Category: Social Theory
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platforms shape desire through the frustration that they deliver
Some typically nuanced and insightful thinking from Rob Horning, on the matter of social media, a topic whose omnipresence this last week has been much easier to bear thanks to not actually being present on any social media, and particularly not That One Site. But Horning’s point is that one need not be on social…
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images which know that they are science fictional / Neom
I would never attempt—nor even wish to attempt—to gainsay Gary Wolfe on the matter of science fiction as it appears in ink on pulp or text on screens; he is a model of critical generosity, and a very nice chap to boot. But there’s an aside in his review of the new Lavie Tidhar that…
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they’ll not know the difference
Work is going slow today, which is to say not really going at all; I had a medical procedure this morning—nothing serious: an elective procedure, shall we say, rather than an emergency—and, while I’m in less discomfort than I expected, I’m still fairly distracted. So I figure it’s as good a time as any to…
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Au ‘voir, Oncle Bruno
Very sad to hear about Bruno Latour’s passing on Sunday—though perhaps not exactly surprised, as I was aware he’d been wrestling with some form of cancer for a while. I’m not a good enough philosopher or theorist to talk eloquently of his position in and influence upon various fields of knowledge, except to note that…
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the creation of a non-discretionary door-tax
A great extended-metaphor explainer for money, from Cory Doctorow, channeling Warren Mosler: … consider this thought experiment devised by economist Warren Mosler, one of the foremost proponents of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT, the theory built upon this understanding of money): Sometimes when Mosler is explaining money to an audience, he’ll hold up a handful of…