OMM – September 2024 – #3
~ a curated selection of discoveries ~
::: The Open :::
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoy this weekly newsletter (published on Sundays).
If you’re a subscriber, please consider reaching out to a friend you think may enjoy this newsletter and encourage them to sign up.
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I’ll be just as happy if you donate to ONE ART: a journal of poetry.
Thank you for reading and for your time.
With Gratitude,
~ Mark
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Please Note:
This newsletter is typically too long to appear in its entirety in an email. Please click through to Substack to read in full.
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::: Personal Notes :::
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You might be seeing a few more posts than usual from me in the coming weeks as I just lost my primary income stream. This happens in the world of freelancing since you’re a “hired gun”.
Given this unfortunate news… I’m more available than usual for assisting others with their literary and academic work. I like to joke that I’ve [sort of] earned quite a few PhDs in my years of assistance with structural and developmental dissertation editing. Of course, there’s only so much I can offer when it comes to the content editing aspects given that I’m not a Subject Matter Expert (SME) in most disciplines.
Learn more about my expertise on VRS CRFT – my poetry editing/coaching/mentorship business.
For information purposes, you can check out my Reedsy profile. I don’t love working through Reedsy as they take a hefty fee for using their service.
Here's my professional website. You can check out a bit of my copywriting/content writing /blogs/articles here.
You will not be surprised to learn that poetry is where I feel the most qualified to be of assistance.
You may be surprised to learn that I feel equally qualified to assist with nonfiction and memoir. I acted as co-editor for Nonfiction for the Schuylkill Valley Journal for many years while I held my title as Managing Editor.
I also briefly held an SVJ position as [interim] Fiction Editor. I can certainly help you with your fiction though that is not my greatest strength, overall. I spent many years believing (like many) that I would be a fiction writer (not a poet) and so I wrote quite a bit of [terrible] fiction—specifically short stories (and, sigh, of course, a few failed novel starts). Luckily, in this instance, not everything survives on the internet so there’s not much you’re going to be able to track down.
Have questions? Feel free to reach out!
Have job ideas? Feel free to share :)
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::: ONE ART :::
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Screw the Rules—Let’s Just Write
Instructor: Kari Gunter-Seymour
Date: Tuesday, September 17, 2024
Time: 6:00-8:00pm (Eastern)
Price: $25 (payment options)
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From Personal to Universal: Using Emotion to Craft Deeper Writing
Instructor: Karen Paul Holmes
Thursday, October 3, 7:00-9:00pm (Eastern)
Duration: 2 hours
Price: $25 (payment options)
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Be sure to check back as more workshops are going to be added soon!
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Save The Date(s)! If a link to tickets is not yet available– don’t worry! It will be closer to the event.
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Thursday, October 10 — 7pm (Eastern)
Featured Poets: Donna Hilbert, Bonnie Proudfoot, Tamara Madison
Tickets available here (Free or Donation)
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Sunday, October 27 — 7pm (Eastern)
Featured Poets: Ace Boggess, CL Bledsoe, Anton Yakovlev, Jason Gordy Walker
Tickets available here (Free or Donation)
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::: Podcasts :::
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NPR Planet Money’s The Indicator – The Denver basic income experiment
This is a less than 10 minute listen – even shorter if you skip through commercials. Gives you lots to think about.
I still really miss Cardiff Garcia as a host of The Indicator.
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LitHub has a new podcast. It remains to be seen if it will be any good.
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::: Music :::
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Not that you needed to hear this from me… or Pitchfork… but…
‘Taylor Swift Endorses Kamala Harris for President’
Taylor endorsed Kamala right after Harris handily defeated Trump on the debate stage.
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‘Linkin Park Selects Emily Armstrong as Singer, Plots Tour and Album’ (Variety)
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‘This Hip-Hop Album Just Became the First to Spend 700 Weeks on the Billboard 200’ (Billboard)
A few points for Eminem (who, at age 51 is still working on growing up).
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It’s not what it sounds like from the headline.
‘English Teacher Win 2024 Mercury Prize’ (Stereogum)
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The debate continues about whether or not Taylor Swift will publicly announce her support of Kamala Harris.
‘Swifties for… How Swifties Are Impacting The 2024 Election’ (The Zillennial Zine)
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‘Ye’s Return to China After 16 Years: Questions Remain as Planned Listening Party Experience Nears’ (Complex)
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"By China's conservative social values, Ye is an outright misfit," one fan commented on Weibo, China's equivalent to X." (CNBC)
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::: The Literary Community & Beyond :::
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‘Money, Merit, and the Economy of Favors: Three Proposals to Improve Class Diversity in the Literary Community’ by Brandon North (Cleveland Review of Books)
Shout-out to Becky Tuch of LitMagNews for calling attention to this excellent piece.
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‘Scenes From The Literary Blacklist: Widespread censorship is killing writers’ careers before they begin.’ (persuasion)
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'Why and Where You Should Start Submitting Your Writing This September' (Authors Publish)
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I’ve mentioned it before but I recommend signing up for George Bilgere’s Poetry Town daily newsletter.
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‘The 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective Writers: Powerful Lessons in Personal Sabotage’ (Joni B. Cole featured in Jane Friedman’s blog.
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::: Health & Wellness :::
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‘An extremely practical guide to this year’s cold, flu, and Covid season’ (Vox)
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‘The Novavax Heterologous Coronavirus Disease 2019 Booster Demonstrates Lower Reactogenicity Than Messenger RNA: A Targeted Review’
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‘Books in, screens out: some Finnish pupils go back to paper after tech push’ (Reuters)
“Minna Peltopuro, a clinical neuropsychologist working with the town on the change, said the total screen time should be cut to a minimum - Finnish teenagers currently stare at screen for up to six hours per day on average - as excessive digital use comes with both physical and mental risks, such as eye problems and growing anxiety.”
"Another one is multi-tasking," Peltopuro said. "The brain is very vulnerable to multi-tasking and especially at a young age one cannot manage it well."
Note: American pre-teens and teenagers have been reported to spend something like 14 hours a day on screens… so… this is really something for the U.S. to consider in a very serious way.
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Airpods as hearing aids.
‘Apple gets FDA authorization to turn the AirPods Pro into hearing aids’ (The Verge)
I’m not quite clear on how this will work… but the reduction in stigma is good news.
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Black Americans are 2X more likely to be vegan. Are restaurants, grocery stores keeping up? (wyso)
“A Pew Research Center study found that 8% of Black people identify as vegan or vegetarian in comparison to only 3% of the general population.”
Shout-out to Louisa Schnaithmann for sending this article my way!
We have a sizable Black Muslim community in Philly and that means restaurants like The Nile Café (vegan soul food) which is super good and I wish I had frequented more often during my years living in the Germantown section of Philadelphia.
A notable piece because there’s been an overall decline in the number of Americans who are vegan or vegetarian since the spike of interest in plant-based meats you may recall from early pandemic era. Stats vary widely but, as of 2023 data, some 4-5% of Americans say they are vegetarian (and are more likely flexitarian). Only about 1% of Americans are true vegans even though Fox News will have you believe they are about to overthrow the government and force you to live off tofu.
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::: Small Explorations & Deep Dives :::
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The Election
Do not believe the polls.
Why? It’s typically very close. And with Trump in the picture, it’s important for Harris to win by more than a slim margin.
Put simply: We must assume it remains a close race until it’s a won race.
We cannot risk complacency.
Yes, voter suppression is real. Regardless, we need Democrats to turn out at the polls on election day. Republicans will turn out. This fight goes beyond politics. The danger cannot be overstated.
We need to win this one.
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The Peter Principle is alive and well.
It helps if the people at the top are… ridiculous.
‘Trump says he will tap Musk to lead government efficiency commission if elected’ (Reuters)
“Trump did not detail how such a commission would operate, besides saying it would develop a plan to eliminate "fraud and improper payments" within six months of being formed.”
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2024 YouGov Brand Rankings
Ok… this kind of poll is a bit different.
“Only 29% of brands are considered bipartisan, according to a new report by survey firm YouGov.”
It’s true, more Liberals have cats. About 8% more. And about 5% more Conservatives have dogs.
Did you know HBO is considered very liberal?
The Washington Post (WaPo) is considered more liberal than the NY Times according to this poll.
Bass Pro Shops is for Conservatives… so if you’re wearing one of those hats because it’s cheap and was trending on TikTok…
Twitter (uhh, “X”) has a pretty good “impression” according to Conservatives.
Conservatives and Liberals don’t even want to drink the same booze in the current political climate. This really emphasizes the degree of the divide. (I’m not joking.)
Apparently, Conservatives have something against eating hummus.
Unsurprisingly, Liberals are more likely to use Progressive insurance.
It remains unclear to me why Conservatives take such issue with PBS. Takes being anti-intellectual to a bizarre level.
Conservatives like brands that have flirted with controversy or been outright controversial… but in a certain type of way. In some instances, it’s just liking the haters (Hobby Lobby, Chick-fil-a, Papa John’s).
Oddly, more Liberals are into using Google Docs. Don’t quite get why that would be partisan.
Ditto Reddit (because being a jerk on the internet does not require any special affiliations)
Anything vaguely foreign (IKEA) is less liked by Conservatives compared to something that seems All-American (Folger’s). Doesn’t matter if the product is quality.
Animal Crossing is a video game for Liberals. Because of course it is.
An interesting section is on “bipartisan” brands. These include: American Eagle, KFC, Enterprise car rentals, Best Western, MLB, Amazon, Capital One, Jeep, Aldi, Charles Schwab, Verizon Wireless, Wells Fargo.
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'The gender wage gap just widened for the first time in 20 years' (Axios)
"Men's median earnings rose 3% last year, compared to 1.5% for women."
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Really good piece from Vox’s Future Perfect—
‘I can’t take care of all my mom’s needs. Am I a monster?’
What’s impressive is approaching the position from many value sets, moral-ethical frameworks. It’s not just letting someone off the hook but explaining why our society has been structured in such a way that we have to make complicated decisions that cannot be trumped by ideas devised at a time when our current reality could not possibly have been comprehended.
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I love a good heist film…
Here’s a regular person trying a heist— ‘FBI busts musician’s elaborate AI-powered $10M streaming-royalty heist’ (Ars Technica)
Points for being clever. This beats the idea in Office Space.
One of the typical lessons is Don’t be greedy.
I’m not in the business of providing heist advice, to be clear. If I were though, I’d advise against running a scheme for a prolonged period of time. That’s not wise.
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‘Imports make up growing share of U.S. fresh fruit and vegetable supply’ (USDA)
Half the fruit and veg eaten in the U.S. is not grown in the U.S.
This feels similar to concerns that we don’t make enough of our pharmaceuticals here in the U.S. An issue that’s become clear due to shortages due as a result of supply chain issues.
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Scientists keep discovering more cool animals. Australia is just one example.
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‘Eleven Predictions: Here's What AI Does Next’ (Ted Gioia)
Scary. Much of this sounds possible if not likely.
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You need safe words.
‘Defend Yourself against AI Impostor Scams with a Safe Word’ (Scientific American)
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‘The 20 Most-Googled Text Abbreviations’ (Mental Floss)
Aw, dang, I didn’t know too many of these…
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‘Feeding the algorithm’ (Seth Godin)
“Feeding the algorithm works when you’re the only one doing it. It works when you seek to fit right into the middle of the lane. And it works if you’re willing to outfeed everyone else–at least until the algorithm changes.”
“But while someone is going to win that lottery, it’s probably not going to be you.”
“The alternative is to be uncomfortable. To create remarkable work and leave scale to others. To figure out how to show up in a way that is generous and distinctive, and to refuse the bait that others take when they decide that feeding the algorithm is their best option.”
“They call it ‘crowd control’ for a reason. If you’re in a crowd, it’s quite likely someone is trying to control you.”
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The following is why I’ve wanted a slightly larger vehicle since 2016 (after a bad accident)… but I couldn’t afford one.
“Americans tend to believe in going big. This works out well for lumberjack breakfasts and flat-screen TVs, but it can create safety issues when it comes to cars, which keep getting heavier. Nearly 79% of the US’ new car sales through last month were SUVs and trucks, per Motorintelligence.com. Heavier cars like pickups and SUVs can be safer for the people in them but not for pedestrians or smaller cars in collisions. That’s why yesterday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said it’s proposing new rules aimed at bigger cars that would require special safety testing to minimize pedestrian head injuries—and it says they’ll prevent 67 deaths a year. But it’s not just pedestrians who big cars can harm: The Economist analyzed data from 7.5 million two-vehicle crashes and found that getting hit by an extra 1,000 pounds of car—about the difference between an SUV and a compact car—increases the likelihood of death by 66%.” (Morning Brew)
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Oh, how we love the “water bear”
‘Among the Moss Piglets: The First Image of a Tardigrade (1773)’ (The Public Domain Review)
“This apparent ferocity aside, the tardigrades seemed a little inept. They would mostly lie on their backs, waving their arms slowly. Goeze wasn’t quite sure how they managed to do anything except cling to duckweed, despite their many sharp claws. He tried to flip one right side up and gave another more water to see if it could swim, but in vain. One tardigrade snagged another microscopic creature with its foot by mistake. When it got free, the escapee swam away slowly and died — its apparent suffering convinced Goeze that even the smallest creatures could feel pain.”
Beautiful writing.
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AI news…
“OpenAI is set to release a new AI model that works differently from the ones that currently power ChatGPT. Code named Strawberry, it has better reasoning capabilities than its predecessor, according to The Information. Don’t get too excited. It takes around 20 seconds to answer a question and only does text. But it could be a seed of something sweet down the road.” (Semafor)
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“The US government is considering allowing Nvidia to export advanced chips to Saudi Arabia, people familiar with the matter said, which would help the country train and run the most powerful AI models.” (Semafor)
I can’t emphasize enough how this is a TERRIBLE idea. Giving the Saudis any chance of competing in the AI race has the potential for disastrous outcomes. Suppose they are the first to create Artificial General intelligence (AGI). We’re talking about the ability to remake the world in the image of your ideologies.
It’s not just Saudi Arabia. You can bring to mind multiple other countries who you would prefer not to have any additional sway on the world stage.
I don’t like that we’re racing at all. But the technocrats are not going to let another billionaire get there before they do… so Elon, Zuck, Bezos and all the other crazies are going to try their best get there first.
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“The cost of rent rose faster than home values for the first time in a decade.” (WaPo)
So… people can’t afford homes and rent is becoming unaffordable.
We need to address this sooner rather than later.
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Vox dives into possible reasons rent may be increasing.
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‘The Core ‘Friend Group’ Is a Myth—and It’s Making Us Feel Bad About Ourselves’ (SELF)
“Just how unrealistic is the expectation that we should be part of a well-defined circle of buddies? According to one 2023 survey by the Pew Research Center, 53% of people in the US say they have between one and four close friends, while 8% say they have none at all.”
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‘Meet the winners of the 2024 Ig Nobel Prizes’ (Ars Technica)
And yet the NEA has to fight hard for a tiny slice of the pie.
Really though… the Ig Noble prizes are fun.
“Established in 1991, the Ig Nobels are a good-natured parody of the Nobel Prizes; they honor "achievements that first make people laugh and then make them think."”
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‘Republicans fear Laura Loomer is influencing Donald Trump’ (Semafor)
Loomer sounds like a real joy to hang around.
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Hyperloop.
“Will America ever get a Hyperloop? The answer is: maybe. Packing people into underground shuttles like sardines and then firing them through airless tunnels at untold speeds may seem bizarre (or even deeply undesirable) to people like you and me, but a cadre of scientists, corporations, and tech billionaires still think that it’s the future of travel, for some reason.” (Gizmodo)
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::: Google Search Trends :::
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“dead butt syndrome”
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“dark empath”
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Worldwide, fact-checking reached a 10+ year high
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“the perfect couple” was the top trending show
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Top searched VMA performances
past week, US
1. Chappell Roan
2. Katy Perry
3. Sabrina Carpenter
4. Eminem
5. Benson Boone
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Top trending VMA red carpet looks
past week, US
1. Chappell Roan
2. Taylor Swift
3. Taylor Momsen
4. Sabrina Carpenter
5. Lenny Kravitz
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::: News of the Weird :::
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Viral Temu “Croissant Lamp” … is more croissant than lamp.
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Blue pigeon… by Banksy?
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South Korea is seeing a surge in dog strollers.
Frankly, so are the boujee areas in the Greater Philadelphia Area… but whatever.
“South Koreans bought more dog strollers than baby strollers last year, as the country declared a “demographic national emergency” over its plummeting birth rate. Sales of dog buggies, which retail for as much as $1,100, have quadrupled since 2019, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
Ironically…
“President Yoon Suk-yeol in June announced a new ministry to tackle the “existential crisis” — despite himself having no children, but a menagerie of at least 10 dogs and cats.”
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“On every Friday the 13th … The world’s economy apparently loses about $900 million because people are afraid to work and travel on this date” (RD)
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Consistent Recommendations: _ last updated 8.21.24 _
Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American – daily news with historical context
ONE ART: a journal of poetry – daily poems
Verse Daily – daily poems
Chill Subs – down to earth submissions resource
** Want to subscribe? Get a discount using this ONE ART exclusive affiliate link.
Becky Tuch’s LitMagNews – literary community news & essential resource
Trish Hopkinson – resource for the literary community
Erika Dreifus – resource for the literary community
C. Hope Clark’s Funds for Writers –weekly email newsletter contains invaluable short essays
Jane Friedman – blog, email newsletter, resource for the literary community
The Poetry Space_ with Katie Dozier & Timothy Green (podcast)
Commonplace: Conversations with Poets and Other People (podcast hosted by Rachel Zucker)
The Gray Area with Sean Illing (podcast)
Hidden Brain (podcast)
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