Well, hello reader. I’m super tired and feeling out of it, but somehow I wrote up an issue of Kat’s Kable today. It’s not great, but I want to put it out nonetheless. Also, some nice/pleasant news: as of last week, the newsletter is five years old! Yay me. I ate a pint of ice cream to celebrate.
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1. A feminist internet would be better for everyone - MIT Tech Review (via outline.com)
I liked this piece. The idea is that, well, I’ll just quote the piece:
This vision of an internet free from harassment, hate, and misogyny might seem far-fetched, particularly if you’re a woman. But a small, growing group of activists believe the time has come to reimagine online spaces in a way that centers women’s needs rather than treating them as an afterthought. They aim to force tech companies to detoxify their platforms, once and for all, and are spinning up brand-new spaces built on women-friendly principles from the start. This is the dream of a “feminist internet.” […] But if we build it, it won’t just be a better place for women; it will be better for everyone.
2. The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature - William Cronon’s blog
I think this is an essay/excerpt from Cronon’s book Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature. I enjoyed it, because it examines and studies the way we have set up a modern idea of wilderness as something apart from ourselves, and which is pure and must remain so. The fundamental critique, I think, of setting nature and wilderness apart as “cathedrals”, so to speak, is in this paragraph:
This, then, is the central paradox: wilderness embodies a dualistic vision in which the human is entirely outside the natural. If we allow ourselves to believe that nature, to be true, must also be wild, then our very presence in nature represents its fall. The place where we are is the place where nature is not. If this is so—if by definition wilderness leaves no place for human beings, save perhaps as contemplative sojourners enjoying their leisurely reverie in God’s natural cathedral—then also by definition it can offer no solution to the environmental and other problems that confront us. To the extent that we celebrate wilderness as the measure with which we judge civilization, we reproduce the dualism that sets humanity and nature at opposite poles. We thereby leave ourselves little hope of discovering what an ethical, sustainable, honorable human place in nature might actually look like.
3. The Dark Side of Chess: Payoffs, Points and 12-Year-Old Grandmasters - New York Times
Pretty interesting, huh. Over the past decades, FIDE has relaxed the rules on who gets to be a grandmaster, which while making the sport more accessible around the world, has also diluted the prestige of being a grandmaster. A second-order effect of this has been that one of the most prestigious titles in chess has become the one of youngest grandmaster. Because of that, there’s a lot of shady business that goes on.
4. Inside the high-precision world of India’s power grid management - Mint
I thought this was pretty cool. India runs the largest synchronous power grid in the world. While coal still forms the majority of India’s power supply, it is hydro and gas-powered plants that can be switched on and off when power demand increases rapidly. The way the operators of the National Load Despatch Centre are described reminds me of Air Traffic Control operators. It truly is a symphony of sorts, with the various components pitching in as needed and ensuring parity.
5. Song for the special
A few weeks ago, I shared a piece called Even Artichokes Have Doubts. This is another (short) piece by the same author, Mary Keegan. Even though both of these were written ten years ago, they really resonate with me. It’s very sad that Keegan passed in a car accident soon after writing these. I would have loved to continue reading what she had to say. Here, she talks about how everyone thinks they’re special (they are!), but not everyone is remembered as truly special (I think?). It’s an antsy vent of sorts, but very relatable.
The thing is, someday the sun is going to die and everything on Earth will freeze. This will happen. Even if we end global warming and clean up our radiation. The complete works of William Shakespeare, Monet’s lilies, all of Hemingway, all of Milton, all of Keats, our music libraries, our library libraries, our galleries, our poetry, our letters, our names etched in desks. I used to think printing things made them permanent, but that seems so silly now. Everything will be destroyed no matter how hard we work to create it. The idea terrifies me. I want tiny permanents. I want gigantic permanents! I want what I think and who I am captured in an anthology of indulgence I can comfortingly tuck into a shelf in some labyrinthine library.
6. The six that reincarnated hope - Sporting Madness
I came across this while watching random cricket highlights on YouTube, and it sure is a lovely article. It’s about Sachin Tendulkar, who in 2004 was going through an extended blip in form. He’d stopped stepping down the wicket to spinners and playing lofted shots, which fueled thoughts of, “oh, is this the Tendulkar of old?”. However, in the Mumbai test of 2004, Tendulkar hit a six off Nathan Hauritz. I remember that time, and how it seemed like his career was done–it sometimes feels surreal now that he ended up playing till 2013 (when this blog post was written).
7. The Gospel of Consumption - Orion Magazine
I enjoyed this piece about the history of the consumption-obsessed and oriented system of the US (tbh, it’s pretty prevalent across the board right now).
Rather than realizing the enriched social life that Kellogg’s vision offered us, we have impoverished our human communities with a form of materialism that leaves us in relative isolation from family, friends, and neighbors. We simply don’t have time for them. Unlike our great-grandparents who passed the time, we spend it. An outside observer might conclude that we are in the grip of some strange curse, like a modern-day King Midas whose touch turns everything into a product built around a microchip.
8. Tech Monopolies and the Insufficient Necessity of Interoperability - Locus Magazine
Cory Doctorow is at it once again–here he talks about interoperability between internet communication platforms (e.g., between Facebook and Twitter) and how it would ensure a better experience for users. The interesting (to me) point he makes is that interoperability in digital technology is far different than it is for physical technology. That is, every computer, phone or tablet we use can run the same code. Making them be able to talk to each other is essentially equivalent to coding up a translation software interface, which can be done on the fly. Further, when it comes to social networks, interoperability will ensure that even if all your other friends are on Facebook (say), you’ll still be able to communicate with them if you’re not.
9. Learning to Cook Intuitively - Thomas Zacharias’ website
I enjoyed this piece of praise for the art of cooking with the concept of andaaza , that is to keep tasting your food and incrementally add seasoning and spice according to what seems right to you. While I understand the value of recipes with precise measurements of ingredients, I always find myself deviating from them when it comes to adding spice. It’s probably, in the long run, more effective to learn to trust your palate rather than a recipe. Judging if food is good is as subjective (and easy to tell) as judging if antidepressants work: if they make you feel good, what you did worked!
See you next week.–Kat.