big tech is guilty + kanye is… forgiven?
rage against the machine! Silicon Valley is reeling and the future suddenly looks marginally less dystopian. Kudos to the jury who just delivered the huge verdict at an LA court. We’ve seen Zuckerberg coast through court cases too numerous to recite, but the latest proceedings will have drudged up that pit...
Current in The Common Thred
ai on a leash + gen z’s age gap paranoia
get your own sh*t! Try to distinguish between a genuine Studio Ghibli image and something thrown together in 30 seconds on ChatGPT, we dare you. Generative AI platforms have become so fast, polished, and culturally omnivorous that any visual style can now be coopted. It’s good clean fun when making crude...
social media is toxic for clicks + banksy revealed
what? Nah I never knew that, never knew that The BBC must be terrified of whistleblowers at this point. But the latest exposé hasn’t come at its expense… it actually gets the honours of spilling the tea on someone else. Canaries have come to the BBC with a case concerning Meta...
why the obsession with gen z + viral auramax just dropped
lady, hear me tonight! 🎶 ‘Why you so obsessed with me?’ asked Gen Z. ‘How long you got?’ the Guardian replied. The news outlet recently wrote a comprehensive story outlining why people, particularly from the commercial world, are so obsessed with Gen Z. ‘Is there something different about people born between 1997...
war again + what’s with jim carrey’s face
well, that escalated quickly. That ceasefire the US apparently brokered in Gaza never materialised, and now both the US and Israel are escalating their military operations elsewhere. This week, Trump ordered pre-emptive attacks on Iran upon hearing that Israel was preparing an imminent attack on the nation. The president feared...
social media’s landmark addiction case + first major arrest for sexual deepfakes
can they prove what we all know? The sun rises and falls, the rivers flow, and every other month Zuckerberg enters the defendant’s dock to commence lengthy court proceedings. The Meta owner has had several major run-ins with the law since Cambridge Analytica, mostly over a lax company attitude towards user...
where ICE agents gossip online + the creeps who set beauty standards
sorry, no good vibes today Welcome back, or hello and welcome if this is your first time with us at the common thred 💌 At first, this week’s edition might seem a bit all over the place: thirst traps on LinkedIn, therapy-inspired dating approaches, beauty standards shaped by the world’s biggest creeps, ICE agents in online forums bitching about their jobs, and medical evidence of state violence that’s impossible to look away from....
brands capitalise on 2016 nostalgia + can we even make babies in space?
i don't think we got the facilities for that Well hello there! Welcome (back) to your fave Tuesday stack… the common thred newsletter 🥞 Whether you’re interested in finance, politics, or culture, you should know one very important thing: young people are officially done waiting for these global systems to catch up with their needs. As a result, they’re learning to play by their own rules. Let me tell you what I mean...
instagram trials premium + why everyone wants to be chinese
is anyone else feeling a little more chinese lately Hey hey everybodayyy! Welcome back to the common thred (!), a digital space we’ve carved out to cut through the intensity and overwhelm of the 24 hour news cycle. Because honestly, sometimes having news app notifications on is just TMI. We’ll touch on viral trends and emerging tech, as well as the news shaping the world and the way we live it. Think of us as...
gen z turns to religion + embraces micro-retirement
he has rizz'en ya'll Welcome back to another newsletter from all of us at the common thred! ⚡️ If you’re just joining, we’d like to extend a warm welcome to you for the very first time. Either way, you’re here now, which means you’ve made it through another week of e-mails, group chat messages, and headlines that probably made you think ‘are you kidding me?!?’. We can relate, and that’s why this newsletter exists. Our mission...
