the kids are ... okay? weird bootleg dating flyers, a friendship content round up, and other juice
No theme or curation just a bunch of stuff
Hello! It’s been two whole weeks. I’m slacking! I don’t have an excuse other than i’m very, very busy :’( Below are some things i’ve been thinking about, reading, or marinating on. As always please reply if anything strikes a chord <3
Just a provocative tweet that gets the people going.
What is up with this weird bootleg dating flyer marketing tactic in NYC.
(edit: updated this with this one I forgot to screenshot but that caught from !)
Anyway idk what this is all about, but make it stop. Or don’t? but at least admit you are advertising! say it with your chest!
We’re desiring food instead of eating it:
A look at the proliferation of food semiotics in fashion and advertising from itsnicethat. This has definitely been bubbling for a while and the tension of it blossoming in the boom era of GLP-1 innovations is… notable. I will add that the fetishization of fresh produce feels uniquely American, where the GMO’s run free and food deserts are likely within a short driving distance from you at any given time. Heirloom tomatoes cannot possibly be this serious anywhere else.
The Friendship Issue / Round-Up
I've seen a bunch of stories popping up about friendship recently, so here’s some links and thoughts in aggregate, for your gen z (and millenial, and gen x) insight slides;
NYT weighs in on ‘the vexing problem of the medium friend’
"Dunbar speculates that the ambiguity around the maintenance of medium friendship may be polite, but it is also selfish. His research has shown that people move friends out of the innermost circle extremely slowly, about one per decade. [..] But at the medium level, there’s a lot of churn. Young adults tend to turn over 30 to 40 percent of their medium friends annually, and although that pace slows with maturity, the principle remains."
Imagine my horror when I recently found out people actually consciously rank their friends this way, largely through the lens of wedding invitations (who warrants an invite and who doesnt). This feels deeply cursed to me but if it makes people happy then whatever.the immensely talented
discusses the loneliness of her generation and their evolving friendship codes:
"Many of us don’t have friends anymore; we have followers. We don’t deeply care about each other’s lives; we consume them as content. We don’t have people we can be vulnerable with; we have people who view our Stories. Nowadays we meet someone new and immediately exchange socials and end up committing to scrolling and skipping through each other’s lives, forever."A paper from two professors of social psychology uncovers that people are reluctant to reach back out to old friends - & suggests we’re more likely to if we “practice” the act.
the
“friendship theory of everything”, a very solid numbered list (& her discussion with about friendship here)
"Almost everyone who’s unhappy is unhappy because they feel isolated. The best cure for isolation is a strong friend group. So much of happiness is having someone you can get a last-minute dinner with on a Monday night, or ask to water your plants while you’re gone for a week.”
I’m tempted to couch some of this in a gender binary (its proven that women lean more/expect more of their friendships) but i also kind of think thats’ not true; men want deeper friendships too, and space to talk about more than sport or, for the dimes sq adjacent amongst us, inseams / pant widths (there was this piece about the male Friendship recession a while back). To put it succinctly, shit just seems kind of… bad? Most people i know would self describe as ‘lonely’, and want more out of their friendships or social circles but don’t seem to know how to create or find that. This may be a bias to my location in NYC, which is a very transient city at the best of times. So:
we have too many ‘medium’ friends and not enough good ones
wfh, social media, remote schooling, literally everything has changed the way we make new friends or manage our existing medium friends
we don’t really have the tools or language to talk about or through friendship (think about all the stuff like ‘love languages’ we project on our romantic relationships)
As a feel-good end to this topic, here’s a gorgeous article from the Guardian with some quotes from people describing their best friends.
Im loathe to quote Peter Thiel again, but here we are; on growing PayPals user base:
“Riches in the niches” is now my official beat/ethos. 20,000 eBay power sellers isn’t a huge target audience, but its the most important one. Please discourage your clients from going mass today. ❤️
Other random links:
Australia is experiencing a Femicide crisis and Instyle have published a feature about it.
Great review of the Sonos Ace, i am in love with mine.
Did you know you can book a MUJI house on Airbnb?
Morehouse are planning to use AI teaching assistants
Coupla social content ideas
Love this ‘overheard @ ’ video execution from Wimbledon. great way to engage the crowd at the events, no reliance on a-list talent, etc.
Auralee flying in the face of product perfection w a bunch of crumpled shirts. Why arent more clothing brands doing this? lived in, worn stuff.
the joe and the juice version of that:
this is definitely an undisclosed ad but it worked on me
Shoes n Feets tidbits
Nice collab from Yatin Srivastava and Gully w/ a shoe called “The Traveller”
Sneak peak of more Ronnie Fieg x Birks
Rick owens describing his iconic platform boots as “a gentle rejection of what was considered suitable”. He always says it best.
Thats all for now,
GG
That Style Archivist IG post is 100% a veiled paid promo. But I was influenced by it too, and now am oddly craving a pair of "boat" shoes, if for no other reason than I can watch "Below Deck" in some semblance of adjacent costumery.