As for the awe he inspires himself, Christgau’s devotees are smaller in number these days than in his Voice years, but they’re still extraordinarily dedicated, particularly among a small community who came together in the comments section of Expert Witness, the MSN blog he started after leaving the Voice. (He’s since moved on to the Medium site Cuepoint.) “The Witnesses are the greatest experience of my professional life,” Christgau says. “Most of them are very married kind of guys, but I’m so very married that it makes sense.”
Internet
Posted inNonfiction, Profiles & Interviews, Unapologetic Women
‘Garbage Comments Cheapen My Work’: Journalist Eva Holland on Freelancing and Commenters
Eva Holland is a journalist based in the Yukon who has written for publications including Pacific Standard and SB Nation. Her latest Longreads Original, “‘It’s Yours’,” explores the life (and maybe death) of an internet commenter community, “the Horde,” that Ta-Nehisi Coates helped foster at The Atlantic. I spoke with her via email about her […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
‘If You Think The Internet Is Terrible Now, Just Wait a While’
I have previously shared with you Balk’s Law (“Everything you hate about The Internet is actually everything you hate about people”) and Balk’s Second Law (“The worst thing is knowing what everyone thinks about anything”). Here I will impart to you Balk’s Third Law: “If you think The Internet is terrible now, just wait a […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
Link Rot, or Why the Web May Be Killing Footnotes
The Web dwells in a never-ending present. It is—elementally—ethereal, ephemeral, unstable, and unreliable. Sometimes when you try to visit a Web page what you see is an error message: “Page Not Found.” This is known as “link rot,” and it’s a drag, but it’s better than the alternative. More often, you see an updated Web […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Old Music Industry: ‘A System Specifically Engineered to Waste the Band’s Money’
During the 90s there was something of an arms race to see who could write the biggest deal. That is, the deal with the most money being spent on the band’s behalf. In a singularly painless contest the money would either be paid to the band as a royalty, which would take that money out […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Pre-Internet Small Town
Mary Karr, in The Paris Review, on her small-town roots.
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
When the Internet Takes Away Our Paul Newman
Building up to 2005, [Tom] Cruise had tackled some of the most challenging dramas of any actor of his generation: Eyes Wide Shut, Magnolia, Vanilla Sky. Even his popcorn flicks — Minority Report,Collateral, War of the Worlds — were intriguingly dark. He’d never played it safe or shot a cash-grab. He trusted that if he chose movies he believed in, the […]
Posted inUncategorized
Reading List: Brave New Internet
Emily Perper is a freelance editor and reporter, currently completing a service year in Baltimore with the Episcopal Service Corps. 1. “The Vice Guide to the World.” (Lizzie Widdicombe, The New Yorker, 8 April 2013) “My big thing was I want you to do stupid in a smart way and smart in a stupid way.” […]
Posted inUncategorized
Reading List: Brave New Internet
Emily Perper is a freelance editor and reporter, currently completing a service year in Baltimore with the Episcopal Service Corps. 1. “The Vice Guide to the World.” (Lizzie Widdicombe, The New Yorker, 8 April 2013) “My big thing was I want you to do stupid in a smart way and smart in a stupid way.” […]