# don't read gabestein.com
> Critical and independent thought about media, technology, politics, and society. My newsletter, personal blog, and archive.
Public Ghost content for AI and LLM tooling. Use `/llms-full.txt` for consolidated page and post context.
Append `.md` to any post or page URL to get the content in Markdown (for example, `/example-post.md`).

## Pages
- [About](https://www.gabestein.com/about.md) - Pro Forma Gabe Stein is a vitalist technologist, developer, and occasional writer interested broadly in how media shapes society, and vice versa. He is currently the Head of Operations and Product at Knowledge Futures, a non-profit that builds public digital infrastructure for knowledge communities…
- [Archives](https://www.gabestein.com/archives.md) - I’ve maintained a number of occasional blogs on various platforms over the years, and even had a brief stint as a professional journalist. I finally got around to aggregating it all in one place. So, if you really, really want to, you can browse through some old, embarrassing, and very weird stuff…
- [Full-Stack Product Consulting](https://www.gabestein.com/hire-me.md) - There are lots of great product consultants and coaches. Many of them excel at teaching their clients frameworks, giving advice, or being a sounding board. I'm different. I specialize in helping leaders develop and implement sustainable solutions for key technology and business problems, quickly. I…
- [Welcome](https://www.gabestein.com/welcome.md) - So, what's this all about?

## Posts
- [Your local coffee shop probably has AI brain](https://www.gabestein.com/your-local-coffee-shop-probably-has-ai-brain.md) - We can't make meaning from everything in the universe
- [Messaging Reform](https://www.gabestein.com/messaging-reform.md) - The emerging democratic reform agenda is great to see, and lacking the critical component that could make it the start of a new American politics
- [Welcome to the age of industrial code](https://www.gabestein.com/welcome-to-the-age-of-industrial-code.md) - An industry of artisans tries to brute force its way into running factories
- [Plugging back out](https://www.gabestein.com/plugging-back-out.md) - Reclaiming agency in our mediatized world requires giving some up
- [Monday: why we need a new "media theory" for open science](https://www.gabestein.com/monday-why-we-need-a-new-media-theory-for-open-science.md) - Join me Monday at 12:30pm Eastern for a virtual panel on how open academic publishing can help rebuild trust in research
- [Your phone or your freedom?](https://www.gabestein.com/your-phone-or-your-freedom.md) - Logging off as resistance
- [Substack is probably not going to solve academic publishing](https://www.gabestein.com/substack-is-probably-the-answer-to-academic-publishing.md) - But there are other ways platforms committed to rationality can help, if they’re willing to work with open science activists
- [I am going to try to write more (and I need your help)](https://www.gabestein.com/i-am-going-to-try-to-write-more-and-i-need-your-help.md) - Plus: new threads on "vibe productivity," trust in open science, and updating our cognitive models of bureaucracy for authoritarian times
- [Big tech and Trumpism share the same ideology](https://www.gabestein.com/big-tech-and-trumpism-share-the-same-ideology.md) - It's time for tech workers to opt out and build a new industry
- [The future of generative AI is using it less](https://www.gabestein.com/the-future-of-generative-ai-is-using-it-less.md) - The boring business problem at the heart of the generative AI bubble
- [You simply cannot trust these people (and should stop using their products)](https://www.gabestein.com/you-simply-cannot-trust-these-people-and-should-stop-using-their-products.md) - It's scary that Facebook's latest privacy scandal has barely broken through
- [Has anyone actually read the generative AI productivity studies?](https://www.gabestein.com/has-anyone-actually-read-the-generative-ai-productivity-studies.md) - They really don't match the headlines
- [Laughing to the bank](https://www.gabestein.com/laughing-to-the-bank.md) - Why it's good for us to admit that yesterday was deeply funny.
- [Soft(ware) power](https://www.gabestein.com/vfwnl291.md) - A coup looks different in a world where software is power.
- [Greenland Standard Time](https://www.gabestein.com/greenland-standard-time.md) - Wherein we oscillate between personal time zone choices, political silliness, and the lengths people went to entertain themselves when history ended.
- [Do we actually make things?](https://www.gabestein.com/do-we-actually-make-things.md) - We are not ready to play with fire.
- [I did an AI](https://www.gabestein.com/i-did-an-ai.md) - Chatbots are just friendly reverse-centaurs
- [How to inoculate yourself against bad takes](https://www.gabestein.com/how-to-inoculate-yourself-against-bad-takes.md) - Resisting the temptation to analyze What Happened may be the most important thing you can do right now.
- [A gentle corrective to all the takes](https://www.gabestein.com/a-gentle-corrective-to-all-the-takes.md) - It's the culture for me.
- [The Metamodern Miasma](https://www.gabestein.com/axgjch00.md) - The decline of cultural postmodernism explains the rise of global far-right populism better than any pundit.
- [Las Vegas](https://www.gabestein.com/5ljvkjg8.md) - An unhinged rant about the only God humanity has ever created.
- [Polling](https://www.gabestein.com/qlt5htca.md) - A scientific case for being cautiously optimistic about 2024 (and yes, we still need to work hard af)
- [Congestion Pricing](https://www.gabestein.com/4d70z7af.md) - What I would say to the MTA
- [Retirement](https://www.gabestein.com/qe6fsf98.md) - A quick hit of late capitalist angst involving Amazon, Larry Fink, and a single-serving cup of Cheerios.
- [Promises tracker 1](https://www.gabestein.com/4fzcr98c.md) - How to read Elon's threat to take his Tesla vaporware elsewhere.
- [Subscribe? Or not!](https://www.gabestein.com/bvdmp0k0.md) - By "popular" demand, I have created a way to subscribe to my writing via email. Subscribe if you want!
- [Back on the rails](https://www.gabestein.com/j203in25.md) - Can the environmental movement — and our collective imagination — be rewilded?
- [Shock and awe](https://www.gabestein.com/04ex75f4.md) - The same absurd Big Promise is driving AI and crypto to the same corrupt ends
- [50K](https://www.gabestein.com/vbbpc8xf.md) - Reflections on NaNoWriMo
- [The Big Promise, revisited](https://www.gabestein.com/740fy9c3.md) - A year+ into the AI boom, what has the tech industry learned about manipulating society with the promise of existential advances?
- [Culture Cure](https://www.gabestein.com/xi9pp0v4.md) - I want to use my off day to help more companies build great cultures. Here's how.
- [The Big Promise](https://www.gabestein.com/zkme9ef3.md) - Is Artificial General Intelligence the start of a new era of big tech deception?
- [Merseyside Rockies](https://www.gabestein.com/k6qnf1sc.md) - Sorry: this is a post about satisfaction, sports, and soccer vs. baseball.
- [Information infatuation](https://www.gabestein.com/j3bf68yi.md) - Are computers really as valuable as we seem to think they are?
- [Not a real post](https://www.gabestein.com/ij70jaht.md) - Why I haven't blogged in a bit, plus what an AI thinks the "High Priest of the Intergalactic Church of Vibrations" looks like.
- [Oh Crossref](https://www.gabestein.com/m3a4se35.md) - If you care about open peer review metadata (and, I mean, who doesn't), please consider taking a small action today.
- [OSTP](https://www.gabestein.com/tsuyuj9p.md) - Jeff Pooley has the goods on the OSTP announcement: it's a great step, but not without significant downside risk for equity in publishing.
- [You, Robot](https://www.gabestein.com/8qh6k3j0.md) - What business leaders get wrong about technology and productivity.
- [Barriers, sustained](https://www.gabestein.com/96fqxgkx.md) - Our little open academic publishing niche needs to talk about the link between underpayment, sustainability, and equity.
- [Road to nowhere](https://www.gabestein.com/wefftx5d.md) - It's not just the Hyperloop. Tesla is also a distraction from the fact that cars are slower, less-efficient trains that you're forced to drive.
- [Take the win](https://www.gabestein.com/we0uqr5u.md) - The far-left’s predictable outcry over the Inflation Reduction Act is a form of climate denial.
- [Lucy](https://www.gabestein.com/11h6m0wm.md) - Facebook yanks the football away from news publishers one more (last?) time.
- [Big Leagues](https://www.gabestein.com/7gatnjd7.md) - My subway train conductor bit.
- [Helpful feedback on 'Social cost'](https://www.gabestein.com/f4mst3qq.md) - I'm using feedback on my last post to dogfood radical open review. Come play!
- [Social cost](https://www.gabestein.com/vo87z2qi.md) - Why traditional startups struggle to disrupt the academic publishing industry.
- [Spilling it](https://www.gabestein.com/bnlkdpyu.md) - The fine balance of "openness" and sustainability is real.
- [No](https://www.gabestein.com/hnm8vqhf.md) - Hell no.
- [Moon II](https://www.gabestein.com/vrnhuhro.md) - My Connecticut bit.
- [Leftovers](https://www.gabestein.com/7duze71q.md) - More people should know that you can just add shredded root vegetables to most bread recipes.
- [Roe](https://www.gabestein.com/yjpv8kg9.md) - For my disaffected friends: facing this moment requires embracing conflicting paradigms.
- [Omicomm](https://www.gabestein.com/0wnqllz8.md) - A brief thought on the virus, CDC guidelines, and #scicomm.
- [Hyperobjects, cynicism, and the post-left](https://www.gabestein.com/jz6cim0e.md) - Is a new kind of politics possible?
- [On Bridgerton](https://www.gabestein.com/ldq52x34.md) - Have they considered not being so repressed?
- [Maybe it's just us](https://www.gabestein.com/nawa98uf.md) - Why is it so hard to name the primary forces driving democratic backsliding?
- [Welp](https://www.gabestein.com/02jsuwb6.md) - So much for the daily blogging habit. Here's a lazy list of things on my mind: accessing money in academia, getting off Google, and the fog of identity and war.
- [HBD](https://www.gabestein.com/xflw3pey.md) - The birthday present I'm asking for: dig deep into your energy reserves and make some noise for democracy this week and next.
- [Caught in the web](https://www.gabestein.com/jln9cwim.md) - Will replacing the attention economy with a speculation economy really more fairly distribute power?
- [Gilded Silly](https://www.gabestein.com/4zqyqlth.md) - It's weird to write a piece about innovation stagnation and not really mention wealth inequality.
- [Meta](https://www.gabestein.com/tnvr2rdm.md) - What would the world be like if Zuck had paid attention to his Facebook comments and read David Graeber?
- [Just Before Dawn](https://www.gabestein.com/22l8d7b4.md) - Is not having to think about how your sewage gets disposed of worth submitting to the rule of the state?
- [Philips](https://www.gabestein.com/dr94iprv.md) - Modern e-commerce is pathological; an example.
- [Killing God, again](https://www.gabestein.com/mv4rda7k.md) - What happens to religion in a Utopia?
- [Reclaiming rye](https://www.gabestein.com/vkoale7b.md) - Is sourdough goyish? A personal essay.
- [A nice pairing](https://www.gabestein.com/tro5z1kn.md) - The dark, moody undertones of Chris Hayes' piece on internet fame go nicely with the bright, yet restrained optimism of Stasavage and Schneider's application of early democracies to the internet.
- [Under review](https://www.gabestein.com/craq4xd8.md) - Nothing to see here, just Nature totally slipping into the business of curating preprints.
- [Solarpunk reading list](https://www.gabestein.com/9gngcp8l.md) - My favorites so far. Extremely incomplete!
- [Going solar](https://www.gabestein.com/wbt99lyj.md) - The 'solar' in solarpunk is both a literal reference to renewable energy and a metaphor for decentralized, locally controlled, but interconnected resilience.
- [Token retreat](https://www.gabestein.com/g2l5vtiq.md) - Let's talk when the metaverse can directly feed the hungry, house people, or remove carbon from the atmosphere.
- [A corrective to the disinfo corrective](https://www.gabestein.com/s9dbouca.md) - Maybe the people who are trying to understand why conspiracies take root online are themselves part of a giant conspiracy to prop up the online advertising economy. Personally, I think the truth might be weirder and a bit less nihilistic.
- [NSF...](https://www.gabestein.com/qhnjvvvm.md) - There's only one search result for 'marxist' on PornHub.
- [4 x 8](https://www.gabestein.com/cp2cx8zv.md) - About a month ago we switched to a 4-day, 8 hour per day workweek. Here are some reflections from the first few weeks.
- [GSD](https://www.gabestein.com/u6hlrbif.md) - What if your todo list is part of a distributed, unsupervised task management app that's running your company without anyone realizing it?
- [Don't go to space like this](https://www.gabestein.com/wiyjc75k.md) - Primal screaming at the new space race. [warning: profanity]
- [The struggle is real](https://www.gabestein.com/inh4heoy.md) - Is there a meaningful praxis for socialist-leaning tech workers?
- [Know how they're paying your bills](https://www.gabestein.com/ltm4o5y1.md) - A very Friday response to a very bad Medium marketing tweet.
- [Nopecoin](https://www.gabestein.com/9k94j19r.md) - A blistering takedown of cryptocurrencies leads to an exceptionally dark thought: what if crypto is a self-perpetuating trauma machine?
- [32](https://www.gabestein.com/n78srcnf.md) - Welp, we're trying the four-day workweek. Here's how, why, and how we'll be gauging success.
- [How to talk to conspiracy theorists about Atlantis](https://www.gabestein.com/yj5ko7ji.md) - It’s tempting to think of conspiracy theorists as uneducated, unintelligent, insane, or bad-faith actors. But we’re increasingly finding that the inverse is often true.
- [It's all abstract](https://www.gabestein.com/6f4itpqs.md) - Research abstracts have changed a lot since they first appeared two centuries ago. It might be time to re-evaluate them.
- [Vacation](https://www.gabestein.com/har2k2wg.md) - I'm heading on vacation, and won't be posting much here most likely. But here's a parting thought about the need for breaks.
- [Oops](https://www.gabestein.com/4g0y3ch2.md) - We need to come to terms with the fact that the information age is basically a giant uncontrolled experiment.
- [All eyes on the primary](https://www.gabestein.com/le2hqs2z.md) - I didn't have much time to write today, so here's just a quick note on the machine and the experience of voting in my first ranked-choice election.
- [My NYC Mayoral Rankings, Part II: Candidates & Rankings](https://www.gabestein.com/xnhk36ou.md) - My mayoral rankings were both quite easy — there are two clear top choices — and very hard between those two. Thanks to ranked choice voting, though, I can give both a shot to win.
- [My NYC Mayoral Rankings: Part I, Approach](https://www.gabestein.com/anjg2d79.md) - I took a debate judge approach to figuring out who to vote for, and I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.
- [Not today!](https://www.gabestein.com/iwgpvnuj.md) - I've been trying to write every day, but today I failed. Sort of. Here's why, maybe?
- [Are "ugly produce" startups good?](https://www.gabestein.com/fivxe5uf.md) - At first, I thought Imperfect Foods was a perfect fit for my lifestyle, wallet, and morals. Then I remembered they're a VC-funded startup.
- [Inequality is the abberation](https://www.gabestein.com/1z314izc.md) - Deep history offers a tantalizing mission for technologists brave enough to adopt it: rebuild the egalitarian, cooperative communities that were our species' norm until very recently.
- [The kids are alright](https://www.gabestein.com/do5o2l2j.md) - I just judged an NYC middle school debate tournament and...wow. The kids really are alright.
- [What if it's just taxes?](https://www.gabestein.com/zyknw825.md) - Ok, here's a much simpler take on the 'Great Online Game': it's all just advanced tax avoidance.
- [If the internet is a 'Great Online Game,' capitalism is the religion it pays tribute to](https://www.gabestein.com/ivrsydjp.md) - I think I finally understand crypto (and a few other things), and it's not...great.
- [Defend Democracy Now](https://www.gabestein.com/tguec0dv.md) - My letter to @SenSchumer today. Send one to your Senator now.
- [It's the business model](https://www.gabestein.com/edxqmao6.md) - The problems with research and publishing can't be solved if the business model doesn't change. It's unfortunate to see lots of otherwise good work ignore this fundamental issue.
- [Covid and the conspiracy conspiracy](https://www.gabestein.com/ct1yox5e.md) - Did science communicators learn nothing from the CDC's early mask mess-up? By refusing to even acknowledge good-faith questions about the virus's origin, we risk repeating the mistake and driving skeptics further to the fringes.
- [Minding the gap](https://www.gabestein.com/dr8z8l3s.md) - New-York's forgotten hyphen obscures a shameful legacy and serves as a timely reminder of the power of erasure.
- [Bread, beer, and the state](https://www.gabestein.com/259pg6uv.md) - Important bread vs. beer update! It might matter quite a bit if alcohol came first. Seriously.
- [Rugged individualism vs. privacy](https://www.gabestein.com/l1go3ect.md) - America's cult of individualism is being put to the test in the fight for digital rights.
- [Venture, crypto, and the better returns trap](https://www.gabestein.com/ffatrfdw.md) - I would rather live in the present than give myself a second job hunting for better returns. But if you do get crazy rich on crypto, please consider inviting me to your yacht parties. You can make fun of me for this post.
- [Influencer marketing, fascism, and the hypernormalization of culture](https://www.gabestein.com/ku45zwdn.md) - Everything is fine.
- [The Diamond Age arrives?](https://www.gabestein.com/kgdbpkjz.md) - We need to talk about the low end of GPT-3, too.
- [Resisting impact algorithms in academic publishing models](https://www.gabestein.com/x5ng8rb1.md) - The problem with impact algorithms isn't that they exist, but that when they dominate, they coerce others into conforming to shapes designed to satisfy profit-driven needs rather than the community's needs.
- [The black holes are leaking](https://www.gabestein.com/8044yqwe.md) - Reality is too full.
- [Airbnb and the future of work and leisure](https://www.gabestein.com/airbnb-future-work.md) - The great intertwining continues.
- [Getting Started With Sourdough](https://www.gabestein.com/9gjxdi7w.md) - When people talk about sourdough baking, they’re typically referring to baking using a homemade (some folks will call it a “natural”) leavening agent — a starter — instead of store-bought yeast. It’s called sourdough baking because homemade starters produce acid as a byproduct of fermentation, whic…
- [Wanted: Late Capitalist Tech Worker](https://www.gabestein.com/kf1jtsn8.md) - We are seeking a highly motivated and extremely intelligent individual to dig into the minutiae of a tiny, mostly boring problem that we have identified as vital to our business because, at our unfathomable scale, even a minuscule improvement will lead to millions of dollars in extra profit for our…
- [The National Consensus News Index (NCNI)](https://www.gabestein.com/opyu75xm.md) - An experiment in creating a diverse, authoritative, auto-generating news source for the post-truth era.
- [No, Facebook does not just “show people what they want”](https://www.gabestein.com/i4uj0ehr.md) - And “we’re just following the data” is a bad argument, anyway
- [A Prototype for Stemming the Flood of Misinformation during Breaking News Event](https://www.gabestein.com/f5rcxnqr.md) - Warning: Some Collaboration Required
- [Why I’ll be treating 2018 like a presidential election](https://www.gabestein.com/pf7lkkz6.md) - And how you can do the same right now
- [Why I’ll be treating 2018 like a presidential election](https://www.gabestein.com/od5fijp9.md) - And how you can do the same right now
- [These are the assholes who just voted to kill millions of Americans](https://www.gabestein.com/6ean499v.md) - Make them pay.
- [Hey Nathan,](https://www.gabestein.com/594yogte.md) - Hey Nathan, Fwiw, I want to apologize for my part in that story. I loved your work and loved editing it when I had a chance to, and I’m horrified to learn you weren’t paid for it. As a staff writer, I had little insight into the arrangement you had with FC, but in hindsight, I should have done more…
- [Use post flagging tools to teach basic media literacy to the masses](https://www.gabestein.com/qopenokp.md) - A modest fake news proposal for Facebook. We should consider whether platforms like Facebook have an obligation to train their users on how to effectively use their platform.
- [You’re not alone.](https://www.gabestein.com/3ipgq9ha.md) - You’re not alone. I’m sitting up at 5am, jet-lagged after a long trip, reading the speculation that this may be preamble to a coup in near-paralyzing terror. What’s keeping me going right now is watching people across the country speak up and share their hopes and struggles, like you are. We’re not…
- [Democrats should refuse to work with Trump until he upholds basic Presidential norms](https://www.gabestein.com/bagd47u8.md) - What I’m telling my reps in today’s calls
- [Action for Today: Call the House Oversight Committee](https://www.gabestein.com/pwkk9ip8.md) - Ask for a bipartisan investigation into Trump’s finances
- [Another thing you can do right now: get involved in local government](https://www.gabestein.com/8v3blhek.md) - Cities are our future. Help make yours better.
- [GOP Senators Who Might Block Kleptocratic Trump Nominations](https://www.gabestein.com/9gfpjj81.md) - If you live in one of these states, get ready to call.
- [Something you can do for me to oppose Bannon.](https://www.gabestein.com/cdklvmmi.md) - It’s fast and easy. Here’s how.
- [Democracy is my side project now.](https://www.gabestein.com/vgk4lcnd.md) - Sorry for that insipid headline, but hey, it got you here.
- [November 6, 2016: Restoring the Republic](https://www.gabestein.com/a5mdohnw.md) - Forty-eight hours before the election, I’m increasingly (and very cautiously, still planning on doing some last-minute phone banking) optimistic about the fact that Hillary Clinton will be elected President on Tuesday (gonna knock on some wood just in case tho). However, I’m also increasingly aware…
- [October 31, 2016: Some thoughts on candy](https://www.gabestein.com/dgnc6mng.md) - Following up on an earlier tweetstream… Hi. It’s halloween, one of my favorite holidays because you can earnestly debate and discuss various candies. As any of my friends, dentists and my mom will tell you, I am an expert in this subject. My qualifications: the far too many cavities I have had fill…
- [October 26, 2016: Otto](https://www.gabestein.com/ctg3cvmu.md) - Some news: Otto, the self-driving trunk company owned by Uber, made its first automated delivery (in my home state, no less) yesterday. Of course the first delivery was beer, because you can be sure someone in Uber’s PR department got wind of this stunt long ago and made sure to capitalize on it wi…
- [October 25, 2016: Herschel’s Backstory](https://www.gabestein.com/gveoo6iz.md) - According to his mother Irene, Herschel Lubowitz Gold was born on October 25, 1947 at “a very nice hospital.” He spent the first ten years of his life in New Jersey, probably, before the family moved to the Upper East Side to help his uncle Gilly open a deli. It wasn’t Second Avenue or Sarge’s, but…
- [October 20, 2016](https://www.gabestein.com/3u9sehhz.md) - The persistent whistling. Like cold air rushing through a partially cracked car window at high speed. That’s what he noticed first. It reminded him of those early morning drives to high school through the snow. There was hot brown coffee in his travel mug that spilled over into the cupholder as he…
- [October 19, 2016: Welp.](https://www.gabestein.com/li30cgb6.md) - I’m taking a detour from fiction to write about the debate again. Sorry, can’t help it.
- [October 18, 2016: Bad Sci-Fi](https://www.gabestein.com/91930evn.md) - “My purpose here is to inform you of a conspiracy that plans to destroy your little Utopia.” The Malgorians were one of the first species humans ever encountered. They were largely benevolent, but like every other people mankind encountered beyond the Milliwave, their gestures were inscrutable to t…
- [October 17, 2016: Part 1](https://www.gabestein.com/4b749jlt.md) - They were in the car when it happened for the first time. The vehicle came to a slow stop in the middle of the deserted road. It was technically a drive zone, so the car reverted to offline mode and crawled over to the side of the road, its warning lights blinking, before it abruptly shut down its…
- [October 14, 2016: Trek](https://www.gabestein.com/8caqxp8w.md) - I’ve been reading Manu Saadia’s Trekonomics for the last few weeks. It’s a little bit lighter than I expected, but in many ways it reads like it was written for me. As I wrote in my very first journal, at my most extreme, my political views can be fairly well defined as “scrap the system and build…
- [October 13, 2016: Isfahan](https://www.gabestein.com/4gc5kgqz.md) - Not the city, although I imagine, given its history, that it is spectacular. No, I mean the Duke Ellington standard. One of my favorites that seems to come up on shuffle more often than it should, thank the algorithm. Written and composed by Duke and Billy Strayhorn during (or, depending on which h…
- [October 12, 2016](https://www.gabestein.com/p5xg5syl.md) - It’s 11:30 and I haven’t written my 500 words yet. Fuck. This has been one of those days where a few extra hours really would have come in handy. But as I discussed with my girlfriend last night, doing so while keeping the Earth habitable would be surprisingly hard. Slowing the Earth’s rotation (by…
- [October 11, 2016: For My Conservative Friends](https://www.gabestein.com/mrshby2k.md) - Politics again, today. Mostly, I liked this article about the state of the GOP by writer John Scalzi (side note: I highly recommend his Old Man’s War series) because a particular line in it reminded me to close my gaping yap and step back from enjoying today’s schadenfreude: I feel sorry for many o…
- [October 10, 2016](https://www.gabestein.com/v0ff8rr3.md) - I promised I’d write 500 words per day, starting today. It’s just to get back in the habit of writing something (other than emails and tweets) every day. There are no other goals. I suspect I’ll publish some of these posts, while others will be relegated to the secret depths of my Medium drafts. Bu…
- [A few hopefully encouraging thoughts for my currently despondent friends.](https://www.gabestein.com/p8prl7kt.md) - On days like these it’s hard to be an optimist. Police murdering black people. Snipers murdering police. Rising anti-semitism. Nativism in Europe. Predictions of global war. And those are just the stories I’ve read since 7am this morning. What’s most shocking is how quickly the tides seem to have t…
- [The viral publishing game is over and we all lost](https://www.gabestein.com/eamwve6a.md) - A lot of the conversations I’m having about audience development these days quickly devolve from focused discussions about acquisition and retention strategies — you know, analytical stuff — to talking about, er…brands. Why brands? Because that’s all anyone has left to talk about. The murmurs from…
- [Towards A Wide Definition Of Programming And Universal Computational Literacy](https://www.gabestein.com/cp6rprx4.md) - It took thousands of years of written language for us to consider universal language literacy important to society, and the shift largely happened as a byproduct of the industrial revolution (with pretty clear lines to the enlightenment and the printing press). Per most definitions, we’ve only been…
- [About That Title II Argument…](https://www.gabestein.com/1nlrw9kh.md) - As near as I can tell, this article by Holman Jenkins is the one that ignited a lot of libertarian concern trolling about Title II that basically didn’t exist until the end of 2014. And it’s essentially being read word for word in the FCC meeting right now. There are some interesting arguments in i…
- [A Branching Method For Covering News Efficiently](https://www.gabestein.com/k58sto9b.md) - Last winter, I experimented with a new method of newsgathering and presentation using the conversation startup Branch. This is the post-mortem.
- [A Death In The Family](https://www.gabestein.com/1aocsq69.md) - Savor your newspaper. This is what it feels like when it’s gone.
- [So is the Academy trolling us or what?](https://www.gabestein.com/dk1xsrh1.md) - This post was originally published on gabestein.com. Dear Internet, Are we being trolled by the Academy, ABC and Seth MacFarlane? Before I get into that, let me do some housekeeping: I agree with the general consensus that he was a terrible host, mostly unfunny and very offensive. He managed to be…
- [Henry Blodget Thanks Me For Aggregating Him](https://www.gabestein.com/56zjv1uo.md) - Henry Blodget of Business Insider personally thanked me for aggregating his content today in a note that I just had to share with you, my dear readers. The note is produced in its entirety below, but please DO NOT SCROLL DOWN, DO NOT CLICK CONTINUE READING. Instead, click on this link and read it a…
- [Dear Internet: Has someone written this piece on drones?](https://www.gabestein.com/awokvzxa.md) - I need to read a news article that asks: are drones logical as a replacement for troops, are they really cost-effective and (how) do they work as both deterrents and killing tools. The problem with everything I’ve read, on all sides of the issue, is that they’re filled with emotion and innuendo, na…
- [Student work owned by the school district? Old news.](https://www.gabestein.com/4onbcyp4.md) - There’s an interesting article from the Washington Post up today about Prince George County Board of Education’s proposal to claim ownership over all the work done by students and teachers (somewhat related side note: Mr. Weinstein, where do I send the check?). It’s a ridiculous proposal for many r…
- [Let’s politicize America’s death problem, or, guns may not kill people, but someone still died](https://www.gabestein.com/auips2lj.md) - Another day, another horrific shooting in America. And every time progressives come together and whisper to one another, “maybe this will be the one that sparks action.” But not one seems to spark anything but “gun control now” on the left, “more guns” on the right and complete stasis in Washington…
- [Why No One (Especially Facebook) Will Control Your Online Identity](https://www.gabestein.com/e7n8s9xu.md) - What does the following paragraph remind you of? They were however still disjointed separate networks, served only by limited gateways between networks. This led to the application of packet switching to develop a protocol for internetworking, where multiple different networks could be joined toget…
- [Starting over](https://www.gabestein.com/sshjkcyv.md) - I’m starting over. From now on, this blog will simply be a place of expression for my thoughts. I will no longer work towards being something I’m not, hide behind anonymity or design, or pretend to be anything but an amateur tinkering around with ideas. As such, I have stripped down to a minimal de…
- [Flash Fiction Friday: Lately](https://www.gabestein.com/2c3kxxr7.md) - Well, we’re back! Or at least, I’m back. The other FFFers have been at it for a while, but I’ve been out of town. Regardless, it is my pleasure now to present to you the eighth Flash Fiction Friday I have written so far, and also to encourage you to read the pieces of my companions in this venture,…
- [Why I haven’t posted in a while](https://www.gabestein.com/68ahxq2f.md) - I recently added some grammar blogs to my RSS feeds, and now I’m terrified of making a mistake and ending up on one of them. So, sorry, but it might be a little while. I am still working on some cool (but long) posts, such as parts 2 and 3 of the newspaper website series and an article about Denver…
- [Re-imagining the Newspaper Website (Part 1 of 3)](https://www.gabestein.com/ccu40bsn.md) - Part one of three: Bring it home Newspaper websites have a major problem: they’re mostly awful. Online news presentation has barely changed in 10 years, and worse, editors and publishers across the industry think the solution is shoe-horning “web 2.0″ ideas into the existing model, rather than re-t…
- [Flash Fiction Friday: To Old Friends](https://www.gabestein.com/81i9kys0.md) - So. This is a Friday. And I am posting Flash Fiction. Unfortunately, this is actually last Friday’s Flash fiction. It’s horrible, I know, but I did write something, and wanted to put it up. I’m going to try to have another one up today, so, you know, treat it as a double-header. Two-for-one, or wha…
- [Flash Fiction Friday: Outfits and Rituals](https://www.gabestein.com/o7n2nrj3.md) - Well, I’m late again…see if you can guess what I was up to this weekend from the story. But more importantly, see if you can guess the rule that connects all four stories this week from myself, Crow (rulemaker and creator of this weeks’ awesome FFF graphic I’m featuring), Caiti, and Robin. Enjoy. O…
- [Style vs. Grammar](https://www.gabestein.com/koymkabl.md) - A hilarious comment from an Anonymous poster at The Sartorialist. Note the completely random lack of capitalization (one I, one i), the one-word sentence (containing a coordinating conjunction, no less), the misused semicolon, and the awkward phrasing that makes it seem like everyone walks around n…
- [A New, Real Post!](https://www.gabestein.com/57rdle2k.md) - April Fools. No really, I’m working on some though. April Fools again. Actually though, I’ve got time to work on some though now that my week from hell is over. No seriously, April Fools again. You are so gullible. Gahd.
- [The @gabestein Twitter Weekly Digest for 2009-03-30](https://www.gabestein.com/mdf9kxq5.md) - * Just updated typography on my new site. Going with just two: Tahoma/Verdana for content, Georgia for everything else. Results are…mixed. # * My prof says to eliminate all pause words in dialogue, but I’m much more of a naturalist. Is perfect dialogue too slick for most characters? # * @crowjonah…
- [Flash Fiction Friday: Red-Red-Yellow](https://www.gabestein.com/f46ew5u3.md) - So this week I am pleased and honored to be included in a tradition that started a few weeks ago over at my friend Crow and his friend Robin’s blogs. They’ve since added Caiti into the mix, and this week they’ve been nice enough to invite me as well. The idea is pretty straightforward: each week, s…
- [Twitter Updates for 2009-03-26](https://www.gabestein.com/k2y87hiu.md) - * Finished essay 1 on the Cold War, now transitioning to screenplay based on Desafinado. After that, moving to essay 2, Kant vs. Utilitarians. # * Finished screenplay based on Desafinado (Not to spoil the ending, but love is like a never ending melody). Bed, then only one essay left! # * The words…
- [Is Obama’s ‘Open for Questions’ Site Rigged?](https://www.gabestein.com/ui8gaiq2.md) - Take a look at Obama’s new Open for Questions website. In case you’re not familiar with the story, President Obama will be holding an online town hall tomorrow, and will take a series of questions from users on the WhiteHouse.gov website. The difference between this concept and past online-generate…
- [Twitter Updates for 2009-03-25](https://www.gabestein.com/5a8lpb0v.md) - * I’m also a pretty lousy photographer, which could have something to do with it. # * Do your photos always seem less vivid than friends’? I think it’s that we’ve lived our own, but have to fill in others’ with imagination. #
- [Twitter Updates for 2009-03-25](https://www.gabestein.com/b6p16w2x.md) - * My TF has a great collection of student essay-related terms, among them: “defensive grading” and “assertive insecurity” # * How much do you worry about repeating sentence structure in academic essays? I think I’ve already killed ‘Although Eisenhower X, he meant Y’ #
- [Twitter Updates for 2009-03-23](https://www.gabestein.com/ozu0e6ue.md) - * Finding just the right shade of cool minty green to match the pink background on my site is one of the most tedious things I’ve ever done. # * Sleep is only a fleeting respite from the weight of our commitments, yet most bliss happens there. How cursed and blessed we are to need it. # * Just upda…
- [Wait, your ‘Top Ten’ are all true and unfunny](https://www.gabestein.com/9ojcjkc2.md) - I’ve commented on this before, but sometimes news headlines can be completely misleading. Usually, the articles that follow them are even worse, because bad headlines often reflect either a bad or distracted editorial staff that for some reason places less weight on its headlines - essentially the…
- [Welcome to my new site](https://www.gabestein.com/68cssnan.md) - Now serving you from two convenient locations, http://gabestein.com (main URL), http://imaginaryblogworldblog.com (surreal URL). I hope you like the new look and content of my blog. The new retro-y design is mostly finished, but I’ll still be making some tweaks as time goes on. I hope you enjoy it…

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