october 22 etc
The only thing I really want to do as a job is get paid a normal, non-obscene amount of money to write and/or blog and/or make videos about the handful of things I really like and know a lot about. I suppose this is called being a cOnTeNt CrEaToR, but I'll be damned before I call myself that. The twin pressures of late stage capitalism x algorithmic culture may have reduced all acts of human media creation to "content" in the eyes of billions, but not this guy.
My dream scenario is (read: has always been) to have 3-5 things I independently do or make or produce but I am allergic to asking people to pay me for my work. No matter how long I've been doing this kind of thing (a long time) and how good I am at it (that's not for me to say but I know I'm not bad at it), I am still a broken person whose default assumption is that everyone thinks he's stupid and boring. I am a mostly confident person but that confidence and assuredness goes out the window when it comes to thinking that something that I produce is worth actual money (it's also that I know how tough it is to make ends meet these days).
About a year ago a guy I used to be friends with started an email newsletter with a paid option. He's a clever enough guy, but he's not a writer and the energy with which he writes has always seemed very synthetic to me. I asked him why he felt comfortable asking people to spend money to read his musings and he responded in a manner that left me cold. TL;DR he was like, "well, it's an option." In my mind, he started thinking about monetizing his words before he thought about making them worth paying for. There's a way to read this as him being confident but to me it reeked of entitlement and a lack of respect for the reader.
I've been a professional writer for 20+ years, which means that people have been giving me money to borrow my brain and my pen since before the word "sexting" was first published in print, and yet I worry that if I wanted to go full-on indie like Shea Serrano, I'd flop hard.
Where does that leave me? Right here with you, as ever.
#lightsupletsgo
๐ฅ๐ฅ "I donโt see young people getting angry over franchise films. Why isnโt that? Why doesnโt that make you furious? Itโs someone selling you something in a two-hour format thatโs really about selling you something else and pretending." If you read one thing today let it be this interview with Kelly Reichardt in The Film Stage.
๐๐ Kevin Durant seems genuinely delighted to be holding a baby. (Twitter)
๐บ๐บ A new Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad) show is coming out on Apple TV+ and here's the trailer. (YouTube)
๐๐ I don't interview actors and musicians anymore, but if I did this is the kind of thing I would ask. (Twitter)
๐ค๐ซง Using a gift link to share this NYT opinion piece about "the third bubble of our century: the A.I. bubble." (NYT)
๐ข๐ข An activist investor group that includes Taylor Swift's fiancรฉ wants to save Six Flags. (MSN)
๐คฏ๐คฏ Bob Iger torpedoed a Kylo Ren movie brought to him by Steven Soderbergh and Adam Driver for... reasons. (AP)
๐๐ Kevin Durant looks genuinely happy to troll IRL in real time. (Twitter)
๐บ๐บ For the (other) booze sober folks, a new Partake beer just dropped. (Partake)
๐๐ Kevin Durant still loves OKC and knows he is loved in OKC. (Twitter)
๐บ๐ธ๐บ๐ธ A guy who admits to having "a Nazi streak" in group chats and says he wants to eliminate Black History Month, MLK Day, and Juneteenth might still end up leading the Office of Special Counsel because America isn't a serious place anymore. (POLITICO)
โ๏ธโ๏ธ A beloved American chess grandmaster has died and it seems to be 100% related to relentless attacks and bullying by a rival who regularly accuses other players of cheating in that disingenuous "jUsT aSkInG qUeStIoNs" way that seems to be the go-to method for the biggest losers alive. (NBC)
๐ฒ gonna let's
๐ผ go
๐ฑ touch blue
๐ณ grass jays
๐ท now clap clap clapclapclap
Be good to yourself.
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