Nothing Here

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nothing here but a comet ambush - issue 183 - 26th June, 2022

nothing here but a comet ambush

issue 183 - 26th June, 2022


CJW: Welcome to another bumper issue (is it a “bumper” if they’re all that long?).

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#183
June 26, 2022
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nothing here but mangoes and abolition

nothing here but mangoes and abolition

issue 182 - 12th June, 2022


CJW: Too much to talk about this week, so I’ll keep things brief. Thanks for joining us. Hope you find value in something in these pages.

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#182
June 12, 2022
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[BONUS] God save the Queen's English: on linguistic prejudice and pop culture

God save the Queen’s English: on linguistic prejudice and pop culture

issue 181 - 7th June, 2022

by Lidia Zuin


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#181
June 7, 2022
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nothing here but scorpion inattention - issue 180 - 29th May, 2022

nothing here but scorpion inattention

issue 180 - 29th May, 2022


CJW: Welcome to another issue of the nothing here newsletter. Things are pretty rough all around, so take care of yourself and look out for your loved ones. Sometimes that’s all we can do.

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#180
May 29, 2022
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nothing here but carbon bombs - issue 179 - 15th May, 2022

nothing here but carbon bombs

issue 179 - 15th May, 2022


CJW: Welcome to another issue of nothing here. As ever, there is a lot happening out there in the world and we can only cover a slice of it, but hopefully you find something worthwhile in these pages.

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#179
May 15, 2022
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[BONUS] The Farm - MJW - issue 178 - 8th May, 2022

MJW: Looking back through the bonuses recently to see what pieces I’d already used, I was struck by how fucking ‘me me me’ everything I write is. Jfc, I’m self-obsessed. (I also was surprised to see how many posts from 2020 I have zero recollection of writing. That’s… not good.)

Don’t forget: you can’t spell ‘memoir’ without me me me me. I write about myself for so many reasons: I have lots of stories, lots of feelings. I hate hot takes, and I often don’t feel like I’m smart enough for deep analysis. It takes me too long a time and lots of reading, writing and editing to distill my opinions down to their ideal form.

I write about myself because I hate writing the universal ‘we’. I can’t speak for anyone else. I do not like to make sweeping statements about the things that ‘we’ do, or that ‘we’ know. All I know for certain is what I think and feel and like and hate. And even then, I’m still not 100%.

I haven’t really been able to write fiction these past couple of years but after reading Tilly Lawless’ Nothing but my body, I thought I’d try writing some auto fiction, taking inspiration from life. I’ve made some illustrations for it because I’m taking a graphic narrative workshop and submitted this piece last month.

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#178
May 8, 2022
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nothing here but digital apartheid - issue 177 - 1st May, 2022

nothing here but digital apartheid

issue 177 - 1st May, 2022


CJW: It’s an absolute bumper of an issue (even with MKY out to the CVD), so let’s get right to it.

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#177
May 1, 2022
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nothing here but five climate futures feat. Andrew Dana Hudson - issue 174 - 17th April, 2022

nothing here but five climate futures feat. Andrew Dana Hudson

issue 174 - 17th April, 2022


CJW: Dan couldn’t be with us this issue, but we’ve got returning guest Andrew Dana Hudson here with a new book to share and thoughts on all the good news we like to discuss in these pages.

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#175
April 17, 2022
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[BONUS] Blood Eclectic by CJW - issue 173 - 10th April, 2022

CJW: I had a couple of ideas on what to write about this time around, but didn’t have the mental bandwidth to spare. Who knew that a dayjob, editing a novella, reading and making notes for a theory podcast, and reading and making notes for this newsletter all at the same time would prove taxing on the grey matter.

So I decided to share this piece of flash fiction I wrote a couple of years back, inspired by the Tom Waits song Romeo is Bleeding. I always liked the story, but I was never sure about being able to publish it because I literally quote the song multiple times.


Blood Eclectic

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#174
April 10, 2022
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nothing here but the strategic sublime - issue 172 - 3rd April, 2022

nothing here but the strategic sublime

issue 172 - 3rd April, 2022


CJW: Everything happens so much, so here we are. Welcome to another issue of nothing here.

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#173
April 3, 2022
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nothing here but fossil fuel war

nothing here but fossil fuel war

issue 171 - 20th March, 2022


CJW: Welcome back to another issue of nothing here, where we read the internet so you don’t have to.

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#171
March 20, 2022
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[BONUS] Red Panda by m1k3y - issue 170 - 13th March, 2022

New fiction coming to you via m1k3y. Embrace the formatting, download the PDF, and enjoy.

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#170
March 13, 2022
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nothing here but pirates of socialism - issue 169 - 6th March, 2022

nothing here but pirates of socialism

issue 169 - 6th March, 2022


CJW: Welcome to another issue of nothing here. Lots to share, so let’s get into it.

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#169
March 6, 2022
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nothing here but DIY heaters and a large bong

nothing here but DIY heaters and a large bong

issue 168 - 20th February, 2022


CJW: Welcome, welcome. Good to have you here.

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#168
February 20, 2022
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[BONUS] Olavo de Carvalho is Dead - issue 167 - 13th February, 2022

LZ: Hey all, my first time here with a bonus edition.

As you may already know, I’m Brazilian, though currently living in Germany and soon moving to Sweden. This is a very recent move and I still have my umbilical cord strongly attached to my motherland. I don’t know if that will ever change, but… even from afar, some things really touch you and leave an impact. Being physically distant helps you think though.

Like the case for the death of Olavo de Carvalho.

Let me introduce you to this marvelous creature who is the embodiment of our current times.

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#167
February 13, 2022
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nothing here but super-graveyard drift - issue 166 - 6th February, 2022

nothing here but super-graveyard drift

issue 166 - 6th February, 2022


CJW: Welcome back to another issue of nothing here.

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#166
February 6, 2022
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nothing here but a billionaire corpse pyramid

nothing here but a billionaire corpse pyramid

issue 165 - 23rd January, 2022


CJW: Welcome to our new subscribers, and welcome back to our old friends. We’ve got another bumper issue for you.

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#165
January 23, 2022
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[BONUS] A Timeline of QAnon Crime - issue 164 - 16th January, 2022

A Timeline of QAnon Crime

issue 164 - 16th January, 2022


DCH: I’ve written about the intersection of technology and far-right conspiracies many times before. I think I have a better grasp of it than most. What I wanted to understand more was the scope of actual crimes committed in service of Q.

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#164
January 16, 2022
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nothing here but toxic feudalism - issue 163 - 9th January, 2022

nothing here but toxic feudalism

issue 163 - 9th January, 2022


CJW: Happy New Year! As they say, New Year, New Sletter.

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#163
January 9, 2022
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nothing here but a retrospective - issue 162 - 26th December, 2021

nothing here but a retrospective

issue 162 - 26th December, 2021


CJW: Welcome! Whatever holiday you might celebrate at this time of the year, I hope you’re enjoying it and getting a chance to relax after another tough year.

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#162
December 26, 2021
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[BONUS] Batman Returns: A Bativity Scene - issue 161 - 19th December, 2021

Batman Returns: A Bativity Scene

issue 161 - 19th December, 2021


CJW: Welcome to a special bonus issue of nothing here - a Christmas movie group watch! This year we’re tackling Tim Burton’s Batman Returns.

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#161
December 19, 2021
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nothing here but abolitionist allies - issue 160 - 12th December, 2021

nothing here but abolitionist allies

issue 160 - 12th December, 2021


CJW: Welcome to another edition of the nothing here newsletter. As usual, we’ve got more links than you can poke a stick at.

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#160
December 12, 2021
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nothing here but untimely futures - issue 159 - 28th November, 2021

nothing here but untimely futures

issue 159 - 28th November, 2021


CJW: Welcome to another edition of the nothing here newsletter. Thanks to our new premium subscribers - great to have you on board (and thanks to Cennydd for helping me realise there was no easy link to sign up before).

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#159
November 28, 2021
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[BONUS] Your Body Is Perfect, and Other Lies - issue 158 - 21st November, 2021

[BONUS] Your Body Is Perfect, and Other Lies

issue 158 - 21st November, 2021

Content warning: weight, bodies, fatness, thinness, all the things.

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#158
November 21, 2021
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nothing here but the dirty dozen - issue 157 - 14th November, 2021

nothing here but the dirty dozen

issue 157 - 14th November, 2021


CJW: Seems I need to apologise - each issue I tell you that you can support us by becoming a premium subscriber, but the link I was providing didn’t actually take you to the right place. My bad. I’ve sorted that out now, so if you would like to support us, you’ve got two options:

  • $5 monthly subscription.

  • $50 annual subscription.

Both options will give you access to the full bonus archive, as well as new bonuses as they are posted. We appreciate any and all support. And if there’s someone who you think will appreciate the newsletter, please forward this to them.

Our latest unlocked bonus is from Marlee: You’re Wrong About: A Love Letter

With COP26, we’ve got a lot of climate change related news… Sorry?


The Team

  • Daniel Harvey (DCH) - Designer, writer, provocateur. Pro-guillotine tech critic. @dancharvey

  • m1k3y (MKY) - Wallfacer / ecopoet // Dark Extropian Musings / pryvt.rsrch / @eattrainrevolt [twit/insta]

  • Marlee Jane Ward (MJW) - is also Mia Walsch.

  • Corey J. White (CJW) - Author, podcaster, sin-eater.

  • Lidia Zuin (LZ) - Journalist, MA in semiotics, and PhD in Arts. Sci-fi writer, futurology researcher and essayist. @lidiazuin


Climate Change & The Environment

MKY: The dirty dozen: meet America’s top climate villains - Georgia Wright, Liat Olenick and Amy Westervelt at The Guardian

Working- and middle-class people must stop blaming themselves for the climate crisis. Instead, it’s time to band together to seek justice and hold these profiteers accountable. Only in calling out their power and culpability is it possible to reclaim the world that belongs to all of us, together.

names-and-addresses.jpg

//

CJW: Surface Tension - George Monbiot

Regardless of which complex system is being studied, there’s a way of telling whether it is approaching a tipping point. Its outputs begin to flicker. The closer to its critical threshold it comes, the wilder the fluctuations. What we’ve seen this year is a great global flickering, as Earth systems begin to break down. The heat domes over the western seaboard of North America; the massive fires there, in Siberia and around the Mediterranean; the lethal floods in Germany, Belgium, China, Sierra Leone – these are the signals that, in climatic morse code, spell “mayday”.

You might expect an intelligent species to respond to these signals swiftly and conclusively, by radically altering its relationship with the living world. But this is not how we function. Our great intelligence, our highly evolved consciousness that once took us so far, now works against us.

One of the best pieces I think I’ve seen from Monbiot - and that’s saying something when he is consistently writing great pieces.

MKY: Nice. I used to explain this as when a spinning top starts to wobble.

//

CJW: Indigenous Knowledge Has Been Warning Us About Climate Change for Centuries - Malcolm Harris at Pacific Standard (via Aaron Stewart-Ahn)

The philosopher Timothy Morton calls climate change a “hyperobject”: It’s so widely distributed and conceptually sticky that we can’t really perceive it except in partial local instances. “When you feel raindrops falling on your head, you are experiencing climate, in some sense. In particular you are experiencing the climate change known as global warming,” Morton wrote in 2010. “But you are never directly experiencing global warming as such.” Humans don’t have the right sensory faculties.

Maybe it was possible to think that way in 2010, but, less than a decade later, I think many of us have developed the ability to see global warming. We are no longer empiricists who route information through our senses to our brain for analysis; we’re conspiracy theorists, every raindrop or sunbeam encountered as hyperobject. Now the totality hits us first.

I grabbed the above quote because I thought it was interesting to consider that in just 11 years we’ve gotten to the point where maybe we can perceive the hyperobject of climate change perhaps due to its rapidity or the increased media coverage.

But this essay is actually about Indigenous knowledge on climate change, and the colonialist extractivist ideology that has driven our climate to this point, and on the causes and effects of an insect megadeath. (Caveat: this piece is a couple of years old now, and I remember there being some question as to whether the original research on insect extinctions was actually accurate or not. That said, all the points on the devaluation of indigenous knowledge are still sadly relevant.)

//

CJW: The climate won’t wait. We need a carbon tax now - Tim Harford at Financial Times

As strange as it may sound, this piece about the implementation and costs of a carbon tax actually gave me hope for the future. It’s a simple and practical step that governments could take which could have a big impact on logistical networks and their carbon output without needing to impact individuals greatly.

We had a carbon tax in Australia and it worked to reduce emissions, but our conservative government dismantled it for ideological reasons, and if Australia’s outing at COP26 is any indication, it seems doubtful they would reintroduce it, or indeed introduce any efforts to mitigate climate change that might impact their friends in big business.

MKY: what other-me sed:

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#157
November 14, 2021
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nothing here but deathly silence - issue 156 - 31st October, 2021

nothing here but deathly silence

issue 156 - 31st October, 2021


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#156
October 31, 2021
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[BONUS] Couch to Hero - issue 155 - 24th October, 2021

CJW: This month's bonus comes courtesy of MKY - on Bob Odenkirk, Nobody, and training montages but in real life.

It's already laid up nice and proper in a PDF, so just to check it out.

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#155
October 24, 2021
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nothing here but astrocolonialism - 17th October, 2021

nothing here but astrocolonialism

issue 154 - 17th October, 2021


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#154
October 17, 2021
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nothing here but anti-fascist mutual aid - issue 153 - 3rd October, 2021

nothing here but anti-fascist mutual aid

issue 153 - 3rd October, 2021


Hello, and welcome again to another edition of nothing here.

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#153
October 3, 2021
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[BONUS] And I Feel Fine - issue 152 - 26th September, 2021

And I Feel fine

CJW


I’ve called myself a sin-eater[1] before in the context of this newsletter, and I was only ever half-joking. Every article I would read about our oncoming climate collapse, mass extinction, billionaire malfeasance, quashed labor rights, police brutality, genocide, and on and on, would stick in my heart like a barb. If ignorance is bliss, then keeping up-to-date with current affairs is self-flagellation.

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#152
September 26, 2021
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nothing here but shapeshifting animals - issue 151 - 19th September, 2021

nothing here but shapeshifting animals

issue 151 - 19th September, 2021


Welcome to another instalment of the nothing here newsletter. We’ve had a huge influx of new subscribers - welcome! I’m not sure what brought you here, but I’m glad to have you join us.

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#151
September 19, 2021
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nothing here but slime molds and Heisenberg cubes - issue 150 - 5th September, 2021

nothing here but slime molds and Heisenberg cubes

issue 150 - 5th September, 2021


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#150
September 5, 2021
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[BONUS] August Movie August - It's Over! - 2nd September, 2021

Here we are again, this time with my thoughts on the final batch of august films for August. Perhaps next year I’ll try and do this again, a bit better organised, with input from more people, and posted out to twitter etc to get more folk involved. Either way I enjoyed myself, and I hope you did too if you decided to watch along with any of these films.


Martyrs (2008)

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#149
September 1, 2021
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nothing here but deepfake pitches - issue 148 - 22nd August, 2021

nothing here but deepfake pitches

issue 148 - 22nd August, 2021


Everything happens all the time, as these past 2 weeks have attested.

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#148
August 22, 2021
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[BONUS] August Movie August 2021 - First Batch

CJW: Here’s my rundown of the first batch of films as part of the inaugural August Movie August (I keep calling it “inaugural” but it’ll probably never happen again…).


A Dark Song

The ending of this one really didn’t do much for me, which is a shame because I felt like the set-up could have gone in lots of interesting directions.

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#147
August 15, 2021
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nothing here but outsourced torture - issue 146 - 8th August, 2021

nothing here but outsourced torture

issue 146 - 8th August, 2021


I’m coming atcha from Wurundjeri lands in Melbourne, in lockdown number 6 (Lock Fast, Lock Furious), and I can’t travel more than 5 kilometres from my house. Again. This time we’ve got a robust climate section (there’s just so much going on, though I never read it ‘cause I spend enough time crying in the shower…) as well as billionaire migration, anarchist prepping, memes, and more.

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#146
August 8, 2021
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[Bonus] August Movie August - The Selection - 1st August, 2021

CJW: My mental health has taken another dive, and I’m finding it basically impossible to engage with my article reading, at all. Usually when this happens I can still read, or at least skim, the articles, but I might struggle when it comes to writing them up for the newsletter - this time around though, I can barely bring myself to read them.

So, I’m going to be taking a bit of a break from being your current events sin-eater. I decided that while I’m taking a minor break, I might dive into this list of movies I’ve been keeping around for ages, and finally get around to watching them. Thus I present to you, the inaugural August Movie August (because heaven-forbid I actually take any time off-off).

Below I’ve included my list of movies so that if you want to play along at home, you can. And if you do, feel free to hit me up with your thoughts and I might include them along with my own in my next dispatch.

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#145
August 1, 2021
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nothing here but dicks in space - issue 144 - 25th July, 2021

nothing here but dicks in space

issue 144 - 25th July, 2021


Welcome, welcome. You’ll notice below that I’ve decided to replace the Articles, URL, and Data Viz sections with topics. That way you can home in on the subjects you’re interested in and skip over the ones you aren’t. It makes so much sense I don’t know how I didn’t think of it before now.

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#144
July 25, 2021
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nothing here but a practical effects arms-race

nothing here but a practical effects arms-race

issue 143 - 11th July, 2021


Hey everyone! This issue m1k3y is back, and we have the pleasure of adding Lidia Zuin to the roster permanently! This is a fantastic team, and I’m really excited to see what we can bring you.

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#143
July 11, 2021
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nothing here but corporate serfdom - issue 142 - 27th June, 2021

nothing here but corporate serfdom

issue 142 - 27th June, 2021


Thanks for joining us again for another issue of nothing here. This time out, we have returning guest Maddison Stoff, Melbourne-based writer, critic, musician, and generally rad person.

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#142
June 27, 2021
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nothing here but ecosystem revival

nothing here but ecosystem revival

issue 141 - 13th June, 2021


Welcome to another edition of the nothing here newsletter. MKY is taking a break but I hope we’ll have him back next month. In the meantime we have special guest Lidia Zuin! Lidia is a Brazilian semiotician, journalist, researcher, futurologist and professor.

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#141
June 13, 2021
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nothing here but this electric face

nothing here but this electric face

issue 140 - 30th May, 2021


Welcome to another edition of the nothing here newsletter. We’ve got more of all the good (read: bad) stuff for you.

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#140
May 30, 2021
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[UNLOCKED] Experiments in Expectation (On GPT-3)

Early this week, I (CJW) was given access to OpenAI’s GPT-3 beta. I half-expected my application to fall through the cracks, thinking they’d be more interested in technical applications rather than the sort of stupid experiments I was likely to conduct, but either they’re letting any old chump get in, or I managed to wow them with my brief application spiel.

My pitch was that I wanted to explore GPT-3’s potential use as the next evolution of the Cut-Up Technique, invented by Brion Gysin and popularised by William S. Burroughs. I’ve experimented with the Cut-Up Technique (CUT) plenty before – both cutting within a piece of work to see what new insights might reveal themselves through the arbitrary juxtaposition of words and phrases, and also as a tool for combining two vastly different texts. CUT can be fun, and it can also be revealing and confronting, like one time where it found the intention behind a very personal piece of writing even when said intention was not on the page.

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#139
May 23, 2021
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nothing here but a birth of violence

nothing here but a birth of violence

issue 138 - 16th May, 2021


Hello again and welcome.

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#138
May 16, 2021
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[UNLOCKED] Becoming

CJW: On Becoming…


Every now and then there’ll be a new meme that spreads through author twitter about an author’s brand, or what themes they find they keep writing. I’ve seen variations go by a dozen times, easily, and I always scrolled right past each time because I had no idea what my response would be.

Being able to work out the answer to that question would mean being able to step back and look at a project subjectively, and I’m usually so deep in a project I can’t tell if it’s any good, let alone what bigger themes it might be touching on. But working through another edit on my current manuscript I finally figured it out… And it’s about damn time.

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#137
May 9, 2021
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nothing here but anti-police insurgency feat. Andrew Dana Hudson

issue 136 - 2nd May, 2021


CJW: Welcome to the latest instalment of nothing here. It’s a big one. Sorry? This issue we’ve got returning guest, Andrew Dana Hudson. Thanks for joining us Andrew!

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#136
May 2, 2021
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[UNLOCKED] Cancelling Deleuze

Cancelling Deleuze

[bonus] issue 135 - 23rd April, 2021

CJW: Apologies for the delay with this issue. Turns out I fucked up something when I first set up the Buttondown account, so I’ve been getting that sorted out, and it’s taken a bit longer than I hoped (which is entirely down to me having too much on this month). I put off sending this on Sunday, just so Mr Buttondown (Justin to his friends) could finish fixing my fuck up. (We’re still not done, but I came up with a temporary workaround at least.)

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#135
April 27, 2021
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nothing here but toothless protest

nothing here but toothless protest

issue 134 - 18th April, 2021


Welcome to another instalment of nothing here. I hope you’re all doing well. These are trying times, but we’re getting through, and we’ll continue to get through it.

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#134
April 18, 2021
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[UNLOCKED] A Eulogy for Micajahala

A Eulogy for Micajahala

[bonus] issue 133 - 11th April, 2021


I imagine more than a few of our readers have lost loved ones within the last year. Thought it might help to share the eulogy I wrote for my mother on February 1st, after she died in January.

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#133
April 11, 2021
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nothing here but global suicide - issue 132 - 4th April, 2021

nothing here but global suicide

issue 132 - 4th April, 2021

CJW: Welcome to nothing here, coming to you via Buttondown. Hopefully everything goes smoothly and you get this email in your inbox without hassle. It’s a long one today, so let’s get straight to it.

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#132
April 4, 2021
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