flâneur

Vincent Yang

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on the atlas — 32

highlights — 93

  • I began to cherish the loneliness of it, the sense that at any given time no one need know where I was or what I was doing
    Diva in Distress: Seen and be seen
  • I could stay up all night and make mistakes, and none of them would count.
    Diva in Distress: Seen and be seen
  • I never felt poor; I had the feeling that if I needed money I could always get it. I could write a syndicated column for teenagers under the name “Debbi Lynn” or I could smuggle gold into India or I could become a $100 call girl, and none of would matter.
    Diva in Distress: Seen and be seen
  • I do not mean “love” in any colloquial way, I mean that I was in love with the city, the way you love the first person who ever touches you and you never love anyone quite that way again
    Diva in Distress: Seen and be seen
  • Music, state of happiness, mythology, faces shaped by time, certain twilights and certain places, try to tell us something, or they told us something that we should not have lost, or want to tell us something; this imminence of a revelation, which does not occur, is, perhaps, the esthetic phenomenon.” Yes that sense of something just about to become clear and yet…and yet…
    Recommended Reads: Jorge Luis Borges’ “Other Inquisitions” – The Houghton STAR
  • one runs away to find oneself, and finds no one at home.
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • There is a similar case for all the small disciplines, unimportant in themselves; imagine maintaining any kind of swoon, commiserative or carnal, in a cold shower.
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • The dismal fact is that self-respect has nothing to do with the approval of others—who are, after all, deceived easily enough
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • In China, ideas are worthless; execution is the only thing that matters. The one who survives is the winner.
    chinese creativity (a visit to china pt.3)
  • travel is this unusual form of conspicuous consumption that isn’t subject to conspicuous consumption taboos.
    Taste games
  • “Which scenario endangers us more: you sleeping with other women, or you not sleeping with other women?”
    Scenes from an Open Marriage by Jean Garnett
  • We have legal ways to cooperate, like with Customs. Every year, Customs auctions seized shark fins and sells them through designated companies. We can buy from the companies who win the auctions. That’s a reliable supply channel. There’s quite a lot.
    A Conversation with a Shark Fin Trader
  • If I think something, I don’t need to go through this big roundabout thing, where I “show” it and make it literary. I don’t need to make my writing ambiguous
    A list of books and essays that I love - by Henrik Karlsson
  • By not appreciating the full range of feeling that people are capable of, we are foreclosing a deeper engagement with one another, an engagement on terms that don’t demand that everyone be the same but leave room for the great unknown of what happens in other people’s heads.
    What if Our Ancestors Didn’t Feel Anything Like We Do? - The Atlantic
  • On the other, we are peculiarly in thrall to everyone we see, curiously determined to live out—since our self-image is untenable—their false notions of us
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • In one guise or another, Indians always are
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • character—the willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own life—is the source from which self-respect springs
    On Self-Respect – Alex Burgin
  • Since the 1994 fiscal reforms, local governments are responsible for roughly 85% of government spending in their jurisdictions and must raise their own revenue, primarily through business taxes and land use sales. They only get to keep just over half of the revenue they raise3 (the proceeds from land use sales are entirely kept by local governments), and technically, they are not allowed to run a deficit4.
    Home | Substack
  • Spiritually poisoned by peace and comfort
    Remains of the Day | Eugene Wei | Substack
  • The glass-half-empty-view is that the quality bar for an initial post can be lower. Sloppy stories get published since they can always be corrected later, as much or as often as needed. This gets us into deterministic “truth” versus probabilistic “truth” territory. In other words, from: Here it is, take it or leave it, to: Here it is, subject to arbitrary ongoing revision.
    The Future of the News Business: A Monumental Twitter Stream All in One Place | Andreessen Horowitz
  • That’s why the lesson to be learned from Grantland may be the exact opposite of what it seems: the problem isn’t that ESPN spent too much money on a web site that couldn’t monetize, it’s that the web site should only have been step one to a multi-media endeavor that converted visitors to fans willing to invest time in formats that can actually pay the bills.
    Grantland and the (Surprising) Future of Publishing – Stratechery by Ben Thompson
  • Just as with HBO, it turns out writing is great lead generation for an actual monetizable business.
    Grantland and the (Surprising) Future of Publishing – Stratechery by Ben Thompson
  • The trouble with podcasts is that they are difficult to grow: while text can be shared and consumed quickly, a podcast requires a commitment
    Grantland and the (Surprising) Future of Publishing – Stratechery by Ben Thompson
  • The key to any sustainable business, whether it be a restaurant, airline, or app developer, is to make money off of your best customers over time. Apps with a service component, like Evernote, or ones with an ever-increasing array of in-app purchases, like Pleco, do this successfully.
    Pleco: Building a Business, not an App – Stratechery by Ben Thompson
  • Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and other stringent environmental protection laws, construction will take over 900 days (about 3 years) while costing four times more than equivalent facilities built overseas.
    Deep Dive: Building an American TSMC | Contrary Research
  • The US’ supply of long-range anti-ship missiles would likely run out in around five days and could take years to replace.
    Deep Dive: Building an American TSMC | Contrary Research
  • Wright’s Law, states that production costs inherently decrease by a consistent percentage with every doubling of cumulative production volume
    Deep Dive: Building an American TSMC | Contrary Research
  • “We don’t really worry about climate change because it’s too overwhelming and we’re already in too deep. It’s like if you owe your bookie $1,000, you’re like, ‘OK, I’ve got to pay this dude back.’ But if you owe your bookie $1 million dollars, you’re like, ‘I guess I’m just going to die.’”
    The challenging politics of climate change | Brookings
  • “The Democrats,” he said, “the longer they talk about identity politics, I got ’em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats.”
    The battle over identity politics, explained | Vox
  • Third, it’s a risky thing to do, since writing it down is likely to prematurely stabilise it. If a proposition makes it into your identity - if you consider yourself the kind of person who believes or disbelieves in climate change, believes or disbelieves in the divinity of Christ - then you are much less likely to react properly to evidence.
    2017 Worldview in Five Books
  • Almost all existing commercial nuclear reactors are light-water reactors.
    Use Cases and Reactor Types | NIA
  • Depending on your capability, you may approach it differently than I do, but I saw massive benefits in reading how other critics and writers describe and critique art. Through their work, I can start to see their methodology in transforming their knowledge, experience, emotions, and their intangible penchant into a smoothly flowing critique on art. It can be very vague at times, as no one really writes from point A to point B; However, if you zoom out, you will see the bigger picture.
    Home | Substack
  • Empirically, yes: a few thousand dollars in some African countries; a few million dollars in most Western ones. But don't confuse price with value! Water, for example, is the most valuable thing to most people, but its price is very cheap.
    In Search of All Souls
  • We've seen declines in organised religion, massive migration to cities (and, indeed, between countries), no-fault divorce, the normalisation of frequent job-switching, smaller families, widespread acceptance of individualist economic assumptions, and loss of local social structures (see the classic book Bowling Alone). We now focus on finding the ideal career without realising that it's communities, and relationships within them, that make us happy. Today everyone is 'somebody' - an individual - but few of us are anybody in the communal sense which matters the most.
    In Search of All Souls
  • But right now it's not only distracting, it's also individualistic, since using technology is currently a very solitary activity.
    In Search of All Souls
  • I also explained how our intuitions about individual lives cannot consistently be extended to whole populations because of Arrhenius' impossibility theorems
    In Search of All Souls
  • I claimed that we can distinguish 3 levels on which we value human lives: intrinsic (simply because a life is human), welfare (based on how good a life is for the person leading it), and outcome (how good the effects of a life are)
    In Search of All Souls
  • Then I decided to attend a post-graduate program at Guignard School of Arts, where it became clear for me that my biggest motivation is not to find answers, only raising more questions. I changed my approach in photographing, trying to be less objective as in the practice of journalism, and to give more space for and attention to subjectivity. I develop my projects powered by my own will.
    fototazo: Interview: Pedro Silveira
  • Subsequently, I decided to quit the job in order to gain the freedom needed to chase my own questions. Especially because the mainstream media here is directly linked to capital, which explains their lack of interest in further reflections on these issues that most provoke me.
    fototazo: Interview: Pedro Silveira
  • A notable escalation occurred in 2025 when the U.S. deployed the advanced Naval/Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) and unmanned surface vessels within Philippine territory, greatly enhancing the alliance’s coastal strike capabilities. These deployments explicitly counter China’s anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) strategy, aligning directly with new U.S. Marine Corps doctrines like Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) and “stand-in forces.” Such moves signal to Beijing a profound shift from mere deterrence toward active preparations for potential conflict scenarios.
    To China, Hegseth’s Philippines Trip Was an Escalation – The Diplomat
  • In ...All the Days and Nights, DuBois says, "I was very conscious to leave key images out and allow space for the viewer to create the story. I think photographs work best that way. I've always maintained that the narrative is really located between the images. You're really trying to push the reader to think about what happens between images - to imagine, to project...to fill that space with some kind of story. Those gaps are critical."
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • The narrative goal is to sustain multiple readings, remain complex, and maintain a certain ambiguity that beckons you back to the work again and again.
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • He audibly calls out the sounds of the images as he goes to help him understand if the sequence is working. A sequence that sounds like "da-dee-da-DUM-da" might work, whereas a more even "dum-dum-da-dum-dum" might signal a sequence that’s too even and flat.
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • With the images laid out on table, he can work quickly, shifting images around. The playing is a kind of "indulgence." He says, "Maybe it's like a writer trying to write everyday: you just do it, and you try not to think too hard about it." He has an eight-foot table and plenty of wall-space to work with the images
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • He also brought back images every summer, giving away 100s of prints and gauging reactions
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • One of the signs, not the only sign, but one of the signs of when a project is nearing completion is that you begin to repeat images. It’s like, 'Oh yeah, I've already made that picture'...I also felt I was wearing out my welcome. The first time in the neighborhood I was a somewhat exotic American with a camera - either that or a fuckin' perv which I was called repeatedly during my first few weeks there - and I could kind of milk that, people were nice to me because I was a visitor and interested in their lives. When I returned each summer, I entered the fabric and the rhythms of the neighborh…
    fototazo: Interview: Doug DuBois, Part I
  • So then the challenge, working in this landscape, is finding a way to describe that violent character Brecht is identifying without ratcheting that violence down to the manageable abstraction of the individual, to borrow a phrase from Wilderson.
    One Wall a Web: An Interview with Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa – AMERICAN SUBURB X
  • “In democratic countries the violent character inherent in the economy doesn’t show itself; in authoritarian countries the same holds true for the economic character of violence.”
    One Wall a Web: An Interview with Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa – AMERICAN SUBURB X
  • I could hear the pictures resonating with each other, and the principle of reverberation or resonance gave structure to what might otherwise have seemed like a random concatenation of individual sounds. Doug Dubois talked about this principle in sequencing really eloquently with Tom Griggs a while back.
    One Wall a Web: An Interview with Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa – AMERICAN SUBURB X
  • I depend upon the confluence of a whole suite of very random factors to realise I should pay particular attention to who is in front of me, and to what their appearance might mean, and I still think that in some fundamental way it’s important that I not know all of that when I’m making the portrait.
    One Wall a Web: An Interview with Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa – AMERICAN SUBURB X