Long Reads

Okay . . . let's try this again.

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P.D.X.
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Re: Long Reads

Post by P.D.X. »

It's hilarious (and expected) that kids will sit in crowded bars and surf Tinder. Millennials are doomed to be the most maladjusted generation yet.
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Shirley
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Shirley »

I bet that article has been written somewhere every 2-5 years for the past 100 or so years.
Totally Kafkaesque
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Gunpowder »

Actual real life is nothing like that article. Sure people Tinder in bars for fun with their friends but come on. That article makes it sound like everyone just sits around Tindering for hours trying to find someone to bang without looking up. It might happen for like 5 minutes.
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DaveInSeattle
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Re: Long Reads

Post by DaveInSeattle »

Boy....working at Amazon sounds awesome...
On Monday mornings, fresh recruits line up for an orientation intended to catapult them into Amazon’s singular way of working.

They are told to forget the “poor habits” they learned at previous jobs, one employee recalled. When they “hit the wall” from the unrelenting pace, there is only one solution: “Climb the wall,” others reported. To be the best Amazonians they can be, they should be guided by the leadership principles, 14 rules inscribed on handy laminated cards. When quizzed days later, those with perfect scores earn a virtual award proclaiming, “I’m Peculiar” — the company’s proud phrase for overturning workplace conventions.

At Amazon, workers are encouraged to tear apart one another’s ideas in meetings, toil long and late (emails arrive past midnight, followed by text messages asking why they were not answered), and held to standards that the company boasts are “unreasonably high.” The internal phone directory instructs colleagues on how to send secret feedback to one another’s bosses. Employees say it is frequently used to sabotage others. (The tool offers sample texts, including this: “I felt concerned about his inflexibility and openly complaining about minor tasks.”)
I've had recruiters call me about working there, and even went so far as to take their on-line programming test when I was in Australia, but now I always say "no thanks...". There's no way I could work in an environment like that.

Should be interesting when the Institute moves to our new building in South Lake Union/Amazon-land next month, and I get to see all the burned out 20-somethings staggering around.
Last edited by Shirley on Sun Aug 16, 2015 1:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Fixed Dave's URL tag
howard
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Re: Long Reads

Post by howard »

That 0.4% profit margin ain't gonna maintain itself.
Who knows? Maybe, you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away and held for ransom.

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DC47
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Re: Long Reads

Post by DC47 »

P.D.X. wrote:Tinder and the Dawn of the “Dating Apocalypse”

MSM is like 5 years late to the party.
No doubt there is a high 'penetration rate' in the Manhattan intern and under-30 professional demographics. And their like. Certainly at some colleges.

But there is also the other 90% of the single world. I have a feeling that Tinder et al. aren't quite such dominant forms of social life.

The author obviously has a theme. This piece is not a survey, it's a hunt for supportive quotes that are as splashy as possible.
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Shirley
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Shirley »

An employee-written counterpoint to the NYT piece on Amazon - https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/amazonia ... ciubotariu" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

After reading the two - I believe his much more than theirs. Yes, I've heard some bad things about working at Amazon too - they were considering buying my company as well - but there's NO WAY a competitive technology company could function anywhere near the way the NYT portrayed Amazon. This isn't indentured servitude. Good engineers are in demand everywhere and when companies mistreat the good workers - poof - they leave. Why do you think Silicon Valley tech companies are so famous for all of their employee perks?

I think part of what happened here is you had two writers who have never worked in a tech company before - or maybe anywhere other than a newspaper - and they honestly don't know what it's like. Because real life simply can't be like that article described and any reasonable person should be able to see that.
Totally Kafkaesque
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A_B
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Re: Long Reads

Post by A_B »

Shirley wrote:An employee-written counterpoint to the NYT piece on Amazon - https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/amazonia ... ciubotariu" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

After reading the two - I believe his much more than theirs. Yes, I've heard some bad things about working at Amazon too - they were considering buying my company as well - but there's NO WAY a competitive technology company could function anywhere near the way the NYT portrayed Amazon. This isn't indentured servitude. Good engineers are in demand everywhere and when companies mistreat the good workers - poof - they leave. Why do you think Silicon Valley tech companies are so famous for all of their employee perks?

I think part of what happened here is you had two writers who have never worked in a tech company before - or maybe anywhere other than a newspaper - and they honestly don't know what it's like. Because real life simply can't be like that article described and any reasonable person should be able to see that.
That's the problem when most of the people you interview are no longer with the company. You get the bad sides and not the full story.
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Shirley
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Shirley »

That and when you believe stories like "I saw everyone I work with cry." I mean, come on. That can't be even close to remotely true.
Totally Kafkaesque
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A_B
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Re: Long Reads

Post by A_B »

Shirley wrote:That and when you believe stories like "I saw everyone I work with cry." I mean, come on. That can't be even close to remotely true.
I dunno. Someone could have mass e-mailed some "soldiers suprising their family on their return from deployment" montage or something.
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sancarlos
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Re: Long Reads

Post by sancarlos »

howard wrote:That 0.4% profit margin ain't gonna maintain itself.
Ha. I was going to say something essentially just like that.
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DaveInSeattle
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Re: Long Reads

Post by DaveInSeattle »

Shirley wrote:That and when you believe stories like "I saw everyone I work with cry." I mean, come on. That can't be even close to remotely true.
I don't know...I'm crying at my desk right now...
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Re: Long Reads

Post by howard »

DaveInSeattle wrote:
Shirley wrote:That and when you believe stories like "I saw everyone I work with cry." I mean, come on. That can't be even close to remotely true.
I don't know...I'm crying at my desk right now...
is that just from having been approached for a job years ago?
Who knows? Maybe, you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away and held for ransom.

Those days are gone forever
Over a long time ago
Oh yeah…
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DaveInSeattle
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Re: Long Reads

Post by DaveInSeattle »

howard wrote:
DaveInSeattle wrote:
Shirley wrote:That and when you believe stories like "I saw everyone I work with cry." I mean, come on. That can't be even close to remotely true.
I don't know...I'm crying at my desk right now...
is that just from having been approached for a job years ago?
No...just from being at work on a Monday morning while those fast dwindling summer days are wasting away...
howard
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Re: Long Reads

Post by howard »

Who knows? Maybe, you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away and held for ransom.

Those days are gone forever
Over a long time ago
Oh yeah…
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rass
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Re: Long Reads

Post by rass »

I felt aswirl with warm secretions.
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Pruitt
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Pruitt »

Great stuff.

Thanks.
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A_B
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Re: Long Reads

Post by A_B »

Couple of swampers posted on Facebook about The Legend at Greenville High. Great stuff.
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Shirley
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Shirley »

A_B wrote:Couple of swampers posted on Facebook about The Legend at Greenville High. Great stuff.
Man, what a great article. I'm a mess over here.
Totally Kafkaesque
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mister d
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Re: Long Reads

Post by mister d »

Pruitt wrote:
Great stuff.

Thanks.
x2.
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govmentchedda
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Re: Long Reads

Post by govmentchedda »

Shirley wrote:
A_B wrote:Couple of swampers posted on Facebook about The Legend at Greenville High. Great stuff.
Man, what a great article. I'm a mess over here.
Yeah, me too. Shouldn't have read that in the office. I posted on FB, but I have three cousins who all went to Rose. The middle of three was on the 1997 state champion baseball team, and the oldest now coaches little league. I think Marvin has been a part of their life for nearly 30 years now.
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Pruitt
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Pruitt »

This long piece ran in the New York Times yesterday.

About what happens when someone dies and the body lays unclaimed.

Fascinating, but occasionally dusty.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/18/nyreg ... -news&_r=0
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Re: Long Reads

Post by brian »

Bandwagon fan of the 2023 STANLEY CUP CHAMPIONS!
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That French Guy
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Re: Long Reads

Post by That French Guy »

Great stuff about Mourinho's career and why his third season with a club is always a mess.

https://www.theblizzard.co.uk/articles/ ... ils-party/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
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rass
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Re: Long Reads

Post by rass »

I felt aswirl with warm secretions.
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Shirley
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Shirley »

Death of a Troll

I think all Swampers will see a lot of eerie similarities here. A brilliant, but pain-in-the-ass longtime member of an online community is eventually banned by the mods. Some time later, he commits suicide. But the story's not over there.
“Many people will probably wonder why I’ve decided to do this,” read the beginning of the suicide note that Eris had scheduled to appear on his Tumblr on 27 April 2015, two days after his death. “I was sexually abused as a child … and have dealt with the consequences of that my entire life. Imagine going through life with an ever-present shadow hanging over you, worrying if you too might be like the people who destroyed your childhood and life.”

Eris’s suicide note was unusual for a number of reasons. For one thing, it included an apology to the many players he had abused online over the years. Eris was one of Epic Mafia’s most popular members, but he was also its most notorious troll. Most of his transgressions were juvenile. He liked to post innocent-looking links that led to a photo of a My Little Pony doll he had jerked off on. He could also be malicious and vengeful. On the Epic Mafia forum, Eris once responded to a post by an African-American player by posting a picture of King Kong. In the heat of an online feud, he had been known to hack into people’s accounts and delete them. And he routinely doxxed other players, using his programming skills to reveal details about their offline identities – their weight, their age, even photographs of their home.
Totally Kafkaesque
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Nonlinear FC
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Nonlinear FC »

Nice tease, I read that yesterday. Interesting and, yes, I had the exact same thought about "shared experience" here at Swamp 4.0 (or whatever we're at.)
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The Sybian
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Re: Long Reads

Post by The Sybian »

Great read, totally relatable.Then the last paragraph:

A month ago, Eris also found a new girlfriend, a woman he met through Epic Mafia and whom he describes as being as “dark, morbid and kind-of screwed up” as he is. “When I told her about [my fake suicide] she thought it was kind of funny.” They have not met in person yet, but she lives in Pennsylvania and Eris hopes she will soon make the drive to New York, so he can take her out on a proper date. “The old ways are the best,” he said.
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govmentchedda
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Re: Long Reads

Post by govmentchedda »

Until everything is less insane, I'm mixing weed with wine.
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Ryan
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Ryan »

This thread is getting pretty long
he’s a fixbking cyborg or some shit. The

holy fuckbAllZ, what a ducking nightmare. Holy shot. Just, fuck. The
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Re: Long Reads

Post by brian »

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brian
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Re: Long Reads

Post by brian »

Bandwagon fan of the 2023 STANLEY CUP CHAMPIONS!
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A_B
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Re: Long Reads

Post by A_B »

You know what you need? A lyrical sucker punch to the face.
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brian
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Re: Long Reads

Post by brian »

Well, the drinking and drugs were secondary. There were, in fact, a given. Regardless of where he went.
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brian
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Re: Long Reads

Post by brian »

Bitter Southerner interviews Patterson Hood.

Read a lot of Hood interviews over the years and this one actually has stuff I'd never heard about DBT's inception and various lineups over the years as well as discussing Hood's lineage to the music of North Alabama and Muscle Shoals. Also a performance of Living Bubba and Ever South from the new album.
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Re: Long Reads

Post by rass »

I felt aswirl with warm secretions.
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Nonlinear FC
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Re: Long Reads

Post by Nonlinear FC »

That was a good read.. thanks!
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rass
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Re: Long Reads

Post by rass »

Wow.

I felt aswirl with warm secretions.
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rass
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Re: Long Reads

Post by rass »

How a Donkey Became My Running Partner

The article isn't too long, but it's part of an ongoing (weekly?) series by the author of the book Born to Run.
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howard
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Re: Long Reads

Post by howard »

Who knows? Maybe, you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away and held for ransom.

Those days are gone forever
Over a long time ago
Oh yeah…
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