#16 It's too hot. Will everything stop being hot, hot, hot.
w/c 18 July - just
Hello and welcome to #16. This is the latest I’ve written my Substack, it’s been too hot. I’m not even joking, also, the letter ‘e’ on my mac is broken so typing is less fun. But hey, you’re not here to read about that. Which feels odd for me to be writing a Substack for a Friday (it’s Thursday night right now), as my Friday substack ritual is 5 Things on Friday which you should all read here. (often on Saturdays).
Pithy stories apart, I was walking home on the night of the 40-degree day and I did have a sudden, damn - this is what everyone has been warning us about. I felt kinda helpless. It was a stark week. On that positivity…
Also, if you got the title reference, I’ll be impressed.
Now, on to the #content.
1. Brands are getting horny.
Why? Why do we need to do this? Because it’s about the engagement. I despair. Though the piece is slightly OTT, it isn’t surprising. If there is a corner of the internet that can be jumped and be put down to the ‘culture’ then sex is next on the list.
2. Meta’s new pivot - bye, bye newsfeed
It’s been coming. Meta is doing a Tik Tok - bye-bye newsfeed, hello discovery engine. I’m actually not against this, but I am a heavy social user so I will be able to curate my feed. I do wonder if this will push people further into private niche networks - see below Discord piece - which I am seeing a lot of journalists and creators use differently. or even Geneva (Slack x Discord clone). But absolutely see WhatsApp and similar being the next chapter. Much, much harder for brands to enter too.
3. Discord, where everybody knows your name
As readers will know, I love TV so the title of this piece always meant it was going in, I grew up watching TV as my education - I didn’t turn out too bad. But anyway. Discord is hot, it’s also quite messy IMO and I’m unsure how it scales but it’s absolutely something to watch and learn about.
Two quick web3 things.
It’s a mess. How bad could it get? Quite bad actually. 👇👇👇
Odds and ends, basic links. Little commentary, just pure linkage, in wine terms, low intervention links.
Rise of Restaurant culture into fashion - food is so hot right now
Breakdown of Epic (Fortnite owners) assets and why they’re important
BeReal is breaking out - Magpie me: Great a new platform. Marketing head me: urgh, great a new platform.
Adieu.
It’s hot. We need to do something. I dunno what to do and where to start. Send me some stuff.
Bonus.
Atlanta Series 3 is half art, half TV. There are some TV shows, writers and directors who get to a point where they are so confident and in such a depth of creative flow that they can do anything. Atlanta is that show. Ep1 is just bang, different. It’s both funny on the face of it and then has something to say. I am a kind of niche person when it comes to TV and film, I like homework TV and movies mostly. Yes Lost is STILL THE GREATEST, because I had to work to find out why. Atlanta does this in a much smarter and more political way of course. Watch it. Also, we need more Donald Glover back in our entertainment.
All the spelling and grammatical mistakes in this Substack are on purpose to test you, actually. Well done. You got them all. No, I don’t need to know about then, you have that kudos.