Soothing

Ann: There's sort of something in the atmosphere—an aura as the days get closer. It's very different than last year. It's getting a little bit more intense. We've had a shooting and a man hunt. And also the election. I think there's a little bit of an edginess.

Glen: The second I put on the suit, people are just like, 'Santa!' They're so relieved to... See more

COLLEGE STUDENTS ARE USING ‘NO CONTACT ORDERS’ TO BLOCK EACH OTHER IN REAL LIFE , wsj

No contact orders (NCOs), originally designed to protect victims of sexual harassment or assault on college campuses, are now being widely used by Gen Z students to avoid interpersonal conflict, often over disputes as minor as stolen bagels or awkward social... See more

What’s worse is the deep capitalism poisoning that confuses consumerism with culture: a new water bottle despite having water bottles, simping for and falling for billionaire theatrics, happily welcoming the AI-fication of everything. A loser landscape is emerging, as teens want less sex in movies, as nightclubs close and sober bars rise, as... See more

Once I watched a trailer, I knew I had to have it right away. I’d never needed to pressure-wash the side of a house myself; I was unaware that there was a whole genre of A.S.M.R.-adjacent YouTube videos dedicated to such activities.

Many commenters have said they found the videos “therapeutic,” he said. “Even though I presented in an educational format, they were using it as more of an entertainment source.”

But that’s another thing I’ve learned: you can’t have it both ways. You have to decide what’s important to you—convenience and comfort, or agency. Is it nicer to be ensconced in a soft web of silk, or do we miss flying?

Either way, what has been lost since the era of the human search engine is the joy of a distinct voice—while we can now find out almost anything automatically, the answer won’t be delivered with warmth or flair.

‘PDF TO BRAINROT’ STUDY TOOLS ARE A STRANGE ITERATION ON A TIKTOK TREND , techcrunch

AI-based study tools like Coconote and Study Fetch are capitalizing on the “PDF to Brainrot” trend, which involves reading text from documents over “oddly satisfying” videos, like ASMR clips or gameplay footage from Subway Surfers . Why read a textbook if you can... See more

I’ve been writing lately about how American politics seem to have moved into a new dispensation — more unsettled and extreme, but also perhaps more energetic and dynamic. One benefit of unsettlement, famously adumbrated by Orson Welles’s villainous Harry Lime in “The Third Man,” is supposed to be cultural ferment: “In Italy for 30 years under the... See more