November 2011
80 posts
October 2011
71 posts
For the past several years, while the mainstream media was dutifully reporting on all things Kardashian or (more recently) a wholly manufactured debt-ceiling crisis, ordinary people were losing their health care, their homes, their jobs, and their savings. Those people have taken that narrative to Facebook and Twitter—just as citizens took to those alternative forms of media throughout the Middle East as part of the Arab Spring. And just to be clear: They aren’t holding up signs that say “I want Bill O’Reilly’s stuff.” They aren’t holding up signs that say “I am animated by toxic levels of envy and entitlement.” They are holding up signs that areperfectly and intrinsically clear: They want accountability for the banks that took their money, they want to end corporate control of government. They want their jobs back. They would like to feed their children. They want—wait, no, we want—to be heard by a media that has devoted four mind-numbing years to channeling and interpreting every word uttered by a member of the Palin family while ignoring the voices of everyone else.
And there’s this. The mainstream media thrives on simple solutions. It has no idea whatsoever of how to report on a story that isn’t about easy fixes so much as it is about anguished human frustration and fear. The media prides itself on its ability to tell you how to clear your clutter, regrout your shower, or purge your closet of anything that makes you look fat—in 24 minutes or less. It is bound to be flummoxed by a protest that offers up no happy endings. Luckily for us, #OWS doesn’t seem to care.
Dahlia Lithwick, my hero
I’ve always wanted someone to love me just for my asshole.
HEY EVERYONE IT’S TONI’S BIRTHDAY SO LET’S ALL BE SURE TO TELL HER WHAT A SHINING EXAMPLE OF AN ASSHOLE SHE IS HAS
I REALLY DO.
I’ll check it out but I usually only wear crap.
I think the goal here is to be able to wear nice stuff for crap prices.
(By the way, that link I just posted? It’s for ladyclothes too, not just for dudeclothes. And no I don’t work there, although it tells you where my mindset is that the first part of the site I looked at was “jobs.”)
Hey Put This On, did you see this? Everlane:
It’s a fact: Your $120 designer shirt sells for eight times what it cost to make. Not at Everlane.
We’ve set out to challenge conventions and offer our designer-quality goods at great—and honest—prices. No tricks. No middlemen taking their cut. No crazy brand markups. Just a new collection of essentials launched each month. And everything under $100. No exceptions.
I got the same email this morning. It’s been bothering me all day because, wow, is it possible that some aspiring writer will think it’s a reasonable offer?
Writing “for exposure” is a scam. When you provide free content to a money-making publication, no one but your mom cares that you’re the one who wrote it.
Every time you let someone else profit without compensating you for your hard work, you make our profession less professional. Always get a contract. Insist on a living wage. Fight to control your content. And if you don’t know what that means, study up.
Someone just wrote “I wish twitter had a “like” button for your statement” and whatever stars remained in the once-shimmering @Favrd constellations were snuffed out for the last time.
