HERE IT IS. (link)

“I doubt Joanna Gaines had ‘Build a Personal Brand Empire Increasingly Reliant on Data Scraping’ on any of her five year plans.” A story of a home renovation show nightmare, and the increasingly surveillance-based world of personal brands. (link)

“Not everything the internet treats as ambiguous actually is. Texts generally do contain evidence that certain interpretations are more valid than others.” (link)

Why are all the TV shows and movies an indeterminate browny-gray these days? (link)

“It feels very much like we’re paying for our freedom — like they have left us to die and are selling us back the right to live.” The cost of at-home COVID tests is a significant financial burden that falls heaviest on poor and disabled people. (link)

This review of Hanya Yanagihara’s latest novel contains many spoilers for A Little Life (and cw discussions of suicide, self-harm, and abuse), and it puts its finger exactly on many of the things I found objectionable about that book, and probably this new one too. (link) (As a caveat, I don’t think it’s appropriate to try to police whether an author is sufficiently queer or sufficiently traumatized to write about queerness and trauma, and I find it very gross that interviewers have asked Yanagihara invasive questions about these things.)

The evolution of book-finding and place-finding. (link)

Joss Whedon’s impact on TV is massive; but his legacy is kind of a mess. (link) He also gave an interview to Vulture, which someone ought to have stopped him from doing but I’m glad they didn’t because he sure says a lot of things. (link)

Elmo vs Rocco and the dubious pleasures of being an adult watching children’s programming. (link)

“We are know-it-alls because we are responsible for knowing everything.” On scams and our constant efforts to avoid them. (link)

How do children’s books address slavery? And what needs to change? (link)

The Gilded Age is really good. On the other hand, how many shows about the adventures of jerky white people does HBO really need? (link)

I loooove to see the Black women of country music get their flowers. (link)

Here is a legitimately sweet and nice interview with the creator of Wordle. (link)

What book previews have you enjoyed so far in 2022? Have you read any 2022 books yet? Are there particular ones you’re dying to get your paws on? I haven’t gone on a proper Netgalley requesting spree in a while, and I definitely oughtn’t do that now, but it is still quite possible that I will.

Also, look. If you read one link from this links round-up, I beg that it will be the Joss Whedon profile in Vulture. It’s just… so damning. There are so many lines in it that made me shriek, not in a good way, and while it’s not necessarily telling you anything you didn’t already know about Joss Whedon’s mindset and behavior as a boss, it’s still fascinating to read it all in one place. My only caveat is that the writer barely challenges Whedon on his racism towards Ray Fisher, either in what she quotes him as saying or when she’s talking about the incident. Which doesn’t seem like a coincidence! In a piece that rebuts moooooost of what Whedon is saying.

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Emma Southon is so great, and she has a new book out about murder in ancient Rome! Here is an excerpt! (link)

Social-emotional learning can help kids relate to each other better, without taking away from their academic competencies. (link)

What went wrong at Gimlet? (link)

Story karma! A lovely, useful concept from Emily VanDerWerff. (link)

Brandon Taylor considers whether we will ever, ever feel comfortable going to the movies again. (We will, I think.) (link)

“There is something backhanded about using authors’ personal statements as a Captcha tool for verifying the emotional resonance of their work.” Not all fiction is autofiction! It is rude to assume! (link)

In case you missed the Amanda Gorman translation controversy, here’s a round-up of responses and reactions to it! (link)

Philip Roth sounds like a real treat to be around. I am consumed with regret that I long ago decided never ever to read one of his books. (link)

Ignoring anti-Asian racism for the last 150 years has brought us to this place. (link)

All Arthuriana is fanfic. (link)

“The psychologist and tech commentator Sherry Turkle has observed that technological solutions often start out being regarded as ‘better than nothing’ only to supplant the alternatives and come to be treated as better than anything.'” On all those therapy apps. (link)

Was Naomi Wolf always terrible? Kinda! (link)

Lyz Lenz and Talia Levin discuss sustained internet harassment and how they have each learned to deal with it. (link)

Generational stereotypes are whitewashed and do not assist us in breaking down unjust systems. So let’s just not. (link)

Here’s how to make small talk, for those of us who have been quarantined so long we don’t remember how to interact with others. (link)

“What I know is that being Bich, and growing up as Bich in a mostly white town in the eighties, has felt like a test that I was constantly failing.” A heartbreaking, complicated essay about Beth Nguyen’s choice to change her name. (link)

Nobody’s doing well; everyone’s doing badly. (link)

Reading in the morning is Good. I can personally attest to this. I used to read every day on my commute, and if I missed it I became very cranky indeed. (link)

Disney keeps making movies where the Black characters spend most of the movie not being Black characters. W h y. (tw for a really heartbreaking set of anecdotes about the author’s son trying to find TV that represents him) (link)

Two of my favorite critics, Alex Brown and Angelica Jade Bastien, discuss why Them‘s overuse on brutality makes the show, overall, an artistic failure.

GOOD TALK, NOW HAVE A WEEKEND.

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