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The Shooting of an Unarmed Black Man in Oklahoma [The New York Times] The Police Department in Tulsa, Okla., released video [YouTube] [Graphic Content] on Monday of an encounter during which, the authorities said, a white police officer fatally shot an unarmed black man who could be seen raising his hands above his head. The department opened a criminal investigation into the shooting and said the Tulsa County district attorney, Steve Kunzweiler, would review its findings. The federal Justice Department opened a separate civil rights investigation.
comment posted at 4:17 PM on Sep-20-16

"If the internet killed you, I used to joke, then I would be the first to find out. Years later, the joke was running thin. In the last year of my blogging life, my health began to give out....My doctor, dispensing one more course of antibiotics, finally laid it on the line: “Did you really survive HIV to die of the web?” On the costs of the always-connected life: Andrew Sullivan, "I Used to Be a Human Being" (nymag.com).
comment posted at 12:01 PM on Sep-20-16

Washington Post Makes History: First Paper to Call for Prosecution of its own Source (After Accepting Pulitzer).
comment posted at 12:15 PM on Sep-18-16
comment posted at 7:15 PM on Sep-18-16

If you think everyone around you is terrible, the joke may be on you.
comment posted at 11:05 AM on Sep-16-16

Which Shakespeare Play Should You See? An Illustrated Flowchart
comment posted at 7:22 AM on Sep-14-16

Just what it advertises in the title.
comment posted at 1:50 PM on Sep-13-16

“What change would you like to see in universities or in your academic field by 2025?” That's the question Heterodox Academy members answer, in honor of their initiative's first year anniversary.
(Previously)
comment posted at 11:08 AM on Sep-12-16

Coming off Labor Day weekend, the POTUS candidates answered questions in the first Commander in Chief Forum, the clear loser of which was Matt Lauer. Hillary managed to move attention to Trump's "basket of deplorables" for a day, but then drew it back to herself by stumbling or collapsing while leaving a 9/11 memorial. Her camp blamed dehydration, then revealed she was diagnosed with pneumonia on Friday.
comment posted at 7:32 AM on Sep-12-16
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comment posted at 9:13 AM on Sep-12-16

How to Pick the Fastest Line at the Supermarket [The New York Times] “You dash into the supermarket for a few necessities. You figure it will be 10 minutes — tops — before you are done and on your way home. Then you get to the checkout lanes and they are brimming with shoppers. Your plan for a quick exit begins to evaporate. But all is not lost. For anyone who has ever had to stand in line (or if you are a New Yorker, you stand on line) at a supermarket, retailer, bank or anywhere else, here are some tips from experts for picking the line that will move the fastest.”
comment posted at 7:43 AM on Sep-10-16

The Intercept have just published an expose on the 2014 catalog of British spy tech maker Cobham, who sell their gear to “clients and partners in over 100 countries” including US police forces. Among the equipment is an array of cellphone-intercepting IMSI catchers, better known as Stingrays (previously); handheld or car-mounted direction finding devices to pinpoint a cellphone's location; and surveillance cameras hidden inside everything from street lights to bug zappers and trashcans along with receivers, recorders and viewing devices. A full copy of the 120 page catalog itself is available as well.
comment posted at 7:46 AM on Sep-9-16

No, Alan Moore Isn't a Recluse [Publishers Weekly] “Speaking in intimidatingly long and thoughtful sentences, Moore is affable, relaxed, and eager to talk about his new novel, Jerusalem [Amazon], to be published in September by Norton’s Liveright imprint in the U.S. and Knockabout in the U.K. It’s a 600,000-word opus that has been lurking, Cthulhu-like, behind his last decade of work. Remixing the most-reader-challenging tricks of writers such as James Joyce, Roland Barthes, and Mark Z. Danielewski, Jerusalem is an astonishing collection of words and ideas that weaves a hypnotic spell.” [Previously] [Previously]
comment posted at 3:49 PM on Sep-8-16

Film acting is built from the very stuff of social life: norms of behavior, standards of interaction and communication, communally legible gestures, and personality tropes and dynamics. But if this poses a challenge for the critic, it’s also the reason acting styles, taken in the aggregate, are such unusually good barometers of cultural modes, themes, and ideas, whether they respond to prevalent motifs or are generated themselves.
comment posted at 1:46 PM on Sep-8-16

David is told he has five weeks to live.
David sees a therapist.
David visits his ex-wife.
David buys a rope and drives into the forest.
David hangs himself from a tree. (suicide, vomit)
comment posted at 10:13 AM on Sep-8-16

When Will New York Sink? Even locals who believe climate change is real have a hard time grasping that their city will almost certainly be flooded beyond recognition: The deluge will begin slowly, and irregularly, and so it will confound human perceptions of change. Areas that never had flash floods will start to experience them, in part because global warming will also increase precipitation. High tides will spill over old bulkheads when there is a full moon. People will start carrying galoshes to work. All the commercial skyscrapers, housing, cultural institutions that currently sit near the waterline will be forced to contend with routine inundation. And cataclysmic floods will become more common, because, to put it simply, if the baseline water level is higher, every storm surge will be that much stronger. {...} Like a stumbling boxer, the city will try to keep its guard up, but the sea will only gain strength.
comment posted at 1:01 PM on Sep-7-16

Lenny Pozner used to believe in conspiracy theories, until his son’s death became one. [Some graphic descriptions.]
comment posted at 3:59 PM on Sep-6-16

At midnight on Friday, Long Island University Brooklyn's campus locked out 400 fulltime and adjunct faculty.
comment posted at 3:18 PM on Sep-4-16
comment posted at 5:21 PM on Sep-4-16

The director of the Athens-Limestone Public Library in Athens, Alabama has announced that the library intends to enforce a 1993 ordinance that allows patrons to be sentenced to up to a month in jail for failing to return overdue library books.
comment posted at 9:10 AM on Sep-4-16

There is one tribe that offers a perfect real-world parallel to Tolkien’s dwarves... "We have, then, a bunch of short, bearded beings exiled from their homeland, who have dreamed forever of returning. They are linked to a place they lost long ago, dwell in other realms throughout the earth, and yet are so profoundly connected to their own kingdom that it remains vivid to them while for others it is a fading memory."
comment posted at 7:39 AM on Sep-4-16

New York Times: Flooding of Coast, Caused by Global Warming, Has Already Begun — Scientists’ warnings that the rise of the sea would eventually imperil the United States’ coastline are no longer theoretical.
comment posted at 4:18 PM on Sep-3-16

For 20 years Roger Ailes ruled the $1 billion a year Fox News empire, expecting a culture of fear to stop widespread sexual harassment from being exposed. Then, beginning with the Gretchen Carlson lawsuit against him, it was all exposed. How Fox News women took down the most powerful, and predatory, man in media.
comment posted at 8:42 AM on Sep-2-16

Charles W. Cushman's Kodachrome pictures of NYC in the 1940s
comment posted at 10:02 AM on Sep-1-16

Donny is flopping about on immigration and his "deportation force," and the view of Donald as a bigot are solidifying, as Hillary's camp keeps up the race-themed attack on Donnie. Meanwhile, Donny bought $10 million in ads for this week, his biggest buy yet, focusing on the economy. Ads will air in battleground states, including Colorado and Virginia, where Clinton’s top aides — citing the growth in minority communities and college-educated white voters — feel confident enough to pull local ads. And to keep things lively, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton trade jabs over their health. With a bit more than 70 days to go, it's too soon for Hillary to run out the clock, so let's go, get back on your feet!
comment posted at 11:03 AM on Aug-29-16
comment posted at 2:31 PM on Aug-29-16

After conspicuously not standing up during the National Anthem played at a preseaon NFL game on Friday, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick explained that his actions were a tribute to the #BlackLivesMatter movement. Moreover, he went on, the song itself has a racist history. If you unfamiliar, here is Jason Johnson of the Root to explain: Lt. Francis Scott Key and the history of the US National Anthem's racist 3rd Verse.
comment posted at 7:46 AM on Aug-29-16
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NYT: "Declines in state support for public universities have helped reshape the geography of public college admissions, leading many students to attend universities far from home, where they pay higher, out-of-state tuition. An analysis of migration patterns among college freshmen shows the states students leave each year and where they go." How does your state measure up?
comment posted at 10:47 AM on Aug-26-16

The National Labor Relations Board ruled today that graduate students at private universities can unionize, reversing a previous decision in 2004.
comment posted at 11:18 AM on Aug-23-16

76 trombones days to go in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election and the candidates have a lot on their minds: Clinton makes a $95 million ad buy; Trump and his band of Steves yearn for calmer days when they'll be able to discuss Morning Joe gossip in peace, as Minion "9/11" Rudy spreads Clinton conspiracy theories; Egg McMuffin continues to do his thing.
comment posted at 7:26 AM on Aug-22-16
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Can Anyone Save the New York Times from Itself? "In 2014 the New York Times Media Group generated just over half the advertising revenue it did in 2002. The organization now generates more revenue from its subscribers than its advertisers. And while the Times now has more than 1 million paid digital-only subscribers, an estimated 70 percent of the company revenue still comes from print subscriptions and advertising. (... the Times’s individually paid weekday print circulation as of September 2015 was 528,000, compared to over 1 million for The Wall Street Journal and 330,000 for The Washington Post. Its Sunday circulation is more than 1.1 million...) In other words: digital revenue is nowhere near enough to support a 1,300-person newsroom—a number that even [executive editor] Dean Baquet has acknowledged must shrink."
comment posted at 8:13 AM on Aug-18-16

With his campaign chair Paul Manafort mired in scandal and polls showing Arizona and Georgia on the brink of going blue, an increasingly agitated Donald Trump has launched a major shake-up of his political staff. Reportedly infuriated by talk of being "tamed," the Republican nominee has rejected Manafort's moderating sway in favor of Breitbart News CEO Steve* Bannon, an alt-right firebrand who Bloomberg has called "the most dangerous political operative in America." Washington Post reporter Robert Costa foresees a vicious campaign in the making, a prospect further suggested by rumors that disgraced Fox News founder Roger Ailes will be advising Trump ahead of next months' debates with Hillary Clinton (whose odds of a landslide are currently on par with that of any Trump victory).
comment posted at 8:35 AM on Aug-17-16
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comment posted at 12:33 PM on Aug-17-16

Fruits of labor: sunny California is no paradise for farm workers (slTheGuardian)
comment posted at 8:44 AM on Aug-15-16

Today, the Hillary Clinton campaign launched a new "With Her" podcast, chronicling her historic run for office. Clinton also released her 2015 tax returns while Sen. Tim Kaine released 10 years’ worth of his. With just 87 days until Election Day, 538's "Election Forecast" looks dire for Republican nominee Donald Trump, who continues to rely on wild, desperate claims to capture each news cycle.
comment posted at 6:31 AM on Aug-13-16

Worst of the McMansions If you love to hate the ugly houses that became ubiquitous before the bubble burst (1980s-2009) you've come to the right place. Highlights include: McMansions 101: What Makes a McMansion Bad?, and this brief opinionated history of the garage.
comment posted at 3:30 PM on Aug-12-16

"TECHNOLOGICAL TENTACLES CONTROL US:
In the form of likes, hashtags, imagery and sounds.
It’s our turn to wake up and recognize.
It’s time to think for ourselves and #CONSUME our own thoughts, not what they tell us.
We must CONSUME or we will be CONSUMED."

—Hal Hefner
comment posted at 11:54 AM on Aug-12-16

"More than‭ ‬her actual portraits‭ ‬of Jews‭, ‬what comes through‭ ‬most clearly‭ ‬is the‭ ‬confused urgency of‭ ‬her emotions about them‭.‬" -- For Moment, Amy E. Schwartz looks at How Dorothy L. Sayers treated her Jewish characters. Some spoilers, some antisemitic quotes.
comment posted at 12:02 PM on Aug-12-16
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PSY 607: Everything is Fucked. What does it mean, in science, for something to be fucked? Fucked needs to mean more than that something is complicated or must be undertaken with thought and care, as that would be trivially true of everything in science. In this class we will go a step further and say that something is fucked if it presents hard conceptual challenges to which implementable, real-world solutions for working scientists are either not available or routinely ignored in practice.
comment posted at 10:07 AM on Aug-12-16

Slightly more than 100 exceptional works of journalism.
comment posted at 12:08 PM on Aug-11-16

Cancer is not a problem or an illness – it's a gift. Or so Barbara Ehrenreich was told repeatedly after her diagnosis. But the positive thinkers are wrong, she says: sugar-coating illnesses can exact a dreadful cost
comment posted at 7:18 AM on Aug-11-16

Are internet populists ruining democracy for the rest of us? by Vyacheslav W. Polonski, Network scientist, University of Oxford
comment posted at 2:55 PM on Aug-9-16

Of Thee I Read: The United States in Literature [The New York Times] Reporters and editors on the National Desk of The New York Times were asked to suggest books that a visitor ought to read to truly understand the American cities and regions where they live, work and travel. There were no restrictions — novels, memoirs, histories and children’s books were fair game. Here are some selections. Recommend a book that captures something special about where you live in the comments, or on Twitter with the hashtag #natbooks.
comment posted at 1:52 PM on Aug-9-16