Category: Culture

  • Tempest on a Toy Box

    Mattel printed the wrong URL on the back of the boxes of toys for the new “Wicked” movie, which was not good, but just how bad was it? Lady Sneerwell in Sheridan’s School for Scandal observes, “There’s no possibility of being witty without a little ill-nature: the malice of a good thing is the barb that makes…

  • Why Musk Supports Trump

    It has little to do with politics. I’m a fan of Arlie Russell Hochschild’s work. Her brilliant 2016 book, Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, explored how a Tea Party community in Lake Charles, Louisiana, came to hold their political views, which became important in the weeks after the 2016…

  • Are There Unpersuadable People?

    In this election season when we’re all getting hundreds of daily messages attempting to persuade us, most aren’t effective. I return to earlier work about persuasion with new thoughts. I’ve been writing about persuasion for years, long before the birth of The Dispatch. Back in August of 2023, I tried to decant a lot of my…

  • Retro Futures: War Games

    Can a 1983 movie thriller about computers and the military tell us anything about drone warfare today?  In 1984, my lifelong friend Juliet and I were watching a then-recent movie, War Games, at my parents’ house. This was in the early years of home video. The first Blockbuster store had yet to open, and Tim Berners-Lee…

  • Mr. Hyde’s Letter, a Microfiction

    What happens when a man takes medication to change his personality, but the new personality has his own opinions? Timothy’s constipated mind pushed to slow, thick wakefulness. Only a wail from his bladder stopped him from plummeting back to sleep. He felt his way to the toilet and sat, too groggy to aim. A long…

  • Serendipity Engines

    In commerce, there’s an incalculable difference between search and discovery. Discovery requires serendipity, and there’s no better source of serendipity than independent bookstores. Wednesday, I was in Eugene, a small Oregon city a couple hours south of Portland. I dropped into the legendary Smith Family Bookstore, where I found a $4.00 copy of Violent Spring by Gary Phillips,…

  • Cheating at Wordle

    In which I confess to a weak moment that also has some interesting implications, or at least that’s what I’m telling myself. Bless me, Reader, for I have sinned. La Profesora and I aren’t competitive when the stakes are real, but this mutual support does not apply to vicious games of Gin Rummy or to…

  • What is Real?

    Generative AI makes it effortless to create photorealistic images (and soon videos), but sometimes the question is more complicated than whether something is fake. I belonged to a fraternity in college. This often surprises folks until they learn that the house in question was a co-ed literary society that fans of the Revenge of the Nerds…

  • Jokes, Puns, Politics, and Other Nonsense

    Why do we laugh at jokes but groan at puns? And what does this have to do with politics and Experience Stacks? (Issue #109) Here’s a puzzler: why do we laugh at jokes but groan at puns? I admit this is an overgeneralization. Not every joke is funny, and not every pun is groan worthy, but it’s not a…

  • Experience Stacks and Matthew Perry (R.I.P.)

    When social media surfaced a clip of the late “Friends” star on “The West Wing,” it activated crashing contexts that explain how Experience Stacks work and why they can be powerful. I am more aware of Matthew Perry after his premature death last October than I ever was while he was still alive. In part…