Internet

What Is Identity in Our Digital Age of ‘The Extreme Self’?

What Is Identity in Our Digital Age of ‘The Extreme Self’?

Do you look “real” in virtual space? Such existential questions are central to ‘The Extreme Self’, which explores identity in our digital world.

The Dramaturgy of the Rise and Fall of the Bon Appétit YouTube Channel

The Dramaturgy of the Rise and Fall of the Bon Appétit YouTube Channel

If food has always been political, as Bon Appétit asserts—so, too, has performance style. It is overdue for food media creators to wake up and smell the coffee.

5 Negative Effects of Fandom Nostalgia and How to Overcome Them

5 Negative Effects of Fandom Nostalgia and How to Overcome Them

Fandom, powered by nostalgia, is gigantic, uncloseted, and unfortunately, argumentative.

‘What a Fantastic Death Abyss’: David Bowie’s ‘Outside’ at 25

‘What a Fantastic Death Abyss’: David Bowie’s ‘Outside’ at 25

David Bowie’s Outside signaled the end of him as a slick pop star and his reintroduction as a ragged-edged arty agitator.

Democratizing Our Data: A Manifesto (excerpt)

Democratizing Our Data: A Manifesto (excerpt)

Just as big tech leads world in data for profit, the US government can produce data for the public good, sans the bureaucracy. This excerpt of Julia Lane's Democratizing Our Data: A Manifesto will whet your appetite for disruptive change in data management, which is critical for democracy's survival.

UbuWeb’s Kenneth Goldsmith Writes the Book on Internet Archiving

UbuWeb’s Kenneth Goldsmith Writes the Book on Internet Archiving

Kenneth Goldsmith's Duchamp Is My Lawyer, a tale of the creation and upkeep of the anti-internet internet, UbuWeb, is highly engaging and avoids the risk of ploughing down theoretical wormholes of limited interest.

Coronavirus and the Culture Wars

Coronavirus and the Culture Wars

Infodemics, conspiracies, culture wars – the fault lines beneath the Fractured States of America tremble in this time of Coronavirus global pandemic.

Life Isn’t Binary and Neither Is the Coronavirus Pandemic

Life Isn’t Binary and Neither Is the Coronavirus Pandemic

Non-binary thinking offers new routes for adapting to life with COVID-19.

Isolation Odyssey: Behind the Scenes with a Lockdown Orchestra

Isolation Odyssey: Behind the Scenes with a Lockdown Orchestra

Scattered throughout the world, members of Opera North's orchestra share how they are enduring the loss of live performance and companionship during the COVID-19 lockdown. They also share a mood-lifting, online isolation performance of a work that everyone knows but not always for the same reasons.

‘Memento’ Is the Movie of the Attention Economy

‘Memento’ Is the Movie of the Attention Economy

We are afraid of time, and so like Leonard in Memento, we kill it, compulsively and indiscriminately.

Be Kind. Please Rewind: An Ode to the VCR

Be Kind. Please Rewind: An Ode to the VCR

Like Netflix, the VCR diluted and transformed the film itself.

‘Uncanny Valley’: When the Confidence Boys Took Over Everything

‘Uncanny Valley’: When the Confidence Boys Took Over Everything

Anna Wiener's Silicon Valley memoir, Uncanny Valley, reveals a piratical industry choking on its own hubris and blind to the cost of its destruction.