Longread #326 -- Depressed Sports Fans -- 5/31/13

This one is dedicated to fans of the Detroit Red Wings who lost a riveting Game 7 earlier this week against the Chicago Blackhawks. Though I was elated with that outcome, unfortunately, I can say that I've been the depressed sports fan many, many times and have shown traits of almost all of the 20 types listed here.

Enjoy this entertaining read and have a happy Friday!

"The 20 Types of Depressed Sports Fans" by Sean McIndoe
Published on Grantland, May 21, 2013

Eric

Longread #325 -- Urban Dictionary -- 5/30/12

This is a fascinating story about how the crowd-sourced website Urban Dictionary (on which I myself have two published entries) has come to be used in courts of law. While it seems like it may have a useful role in contributing to the understanding of particular cases, I can understand the concern about putting too much faith in this resource when determining the outcome court cases. Absent an increase in speed for additions to actual dictionaries, though, it is hard to see this role going away anytime soon for Urban Dictionary.

"For the Word on the Street, Courts Call Up an Online Witness" by Leslie Kaufman
Published in the New York Times, May 20, 2013

Eric

Longread #324 -- Lunch -- 5/29/13

I was on vacation over the Memorial Day weekend, so I apologize for not posting longreads on Friday or Tuesday. But we'll be back in full swing starting today.

A few months ago, I decided to take a different approach to lunch. Instead of eating a heavier meal in hopes of sustaining me through the day, I decided to simply eat an orange or an apple and grapple with some afternoon hunger. To many, this approach was completely ridiculous and defied everything about how we usually think of lunch. In light of that, I found this article to be revealing that our notions of lunch are not as longstanding as we've come to believe. As a recent exhibit at the New York Public Libraries demonstrated, the very definition of lunch has changed dramatically with urbanization and is a reminder of how meals and food become defined not by biology and hunger alone but by social and cultural context.

"Lunch: An Urban Invention" by Nicola Twilley
Published in Edible Geography, June 22, 2012

Eric

Longread #323 -- Facebook, One Year Later -- 5/23/13

Just over a year ago, I posted an article about the Facebook IPO process and how investment banks courted the company for lead position in in the IPO (Longread #73). This article from the Atlantic looks at the Facebook IPO after the fact and reveals how shady disclosure practices allowed the IPO to earn windfall profits for high-profile investors to make a killing on the backs of investors with less clout. It's a sad story although one that should come as no surprise to anyone who's been paying attention to how these things usually unfold.

"Facebook, One Year Later: What Really Happened in the Biggest IPO Flop Ever" by Khadeeja Safdar
Published in the Atlantic, May 20, 2013

Eric

Longread #322 -- The Genius of QVC -- 5/22/13

I post this article today in honor of my parents who I will be visiting soon. Growing up, it sometimes seemed like every day that I came home from school that there would be a new QVC box by the front door. While I'm sure there were some products that we used extensively (the Gorge Foreman Grill, for example), for the most part, these QVC goods ended up collecting dust. Nevertheless, it never turned my parents away from watching, especially "In the Kitchen With Bob." Frankly, I wouldn't mind one bit if I never saw another minute of QVC.

"The Genius of QVC" by Megan McArdle
Published in the Atlantic, May 11, 2010

Eric

Longread #321 -- Eyewitnesses -- 5/21/13

Given the importance of eyewitnesses to criminal investigations, their unreliability can be astounding. This article looks at new research investigating how to improve  the accuracy of eyewitnesses.

"Shuffling the Lineup: How One Man Is Redesigning the Witness ID Process" by Ben Paynter
Published in Good, March 13, 2012

Eric

Longread #320 -- Creative People Say No -- 5/20/13

There is a lot to be said about the position the author takes about creativity. Obviously, someone who is constantly getting diverted from his or her creative pursuits is unlikely to see that creativity produce much of anything. Focus and work ethic are clearly a tremendous boon to a creative mind. That said, I think this is horribly oversimplified. Creativity comes from many places, and to think that a person can only be creative if walled off from all distractions seems comical. In fact, many people find that sparks of creativity come from unsuspecting places or that breaking from an isolated routine is essential to shake conditions like writer's block. Creativity can also be valuable without having to result in something that is productive in the tangible sense mentioned by the author (such as a book or painting). I would argue that creative people are often "productive" in a different sense by enriching the lives of people around them. For example, maybe the author who takes a few minutes to interact with others ends up inspiring those people to be creative. That author's individual creative productivity may decline, but society's net creative production may increase.

This may take the headline too far, but I also think that this article misses the boat on something that to me is endemic to creativity, which is the inclination to find ways to make things possible (e.g., to find ways to say "yes"). Many of the world's most innovative and creative people were willing to ignore doubters and those who always said "no" or "this can't be done." Instead, they were creative precisely because the refused to take no for an answer.


My point here isn't that all of these people should have taken the interview request discussed in the article or that creative people should always say "yes." But I think it is dangerous to define creativity and its value in such a way as to encourage creative people to say no.

Thanks to my friend Ross for posting this article on Twitter. 

"Creative People Say No" by Kevin Ashton
Published in Medium, March 18, 2013

Eric

Longread #319 -- NACHOS! -- 5/17/13

Gotta love 'chos at the ballpark. Even if they are served out of a helmet or found discarded under someone's seat.

Happy Friday!

"The History of Baseball Stadium Nachos" by K. Annabelle Smith
Published in the Smithsonian Food & Think blog, May 7, 2013

Eric

Longread #318 -- The Next Pandemic -- 5/16/13

Keeping with yesterday's Outbreak theme, here's another good longread about zoonotic diseases and efforts to better understand and combat them.

"Where Will The Next Pandemic Come From? And How Can We Stop It?" by David Quammen
Published in Popular Science, October 15, 2012

Eric

Longread #317 -- The Hunt for Ebola -- 5/15/13

Whether it's because of the movie Outbreak or because of numerous situations talking about disease epidemics in debate, these articles almost always interest me. It's damn complicated research, and I don't envy the scientists who go out searching for ebola.

"The Hunt for Ebola" by Joshua Hammer

Published in Smithsonian Magazine, November 2012

Eric

Longread #316 -- Black Metal Troy -- 5/14/13

I'm going to take a few days to post articles that I read a long time ago and have been sitting in my "longreads to post" folder for way too long. Given the growing number of ways that life is now lived online, stories like this one shouldn't be that surprising. But it can always be jarring to read about a specific individual and in this case, how his life unfolded online. Ignore overarching tropes about how the internet makes us more or less isolated. As with most things in life, it is much more complicated as the internet can mediate all sorts of interactions that can connect, disconnect, inspire, despair, etc.

"BLACK METAL TROY or, How to Drink Online" by Robert Moor
Published in the Brooklyn Rail, April 2011

Eric

Longread #315 -- Truth and Consequences -- 5/13/13

This article gives the background of a case recently heard by the U.S. Supreme Court about the constitutionality of obtaining DNA samples. As this article outlines, the decision will have tremendous ramifications not only for police practices but also for one individual whose assailant was only identified through the DNA collection practices being challenged in the courts.

"Truth and Consequences" by Harry Jaffe

Published in the Washingtonian, April 30, 2013

Eric

Longread #314 -- Word Aversion -- 5/10/13

This probably shouldn't qualify as a longread, but because it's a Friday we can fudge the rules a little bit. This is a fun article from Gabe about word aversion. Feel free to post your most-hated words in the comments.

Happy Friday!

"Why Do We Hate Certain Words?" by Matthew J.X. Malady
Published in Slate, April 1, 2013

Eric

Longread #313 -- Who Killed The Deep Space Climate Observatory? -- 5/9/13

This is a remarkably frustrating story about how politics and bureaucracy can get in the way of science and also waste boatloads of taxpayer money. Recent news reports about Obama's proposed budget indicate that this might finally get funded for launch in 2014, but with all the budget uncertainty right now, it's hard to know if this will be for real.

"Who Killed The Deep Space Climate Observatory?" by Bill Donahue
Published in Popular Science, April 6, 2011

Eric

Longread #312 -- The KKK -- 5/8/13

I'm going back through my folder of good longreads, and this one caught my eye. For all the notoriety received by the KKK, this author found that, unsurprisingly, they're a pretty pathetic bunch. 

"My Kasual Kountry Weekend With the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan" by Hamilton Nolan

Published on Gawker, April 3, 2012

Eric

Longread #311 -- Trailer Parks -- 5/7/13

This was not something that I had ever thought about before, and while the headline is clearly hyperbolic, the idea nevertheless seems to hold a lot of water. It certainly seems like a revision of government policy toward mobile homes (vis-a-vis houses) would be worth discussing.

"How the Trailer Park Could Save Us All" by Lisa Margonelli
Published in Pacific Standard, April 22, 2013

Eric

Longread #310 -- Still Waiting -- 5/6/13

The numbers in this article are staggering. This type of simple but straightforward reform seems as though it would save a tremendous amount of time, money, and general suffering for people who are making their way through the legal system. While a large city like New York probably experiences this more acutely than most cities, I imagine that this type of reform could be utilized by many other medium-to-large cities across the country.

"Waiting and Waiting ... for Justice" by David Feige
Published in the New York Times, May 1, 2013

Eric

Longread #309 -- The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved -- 5/3/13

In honor of tomorrow's Kentucky Derby, here's Grantland's presentation of a classic article by Hunter S. Thompson about Derby weekend.

Happy Friday!

"Director's Cut: ‘The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved’ by Hunter S. Thompson" by Michael MacCambridge
Published on Grantland, May 4, 2012

Eric

Longread #308 -- Hearing the Voice of God -- 5/2/13

I don't believe in God, but I believe in nuance. This article, which looks at a researcher who has studied people who feel that God talks to them, adds nuance to our understanding of religion and spirituality. While I don't think that people are truly hearing an independent voice of God, I do think it is important to figure out what it is that they are hearing. What emerges from this research is that intense and focused spirituality and prayer can manifest in experiences that are interpreted as divine wisdom. While this is easy to ridicule, it is more valuable to actually understand and perhaps in some instances even [gasp] appreciate.

"Hearing the Voice of God" by Jill Wolfson
Published in Stanford Magazine, July/August 2012

Eric

Longread #307 -- Confessions of an Ex-Mormon -- 5/1/13

Religion is a complicated subject that all too often gets painted as simply black and white. I've not practiced religion since my mid-teens, but I try to remain open-minded about religious thought and what drives people to it. Especially in the sphere of public policy, it is easy to dismiss opinions or positions informed by religion as baseless or unsupported. That may be an accurate assessment in many situations, but it is useful to think more broadly about religion and the role that it can and does play in communities and the lives of millions of individuals. In this longread, the author explores his own personal history with Mormonism to portray a somewhat different account of the religion that the one often conveyed in mainstream media sources. I think there is a definite danger that this kind of account can become an apology for the worst abuses of religious organizations (such as the Mormons and Prop 8, as mentioned in this piece). It is important to hedge against that kind of apologism but that doesn't require completely disavowing some of the benefits that religious institutions can deliver.

"Confessions of an Ex-Mormon" by Walter Kirn
Published in the New Republic, July 13, 2012

Eric