Hello! We’re off Monday, hope you enjoy the long weekend if you can. During long weekends I like to make a bunch of the paid subscriber editions available for a few days without the paywall. If you enjoy what you see, consider upgrading to a paid subscription. It helps to keep the newsletter running, you get a solid weekend interview, and I’m throwing out a little deal this weekend.

Get 20% off for 1 year

Either way, enjoy, here’s some of my favorites from the past couple of months.

Wattpad and the fanfiction boom with Julia Alexander

Julia is one of my favorite writers — you should check out her newsletter Musings on Mouse — and she wrote a really prescient profile of Wattpad, a company that is trying to turn user-generated fiction into Netflix hits. A week after her story, Wattpad was purchased for $600 million. We spoke about her story, why this could change the future of media adaptations and why some films get moved to streaming and others get their release dates moved.

The growth and change of the crossword puzzle with Michelle McGhee

McGhee wrote a brilliant story about crossword puzzles and how they’re changing — or for that matter, not changing — with the times. “Who’s In The Crossword?” for The Pudding is a seriously clever approach that puts hard data to an otherwise difficult-to-quantify problem, and I learned a whole lot about how some highly motivated editors have successfully managed to drag some crosswords into the 21st century.

The accounting bug behind millions of tons of carbon emissions, with James Temple

James wrote a story about a crucial bug in the way that carbon credits are calculated, and how it can lead to a serious overestimate in how beneficial the credits can be. This story is fascinating because it takes a concept that gets discussed a lot in the abstract and drills down what the heck is exactly being measured, and in doing so discovers ways that the system can be improved and finds things it’s failing to capture.

Get 20% off for 1 year

The box office smash hit of the pandemic era with Ana Diaz

Ana wrote all about the anime hit Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, which somehow became a pandemic-era juggernaut at the box office the world over. Demon Slayer has smashed all kinds of records, and has done so at a fascinating time. Beyond its hits at the box office, it’s also a big hit for an anime format that has long been on the rise.

Figure skating's failure to stick the landing with Rebecca Jennings

Jennings wrote “Figure skating is on thin ice. Here’s how to fix it” for Vox’s The Goods, it’s a great look at a fascinating sport that has been in broad decline for decades, but has seen a surge in interest thanks to the growth of new platforms and influencers who are spreading the sport. I loved this story because it explores not the viral rise of a phenomenon but rather the end of one, how figure skating went from a mass-entertainment enjoyment to a niche sport, and the economic and policy choices that deliberately put it there.

Get 20% off for 1 year

The money, data and tech fueling politics with Dave Levinthal

Dave and I go way back, and it was great to talk to him about some of the fundamental changes in how political campaign fundraising have permanently broken the overall system. With nationalized elections and small donors, every election is the most important election. Dave’s data reporting on this phenomenon is great and you should check it out.

All the podcasts!

You can also read unlocked versions of my conversation with Alex Davies about the electric car, Abraham Riesman on Stan Lee, Karen Hao on Facebook’s troubled AI team, Joshua Darr about the great Palm Springs opinion page experiment or last week’s chat with Pat Garofalo about how coportations fleece small towns. Those are always unlocked because they’re also podcast editions of the Sunday edition, which are available always on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Get 20% off for 1 year