Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
We’re in an era of the cult of the entrepreneur. We analyze the Tory Burches and Evan Spiegels of the world looking for a magic formula or set of personality traits that lead to success. Entrepreneurship is on the rise, and more students coming out of business schools are choosing startup life over Wall Street….
Photo Credit Eleanor Taylor The National Park Service has a cautious, sensible policy that allows parks to ban the sale of plastic water bottles. Those that do so are required to provide easily accessible filling stations at which visitors can replenish their own containers — or fill reusable bottles sold at park concessions — with…
Schema.org microdata HYPE-1277 There’s this video that went viral earlier this year. On Berlin’s Alexanderplatz, a vending machine is selling plain white T-shirts for €2 each. Customers approach in ones and twos, insert coins, pick a size. Then, before the shirt comes out, a photo appears—a black-and-white image of rows of sewing machines. “Meet Manisha,”…
There’s something so wonderfully easy about reading this column in a physical newspaper. You turned the page, and here it is, with few annoyances or distractions, in an ultra-high-definition typeface which was custom-designed with pleasurable reading in mind. Or – wait – are you reading this on a phone? Did you follow a link from…
by Frederic Filloux News sites use trackers more indiscriminately than ever. A random sample of twenty digital properties yields stunning results. Last week, we looked at how long web sites take to load, today, we see how messy their user data collection is. When landing on Politico’s home page, your browser loads about 100 pieces…
Spotify quietly changed the tone of its green last month and it drove people insane, wondering if they were imagining it or if something was wrong with their phones. The company’s lead designer, Tobias van Schneider, wrote in his personal email newsletter today what happened when the company changed the color and how it didn’t realize…
Tommy Craggs, the executive editor of Gawker Media, and Max Read, the editor-in-chief of Gawker.com, are resigning from the company. In letters sent today, Craggs and Read informed staff members that the managing partnership’s vote to remove a controversial post about the CFO of Condé Nast—a unprecedented act endorsed by zero editorial employees—represented an indefensible…
On a visit to Greece, we talk to a guy who found an ingenious place to hoard his cash, a government-protected milk peddler, and a would-be olive oil tycoon. Music: Jahzzar’s “Fireworks” and Bad Bad Hat’s “Fight Song.” Find us:Twitter/ Facebook/ Spotify/ Tumblr. Episode 639: Where To Hide €50,000, And Other Stories From Greece :…
Our union drive has expressed at every stage of the process that one of our core goals is to protect the editorial independence of Gawker Media sites from the influence of business-side concerns. Today’s unprecedented breach of the firewall, in which business executives deleted an editorial post over the objections of the entire executive editorial…
Meet the Timmy brothers. They wear beanies in the summer, and they have created something important, unique and special. They have created…water. “You talk about wetness, or moistness,” they say, eyes squinty with gravitas. “Mark Twain.” “Hand-crafted.” “Straight razor.” Squint. Hand gesture! A two-beat pause, to let it sink in. In some cases, more squinting….