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Some helpful tips from the Oregon Health Authority for the spooky season
posted by OverlappingElvis at 9:37 PM PST - 14 comments

Dodgers Win the World Series After Years of Frustration. A win against the Rays in Game 6 sealed the franchise’s first title in 32 years and compensated for several postseason disappointments in recent years. "The same manager that left Tyler Glasnow out there to die for 112 pitches when he didn’t have it took Blake Snell out of an elimination game when he had a 2-hit shutout going at 73 pitches with the part of the order coming up that was 0-for-6 with 6 strikeouts on the night. How." Twitter melts down over TB pulling Snell due to ... analytics?
posted by geoff. at 8:45 PM PST - 34 comments

Seattle-based collective Polyrhythmics specializes in a flavorful blend of progressive funk, psychedelic rock, and modern afro-beat. As Troy Nelson explains in this week’s episode of Live on KEXP, it’s music for the "heads.” Their songs take time to unravel, rewarding patient listeners with a lush and intricate experience that defies the current song trends for something more gratifying. When the world is a whirlwind, don’t forget– take the time to let something develop. [about 30 minutes] [more inside]
posted by hippybear at 7:39 PM PST - 6 comments

Four scifi stories about jobs, loyalty, and navigating difficult politics and priorities. In the happiest of the four, "Happenstance" by Fran Wilde (2017), an engineer of serendipity has to subvert residents' expectations and a skeevy executive's plans. "Sweet Marrow" by Vajra Chandrasekera (2016) (audio) portrays the fraught relationship between a journalist and a government worker in a turbulent time. "Exile’s End" by Carolyn Ives Gilman (August 2020) is "a complex, sometimes uncomfortable examination of artifact repatriation and cultural appropriation." And in "Thank You For Your Patience" by Rebecca Campbell (March 2020), Mark's stuck doing tech support while the world slow-motion falls apart outside.
posted by brainwane at 6:37 PM PST - 5 comments

The long-running UK avant music festival TUSK moved to an online streaming format this year in early October. They've posted the sets on their YouTube channel.

Some highlights: Eiko Ishibashi & Jim O'Rourke • The Dead C. (set one | set two) • Horse Lords • Matana Roberts • Crank Sturgeon • Blood Stereo [more inside]
posted by porn in the woods at 3:09 PM PST - 12 comments

In three books and a series of essays, Hartman has explored the interior lives of enslaved people and their descendants, employing a method that she says “troubles the line between history and imagination.” Her iconoclastic thinking on the legacy of slavery in American life has prefigured the current cultural moment. In 2008, five years before Black Lives Matter was founded, she wrote of “a past that has yet to be done, and the ongoing state of emergency in which black life remains in peril.” Her writing has become a lodestar for a generation of students and, increasingly, for politically engaged people outside the academy.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 2:25 PM PST - 3 comments

"My son Akash represents our fourth generation in this occupation," Ashok Yadav told me. "My grandfather was the first in our family to take up tuning and repairing harmoniums - a skill he learned from musical instrument shop owners in Jabalpur 60-70 years ago. In those days, far more people were into classical music and playing harmoniums. This skill earned our landless family a living." [more inside]
posted by smcg at 12:40 PM PST - 10 comments

Ballrooms, Carriages, and Luxury Cottages During Trump's Term, Millions of Government and GOP Dollars Have Flowed to His Properties (WaPo)
posted by box at 12:03 PM PST - 36 comments

When (and why) right-wing conspiracy theories converge with faux-progressive wellness utopianism. A weekly podcast hosted by Derek Beres, Matthew Remski and Julian Walker whose experiences as cult survivors and yoga teachers inform their insights. In addition to the podcast and the extensive notes for each episode, resources include Redpilled , an "ever-growing list of wellness industry figures that have posted, shared, or explicitly created QAnon-related content." [more inside]
posted by spamandkimchi at 10:56 AM PST - 58 comments

There's an update on this previous post about fanfic tropes that the NYT wrote about this past May, about a situation involving copyright law and DMCA takedowns and accusations of DMCA takedown abuse within publishing for a somewhat niche genre. ('Omegaverse' wolf-related porn.) Author Addison Cain and her publisher levied accusations of copyright infringement against author Zoe Ellis, and hijinks have, as the kids say, ensued. Media critic Lindsay Ellis (previously), no relation to Zoe Ellis, posted this video about the whole situation last month, which lays things out pretty well. Addison Cain's lawyer mailed her about it with further accusations of copyright infringement and sent DMCA takedowns. Lindsay Ellis has posted her video response.
posted by rmd1023 at 10:37 AM PST - 14 comments

You may remember Russian propaganda campaigns from the 2016 US presidential election, but did you know operations really kicked into gear after the election of Trump? Things look a little different in 2020, but that is likely how the story will go this time, too. [more inside]
posted by Lonnrot at 10:21 AM PST - 25 comments

What could make you walk miles across a landscape full of Ice Age predators, all alone except for the toddler you’re carrying? Archaeologists recently discovered a long trail of footprints left behind by someone brave enough—or desperate enough—to undertake the journey. A typical teenager’s stroll: Carrying a baby and dodging mammoths [Ars Technica]
posted by chavenet at 7:12 AM PST - 9 comments

Anna Wiener profiles Moxie Marlinspike (The New Yorker), founder of the end-to-end encrypted messaging service Signal, exploring his path from Silicon Valley anarchist groups to ethical hacking, working for Twitter following the acquisition of his startup Whisper Systems, to the development of the Signal Protocol, now used in WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Skype. [more inside]
posted by adrianhon at 2:59 AM PST - 34 comments