Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
Getty Images. Photo by Drew Angerer In early 2019 the L train in New York City will shut down for 15 months to repair damage caused during Hurricane Sandy. Leading up to the closure, VICE will be providing relevant updates and proposals, as well as profiles of community members and businesses along the affected route…
Imagine a group of people who believe that manatees are destroying civilization. Even though there is abundant evidence showing that humans endanger manatees and not vice versa, this hypothetical group continues to insist that manatees are a menace. Imagine further that reporters are assigned to cover this group. But instead of including facts about manatees…
Over the weekend, a game developer in Boston named Brianna Wu fled her home after an online stalker vowed to rape and kill her. She isn’t the first woman who’s been forced into hiding by aggrieved video game fans associated with Gamergate, the self-styled reform movement that’s become difficult to ignore over the past several…
Can Twitter be saved? I’m not talking about last week’s social media stock price plunge. It’s the ritualization of Gamergate-style uproar and dishonest brigading that has me disillusioned with the platform. I know soul-searching about Twitter is a bit of a journalistic trope at this point, since we all seem to be simultaneously enraptured with…
Since announcing her new job with The New York Times, a widespread campaign of harassment has targeted Verge reporter Sarah Jeong for a number of tweets she wrote years ago. Many of those now reacting to these tweets have intentionally taken them out of context, and she has since received an unrelenting stream of abuse…
Photo: AP Yesterday, the New York Times announced that it had hired Sarah Jeong, who is by all accounts an extremely talented tech reporter, as a new member of its editorial board. Today, Jim Hoft, once accurately called the “dumbest man on the internet” by Media Matters, published a collection of Jeong’s tweets which he…
It’s harder and harder to have an honest debate on the internet. Social-media platforms like Twitter, Reddit, and Facebook Groups are rife with trolls; forums are plagued by archaic layouts and spambots. Teenagers who are looking to talk about big issues face additional frustrations, like the fact that most adults on these platforms don’t take…
Photo: Spencer Platt (Getty) This past spring, Michael Ferro resigned as chairman of publicly traded media-looting hell-company Tronc, Inc., just ahead of the publication of sexual harassment allegations against him. As a parting gift, Tronc paid him $15 million, voluntarily bundling up the total value of a three-year consulting contract into one lump payment expensed…
When a top executive from frugal newspaper giant Tronc was asked Tuesday about the specific strategy behind draconian cuts to the New York Daily News on Monday, he didn’t have an answer. On Monday, the company slashed 50 percent of the editorial staff at one of New York’s two remaining iconic tabloids, including dozens of…
Illustration: Jim Cooke (GMG) A year ago today, my brilliant predecessor, Dodai Stewart, announced our little blog’s existence with a rhetorical question that also served as a philosophical one: “What the Hell Is Splinter?” The question could just as easily have been: How (and why) the hell do you start a new website in 2017?…