WR Long shots and flu shots
Posted: 23th Feburary 2020
Are you a budding dictator? If so, piss off. If not but you're interested in the failure modes of such how the coronavirus revealed authoritarianism’s fatal flaw by Zeynep Tufekci is for you. This is a great piece looking at how the punishment of dissent and rumours weakened China's response to coronavirus. I find this sort of analysis fascinating because it's a great example of how the values of different systems encourage different behaviours (in this case how fear of reporting failure outweighs the advantage of honest reporting).
The Mandalorian: this is the way by Jay Holben. This is a long read (eight-thousand words by my count) but well worth it if you like getting behind-the-scenes. It's a deep dive into how, when making The Mandalorian[1], they used a massive circular[2] LED screen in place of more "traditional" greenscreens. As well as being a great write-up of some mad technology this really explores the pros, cons and why of the system as well as getting into how it changed the series' production overall.
Finally, talking of film, if you "enjoy" gory psychological horror I really recommend Midsommar. Directed by Ari Aster it's a fairly standard "don't join a cult, m'kay" story but what sets it apart is some utterly beautiful cinematography and sound design. Content note for suicide, unhealthy relationships and gore.