Is The Big Chill the best ‘friends-reuniting’ movie of all-time?

In a potential low point for me, I watched the above movie — alternatively titled The Wedding Weekend or Shut Up And Sing — on Amazon Prime Video a couple of nights ago. Basic plot is that the guy from Royal Pains on USA Network gets… Continue Reading →

Your social world is basically structured like an onion, and the broad ability for changes and shifts isn’t really there

Felix Reed-Tsochas of Oxford University (video of him speaking embedded above) and five other academics have a new paper out which uses longer-term observational research on how we develop, and shift, our social circles over time. There’s a good write-up in The… Continue Reading →

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If you like beer, get yourself to Guangzhou, China

Americans lose their shit over cheap beer prices. If you ever meet someone from western New York state, they will — not a question of if, a question of when — tell you about Genny Cream Ale and how it’s something like… Continue Reading →

Goodnight, BCS: remembering perhaps the biggest debacle of them all (2001 with Miami, Colorado, Nebraska, Texas et al)

The BCS said goodbye last night with a doozy of a game — 24 points were scored in the final 5:15 — and actually, with a doozy of a BCS season overall (MSU-Stanford was great, UCF over Baylor was interesting… Continue Reading →

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One of the greatest challenges of our time? How to motivate employees aside from simple compensation models

There’s a profile of Mark Zuckerberg in The Wall Street Journal that’s getting some attention for a couple of different reasons: first off, Zuckerberg doesn’t do profiles very often, so the base idea is rare. Second off, it’s a wide-ranging portrait of… Continue Reading →

The Rapid Packing Container could change all our lives for the better

Henry Wang and Chris Curro of Cooper Union went and did the damn thing: they created a better, more effective cardboard box. This isn’t something that people often think of, but we use cardboard boxes for (a) basically every Amazon purchase… Continue Reading →

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The age of Mia Love is now upon us all

You may have heard that seven-term Utah Democrat Jim Matheson isn’t seeking an eighth term, because, as the National Republican Congressional Committee will tell you: “It’s telling that Matheson, who didn’t even vote for ObamaCare’s original passage, knows he can’t run and… Continue Reading →

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In which I actively consider quitting Facebook and the pros and cons therein (alternate title: the downfall of Americana)

I’ve been thinking about quitting Facebook a lot recently. In the last 2-3 weeks, it’s become almost more of a when, not if scenario. I still have some hesitations, which I’ll attempt to outline below, but I figured this was something worth discussing… Continue Reading →