Severin Matusek

sheer narrative discipline and command of the digital.

A decentralized brand is a fiction made real, an egregore, a self-sovereign entity that lives through the imagination and belief of many. One does not simply decide what a decentralized brand "is." It is not something that can be created by focus groups, strategists, and identity designers. Like Bitcoin, a decentralized brand has its own autonomy,... See more

The internet created the false impression that all socializing is authentic and improvisational. We’re discovering social lives are planned once again.

O’Rourke is among a growing group of literary writers who have tried to answer the question in the first person, scoping out artificial intelligence’s encroachments from within the domains it most imperils. Their writing asks what AI-generated writing can or (much less often) can’t do, and how human writers can or (much more often) can’t respond.... See more

People pay to see others believe in themselves.

For creative people this hits especially hard as social media’s invention of “personal brands,” “influencers,” and the “Creator Economy” turned the few remaining aspects of life that hadn’t yet been marketized into the last ways we could make a living without working for somebody else. Gradually and then suddenly creative people found themselves... See more

Many anonymous online spaces dedicated to “youthful” activities (gaming, degenerate trading, fandoms etc.) are in fact filled with 40 year olds. Not because they’re groomers, but because they never felt like they aged out of them. 40 year old boomers are colonizing traditionally young cultural spaces with their own youth culture vintage. There’s no... See more