ABC News:

Facebook parent Meta said Wednesday it will restore former President Donald Trump 's personal account in the coming weeks, ending a two-year suspension it imposed in the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Me, two years ago:

This is good news for now, but don’t count on the decision from this “independent oversight board”* to last for very long. I’d bet a thousand dollars that Zuckerberg comes up with some bullshit excuse to allow him back on the platform before 2023, and probably by the end of this year. The only thing that drives Zuck is profit, engagement drives profit, and Donald Trump drives engagement.

Missed it by 25 days.

#deletefacebook

Joesph White, reporting for Reuters:

General Motors plans to phase out widely-used Apple CarPlay and Android Auto technologies that allow drivers to bypass a vehicle's infotainment systems, shifting instead to built-in infotainment systems developed with Google for future electric vehicles.

[…]

GM's decision to stop offering those systems in future electric vehicles, starting with the 2024 Chevrolet Blazer, could help the automaker capture more data on how consumers drive and charge EVs.

CNBC:

Apple engineering manager Emily Schubert said 98% of new cars in the U.S. come with CarPlay installed. She delivered a shocking stat: 79% of U.S. buyers would only buy a car if it supported CarPlay.

“It’s a must-have feature when shopping for a new vehicle,” Schubert said

Given that Android has 47% of the smartphone marketshare in the US, that stat doesn’t seem right. But when you consider the fact that wealthier people are the ones buying most of the new cars, and wealthy people tend to prefer iPhones, I don’t think this stat is too far off at all.

Given that, this move by GM sure sounds like they’re shooting themselves in the foot for.. what? Data collection? Hubris? Unclear.

Barbie Latza Nadeau, reporting for CNN:

Italians who use English and other foreign words in official communications could face fines of up to €100,000 ($108,705) under new legislation introduced by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party.

Fabio Rampelli, a member of the lower chamber of deputies, introduced the legislation, which is supported by the prime minister.

While the legislation encompasses all foreign languages, it is particularly geared at “Anglomania” or use of English words, which the draft states “demeans and mortifies” the Italian language, adding that it is even worse because the UK is no longer part of the EU.

[…]

The move to safeguard the Italian language joins an existing bid by the government to protect the country’s cuisine.

It has introduced legislation to ban so-called synthetic or cell-based cuisine due to the lack of scientific studies on the effects of synthetic food, as well as “to safeguard our nation’s heritage and our agriculture based on the Mediterranean diet,” Meloni’s Health Minister Orazio Schillaci said in a press conference.

Italy on the fascism fast-track, what could go wrong?

Nicole Chavez and Justin Gamble, reporting for CNN:

A film about a Black first grader who integrated an all-White elementary school in the South is under review in a Florida school district after a parent objected to the movie[…]

Two weeks before the movie was shown to second graders at North Shore Elementary, permission forms were sent to the students’ parents along with a link to the “Ruby Bridges” trailer, Mascareñas said. The parent who filed the objection was among the two families that opted to not have their students watch the movie, she said. […]

The 1998 film’s screenwriter, Toni Ann Johnson:

“If children are old enough to be called the N-word and learn what it means, then it’s my opinion that second graders who are 7 and 8 years of age can and should begin to learn about the history of racism in this country,” Johnson said. 

Such a salient point. The people trying to prevent this movie from being shown are the same people whose parents were in school when Ruby Bridges was integrating William Frantz Elementary School, and their grandparents were the ones hurling slurs at a six-year-old girl.

It’s a truly succinct summary of the Republican Party’s evolution: a generation of outspoken and violent racists, followed by a generation of stereotype-prone assholes, followed by the generation who “just asks questions” and wants to “protect the children”.

The ignorance is unparalleled. If a six-year-old is old enough to be vilified like Ruby Bridges was for simply daring to go to school, then your fragile, tender eight-year-old babies are not too young to learn about the transgressions and atrocities their immediate relatives committed against her.

First and foremost, I want to point out that the shortcut I’m about to reference only works for people using Apple Music (right now, at least; if you have Spotify or something else, pressure them to add support for Apple’s Shortcuts app).

Basically, what I’ve done here is create a series of custom wallpapers using photographs that I took myself that I feel match the vibe of some of my favorite albums. I then created a shortcut to change the wallpaper to the corresponding image when a particular album plays using automations.

I posted about this on reddit a couple months ago. At the time it was just for Taylor Swift's ten albums, but I’ve since expanded it to others, and you can expand it as much as you like, to work for whichever albums you care about.

Step one: decide which albums you want to change your lock screen for. This is a very personal set of decisions, and I can’t decide for you. Choose an album, then find a photo from your photo library and make a Lock Screen that evokes the vibe of the album you’ve chosen.

Step two: set up a shortcut to tell your phone to switch the wallpaper automatically when a song plays. Here’s a link to a basic version of the shortcut made to work with ONE album/wallpaper set. If you want multiple, you’ll need to go into the guts of the shortcut and add a couple steps for each additional album you want to create a wallpaper for. For each additional album you want to change your Lock Screen for, add an “If” statement to the shortcut. Then tap the first item that says “Input” and select “Album”. Then, where it says “Condition”, tap “contains”. Then, where it says “text”, type the name of the album you’re referencing EXACTLY as it appears in the Music app (spelling, symbols, and capitalization matter). After you’ve added and set up the “If” statement, you need to add the “Switch Wallpaper” action. After adding this action, it will prompt you to select a wallpaper; choose the one you created to match the album you’re currently working on.

Step three: create an automation to run the shortcut automatically. Go to the Automations tab of the shortcut app, and tap “create new personal automation”. Then, when presented with trigger options, choose “App”, and then make sure “Is Open” AND “Is Closed” are both selected. Then, where it says “App”, tap “Choose”, and select some of your most frequently used apps. I selected about twenty of my most frequently used apps.

Step four: after you've set up the automation, you’ll want to prevent it from telling you it’s running, since it’ll happen any time you open or close your most used apps (all those notifications will get annoying pretty quickly). Go to the automation you just made in step three, then turn off the toggle for “Ask Before Running”, and then turn make sure then toggle for “Notify When Run” is also turned off.

And that’s it! Now, any time you open or close any of the apps you designated in step three, your phone will check to see what song is playing (if any), and will change your wallpaper to match the album the song belongs to.

Here’s a short video of the shortcut in action using Taylor Swift inspired wallpapers.

Shortcuts can be notoriously difficult to set up, so if you have any questions, feel free to reach out through our contact page for support!

David Remnek, writing for The New Yorker:

It’s not even clear that the most vociferous of the pro-Trump groups such as the Proud Boys and the Three Percenters, which have endured intense investigation and legal charges for their roles in the Capitol insurrection, will be eager to take to the streets again in Trump’s name. Recently, Ali Alexander, one of the organizers of the Stop the Steal rallies that followed the 2020 election, posted on social media, “Previously, I had said if Trump was arrested or under the threat of a perp walk, 100,000 patriots should shut down all routes to Mar-a-Lago. Now, I’m retired. I’ll pray for him though!”

I suppose it’s difficult to maintain enthusiasm for your favorite criminal when he keeps losing elections.

If you’re going to the tour and don’t want to know the setlist, then:

⚠️ Spoiler Warning

Like right now.

Seriously.

Look away, DON’T glance down.

At all.

Okay, you’re still here.

Onward!

The setlist:

1. Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince

2. Cruel Summer

3. The Man

4. You Need To. Calm Down

5. Lover

6. The Archer

7. Fearless

8. You Belong With Me

9. Love Story

10. ‘tis the damn season

11. willow

12. marjorie

13. champagne problems

14. tolerate it

15. …Ready for it?

16. Delicate

17. Don’t Blame Me

18. Look What You Made Me Do

19. Enchanted

20. 22

21. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together

22. I Knew You Were Trouble

23. All Too Well (10 Minute Version)

24. seven

25. invisible string

26. betty

27. the last great american dynasty

28. august

29. illicit affairs

30. my tears ricochet

31. cardigan

32. Style

33. Blank Space

34. Shake It Off

35. Wildest Dreams

36. Bad Blood

37. surprise song

38. surprise song

39. Lavender Haze

40. Anti-Hero

41. Midnight Rain

42. Vigilante Shit

43. Bejeweled

44. Mastermind

45. Karma

I have so many thoughts but first of all: how fucking insane is it that she’s doing FORTY FIVE SONGS per night!?!? In my wildest dreams, I was hoping for a count in the low thirties. This woman truly goes FAR above and beyond for her fans. I can’t imagine how physically taxing this tour will be for her, doing a three hour long show two or three nights a week until September.

Given that number of songs, it feels supremely disrespectful and unappreciative to suggest that anything about it isn’t good enough, but I do find the lack or representation for two albums in particular a bit striking. Speak Now has only ONE song on the permanent setlist, and the debut album has NONE. While Taylor may supplement the representation for these albums using the two surprise songs, that still doesn’t really do much to close the gap between these neglected albums and most of the others, which on average gave at least five songs each.

My expectation going in was that the more recent, untoured albums would be favored, but not quite this extensively. I expected there to be about thirty songs on the setlist, with a decent number of mashups/medleys. I expected each album to get at least two songs, but for some to get up to four or five. What I didn’t expect was for ANY album to get seven or eight, which is what happened. Folklore got the most, at eight, then was Midnights at seven, followed by Lover at six, and Evermore at five. 1989 also had five, while Red and Reputation both got four. That left Speak Now with one, and the Debut album with NO songs on the recurring setlist. Very curious, especially given the strong hints that Speak Now would be the next rerecorded album to be released.

What for you ask? Good question, the list of possible charges is pretty long.

From Emily Olson at NPR:

A quick refresher: Trump is currently facing at least five investigations, covering everything from his possession of classified documents to his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

But the latest indictment rumors stem from just one of those probes: the one led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

Bragg's office is examining whether Trump and his company broke state laws in paying hush money to adult film star Stephanie Clifford, better known as Stormy Daniels.

Daniels says she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, a claim that Trump has repeatedly denied. But his company still paid $130,000 to the star in exchange for her silence during Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.

In 2018, a campaign finance investigation into that payment led Trump's longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen to plead guilty to federal charges. […]

Federal prosecutors have also said that it was Trump himself who directed Cohen to arrange the payments, meaning Trump could be held responsible for those false records.

Doesn’t sound great.

That said (and let me first remark that NO ONE is above the law; I’m not saying he shouldn’t be held accountable because of the political ramifications (what an odd sentence to type, but alas, we live in a political climate where 40% of voters are so throughly brainwashed by Facebook and Fox News that being a felon isn’t a disqualifier for presidential candidates)), I do wonder what the result of a possible arrest will be. My fear is that it could be easily weaponized by Trump to stoke fear and anger resulting in political violence, or that it could be capitalized upon by Ron DeSantis to put Trump’s campaign in the grave, cementing his spot as the Republican Presidential nominee frontrunner. And I’d much rather Biden face a rematch with a withered, resentful old Donald Trump than a much younger, more palatable but still extremist Ron DeSantis.

I’m torn between whether I’d rather see Trump on his perp walk pre-hair and makeup, or whether I’d rather see the orange spray tan/cheeto dust stained handcuffs after the fact.

A few notable excerpts from the BBC’s obituary:

She became for many the one constant point in a rapidly changing world as British influence declined, society changed beyond recognition and the role of the monarchy itself came into question.

[…]

She was said to have shown a remarkable sense of responsibility from a very early age. Winston Churchill, the future prime minister, was quoted as saying that she possessed "an air of authority that was astonishing in an infant".

[…]

The hallmark of her reign was constitutional correctness, and a further separation of the monarchy from the government of the day. She took seriously her rights to be informed, to advise and to warn - but did not seek to step beyond them.

[…]

The Queen described 1992 as her "annus horribilis" and, in a speech in the City of London, appeared to concede the need for a more open monarchy in return for a less hostile media.

"No institution, city, monarchy, whatever, should expect to be free from the scrutiny of those who give it their loyalty and support, not to mention those who don't. But we are all part of the same fabric of our national society and that scrutiny can be just as effective if it is made with a measure of gentleness, good humour and understanding."

[…]

Although the monarchy might not have been as strong at the end of the Queen's reign as it was at the start, she was determined that it should continue to command a place of affection and respect in the hearts of the British people.

What an incredible life.

The Queen’s death was an event that we all knew was coming, but it was the sort of day you never quite believed would actually arrive.

John Gruber, on Daring Fireball:

Interesting turn of events that it’s the Play Store that is being more strict about this than Apple’s App Store, where Truth Social has been available since February.

Not a good look for Apple, but seems difficult to walk back now without looking like they’re trying to mirror Google, which would surely be met with a cacophony of conservative outrage and accusations of cancel culture-fueled hypocrisy.

Mary Papenfuss, reporting for HuffPost (a source I usually disregard as being exceedingly liberal):

All book donations and purchases have been halted in the district for the rest of the year because the new law (HB 1467) requires books to be approved for suitability by state-certified media specialists, a job that doesn’t currently exist in the district.

DeSantis, who has signed laws that also restrict discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in elementary school classrooms, has said HB 1467 will help prevent “indoctrination through the school system.”

The Sarasota district, which has nearly 45,000 students across 62 schools south of Tampa, ordered all principals last week to bar new books from school media centers and classroom libraries until at least January […]

[…] a member of the Venice Suncoast Rotary Club, told The Sarasota Herald-Tribune that the club has been donating dictionaries to district elementary schools for almost 15 years.

If there’s anything Florida needs more of, it’s goddamn books, especially dictionaries. Next time they (or Texas) threaten to secede, let them.

This is the sort of story you love to see. From Deepa Seetharaman and Salvador Rodriguez at The Wall Street Journal (via Apple News+):

Meta shares plunged after the results were announced, dropping more than 20%. If shares dropped that much when trading opens on Thursday, it would wipe more than $175 billion from the tech giant’s market capitalization.

Quick update: the Journal’s story was published on the evening of Facebook’s report, before the market opened the next day. They ended up dropping slightly more than 25%, and they lost over $200B.

The company said it expected revenue growth to slow because users were spending less time on its more lucrative services. Meta cited inflation as a weight on advertiser spending and estimated that ad-tracking changes introduced by Apple Inc. last year would cost Meta some $10 billion this year. 

I bet Apple is happy about this. And they certainly should be. Their App Tracking Transparency policy wasn’t designed to cripple Mark Zuckerberg’s company, it was designed to give users a little more control over their data and prevent unwanted tracking. Facebook blaming Apple for the loss would be like a peeping tom blaming his victim for his blue balls when they finally close the curtains of the window he’s looking through. Merlin Mann put it well on Twitter (quipping about a particularly stupid framing of the issue by the New York Times):

“Local burglar blames revenue shortfall on industry-hostile doors.”

From the Journal again:

Meta also lost about a million daily users globally and stagnated in the U.S. and Canada, two of the company’s most profitable markets, the results show.

The fact that they’re losing users is a good sign, but it it shouldn’t take Facebook by surprise unless they’re so high on their own supply that they've completely isolated themselves in echo chambers reaffirming how much good they’re doing in the world (probably by means of Facebook groups). The global social media market is saturated, this plateauing shouldn’t come as a surprise, and Facebook acting like this caught them off guard is bullshit. They clearly did see it coming because they decided to refocus the whole business on personal porn theaters virtual reality goggles. We’ll see how that goes, but here’s to the next Google Glass.

I must say though, it pisses me off that Wall Street is gonna get the credit for finally dealing a significant blow to Facebook when those of us who have been paying attention have been screaming about how terrible they are for years. Fuck capitalism, fuck Facebook.

#deletefacebook

I went into “Red (Taylor’s Version)” with a pretty sour attitude, and I want to address that first, because while my opinions have since changed and I’m now very pleased with the album, I still think my frustrations at the time were valid. I posted the following on Reddit the week before the album was released:

Is anyone else feeling a bit down on Red (TV)? I’m a huge fan, don’t get me wrong, but the lack of promo material for this album has me feeling ambivalent about it, and at times even resentful.

She first told us about the album five months ago, and I just think that’s a lot time to let us sit on the knowledge that it’s coming, but to keep us wondering the whole time if could finally be the day we get a single or a vault track or something. The fact that the album comes out a week from today and we still haven’t gotten ANYTHING is really frustrating to me, and it’s souring me on the album as a whole. It feels like Taylor is taking advantage of our dedication and our excitement by keeping us all anxious and waiting, but never giving us more than a 10 second scrap of a song.

Red was one of the re-records that I was most excited for, but now I’m just feeling a bit aggravated at the thought of it. I feel like we deserve at least one single to help us get in the mood for it, especially given that Fearless (TV) gave us 3 singles (with two of them being vault tracks) across a much shorter time frame.

I recognize that this probably isn’t the general sentiment right now because most people ARE excited, and I know Taylor doesn’t owe us anything, I’m just curious if anyone else is feeling the same way.

I was excited for the first single to drop so we could get a taste of what the next chapter in the Taylor’s Version story would sound like, to begin comparing and contrasting with how “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” sounded. Unfortunately, weeks and months were passing with no singles ever being released, and really no other promotional material to help get me excited about the rerelease. Even though Taylor promoted her version of “Red” heavily following its release, I still think my points stand.

Anyway, once the album finally came out, I really enjoyed it. So, without further adieu:

My Notes

As with my “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” review, I won’t go song by song for the entire album since most of them aren’t original, but here are my more general thoughts and some specific points I wanted to make.

The album sounds really good. Her voice is, again, noticeably more mature. The production on most of these songs is as good as ever, and I actually think it’s better in more than a few cases. However, there are a few songs where I don’t think they were improved, and they sound a little too different from the originals for my taste, and that’s particularly true of some of the louder, more upbeat songs like “I Knew You Were Trouble,” “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” and “22.” They just sounded a bit hollow to me the first few times I listened to them. Taylor’s voice is front and center, but it sounds like the instruments were positioned about 20 feet behind her when it was recorded. They lack bass and they aren’t punchy enough. However, listening to these songs in Spatial Audio does improve the experience significantly. It no longer sounds like the instruments are far away, instead it’s as if you’re inside the song and the instruments are all around you (though they still aren’t quite loud enough). It gives me the impression that these songs were recreated with Spatial Audio in mind, and tuned specifically for that format to the detriment of the stereo listening experience. Even taking that into account, those more upbeat songs still aren’t produced as well as the originals, and they just needed to sound a little fuller.

While we’re talking about how the songs sound, “Girl At Home” is an interesting case study. On the original album, it was arguably my least favorite song. Frankly, it’s sonically boring, and the lyrics come across as a little high and mighty to me. That said, in the interest of having the most faithful rerecords possible, I don’t like how much she changed it. It doesn’t sound much like the original at all, and while I must admit that I like the new version better and find it significantly more enjoyable, the idea that she’s willing to change songs that much scares me. I don’t like her setting the precedent that the original sounds of some of her less popular songs aren’t off the chopping block; it would really upset me if she changed a song like “I Wish You Would” or something else that was a lesser known track from its album, but now I’m afraid that’s a possibility. “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” was a more faithful recreation than “Red (Taylor’s Version),” and it made me feel really good about the prospects of everyone getting their favorite songs recreated in a way that was faithful to the originals, even if your favorite wasn’t everyone else's favorite. “Girl At Home” is causing that fear to creep back in a bit.

On a different note, I was really stoked that she got Gary Lightbody back for “The Last Time.” That was the song with a featured artist I was most excited to hear recreated, and also the one where I thought it was most uncertain whether the featured artist would return, so I’m really glad she got him back, and the song sounds great. It’s always been one of my favorites from “Red.”

I was worried that the vault songs on this album wouldn’t be terribly impressive, both because there were so many of them, and because most of the Vault songs from Fearless weren’t terribly impressive. However, the “Red” Vault did not disappoint. There were some songs we’d heard before, and they were more or less what we were expecting, but the new songs were all more capable of holding their own that the “Fearless” Vault tracks. I could envision an alternate history where any of those songs had made it on the original album.

The Vault, Song by Song:

As usual, I’ve given each song two ratings out of ten, the first rating is how I felt about it after the first time I listened to it, the second is how I feel about it after more listens and some time to process each track.

“Ronan (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 4.5/10, 2/10

I don’t like anything about this track. It’s slow, depressing, and nothing about it is musically impressive. Most of the lyrics don’t even rhyme. Yeah, yeah, I’m an asshole. We know.

“Better Man (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 9.5/10, 9/10

It takes a little getting used to just because it’s not what we’re used to, but I love it. It’s crazy that her original “Better Man” demo from 2012 leaked right before the album came out, but I liked it, and I liked that this was very similar to it.

“Nothing New (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault) [feat. Phoebe Bridgers]”: 6.5/10, 5/10

This song would’ve made a lot more sense if it’d come out in 2012. Also, one of my friends pointed out that the duet could’ve been better if they were having more of a conversation between someone at the start of their career and someone well established, rather saying almost the exact same things, as if they were both fledgling celebrities.

“Babe (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 7/10, 6.5/10

The “promises promises” part was unexpected and less than needed, but I still like the song. Like “Better Man,” it does take some getting used to.

“Message In A Bottle (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 6.5/10, 6.5/10

This one is very poppy. It’s a bit more early 2000s bubblegum pop though, and I’m glad that her pop style evolved in the direction of 1989 rather than having gone this way. That said, I do like the song.

“I Bet You Think About Me (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault) [feat. Chris Stapleton]”: 8.5/10, 7/10

She sounds like a pirate at the beginning. Other than that, I like the song. It clearly ties in with “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” (see: “do you have all the space that you need”), and I think it fits the “Red” vibe pretty well. I don’t see why Chris Stapleton is here though. Did he also get left by a boy who thought he was better than him? Probably not, and he doesn’t really add anything to the song.

“Forever Winter (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 6.5/10, 7/10

I liked this one a lot. I expected it to be the “rip your heart out and stomp on it” song, but none of the new vault tracks really were that (I think she saved it all for ATW10, which is fine). I think this track is a good commentary on men’s mental health, which doesn’t get talked about nearly enough. The man in the song is clearly dealing with some mental health issues, and the girl is slow to recognize it and clueless as to how to fix it. It’s from her perspective, but it’s 100% about him.

“Run (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault) [feat. Ed Sheeran]”: 6/10, 7/10

I liked this one a little more than I expected to. I think the fact that it didn’t make the album original led to it being repurposed and turned into “I Know Places.”

“The Very First Night (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 7/10, 6/10

This one is good, but a little forgettable despite being very catchy. People have been trying to out Taylor as a lesbian forever, and I don’t buy that at all, but someone pointed out to me that the lines “didn’t read the note on the Polaroid picture” and “no one knows about the words that we whispered” are followed by lines that go “do you know how much I miss you” and “they don’t know how much I miss you,” and in both cases, the line “how much I miss her” would’ve rhymed perfectly. Probably a coincidence, but interesting nonetheless. And “miss her” rhymes so much better that I often sing it wrong.

“All Too Well (Ten Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault)”: 7.5/10, 9/10

Ah, where to begin? I guess the beginning is the best place: right from the start, you know that this is not the “All Too Well” we’re used to. It’s a little slower, but the whammy bar in those first few measures is a little hypnotic and I think it sounded great. Following that, it took a little longer than I expected for us to start hearing some of the added lyrics. When they finally do come in, they take you by surprise: one of the first added lines is “fuck the patriarchy.” This really put my guard up. I was not expecting Taylor to come out swinging with some political message in her most beloved and most anticipated song ever. After a few listens, and a few conversations with friends who were also taken aback, you piece together that she’s talking about the “keychain on the ground,” which we’re to presume had the words “fuck the patriarchy” on it. This makes more sense and is a lot less random, and it also makes it somewhat plausible that this line was from the original version of the song, but still, the way the line is delivered makes it sounded pointed and modern, almost disconnected from the lyrics that come before and after it. Maybe Jake Gyllenhaal really had a keychain that said that, but it’s hard to know, and the line certainly does play well with Taylor’s liberal fanbase today.

Next: the best lyric in the song. I have no idea why she wouldn’t have put this in the original. “You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath” is an absolutely devastating piece of lyrical genius. Honorable mention to “they say all’s well that ends well/but I’m in a new hell every time/you double cross my mind.”

This part isn’t as impressive from a lyrical perspective, but her voice is really powerful and I love the part where she sings about her dad telling her “it’s supposed to be fun, turning 21” as she sits at her own party upset about her boyfriend who didn’t show up.

There are two times where the sound of the song shifts so dramatically that it almost sounds like a separate song entirely. The first of those is when she sings “And I was never good at telling jokes.” You aren’t exactly sure where it’s going, but it fits the vibe of the rest of the song, if not the sound.

The second time when the sound of the song shifts is when she sings about the snow “and how it glistened as it fell.” The last two minutes of the song are really slow. It feels like this maybe should’ve been “All Too Well (Eight Minute Version)” but she had to live up to ten after nearly a decade of rumors, so she stretched it out a little bit. I know some people think the extra time to wind down is good after such an emotional song, but I think I would’ve liked it better if it went out with the same energy as 2012 Taylor screaming “broke me like a promise,” even if it needed to be a little shorter to make it work.

Overall, I really love this track, and it is now the only version of All Too Well that I listen to. It isn’t perfect, but I think there’s enough here that’s great that is has replaced the original for me.

Final Thoughts

This album is really good, but it’s not as faithful a recreation of its source material as Fearless (Taylor’s Version). I hope Red (Taylor’s Version) is the outlier and not Fearless (Taylor’s Version).

That said, I hope that “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” is the outlier when it comes to vault tracks, because “Red” knocked it out of the park. Granted, having ATW10 is an unfair advantage, but the rest of the vault tracks were all solid, and the same can’t be said for “Fearless.” I still think she could have some great stuff up her sleeve, and I’m especially excited for the vault tracks from “1989” and “Reputation.”

I’ll get skewered by the Swiftie mob for this, but Red (Stolen Version) was never my favorite Taylor album, and it still isn’t. Right after the rerecord was announced, I had thought that it may give me the opportunity to appreciate this album on a deeper level than I had before, and allow me to connect with it in that almost spiritual way that some Swift fans do. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. I still think it’s a great album, I respect the hell out of it, and I’ve loved having this opportunity to experience it, but the lack of promo before the release did take its toll, as well as the issue of it not being quite as sonically similar to the original, with some of the most popular songs sounding slightly hollow. I hope that this turns out to be the worst of the rerecorded albums, for me. But I am genuinely happy for the fans for whom this will be the best rerecord, because even if they don’t think it’s perfect, I know how much this album means to people and I’m glad they’re getting to re-experience it like this.

I will say though, l hope that with the next Taylor’s Version album, she doesn’t announce it until she’s a little closer to its release date, or that she at least gives us a single or two to get us through. I think a lot of my more negative opinions were shaped by my early disappointment.

I’ve just learned this: if you say the word “lumos” to Siri, she’ll turn on your flashlight!

(If you’re unfamiliar, “lumos” is the incantation for the spell in the Harry Potter Wizarding World that produces light from the tip of a witch or wizard’s wand.)

Talk about surprise and delight.

I wrote this on October 28th, 2021 and forgot to publish it, but better late than never:

Presumably because they make all their money selling your metadata?

Somehow this feels desperate, dorky, cowardly, and creepy all at the same time. Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg are pathetic, greedy human beings.

#deletefacebook

Overall, I liked this movie a lot. I’d give it an 8/10. ⚠️ Spoiler Warning. Here are some unorganized thoughts:

• There’s no reason this couldn’t have been released during Phase 3. It would’ve fit perfectly, and it’s absurd that it came after Nat’s death in “Endgame.”

• Scarlett Johansson was incredible, as always.

• Florence Pugh was delightful.

• David Harbour was a bit of a drag.

• I get that the Taskmaster was a victim and we’re supposed to feel bad for her, but she creeped me the fuck out. She needed to die. With fire.

• The whole plot of this movie is based around that the fact that the (offscreen) death of the bad guy wasn’t stone cold certain, and somehow he survived. So in this movie, one would think they’d go out of their way to show his death, but they don't. It’s implied, but we know he survived the last explosion, we can’t assume there’s no way he could’ve survived this one.

• Speaking of Dreykov, he gave me big creep vibes, very Weinstein-y.

• The whole mask wearing swithceroo was a useful but lazy plot device. In my opinion, if a movie is doing so much offscreen plot development that it has to go back and explain itself to viewers after the relevant on-screen action has taken place, that isn’t a great sign.

• I think it’s time for the witty, Tony Stark based humor of the MCU to evolve, and it doesn’t seem like it is. I’m not saying they shouldn't still make funny movies, but the brand of comedy they’re doing just feels a bit tired. I was hoping Phase 4 is where they might’ve chosen to refine it, but that doesn’t seem to be happening.

I wrote the following post on September 9th, the day after I saw Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, and never really came back to it. I haven’t really thought about the movie at all since then, which ought to be criticism enough. ⚠️ Spoiler Warning. Anyway, here’s what I was going to say, had I not more or less forgotten about the film:

I just saw Shang-Chi last night, but I think I’ve already got most of my thoughts in order.

Overall, I’d give the movie a 5/10. I was going to say 4/10, but I don’t want to be too harsh prematurely. I didn’t care enough about the film to write a huge review, but I’ve jotted down some thoughts, some more flesh out out than others. Spoiler Warning

• Awkwafina (ridiculous name) was funny, and her character was the best, but she was also very predictable. The witty sidekick is almost a trope in Marvel films at this point. Marvel is an action franchise with a lot of comedy, but the comedy is going to have to evolve. I expected that to happen with the start of phase four, but based on Black Widow (which was great) and Shang-Chi, it hasn’t.

• The actor who plays Shang-Chi, Simu Liu, is just not that convincing of an actor. “I'm gOing to kiLL mY fAtHeR,” c’mon dude.

• Shang-Chi is called “Shaun” half the time, so I’m gonna stick with that too.

• There were several things that reminded me of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Apparently, Shaun’s mom was a dancing air bender? And that's where half of Shaun’s “power” comes from?

• The other half of his power comes from the rings, which are of unknown origin and lack and specific power other than like… flying around. And coming back. Like a boomerang. Also, the power of the rings themselves is poorly defined. Presumably, they’re very powerful, but in the scene where Shaun’s mom fights his dad, she beats him and the rings seem pretty lame. Their power varies a lot to suit the needs of the plot.

• Bringing back Trevor Slattery from Iron Man 3 was a great call, but they fumbled the opportunity. The character wasn’t the same, and the performance felt flat.

• The plot didn’t make a ton of sense. They don’t really explain why the dragon scales make their weapons so powerful, but we’ll chalk it up to magic I guess. Too many things in this film were explained by magic though.

• Shaun's costume… is lame. it looks cool in the first scene where it’s shown folded up, but after that it looks like some cheap, off-red, fake leather BDSM getup from a shady internet site.

• Inarguably, the best part of the movie was the post credits scene where we see that Captain Marvel has grown her hair back out after Avengers: Endgame.

The event, titled “California Streaming,” will be broadcast on Apple.com next Tuesday, September 14th at 10AM pacific.

Apple Watch

The new watch rumors are more exciting to me than the new iPhone rumors, this year. We saw some interesting leaks and renders earlier this year from the ever insufferable John Prosser, and while the renders themselves looked like shit (did they make those sides concave?), they do give me hope that Apple could design something in that general style that would look nice. The Apple Watch has never had a significant industrial design refresh, and it’s time. As I believe Myke Hurley pointed out on a recent episode of upgrade, going with squared off sides will probably make it look more like a device and less like a timepiece, but until Apple designs a circular Apple Watch, that’s probably going to be the case regardless. Also, bands: if Apple is going to change the band mechanism any time in the first 15 years of the Watch’s existence, I believe this design refresh is when they would do it. That said, I don’t think they will. Eventually, the watch case may change to the point where they simply can’t make the existing bands compatible, but until such time, I think Apple will do everything they can to keep the current band design.

There aren’t any rumors of significant new features for the Watch this year. Any rumors flying around about new health sensors are focused on 2022 and beyond, so perhaps Apple will get a good surprise in this year, or perhaps they’re relying on the new design to be enough of a feature on its own.

I do think (I hope) it’s almost certain that they finally kick the Apple Watch Series 3 out of the lineup and move the Apple Watch SE down to the $199 price point. That’ll be a great option for a lot of people.

I don’t know about Edition models this year. I would like to see a new material and I think it could be time (if Apple intends to keep the Edition line around in perpetuity, which I’m not sure about), but I don’t know what they could go with and there haven’t been any rumors about it. In all likelihood, it’ll be titanium again, if anything.

iPhone

Me, last year, regarding the then-upcoming iPhones 12:

The rumors are suggesting there’ll be four new models this year, which in my opinion is too many. The rumors are also suggesting that between the two pro models (both of which are rumored to be getting bigger, which sucks), the Pro Max is going to get better camera improvements than the Pro (non-max), which really blows. I’m not a huge fan of massive phones, but I am a huge fan of great cameras, and with four new models, and that doesn’t seem like a compromise I should be forced to make.

I’m sick of Apple differentiating between top tier models. We don’t need to go back to the days of the iPhone 6 Plus, where the biggest phone always has at least one notable camera improvement over its little brother. I thought Apple had moved past this, given that the iPhone XS Max and iPhone 11 Pro Max had identical cameras to the XS and 11 Pro, respectively, so I was very disappointed when they fell back into this pattern with the iPhones 12. And I’ll be frustrated again this year, when the iPhone 13 Pro Max ends up having something that the iPhone 13 Pro doesn’t, and I’ll be forced to make the uncomfortable decision of dealing with a monstrously large phone or settling for a lesser camera.

In regards to the number of new models, I still think four is too many. I liked the lineup a bit better when there were fewer choices to make. The days of the iPhones 6 we’re simpler times: you could get the new iPhone, or you could get the big new iPhone (I’m actually something of a purist who misses the days of the iPhone 5, but we’ll save that conversation for later). But now, there are so many sizes it becomes difficult to remember how many we’ve actually had in the past three years. If Apple is okay with having a hundreds of SKUs, I think they need to go a step further than four models. Actually, two steps further. I think there ought to be three iPhone sizes, with standard and pro tier options at each size. In other words, I want them to introduce “iPhone ## Pro Mini” and “iPhone ## Max” models. Not everyone who wants a big phone wants a pro phone, and not everyone who wants a small phone wants a standard phone. Personally, I would be very interested in something around the size of the iPhone 12 Mini if it had the best cameras and other differentiating features from the Pro line. Alright, end of rant; let’s get on with it.

While none of the rumors about the iPhones 13 are groundbreaking (120Hz display, possible always on display, A15 chip, larger camera sensors and stabilization), I do think this set of iPhones could be a point where we’ll look back at in a year or two and say “I can’t believe it wasn’t always like this”, in regards to the displays. I imagine it’ll feel something like when you’re confronted with the lack of Tap to Wake on Home Button iPhones after getting used to Face ID iPhones, or the lack of Raise to Wake before that.

Other Possible Announcements

A lot of people on the bird app seem to think that Apple could introduce the clunky rumored VR headset at this event, based on the design of the invitation. I think they’ve lost their minds.

We might get an iPad Mini or an AirPods update, but that’s all I’d be willing to guess.

The year is 2021, the NFL has been around for a century, and an active player has just come out of the closet for the first time. On the one hand, it’s astonishing that it took this long, but on the other hand, it’s a miracle that it happened at all. 

Earlier today, Las Vegas Raiders defensive end Carl Nassib posted a video and a statement on Instagram today coming out as gay:

Full statement from Carl Nassib. #PRIDE pic.twitter.com/92cSSDqZoR

— NFL (@NFL) June 21, 2021

I think this has the potential to spur similar announcements (not that they’re required to share the details of their personal lives) from more NFL players and other professional athletes. 

Whether that happens or not, I think this announcement will definitely be a big deal for boys and young guys who are having trouble reconciling their attractions to other guys with stereotypically masculine demeanors and interests, because Nassib is totally correct, representation does matter. And it doesn’t just matter for little boys who want to be broadway stars or princesses, but also for boys who want to be soldiers or football players. There’s nothing wrong with boys who have more feminine personalities or interests, but our society seems to forget that not all same-sex attracted guys fit that mold. 

For the first time, boys who can tell that they’re a little different but otherwise feel normal will have a man to look up to who acts them and likes some of the same things they like. And I think that means a lot — I know it would’ve made life a lot less confusing for me, personally — because it’s important for boys to know that honestly acknowledging who you’re attracted to, whether publicly or privately, doesn’t mean you have to alter your behavior, interests, or personality to fit a stereotype. Seeing masculine, everyday guys come out in roles they look up to will help to show young guys that healthy expressions of traditional American masculinity don’t just belong the insecure, conservative, evangelical men who have tried to exclude other men who make them feel threatened.

On that note, while progressives have done a ton for same-sex attracted people, there’s a large part of the movement that thinks being male and acting like it gives you enough privilege to alleviate all your other problems, and that’s just not the case. Being able to pass as a straight guy in a homosexual-hostile community has its advantages, but it also results in a lot of internalized problems that these men don’t deserve to be blamed for, because they’re conditioned to never feel comfortable addressing them. Given this hurdle, it’s remarkable that a successful football player with everything to lose finally worked up the courage to go against the grain and take this step, but it’s great that he did because it helps to break a link in a vicious cycle. If more young guys in those homophobic environments see same-sex attraction as a normal aspect of human sexuality, then they won’t have to wrestle those demons as young men, and our whole society will be better off. 

All that to say, representation does matter, and for a lot of kids, having a football player to look up to who is open about his same-sex attraction is a big deal. Nassib is going to be at least a few kids’ new favorite player.

Jasmine Wright and Veronica Stracqualursi, reporting for CNN:

Vice President Kamala Harris held a private dinner Tuesday night for the female US senators, a show of bipartisanship among a deeply divided Congress. 

It was the first known time that Harris hosted lawmakers in the vice-presidential residence at the Naval Observatory since moving in April, a process that was delayed due to renovations.

CNN previously reported that Harris had invited all 24 female senators -- 16 Democrats and eight Republicans.

[…]

The senators who attended included Tammy Baldwin, Marsha Blackburn, Maria Cantwell, Shelley Moore Capito, Susan Collins, Catherine Cortez-Masto, Tammy Duckworth, Joni Ernst, Dianne Feinstein, Deb Fischer, Kirsten Gillibrand, Maggie Hassan, Mazie Hirono, Amy Klobuchar, Lisa Murkowski, Patty Murray, Jacky Rosen, Jeanne Shaheen, Debbie Stabenow, Tina Smith and Elizabeth Warren.

Only two senators didn’t show, and only one was a Democrat. I give you zero guesses who it was, you should already know. It was Kyrsten Sinema. Fucking bitch.