[A Pleasurable Headache] Dark Matter in Crates off a C-130
It has been an unrelentingly grim time in the day job this past week or so, so please excuse the brevity of this week's edition.
Links
i had a problem with doom eternal and i wrote about it but there was gonna be a part 2 and this is that part 2.
GB 'Doc' Burford is fast becoming one of my favourite writers when it comes to video game discussion. This piece is a long read about gameplay flow and level design, specifically in relation to Doom Eternal and similar shooters. It's great.
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30 years of Alan Partridge: A guide to Britain’s most infamous (fictitious) broadcaster
https://www.avclub.com/30-years-of-alan-partridge-a-guide-to-britain-s-most-i-1846942721
AV Club did a primer on Steve Coogan's Alan Partridge, going through the last 30 years (!?) of material. It's interesting to read a piece designed for those outside England who have no experience of the character. As a bonus the article embeds the scene of Partridge working at Tesco which is still fantastic.
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Goodreads: A History of Where It All Went Wrong
https://litreactor.com/columns/goodreads-a-history-of-where-it-all-went-wrong
TLDR: Amazon. Amazon ruined it.
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Hundreds of Ways to Get S#!+ Done—and We Still Don’t
https://www.wired.com/story/to-do-apps-failed-productivity-tools/
Clive Thompson at Wired talks productivity/GTD software and how we still don't have things quite right when it comes to building the perfect 'To Do' app.
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Fight Club and the 21st Century
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/08/fight-club-and-the-21st-century
Vanity Fair discuss all the ways in which Fincher's movie was prescient - 9/11 imagery, men's rights groups, Donald Trump and disaffected millennials.
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12 Authors Answer the Question “How Do You Write in Tough Times?”
https://www.tor.com/2021/08/11/12-authors-answer-the-question-how-do-you-write-in-tough-times/
It does what it says on the tin. A favourite:
"For years I’ve made a religion of writing every day, somehow, no matter what, how little inspired, how unclear my direction in a current project, whether the project is big or small. The longer this persists, the less it seems a noble thing, more like habit. Blowing my nose, drinking coffee, shoving the alphabet around a few times. It becomes muscle memory, the thing I do that makes me know I’m still here."
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512Kb Club
The latest lo-fi website link to be included in this newsletter. This link lists a huge number of websites that are light, simple and easy to digest. The list is ordered by size, with the lowest website (at time of writing) coming in at a measly 0.60kb!
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We Asked, You Answered: Your 50 Favorite Sci-Fi And Fantasy Books Of The Past Decade
https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade
NPR produced a pretty good list of the 50 best sci-fi and fantasy books of the last decade.
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David Mamet Memo
https://screenplayhowto.com/screenplay-blog/david-mamet-memo/
This is an oldie, but I came across it again this week after it was referenced on a podcast I was listening to. If you excuse the old man CAPS LOCK style of writing there are some fantastic writing nuggets amid the exclamations.
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The 100 Best Horror Movies of the 21st Century
https://www.slantmagazine.com/features/the-100-best-horror-movies-of-the-21st-century/
I thought this was a really strong list. I have seen 53% of them and so, now, I must see them all. If you're on Letterboxd and into checking things off I made a copy of the list here.
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Afghanistan
Obviously, the biggest news of the last fortnight has been the (inevitable) collapse of the Afghan government and its army, leading to a resurgent Taliban taking back the country as U.S personnel evacuate.
There has been a lot of commentary, discussion and hot takes about the events there. Some of it is just neo-liberal hand wringing. A lot of it seeks to blame either Biden or Trump, ignoring the previous 15 years of terrible American foreign policy before it. Case in point, on a lot of last Sunday's coverage of events the word 'Bush' was not even mentioned. Astonishing.
Anyway, here are the two best pieces on the whole debacle I have read:
Was There a Plan in Afghanistan?
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/08/the-war-nerd-was-there-a-plan-in-afghanistan.html
Gray Brecher writes and podcasts under the name 'The War Nerd'. As someone who has been obsessed with geopolitics since I watched those planes hit those towers live on TV, I have always found Brecher's writing to be on the money. He is extremely knowledgeable and his commentary in the post 9/11 years has always been incredibly accurate to an almost eerie degree.
If you can spare an extra few dollars a month his newsletter and podcast are very worthy of your time and attention.
The above link is a repost of a newsletter that went out in May 2021, almost three months before the events of last weekend. In my opinion, the smoking gun comes under the seventh heading of Brecher's piece. Here Brecher gets into the nitty gritty of the business of war, tossing out some shocking figures. Out of the almost $2.1 trillion spent on the war, only a measly $24 billion went on economic development. The rest? Into the pockets of the DoD (Department of Defense) and its many subcontractors.
When it boils down to it, simple greed continues to motivate.
# Afghanistan: The Taliban Victory in a Global Context
This piece is from a veteran of the occupation in Afghanistan in a global, anti-imperial context. Again, greed and good ol' capitalism rears its head:
"Based on what I saw, US counterterrorism operations are chiefly about creating markets for US military technologies and products and securing resources for the US empire. For 20 years, we propped up local and regional warlords, giving them weapons, money, and arms so they wouldn’t attack our forces. We green-lit their death squads and called them the Afghan Local Police. Working at senior-echelon levels, I watched both ranking officers and junior soldiers scramble to pad their résumés in hopes of becoming mercenaries for the companies and agencies that were actually running the show. Generals made careers and went on to be employed by those companies or the Department of Defense/Intelligence Community. From Syria and Iraq to Yemen and all across Africa, throughout our 800 military bases, I do not know of a single military mission that is chiefly focused on creating peace and stability."
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I'm off to rest my weary head. See you in two!