Sixian

The body is now presumed to have more in common with the segmented clock face — which at least approximated natural rhythms, even if it locked them into a standard compatible with the needs of capital — than it does with the “vapor” of internet time.

We live and listen, he writes, “in the afterlife of data,” no longer believing in the communicative precision that the digital promised us, but continuing to live as though we do: “Nobody knows what a ’97 percent match’ in the context of a dating app really means — and no reasonable person would take that ranking as indicating that a successful... See more

People used to think they needed permission - so they would ask for somebody else to give them permission to advance, to be something different - a new job title, a new degree, a new certification, a new membership.

This really changes the narrative, and the organized presentations of history in a way that history cannot recover from. This is the source of our gnawing discontent.

The moment when the fiction changes the reality, when the story you are telling has real effects. You might not have begun with yourself in mind, but at this moment you come into sudden, astonishing contact with your “I.”I wanted to provide points of realization akin to what I experienced in the roleplay, and which I also experienced while writing:... See more

One important lesson here is that engagement matters to network effects. A first level understanding of network effects is that they occur when more users = more value for existing users. That’s true, but go one level deeper, and you realize it’s actually the amount of usage that matters.

The assumption that my desires are all my own—this story that I tell myself—is what the French social scientist René Girard calls “The Romantic Lie.” The Lie is that I want things independently, or that I choose all of the objects of my desire out of some secret desire chamber in my heart. I know a good thing when I see it; I know what’s desirable... See more