Assorted links from week48 to 49, 2024

🖼 I first saw Ian’s answer directly on Twitter. The whole thing sounds like poetry to me. Of course I’ve shared many of his influences growing up -starting with skateboarding- so I understand his language. Moreover, with Objet, we're allowing people to imbue their clothing with stories and memories. So the whole ‘storytelling’ part of this makes just total sense. Why Collect Digital Art? What Do You Believe?

Basquiat's work increases in value because the number of people who know the story increases while the supply does not. Luxury brands are trading on heritage and storytelling, not only products.

🎻 Talking about stories and memories, I’ve found Zach’s story about “a family treasure” so beautiful: The Violin. It’s also an ode to craftsmanship and I share Zach’s conclusion: ‘we need more people like Aaron’.

Assorted links from week47, 2024

🪩🗽🪡 aaaaand Mathilde did it again: this time with a behind-the-scenes from our latest Objet soirée in NYC -first one in the big apple, definitely not the last I can promise you.

is throwing a party 3,800mi from home (vs 5,800mi) easier? let's find out

🛌 💤 latest instalment of the Objet column in Dirt with Erin Somers on sleepwalking, surveillance delusions, and the anxieties of adulthood: The Sleep Mask.

Assorted links from week45 to 46, 2024

🪩 Mathilde delivered another behind-the-scene from our Objet soirée n°2 in SF early Oct in the Objet journal: it's happening in about 48h!

To get an idea of who we are (sometimes a bit crazy but lovely overall) and discourage you from throwing events 5 800 miles from home.

🍄🍳 The Obet column in Dirt never disappoints. Akosua on micro-utopias, going Matilda-mode, and embracing her consumerist impulses: The Milk Pan.

Facebook-Meta: the company that connected the world

No-one can underestimate the global -and most probably long-lasting- impact of Facebook. 4 billion -with a b- monthly active users across Meta's family of apps -which includes Facebook, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram. It's hard for the brain to grasp such numbers. The global population is around 8b. 3 billion -still with a b- daily active users! Can we imagine? It literally means 3 billion people log in and actively use at least one of these apps daily 🤯

Never in the entire history of humanity something -an institution, a company, a government- reached such penetration on a global scale. Now imagine, the company is only 20 years old.

What's next for music?

Ted Gioia -or The Honest Broker; which I highly recommend- posted a few days ago: Nine Predictions for the Future of the Music Business. First I'd suggest a 10th prediction: a new cohort of companies cooperatively owned by the artists themselves, the workers and/ or the community.

Two recent examples I'm very excited about: Hearing Things -or the next cooperatively owned Pitchfork [i.e. music journalism]; and Subvert -launching today; join me and many other artists, labels and supporters and become a founding member- or a collectively owned Bandcamp successor [i.e. online record store and music community].

A Concert - attributed to Granddaughters of Dr. Samuel Parr - The MET

Kids screen time is an urbanism problem

This summer, I went to a nice space in SF named Founders, Inc. -in a quite amazing spot in the city by the way: Fort Mason; with a very 'San-Franciscan' view- listen to a live discussion between Ryan Hoover and Furqan.

Something Ryan said stuck with me since then: 'adjacent 2nd order impact'. As a non-human bot gently detailed it for us: "Second-order effects, also known as second-order consequences, refer to the indirect or ripple effects that occur as a result of an action or decision, which may not be immediately apparent. While first-order effects are the direct outcomes of an action, second-order effects are the subsequent changes that result from those initial outcomes.".

My mind started to wonder constantly about possible second-order effects around us. Two topics close to hearts -for obvious reasons- are: kids [I'm a father after all] and urbanism [I've lived all my life in urban areas and I'm a skateboarder, so my natural 'playground' are the streets]. Meanwhile, I was living this summer a kinda perfect suburban life in Berkeley, CA. Here are some behind-the-scenes pics and details by Mathilde if curious.

So when Steyn published his view on screen time limit -tl;dr: they've never enforced screen time limits on their kids [now 5 and 3 yo]- and then shared it on the #parent-lounge channel from the Sublime slack [oof] it occurred to me: kids screen time might just be an urbanism problem.

Jump Rope, from The Games of the Urchins of Paris - 1770 - by Jean-Baptiste Tilliard - artic

Assorted links from week41, 2024

😇 Many things in this ‘30 values, beliefs, and other ideas’ by Jackson resonated: Things to Remember.

It all comes down to love and gratitude. Happiness is love, full stop.

👧👦 Mathilde insisted I read that one and it’s a must-read indeed. Freya dug into ‘our broken homes’ and how it affected -more than we might think- an entire generation. The subtitle itself is powerful: ‘we simply don’t believe anyone will stay’ -it gives me goosebumps. As a young father of two who grew up in a very broken home -no father and a hard-working mum who didn’t have any bandwidth most of the time- that post feels quite special. The Age of Abandonment.

Throughout history our ancestors built customs and institutions to bind us together and then, one by one, we kicked them down. We killed God, we mocked marriage, we attacked the family, we uprooted neighbourhoods, we debunked every last myth and story. And we kept going and going, until we got here, with our sad little divorce parties. Until we got here, with a generation huddled, heartbroken, fearful of love, fearful of life, kicking away at anything that reaches out to help. We lifted the burden from adults, told parents to do what makes them happy, forgetting that those structures weren’t just limits on adult freedom; they were foundations for children to stand on, to step off from, on which they depended. We shattered them and now we wonder why a generation is falling apart. Welcome to the age of abandonment.

Shimayama-san behind the counter of his tiny shop in Akihabara, Tokyo, which he ran for 43 years. Photo by Lee Chapman

Assorted links from week39 to 40, 2024

🪡 🌁 Last week was special with Objet -we threw our second soirée in SF on Friday and got lucky to see some great folks share the love.

What Saumya and Colt are building is so important. Check their work out: Build IRL Newsletter #22. And especially if you’re living in SF, they always share some cool events you can join. That’s how I knew about the new IRL Movie Club for instance and got to watch the Join or Die documentary.

I can’t agree more with Caitlin and really liked her invitation to move from volume to value: Less Volume, More Value. I also agree with her ‘medium-hot take’: “volume-based growth lacks imagination”.

🍄 👜 Dirt also introduced their new column -Objet- in collaboration with us. They’ve asked five writers to write about a single object that is significant to them and will be publishing these essays in the coming months. For its first: Marlowe Granados on the cathartic potential of a second-hand bag: The Bakelite Bag.

I like to think of them [old things] as talismans of the past. I don’t just put them on display but use them as they were made to be used.

There’s also a sense that whatever it witnessed through my ownership is just a minor chapter in the bag’s life. It holds my secrets but also the mysteries of those that came before me. I can only hope to pass it on as the common thread between me and generations of stylish women.