How the next generation processes the meaning of today — Holocaust Remembrance Day feels part sentimental overkill, part Hallmark greeting card for the children of Holocaust survivors, who thanks to intergenerational trauma have been reminded of and personalized the cataclysmic historical tragedy every damn day of their lives. My mother, a Hungarian Jew born in Transylvania, survived by hiding in…

Why everything I thought about the band Phish was wrong — Thanks to Bobby for inviting me to see Phish at MSG in NYC on the night of December 29th this week! Here’s what I thought… Known for being an unabashed, shameless Critical Asshole, I tend to trash more movies, theatre, and concerts than rave about them. Hating art is as…

Spice things up in the sack with a Failing NYT threeway — The appetizing appeal of the latest craze Wordle is the game’s shareability. At the stroke of midnight I eagerly do the day’s puzzle, then share my result right away with half a dozen friends on my Wordle thread. …

Did an AI write this blog? The TV show you just watched? The news story you just read? Thanks to ChatGPT you won’t know, or eventually care… ChatGPT launched on November 30, 2022, a day that will be remembered as the dawn of a new era for humanity. That sounds…

Somewhere between science and sensation is the truth — Call me crazy for believing in a causal connection between these two events, but I’m linking the recent demise of the sushi joint right below my apartment in New York City with the placement of a Santeria totem on their doorstep several months ago. Let me explain: Back in the…

Big Tech needs a reboot and Musk is just the guy to CTL-ALT-DEL — The current crypto, tech, and streaming crashes are the perfect backdrop for Elon Musk’s imperfections to wreak maximum havoc. His infantilism is just what the doctors of disruption ordered, and Twitter is the most disabled patient to either resurrect or bury. Regardless what you think of the world’s richest egomaniac…

Will it work? Depends on what the hell he’s actually trying to do… — Musk is running the same plays at Twitter as he did at Tesla and SpaceX: Darwinian firing, Skinnerian performance assessments, Draconian working conditions, and basically micro-managing the shit out of the entire organization. Based on his prior track record these techniques worked in the medium- to long-term. Twitter is only…

FTX pulls a Lehman Brothers as the crypto industry licks its wounds — Crypto is screwed right now for the simple and obvious reason that under- and unregulated industries inevitably lean into unfair business practices and fraud to maximize profits for their owners. Always. “Self-regulation” is an absurd oxymoron because people can’t and won’t ever limit themselves. Why would they, especially when so…