Is the Guardian worse than it used to be?

A L Kennedy's is genuinely great, I think. The language is wonderful. There's something almost Shakespearean about it. And Scott Reid is terrific, IMO.

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/ng-interactive/2017/jun/19/brexit-shorts-permanent-sunshine-al-kennedy-scott-reid-video

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/jul/15/living-in-a-caravan-mobile-homes-interiors-small-spaces

In favour, I'm massively in favour of people exploring alternative living spaces, but the tone of this article...

One day in early 2016, Ashim spotted a contract as a locum psychiatrist in a hospital in Bermuda. We let out our house, arrived in April, and for six months I drank a lot of rum swizzle, and Ashim had one of the world’s most beautiful commutes. It got us thinking: there is a shortage of senior psychiatrists everywhere, and locum jobs pop up in the most interesting places. ]’m turning my PhD (on the influence of sculpture on contemporary British ceramics – a guaranteed conversation-stopper) into a book, so can work anywhere. We could live a rich life, in lots of different places. And we decided to do it in a caravan.

We leave Cork in August, and after a trip in the van to France and Spain, we are planning to head to New Zealand for the winter. We will have to abandon our van on Ashim’s sister’s drive, but we’re not done with tiny homes. We are learning to sail and are hoping to live on a boat for our next posting. After our 17ft van, we won’t know what to do with the space.

https://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2017/jul/22/letter-to-my-younger-self-money-squat-dont-panic-logan-hall-rebel-hack-studios

LOL fuckin' bawbag.

has there ever been anyone who did this open letter to my younger self thing without seeming like a complete twat?

Mary Bell

Did she make a killing with the sale of her London house? Oops, getting her mixed with a smug graun hack!

Hitler

'When good TV goes bad: how Game of Thrones became a throng of dire old vice'

that's appalling

Not a complaint by any means but interesting to see a Bill-Gates-sponsored article attacking a Bill-Gates-sponsored chain of schools:

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/aug/03/uk-urged-to-stop-funding-ineffective-and-unsustainable-bridge-academies

Yeah. Sponsored Content is still editorially independent (though I wouldn't be surprised if editors get jittery and self-censor).

It's Paid Content (in a different font) that's the advertorial stuff.

Simon Jenkins tries to outdo Jonathan Jones in the ignorant clickbait stakes:

'Ignore the panic. There’s little point learning languages at school.'

From Andrew Graham-Yooll's A State of Fear: Memories of Argentina's Nightmare (as mentioned on the current what are you reading thread), from his time in exile in the UK, in 1979:

I went to work at The Guardian, where liberals are conservatives who counsel readers to vote Labour

How times have changed

That's marvellous

Alastair Campbell and @OwenJones84 have a bit of a The Thick of It moment. Watch the full encounter: https://t.co/0FONZmHiuR pic.twitter.com/gd66pNgOr7

— The Guardian (@guardian) September 19, 2017

we can all laugh about it now

that's another good one for my expanding Can't fucking stand Owen Jones dossier.

lol alastair remember when you played a leading role in condemning hundreds of thousands of people to death haha okay anyway let's sit down and have a chinwag

just a couple of lads from the north in london together!!!

Isn't it the most infuriating thing to watch someone who is broadly right being so intellectually outclassed by somebody who is fundamentally wrong? And yes, the rubbish Iraq joke followed by chummyness with *millions* dead and nobody held to account for it, fucking hell Owen, I'm done defending this debating society prick.

This guy writes for the Guardian I think. This isn't any more than averagely bad but it's interesting seeing good tweeters come unstuck at length.

https://theguyliner.com/2017/10/05/the-trouble-with-nostalgia/

managed a sentence and a half

same

"So I try not to live in the past. It’s a murky, gloomy, weird mix of swamp and ocean, replete with sinkholes, dangerous currents and hands grasping at you, trying to drag you deeper and deeper into mawkish sentimentality, rose-tinted fantasy sequences and dreary bygones."

makes u think

the tyranny of content production

otm

paid by the adjective.

my regular mailout where subscribers receive new writing by me before anyone else. It’s not a newsletter; I never have any news. Just writing

He realised there was a scarcity of words in series on the internet.

it must be horrible to get up every day and think "gotta opine about something"

I mean Turrican seems to enjoy it, but otherwise

I'd have some sympathy for the writer if there was a sense that it was as painful for them to make this content as it is to read. But we're all stocked up on banal inanities wrapped up in fake jauntiness/smugness etc, thank you very much.

Well, The Graun is for sure.

https://www.theguardian.com/membership/2017/oct/26/together-we-are-safeguarding-the-guardians-independent-journalism?CMP=share_btn_tw

The Graun is on the up + up. They defeated Trump with their progressive journalism and now their paywall revenue outstrips advertising income. So obv now they are going to abandon clickbait and the all ads masquerading as journalism type shite. And give Deborah Orr a payrise for her services to Hot Takes.

as long as there's still plenty of lifestyle and thinkpieces that reflect my on-trend, cosmopolitan centrist Dadism then keep on keeping on I say

luv2support independent journalism (and occasionally enjoy entire sections of advertorial about how wonderful azerbaijan or saudi arabia are)

bg, where did the “luv2verb” thing come from?

i guess must have picked it up somewhere but honestly i have no idea where that would have been - all i know is that i'm committed to getting myself 51'd by using it constantly

luv251 hang on

@hambeef love too get a bite on that. thank you for sharing

— wint (@dril) December 8, 2009

^^^i believe it began with this fella tho i only starting seeing it in bulk this year

everything circles back to @dril eventually

martin kettle offers a blazing-hot take on the list of alleged tory sexual harassers, gets instantly ratioed

If I worked for Putin, I'd think that Tory spreadsheet was a good day's work.

— Martin Kettle (@martinkettle) November 1, 2017

anybody who claims harrassment is an enemy of the state

2/1 Doubles down on this
4/1 Feeble non-apology
8/1 "Please ladies, help me to be a better man"
10/1 "Somebody hacked my Twitter"
16/1 "It's Corbyn's fault"
200/1 "I've behaved like a cunt and will retire from public life immediately"

he doesn't tweet much so i'd put my money on 'doesn't react on twitter, shits out an "i got ratioed for truth-telling" column' next week

That half page advert wrapped around the guardian today is a ballache. Can't pick the paper up without it flapping, can't throw it away because the crossword's on the back of it.

Maybe you could put it to one side.

How to drink wine: a quick guide for Theresa May

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/24/the-guardian-view-on-taylor-swift-an-envoy-for-trumps-values

This would be embarrassing on a Blogspot page, it’s astonishing in an editorial.

it's an envoy for the Graun's values