This week’s Sunday Morning Reading is tariff free. As usual, even in unusual times there’s some politics, some tech, and things pulled from the cultural file. Enjoy.
Apparently folks in the tech industry can’t stand to look at themselves in the mirror. Issie Lapowsky isn’t. Take a look at ‘The Terror Is Real’: An Appalled Tech Industry Is Scared To Criticize Elon Musk.
For some good context that gets lost in all of what’s washing over us, Jill Lapore takes a look at The Failed Ideas That Drive Elon Musk. Everything old is new again is the saying, even bad things.
Trying to pin down any real coherent details or point of view about what’s happening in the economy is a fool’s game played by the foolish at this point. But context does help. Hamilton Nolan thinks the recent foolish moves will eventually make the rich poorer. I agree. Take a look at what he calls “a deep, dark ocean of harm” in Divergence From The Interests of Capital.
Like the political world, the tech world is seeing its myths and myth makers exposed for the frauds they often are with new layers of the onion peeled back daily. Joanna Stern in the Wall Street Journal takes a look the erosion of trust in her piece, Apple and Amazon Promised Us Revolutionary AI. We’re Still Waiting. It’s a soft headline. Here closing line hits harder, “Where’s the trust?”
Andrew Lanxon wonders Is Technology Actually Terrible Or Am I Just A Grumpy Old Man? He’s not the only one who’s grumpy.
But perhaps, all is not lost. Yet. Nate Anderson takes a look at Unshittification: 3 Tech Companies That Recently Made My Life…Better.
Flipping back to politics a bit for another positive note, Tiffany Stanley tells the tale of how A Historic Black Church Took The Proud Boys To Court. Now It Controls Their Trademark. Take victories when we can.
Lest we forget that our culture and society is one weird, yet overly predictable wrestling match over how to, or not to control our animal impulses, comes word that Hooters is filing for bankruptcy. Annie Joy Williams takes a look at The End of Hooters.
We’re all staring at everything we’re facing hoping, perhaps against hope, that none of it will lead to any permanent damage, yet teetering on the verge of grief because we recognize our personal impermanence means it might be permanent enough in our short respective lifetimes. That strikes home when someone brave talks about a moment of personal grief. Check out Death Comes Gently Into The Night by NatashaMH.
Image from Michael Constantine on Unsplash
If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.
First up, John Gruber in Daring Fireball takes on the broad gulf in the Gulf of Mexico (America) debate in a well reasoned, often too nuanced post entitled 
The documentary itself is excellent work. The six episodes splice together historical footage-some already famous, some new-with interviews from those who were actually there, on all sides of the conflict. We’ve seen similar story telling techniques in other historical documentaries. This time around we get to hear not just from Americans, but also from North Vietnamese and Viet Cong voices. These moments are certainly compelling, as are some of the stories of the journalists and other non-combatants involved.
Add to that what I’ll call the reunion factor. Each episode features a couple of individuals who served together to tell their stories, often with completely different views on the war and its aims. In the episode’s conclusion they are then reunited. It’s effective and at times emotional and effectively reveals the folly and tragedy of division.
As good as the series is at chronicling an inflection point in American and world history, what got me thinking was again witnessing scenes of anti-war protests. While I’ve seen many such scenes before, watching them through the prism of this contemporary moment of peril we’re trying to find our way through in the U.S left me curious and unsettled.
There’s no doubt that those anti-war protests had an impact on America culturally and politically. That tumultuous era created new alliances and divisions over root causes that we are still fighting over today. But as I watch those surging crowds of protesters, knowing how history often repeats and/or rhymes, I remind myself that was a different age. One without the organizing tools like social media and mobile communications that we have at our disposal now.
As I and many others anguish over the lack of leadership defying what is happening currently in Washington DC, I’m left wondering, given the tools we have at our disposal today, what it will take to effectively take advantage of those tools and galvanize, as was done then, to meet the challenges of today. Certainly the forces we’re now in contest with have bought and pillaged some of those services and learned how to use them more effectively than those in the reluctant opposition.
Perhaps we lost this round when most of us left Twitter to avoid the cesspool of Elon Musk’s making, instead of sticking around and forcing them to toss us off.
It took time in that era for anti-government pressure to come together and coalesce with enough momentum to bring change. And yes, it also took events like the murders of student protestors at Kent State, Martin Luther King, and Bobby Kennedy, not to mention the too many casualties of war.
Let’s hope we don’t need the time, or that type of violence, for leaders to emerge and spark enough outrage to bring a stop to the evil we now face. I’m not talking about leaders emerging from conventional political party structures. I’m talking about from the ground up. The tools are there. It should be easier to organize and get the word out with less effort than it was during the age of the War in Vietnam.
Here’s also hoping we have the courage, conviction, and most importantly the desire to do what is necessary when the time comes.
Because it’s coming.
You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at 
Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3 