Alex Burns
@alexgraceburns
Alex Burns
the internet’s sprawling databases, real-time social-media networks, and globe-spanning e-commerce platforms have made almost everything immediately searchable, knowable, or purchasable—curbing the social value of sharing new things. Cultural arbitrage now happens so frequently and rapidly as to be nearly undetectable, usually with no extraordinary... See more
W. David Marx • The Diminishing Returns of Having Good Taste
this is why it’s so important to be able to connect disparate ideas
Yesterday, ESPN reported that Ippei Mizuhara, the former translator who is accused of stealing $16 million from Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani to pay for his gambling addiction,has a connection to The Real Housewives of Orange County .
I really never thought this day would come. An ESPN headline about one of the biggest sports betting... See more
I really never thought this day would come. An ESPN headline about one of the biggest sports betting... See more
The Real Housewives of Sports Betting Scandals
Send handwritten letters
In this essay, I go deep on a Great American Bromance: the handwritten letters shared between Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. I think most of us are so out of touch touch with letter writing (beyond stiff wedding Thank Yous) that we’d assume letters demand a formal comportment — and are therefore boring, onerous,... See more
In this essay, I go deep on a Great American Bromance: the handwritten letters shared between Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. I think most of us are so out of touch touch with letter writing (beyond stiff wedding Thank Yous) that we’d assume letters demand a formal comportment — and are therefore boring, onerous,... See more
The Analog Life: 50 Ways to Unplug and Feel Human Again
"Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying."
—Arthur C. Clarke
Part of what makes fall so accessible to Gen Z is that you can create content about it from inside your bedroom, with a string of orange LEDs, a hot beverage, and a few pumpkin throw pillows. Summer doesn’t offer the same accessibility: Conjuring summer on the feed means vacations (costly) or bathing-suit content (not everyone’s thing). Fall is a... See more
Kathryn Jezer-Morton • Welcome Back, Social-Media Fall
“We live in an age of discovery,” Adams’s sister wrote to her, “One of our acquaintances discovered that a full grown child may be produced in less than five months!”
She goes on to explain that the husband of the new mother in question was out of town nine months earlier ... suggesting this baby is not, in fact, a miracle of the age of discovery... See more
She goes on to explain that the husband of the new mother in question was out of town nine months earlier ... suggesting this baby is not, in fact, a miracle of the age of discovery... See more
Byrd Pinkerton • Hidden from history: Archivists reveal the lives of famous, and not-so-famous, women
The Medieval Sect That Inspired the Video Game 'Assassin's Creed'
smithsonianmag.comDo a lot of work — do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week, or every month, you know you’re going to finish one story. Because it’s only by actually going through a volume of work that you are actually going to catch up and close that gap. And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions.