Hussain

If you didn't catch the names in PTA's speech, the 1975 Best Picture nominees are Barry Lyndon, Dog Day Afternoon, Jaws, Nashville, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. There are no skips; there is no wrong place to start. They will make you love American movies anew, and demand the best from them.

I wrote about the likely unfixable harms of the Trump administration’s war on vaccination. www.slowboring.com/p/the-shocki...

With the news that the State Department is going back to Times New Roman, calling the move to Calibri a "wasteful diversity move", reupping this. With an administration this bad it's important to highlight the few good things they do. standard-out.com/2023/01/18/s...

One like = one book recommendation (will likely be nonfiction, often niche)

This is an obsession of mine - a huge pathology of the press is coverage suggesting that politicians who are less skilled performers are somehow less "authentic" Me on Romney coverage in CJR: www.cjr.org/united_state... Me on Hillary Clinton coverage in The Upshot: www.nytimes.com/2015/10/02/u...

I always forget to post Gift Links! Thanks, Hussain.

Here it is: the 10 best TV shows I watched this year.

It’s pretty clear that we’re past the tipping point. Network effects are powerful. Threads misread the market. People didn’t want Insta w/ Words. They wanted a Twitter replacement.

Swing voters/independents on average are LESS informed and follow things less closely. Many don't even know who Liz Cheney is. The idea that it mattered one way or the other to them -as opposed to a small number of agitated extremely online types - is implausible.

Starter packs are genius, but I was surprised there wasn't a list of them for people to find. So I built it: blueskydirectory.com/starter-pack... The website monitors the packs being shared and adds the ones it finds to the database. Missed your stater pack? Message me and I'll get it added.

The best(s) of the year! www.nytimes.com/2023/12/01/m...

A Murdered Israeli Filmmaker’s Prophetic Warning, in “The Boy” www.newyorker.com/culture/scre...

Chandler Bing was my favorite. Matthew Perry was a genius at knowing exactly how to deliver a line to generate the most possible laughs. I hate that he's gone, and tried to capture what made him great:

This week is like Christmas for great Taylor writing

Reminder that if you see disturbing or traumatic images, playing Tetris as soon as possible afterwards can help the brain cleanse itself, and lessen the impacts of it longer term. No, I'm not kidding. And no one knows how or why it works. But it DOES work, and I encourage you to remember it.

I wrote about Taylor Swift, Stop Making Sense, and the future of movies.

Swung into the podcast studio today to guest-host an episode of Vox’s The Gray Area, starring the brilliant Walt Hickey, about his next book and everything we get wrong about Hollywood and why humans are amazing. I love this book. Pod coming soon. www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/walte...

It was a real thrill to talk to Michael Phillips about Opposable Thumbs in the Chicago Tribune. I gotta get a print copy.

This is not exactly that, since I think it's only for the last 24 hours, but the "Best of Follows" feed will give you the most liked/reposted recent content from the people you follow, which is great if you're not always on here to see it all.