This week: How conversations are more exciting than art right now, capitalist realism content and more! Favor: Is this newsletter going to your Promotions tab in Gmail? Either move one Stupefy email from the Promotions tab to the Primary tab or add mgardner@gethighfield.com to your Google Contacts. And remember to tell your friends to sign up right here. Let's get to it.
Conversations are what’s exciting right now
That's a quote from Dean Kissick's latest column in Spike about a community radio station launched in New York's Chinatown. And I could not agree more. Last month I wrote about Kissick's idea that communication is increasingly being forced underground, with our most honest and most interesting communications happening within group chats and private social media accounts meant only for close friends. These "gated communities" are where the most exciting ideas are being formed now. This month, he's pushed this argument even further: the conversations we have with self-selected groups of new or familiar people are more exciting right now than even art or content itself. His proof of the trend: Montez Press Radio."Last summer, Anna Clark, Stacy Skolnik and Thomas Laprade took over Mathew Gallery’s old space in what’s known as Dimes Square, on the Eastern edge of Chinatown, built a radio station, and hosted a month of non-stop programming..."Most shows are recorded live in the studio, and doors are wide open to the public whenever they’re on air.
Anybody can pitch a show of any kind, so it’s not only inclusive, it’s weird as hell: if you remember to tune in, or turn up in person, you’ll likely hear experimental playwrights, Chinatown activists, queer insurrectionary poets, no wave performance groups, Latino rappers, classical musicians, punk zine publishers, reading clubs, librarians and archivists, indie presses and techno labels, skate critic/art historians, art critics reviewing art reviews, and who knows who else..."And if you forget to tune in, you’ll just have to wait until next time. I have no idea who most of these people with shows are or what they’re going to do. Every day’s a mystery stream, but one that’s thrown together by poets, artists and musicians, not broken corporate algorithms."And really there aren’t so many welcoming, comfortable, weird public spaces where you can go and dissociate from your body for a few hours and have those conversations that continue long into the night."
Billionaire VC Vinod Khosla says we won't be listening to music in a decade. Instead we'll have "custom song equivalents that are automatically designed specifically for each individual, and tailored to their brain, their listening preferences and their particular needs." Cool! (That is sarcasm.) (TechCrunch)
The team at Genius had a feeling that Google was stealing their lyrics for use on Google Search. So they hid apostrophes in their lyrics that spelled out "Red Handed" in Morse Code to prove it. (WSJ)
However, Andrew Nosnitsky claims that Genius stole its lyrics from early-internet favorite OHHLA.com (Original Hip Hop Lyrics Archive) in the first place. (Twitter)
WarnerMedia's streaming service will have a series set in the Dune universe called Dune: The Sisterhood. Produced by Denis Villeneuve, who's directed next year's film reboot of the original sci-fi book. (Variety)
Must-follow Twitter account: If you read the shocking article about the devastation of UMG's master tapes archive in this weekend's NYT Magazine, a new Twitter account called Exctinctophonics is posting a "selection of recordings whose master tapes perished by fire on June 1, 2008." (Twitter)
The week in capitalist realism
Capitalist realism is a concept made famous by the late, great Mark Fisher: he argues that capitalism is such a pervasive atmosphere that it actually colors the production of culture, art and entertainment. Since there's no imaginable alternative, all our cultural products reflect it. This week we saw two disturbing examples of this in action. One went semi-viral on Twitter: a new Netflix show hosted by one of the Stranger Things kids that pranks innocent people searching for work. From AVClub: Prank Encounters pranks "people who think they’re starting the first day of a part-time job. These lucky 'contestants'—already presumably freaked out by the tenuous specter of employment in the modern economy—are then subjected to 'business as usual until their paths collide and these part-time jobs turn into full-time nightmares.'"Also this week came news that Eko, an interactive video studio backed by Walmart, has inked a deal to make choose-your-own-adventure style shows for Refinery29.The first show Eko and Refinery29 are developing together? Money Diaries, Refinery29's series tracking the spending habits of anonymous millennials.
From Variety: "In Refinery29’s interactive adaptation of Money Diaries, users will be able to make spending choices on behalf the characters. 'It’s you, the viewer, having your own ideas about how to manage and spend money,' said Ivy Sheibar, VP of business development at Eko."Interactive storytelling has enormous potential. And this is what we're doing with it first: fantasy spending.
Further reading: — Experts: Spy used AI-generated face to connect with targets
The persona was part of a vast army of phantom profiles lurking on the professional networking site LinkedIn.
This Is Why Uber Drivers Play Such Bad Music
It’s all about embracing the musical safe space — and keeping that rating high
Chinese Parents Want Students To Wear Dystopian Brainwave-Detecting Headbands
An elite primary school in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province is making its students wear brainwave-reading headbands that can supposedly detect their attention levels in the classroom.
30 Years of Dining and "Woo"-ing at L.A.’s Toscana
Gary Newman Shares Personal Stories of Laughter and Tears
Louise Linton, aka Mrs. Steven Mnuchin, Is Sorry
America’s most controversial cabinet wife sounds off on the perils of D.C., her feelings about the Trumps, and her starring role as a sociopathic bisexual serial killer
How Bushwick Bill Became a Rap Pioneer and One of Its Most Conflicted Figures
He wrote frequently about his suicidal impulses and presented his grisliest, pulpiest scenes of violence as an extension of or outlet for the mental anguish he truly faced.
This Picture Featuring 15 Tech Men And 2 Women Looked Doctored. The Women Were Photoshopped In.
“We meant no harm or had any malicious intent in doing this and we are sorry.”