James Stevens

My latest column at The New Yorker is about the revenge of homepages: Why we're turning toward individual websites as the platform era of the internet continues to disintegrate.

I started working on this piece because I've found myself going to homepages more often. It's a way to get a controlled, curated look at what a publication offers, and a ch... See more

Toward the album’s end, “O Wow O Wow” seems to provide a response: The pain of feeling broken is ultimately an affirmation that our late loved ones still live on within us. The day the hurting stops is the day they’re truly dead. Wild God reminds us that joy and sorrow aren’t mutually exclusive states, they’re more like adjoining rooms in a house; ... See more

There’s a particular allure to a simple point system as a means of evaluating behavior. It smooths out complexity, giving individuals clear metrics and goals. Gamification makes progress feel visible and tangible, rewarding you with a sense of achievement each time you hit your workout goal on your fitness tracker or log a movie on Letterboxd.

“It g... See more