Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
Disney‘s latest princess movie sounds worryingly tone deaf, provoking accusations of racism long before it’s due to go into production. Following this backlash on Twitter, the film’s screenwriter claims the movie has been misrepresent by the media.According to The Hollywood Reporter, The Princess of North Sudan is a “unique princess tale inspired by the true account…
Comedian Patton Oswalt mistakenly thought it would “be fun” to go toe-to-toe with journalist Charles Johnson today over the latter’s offer of $400 to anyone who could discover “the name and race of the conductor” of the Amtrak train that derailed yesterday. Someone tried to warn Oswalt that engaging with Johnson is never “fun,” but…
Newt Gingrich has been many things in his life. House speaker. Presidential candidate. Moon-colonizing advocate. And he’ll soon add Mashable tech blogger to his resume. It started in 2013. Gingrich queried his followers about self-driving cars for one of his “Newt University” workshops. Have you read or seen anything interesting on driverless cars? Tweet it to…
TL;DR: We are unhappy with harassing behavior on reddit; we have survey data that show our users are, too. So we’ve improved our practices to better curb harassment of individuals on reddit. Running a community-based site is complicated; running a site with 9,000 active communities in a changing world is even more complicated. For the…
Blockbuster games rarely feature women as protagonists, and those that do often feature hyper-sexualized characters like Lara Croft. It’s a sad truth of the video game industry: games that cost tens of millions of dollars court the 18-25 year old male demographic. But the situation is thankfully getting better, and this year’s “Assassin’s Creed” embodies that…
Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) in “Avengers: Age of Ultron” (Marvel/Walt Disney Studios) This post discusses the plot of “Avengers: Age of Ultron.” Joss Whedon, the auteur who rose from indie television sensation “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” to stewardship of some of the most important movies in Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, has seemed…
Thirty-nine minutes into his southbound ride from Wilmington, Delaware, to Washington, D.C., Joseph H. Boardman, president and CEO of Amtrak, begins to cry. We’re in the dining car of a train called the Silver Star, surrounded by people eating hamburgers. The Silver Star runs from New York City to Miami in 31 hours, or five…
START “MORE ON” SINGLE STORY BOX v. 2 END “MORE ON” SINGLE STORY BOX v. 2 Here’s a loaded question: Is casual sex immoral?From Hester Prynne to Hobby Lobby, from our dorm-mates to our politicians, it’s an issue that’s sparked more than its fair share of fiery public debate (after all, we Americans are a…
Former U.S. secretary of state and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton is apparently encouraging even more women to run for office. You’ve been warned. (Mike Blake/Reuters) Women: They ask a lot of questions, they don’t listen to financial arguments and thanks to Hillary Rodham Clinton, legislatures around the country are probably going to be seeing a…
Luc Besson started dabbling in sci-fi once again with last year’s Lucy, but his next film will really be his big return to the genre. Besson announced on Twitter this morning that he’s started work on an adaptation of Valerian, a French comic series that’s supposed to be a mixture of space opera, adventure, and time…