The FADER Weekend Reading List

Daniel Duane, New York Times

In my dreams, all the destruction humans have wreaked on the world is fixed by technology. My good dreams, I mean. In my nightmares I attempt and fail utterly to save the universe from a corporation that has obtained all-powerful technology.

This article details the ways in which what remains of Earth's wilderness is tagged and tracked by biologists, and envisions a future that could go one of two ways. "Undeniably in the service of good," Duane writes, "this technological revolution in the human relationship to wildlife is also accelerating the ancient human project of bringing the physical world under our control." Even if that effort is to protect what lives in the wild, we're approaching an inevitable point at which everything on earth will be monitored by humans. And, as Duane puts it, "once you break something and try to put it back together, you have to decide what exactly you want the restored version to look like." I'm hoping (like Duane) that the restored version (if there ever is one) will look more like my dreams than my nightmares.

Scaachi Koul, BuzzFeed

Time is funny—it changes things. When you revisit a house that your family used to call home, one you haven't seen in a long time, it will be different to your eyes than it appears in your memory. In this moving essay, Koul recounts what it was like returning to to her grandparents' house in India after decades—"The house was not reddish-pink like it used to be, instead, it was a grey, dusty rose. The house was smaller than I remember, like everything is when you return to something from when you, too, were much smaller"—and the feeling of watching her father remember the home he grew up in.

Duncan Cooper, The FADER

Mark Barrott is releasing his next Sketches From An Island this summer, an album he recorded while living full time in Ibiza, his new home. The FADER's Duncan Cooper spoke to Barrott about how he wound up living on a tropical island after years of traveling the world, making music, and running a music consultancy firm.

Rob Horning, The New Inquiry

From "The Purpose of Like" to "Self-Consciousness and Self-Performance," this piece breaks down what's going down behind the scenes of Facebook's newly introduced "Reaction" buttons. The addition of these new buttons, according to Horning, "presumes we have an immediate, precise response." And therefore, Horning continues, by "allow Facebook to generate a simulacrum of ourselves that anticipates how we might react to future situations. This can create a hermetic feedback loop, where past actions fully dictate future potentialities, foreclosing the possibility of surprise or change." Ah! The future is creepy!

Patrick D. McDermott, The FADER

The FADER's McDermott jetted to Mexico City to hang out with its most fire electronic collective. They're changing the party game by making their own rules.

Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic

In this extensive cover story for The Atlantic, Goldberg asks the tough questions and Obama answers with his usual grace, recounting the hardest decisions he's had to make in the past seven-and-a-half years, saying things like, "Where America is directly threatened, the playbook works. But the playbook can also be a trap that can lead to bad decisions. In the midst of an international challenge like Syria, you get judged harshly if you don’t follow the playbook, even if there are good reasons why it does not apply.” In a media climate where all we hear is drivel from presidential candidates, it's refreshing to read our actual president's actually smart, often funny ("'Samantha, enough, I’ve already read your book,' he once snapped"), thoughtful words.

Amy Lombard, Mashable

The pictures of the convenience store chain are bright and beautiful, and apparently Wawa is a community hub whose work culture is all about family. About it.

Daniel A. Gross, Nautilus

Recent research suggests that, despite the advent of iPods and headphones, listening to music is still an inherently social activity. Even if you're alone. Because music makes you feel less alone, and the act of listening connects you to others. Connect yourself to this Nautilus piece like you would plug in your aux. 🎶💖🎶