A number of those surveyed raised concerns regarding the complete avoidance of the word “suicide.” One participant said it was “dangerous” and “isolating” to avoid the word, while another said, “My brother committed suicide and my sister attempted suicide. I don’t think [...]
Tag: Culture / Digital Culture
The Breaking Point Is Here—Again
What I want to pinpoint is a sensation—physical, cognitive, temporal—that is occurring at this fixed point in time, especially this past week, in the days following the twin tragedies in Buffalo, where 10 Black people were fatally gunned down in a supermarket, [...]
What’s the Deal With Synesthesia TikTok?
So what’s the deal with synesthesia on TikTok? Harrison says when he first met synesthetes four decades ago, they were reluctant to talk about their condition because they feared ridicule. “That seems to have changed,” he says. “Now it’s a very sexy thing to be a synesthete.”
Of [...]
The Infinite Deaths of Social Media
Meet the People Illustrating the Brutality of War in Ukraine
Paper Planes launched just days after Russia invaded Ukraine. An effort by filmmakers Alex Topaller and Dan Shapiro, it started as an attempt to connect artists displaced by the war with colleagues in the design, VFX, and production fields in Eastern Europe. [...]
What Is the Metaverse, Exactly?
The flashiness of VR and AR also obscure the more mundane ways that our existing, interconnected digital world could be improved right now. It would be trivial for tech companies to invent, say, an open digital avatar standard, a type of file that includes characteristics you might [...]
Of Course We’re Living in a Simulation
In 1999, a trio of cinematic mindfucks—The Thirteenth Floor, eXistenZ, and, of course, The Matrix—came out, all illustrating the possibility of unreal realities and thus fulfilling condition (1). Four years later, in 2003, (2) was satisfied when the Oxford [...]
Volodymyr Zelensky Is Not a Meme
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s family photo keeps appearing in my social media feeds. Perhaps you’ve seen it, too. The picture shows the politician alongside his wife and daughter, holding his son in his lap. Father and son grin, wearing superhero [...]
The Age of Everything Culture Is Here
The latest and most laughable online fad erupted in late January, when beauty influencers on TikTok—many of them young white women—started uploading clips of a particular, but not particularly novel, skincare hack as part of their nighttime regimen: lathering their faces in Vaseline.
Called [...]
What Are the Rules for Celebrities Promoting NFTs?
This January, actress Mila Kunis videoconferenced with Mark Zuckerberg’s sister Randi Zuckerberg to discuss her NFT project, “Stoner Cats,” as a few thousand viewers watched from home. The conversation was part of an online event held by the new crypto-for-ladies [...]