Go for the links, stay for the slow unspooling of the myth of the American Dream.

"contact high-five: n. an innocuous touch by someone just doing their job… a feeling of connection so stupefyingly simple that it cheapens the power of the written word, so that by the year 2025, aspiring novelists would be better off just giving people a hug."

Pretty great.

"We are continuously challenged to discover new works of culture—and, in the process, we don’t allow any one of them to assume a weight in our minds. "

More hurf durf on "brain fade," this time from someone of a little more import than Fake Steve Jobs. A tangent: can great works (of art?) exist in a culture where everything is so easily disposed/replaced/forgotten? In his terms, how can we make something with its own gravity, which will "assume a weight" in the viewer's mind?

(I realize now that this may be what I've been feeling as I've been telling anyone who will listen that I want to create something so horrible it can't be overlooked.)

Epic roundup of links relating to Kinkeshi/M.U.S.C.L.E toys.

"What’s happening is this: we are being so overwhelmed by the noise and junk zooming past us that we’re becoming immune to it. We’ve become a nation of Internet-powered imbeciles, with an ever-lower threshold for inanity."

Fake Steve hurf durfing about "brain fade." I agree with the part about our (your) threshold for inanity, though.