tour.html “If Saudi Arabia want to use the game of golf as a way for them…
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How Shanghai Residents Endured the COVID Lockdown | The New Yorker
How Shanghai Residents Endured the COVID Lockdown For more than two months, China’s financial hub, which is home to some twenty-five million people, came to a halt. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-shanghai-residents-endured-the-covid-lockdown just to clear the air, a municipal secretary told reporters, “We are not going into lockdown, and it is unnecessary to do a…
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The Surreal Case of a C.I.A. Hacker’s Revenge | The New Yorker
The Surreal Case of a C.I.A. Hacker’s Revenge A hot-headed coder is accused of exposing the agency’s hacking arsenal. Did he betray his country because he was pissed off at his colleagues? via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/06/13/the-surreal-case-of-a-cia-hackers-revenge One of the Nerf gunfighters was Joshua Schulte—his real name. A skinny Texan in his twenties, he had a…
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How the Internet Turned Us Into Content Machines | The New Yorker
How the Internet Turned Us Into Content Machines Two new books examine how social media traps users in a brutal race to the bottom. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/infinite-scroll/how-the-internet-turned-us-into-content-machines The rise of social networks in the twenty-tens made this model only more dominant. Our digital posting became concentrated on a few all-encompassing platforms, which relied…
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Two January 6th Defendants and the Consolidation of Right-Wing Extremism | The New Yorker
Two January 6th Defendants and the Consolidation of Right-Wing Extremism As Congress searches for accountability, Guy Reffitt and Jessica Watkins remain defiant. via The New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/two-january-6th-defendants-and-the-consolidation-of-right-wing-extremism In the seventeen months since the insurrection, Cohen said, a unit of some nine hundred analysts had picked up on a number of disturbing patterns. “Anti-government militia, hard-core…