oh god what have I done: 2015
LONGS
I made a bracket to determine the best Kanye West song, so far. I started working on this in December of last year, and Matter very nearly held this article until Kanye’s new album came out. The bracket got Approval Matrix’d in NYMag, where they called it “almost too thorough”; literally, have you met me.
I covered a side battle in the Content Wars. Many people came to me to say “but what if I didn’t agree to see ads” or “adapt or die” or “things can only change for the better.” Those people are dead now, maybe; I can’t say for sure because I blocked them all.
I wrote about Russia’s Mark Zuckerberg, Pavel Durov, and the time the Russian government came literally banging on his door trying to shut down his social network.
I learned that true crime exists to teach women that they deserve all of the garbage that happens to them.
I also learned that Kickstarter’s delivery delays are rough but crowdfunding gives opportunities to the people VCs usually dismiss or ignore.
I made my uneasy peace with house centipedes. Now everyone messages me every time they see a house centipede, and I can appreciate the irony.
I started the work of cutting through all of the bullshit marketing and “science” surrounding beauty products for The Sweethome. We published guides to eyeliner, mascara, and sunscreen.
EDIT 12/23: The Awl’s year-end theme was Save Yourself, so I took this extremely seriously and wrote about my most catastrophic regret and what I have (or haven’t, really) learned from it.
SHORTS
I broke the news that all the iPhone apps that you can’t delete are made for rich people.
I can write tech jokes and make fun of men at the same time; call me.
I made the greatest mistake of my life, which was watching the first episode of Season 2 of True Detective. I punished myself for this by watching the rest of the episodes of Season 2 of True Detective and forcing myself to distill them to their putrid essence. “These contracts… there are signatures all over them.”
I patented a method for making your phone unusable during times when you shouldn’t be using it, like vacation or three day weekends. Dig up your little mind-ruts.
I’ve been a morning person for two decades and shared some of my secrets. Many mornings I get up at 2AM.
People kept saying “I wrote the article” to me for a long time after this happened. Somewhat fewer people actually read the article.
