Vacation is nice, but tabs never rest, so I'm afraid we have a few stupid things to catch up on.
Like for example Paul Graham, Silicon Valley's oracle of ignorant privilege, who told The Information: "God knows what you would do to get 13 year old girls interested in computers." God knows, right?! Girls! We don't even understand their alien biology, let alone their unfathomable motives. How can they even operate a computer, without possessing a penis? Remind me never to borrow Paul Graham's laptop, if that's how he thinks you have to use it.
Also Today in Privilege: Ani DiFranco was planning a songwriting retreat at a restored slavery-apologist plantation that she described as a "captivating setting." She canceled the event by whining about how it sucks that she can't do whatever she wants because the rest of you are being so divisive.
Shani O. Hilton had a great bit on NPR talking about how 2013 was not the year of "the black film." BI's Josh Barro got some very interesting questions on Facebook and answered them lucidly, finishing with what might be 2013's best kicker. Benjamin Bratton: "I Think TED actually stands for: middlebrow megachurch infotainment." The Best of Richard Dawkins 2013.
Doge may be dead but Dogecoin is valuable enough to steal. Cryptocurrency thefts make me happy, because they demonstrate forcefully the politics encoded in decentralized cryptocurrencies. If you repudiate the rule of law and the infrastructure of social agreement, you have no security except what you personally can provide. Coins that are easy to use and spend will always be easy to steal. Meanwhile the Dogecoin community is raising money to give to the victims of the heist or whoever wants to steal the donations or whatever.
Gawker's year in hacks. 2013's most important tweet. Isaac Asimov offers a look at what the year ahead holds for us. And Stefan Becket helpfully provides a year-end wrapup of my twitter feed, in NYMag.
Camden, NJ and Flint, MI vie for America's most apocalyptic city. Time, Inc. is unrivaled for America's most apocalyptic media company.
Nerds: Ban Moms on Twitter. In hindsight, making computers that work like brains is going to seem like a really bad idea. NSA good at spying. The best science jokes. The bogobogosort is the best worst algorithm.
Misc (Good): The poem considered as an object. Why Candy Crush is more interesting than most games. Things Hunter Schwartz overheard at the Britney Spears concert.
Today's Game: is afoot!
Today's Song: Psybrid Theory (see also Tumblr and Gawker)
~tabsbs~
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