• Dear Guest, Please note that adult content is not permitted on this forum. We have had our Google ads disabled at times due to some posts that were found from some time ago. Please do not post adult content and if you see any already on the forum, please report the post so that we can deal with it. Adult content is allowed in the glory hole - you will have to request permission to access it. Thanks, scara

Cool things I found on the internet

Not cool. Connections aren't binary. At the least, they vary in strength. And when we're looking at the spread of ideas, memes and untruths, the context of the connection (social, professional, academic or whatever) is highly relevant.

So this is just another oversimplification of stuff with pretty drawings and music. That's pretty much what I hate about the Internet. And why nonsense tends to spread, to boot.
 
Not cool. Connections aren't binary. At the least, they vary in strength. And when we're looking at the spread of ideas, memes and untruths, the context of the connection (social, professional, academic or whatever) is highly relevant.

So this is just another oversimplification of stuff with pretty drawings and music. That's pretty much what I hate about the Internet. And why nonsense tends to spread, to boot.

Tl;dr
 
Not cool. Connections aren't binary. At the least, they vary in strength. And when we're looking at the spread of ideas, memes and untruths, the context of the connection (social, professional, academic or whatever) is highly relevant.

So this is just another oversimplification of stuff with pretty drawings and music. That's pretty much what I hate about the Internet. And why nonsense tends to spread, to boot.

Isn't it better to engage people and see some form of creativity even if not perfect? Easy to criticise harder to create. What would you do instead?
 
Isn't it better to engage people and see some form of creativity even if not perfect? Easy to criticise harder to create. What would you do instead?

I’d write 10,000 words on whatever it was, rather than engaging animators. I do that all the time, and I do quite often employ designers to make stuff look prettier - but never to oversimplify.

Do you ever go to meetings where people with some level of expertise are discussing a nuanced topic to quite a high level of detail, and some knob has hired some other knob with a set of magic markers to draw facile illustrations of the topic on the walls? You’re trying to make a complex point and thankfully at least half the people there get it, and meanwhile the knob is drawing a cartoon man with a lightbulb over his head? That’s a good example of why creativity shouldn’t be allowed, not when there’s a useful point to be made. And the stuff about connections and networks is useful, and interesting, and worth covering properly, in tl/dr depth.
 
I’d write 10,000 words on whatever it was, rather than engaging animators. I do that all the time, and I do quite often employ designers to make stuff look prettier - but never to oversimplify.

Do you ever go to meetings where people with some level of expertise are discussing a nuanced topic to quite a high level of detail, and some knob has hired some other knob with a set of magic markers to draw facile illustrations of the topic on the walls? You’re trying to make a complex point and thankfully at least half the people there get it, and meanwhile the knob is drawing a cartoon man with a lightbulb over his head? That’s a good example of why creativity shouldn’t be allowed, not when there’s a useful point to be made. And the stuff about connections and networks is useful, and interesting, and worth covering properly, in tl/dr depth.

That shows your bias.

Sadly i don't go to meetings where people start drawing - but wish I did. Is the area so complex or are you feeling self important? People, connections, sociology doesn't strike me as complex especially if its taken out of a fusty academic context. If people are engaged, questioning and learning, about things they maybe wouldn't otherwise, isn't that a positive democratisation of knowledge and insight?
 
Yeah, I do get that, and it wouldn’t be a problem if it was just a simplification. I thought that portraying connections as non-variable stopped short of being helpful.

Next time I get invited to a workshop or whatever where some chancer with Rolf Harris’s doodling skills and probably the predilections to match is on scribe duty, you can go instead of me. You won’t like it.
 
Yeah, I do get that, and it wouldn’t be a problem if it was just a simplification. I thought that portraying connections as non-variable stopped short of being helpful.

Next time I get invited to a workshop or whatever where some chancer with Rolf Harris’s doodling skills and probably the predilections to match is on scribe duty, you can go instead of me. You won’t like it.

You do have some sympathy. Dumbing down especially an area you have deeper insight into could be maddening. But this website is playful, and that's got to be a good thing. Unperturbed, I would be fascinated to know which theory you find interesting/cool? Something we should be considering...
 
I’d write 10,000 words on whatever it was, rather than engaging animators. I do that all the time, and I do quite often employ designers to make stuff look prettier - but never to oversimplify.

Do you ever go to meetings where people with some level of expertise are discussing a nuanced topic to quite a high level of detail, and some knob has hired some other knob with a set of magic markers to draw facile illustrations of the topic on the walls? You’re trying to make a complex point and thankfully at least half the people there get it, and meanwhile the knob is drawing a cartoon man with a lightbulb over his head? That’s a good example of why creativity shouldn’t be allowed, not when there’s a useful point to be made. And the stuff about connections and networks is useful, and interesting, and worth covering properly, in tl/dr depth.
Just don't invite the doodlers.
 
Hell yeah. It's straightforward data, presented in exactly the most telling format. Edward Tufte and his followers would be delighted. And it's a really important set of points to make about the gun law issue.

If I was going to cavil, it would be that the single infographic would tell the story just as well as clicking through the build, and - in general - sites want you to click through multiple images not because it's the best way to digest information, but because it makes advertisers happy. But the staff of the five thirty eight (which includes, I think, the super Nate Silver) need to eat, and I like giving them clicks.

What's great about those stats is that they leave you hungry for more information: snap international comparisons of gun law and deaths rarely consider suicide. Detail on prevalence of attempts and suicides, correlated to local availability of guns, might be really useful in swaying the policy debate.
 
https://www.lrb.co.uk/v40/n11/andrew-ohagan/the-tower

Andrew O’Hagan looks at the causes of Grenfell and the response to it. It’s 17,000 words, but the issues involved are all complicated and the supporting facts need to be set out. There’s still long-form journalism on the internet which is free to air, demands to be read, and could never be summarised in a picture or a tweet.

I haven't had a chance to read it yet but I will.

This complaint to IPSO and LRB by one of the contributors should probably be read alongside it.

 
I haven't had a chance to read it yet but I will.

This complaint to IPSO and LRB by one of the contributors should probably be read alongside it.


Have to agree with Bullet, if you're going to do a piece of journalism to that size and scale, some of your interviewees will end up being grumpy. I don't see anything there which invalidates any of O'Hagan's work.
 
Back