brainrot
The dark forest theory of the web points to the increasingly life-like but life-less state of being online. Most open and publicly available spaces on the web are overrun with bots, advertisers, trolls, data scrapers, clickbait, keyword-stuffing “content creators,” and algorithmically manipulated junk.
Maggie Appleton • The Expanding Dark Forest and Generative AI
We already have too much internet inside of us.
Drew Austin • The Meme Fossil Record
It's this terrible Faustian bargain where you don't have to be bored anymore, but you also aren't going to feel alive.
J.E. Petersen • Uncomfortable on Purpose
“‘Internet novels’ have succeeded too entirely, which is to say that they are too exactly like being online,” wrote critic Becca Rothfeld. The fear was of a cheapened literary experience that leaves you as empty as a scrolling binge. Today’s internet novel doesn’t recount a person using websites and social media so much as those websites and social
... See moreGreta Rainbow • IYKYK: When Novels Speak a Language Only Part of the Internet Gets | The Walrus
I prefer “brain poisoning,” as the preceding discussion should support—it feels more precise. We are not decaying online so much as being incrementally loaded up with heavy metals like tuna in the ocean over the course of a lifetime, carrying this accumulation inside of us wherever we go.
Drew Austin • The Meme Fossil Record
The results showed that real-life artworks activated the precuneus, the part of the brain associated with self-reflection. “Girl with a Pearl Earring” elicited the strongest response, inducing “deeper personal engagement and self-reflections” than the other works tested, according to the report. The pattern of artworks inducing stronger positive
... See moreIsa Farfan • Original Art Stimulates the Brain More Than Reproductions, Study Finds
Researchers outfitted 20 subjects, ranging in age from 21 to 65, with eye-tracking equipment and an electroencephalography (EEG) brain scanner and showed them five original works in the museum and poster replicas from the museum gift shop in varying order. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans recorded participants’ brains to identify emotions
... See moreIsa Farfan • Original Art Stimulates the Brain More Than Reproductions, Study Finds
it’s never been so easy to look up an unknown term. But there’s a reward if you get the reference: you are in communion with the author; your specific habits and tastes are seen, confirmed, and validated by the knowledge that someone else is watching the same shows, reading the same books, reposting the same posts as you.