THE YEAR ACCORDING TO CULTUREWORK

We've got just a few minutes to spare.

Before we begin — 10,000 subscribers! I’m not going to be painfully humble here. All of my traffic is organic, through my own channels or through like-minded peoples(!) who recommend, crosspost, and share my work. I’ve never had Substack platform my work in any formal sense THOUGH I’ve had Substack PR reach out to me to help them platform other people’s work! Insane! Besties, it’s just us against this world!

To celebrate, this post is free to all subscribers! But please do consider that upgrade for 2025!

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I’ve been thinking a lot about disappearing media, and also about what omnimedia looks like in the future. Slightly jealous of Martha and Oprah, and the world of real media their ideas and brands got to flourish in. Even if temporarily. Magazines were real, then. TV was permanent, then. The idea of multi-channel saturation, even over-saturation, was real. I saw a post from internet genius

kianamoods

discussing the millennial generation’s adaptability in the face of never ending platform deaths. A cycle of constant migration and constant loss in search of spaces to curate our own cultural and editorial worlds. Friendster, and Myspace, Flickr(!), Tumblr, Vine, and Twitter. With each death, we lost photos, moments, community, and memories. Records of and parts of our lives disappearing every time an app dies, sells, merges, lays-off, or collapses. TikTok, they say, is next, and, our remaining options are either dangerously problematic or wholly amateur.

But, we shall survive. We shall adapt.

…Anyway, how do we feel going into 2025?

Me?

I’m feeling very bored.

Should I fuck around and just get married this year?

For the plot?

I’m turning 40.

Me and a tolerable man going 50/50 (!) could be living the life right now. Cozy in our three bed dreamhouse in Pasadena. With a cedar shingle shed out back. Creaky floors. Invasive ivy. Playing footsie under a wrought iron patio table. Under the oak trees and all.

Tonight’s wine is a slightly fizzante Spanish white.

Saving the champagne for tomorrow.

Me and Honeybaby — my injured little angel — will be watching Sunset Boulevard (the real version) like we usually do every weekend morning while I write out this newsletter. I’ll be asleep by 10, up sometime around 3, might do a little scroll, a little meme send, a little DM, and, then, of course, wake up at 7 like a real person and forget my insomniac twin ever existed.

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How I started the year…

Shout out to my bestie [redacted] for the 2024 roadtrip kickoff. My high-desert travel guide is here.

The Biggest Stories…

If it’s Boeing, I ain’t going — We end the year just as we started it …with Boeing planes falling out of the sky. Two whistleblowers are dead, I’m still standing, for now. (Boeing Playlist)

I went to war with Amazon… and won — I also called Andy Jassy a coward and he might’ve liked it (we don’t kink shame around here). They sent me a $75 gift card, even after I delivered the riot act in a Rage Against The Machine shirt. I used it to buy crab legs. ( Chantilly Crisis Playlist)

The final season of “Weekend At Bernies: The Remake” was cancelled. Goodbye Genocide Joe.

Elsewhere in 2024…

• The Chicago rat hole lived and died.

• Ultimate World Cruise came and went.

• The Emmys happened, and so did this…

OOOOH THEY DID IT. (JKJKJKJK)

• My fav Ayo Edibiri swept, slayed, and served SNL ☘️

• Taylor Swift’s unforgivable weirdo snub of Celine Dion

• Cowboy Carter, sure, but PinkyDoll did it first!

• We got a Normani album, and yall didn’t listen to it!

• Bruno Mars vs. the loan sharks

• Katt Williams’ prophecies cometh trueth 🔮

• Donald Trump got “shot” and we literally moved on so quickly

• Justin Timberlake’s flop decade persists

• Goodbye George Santos. Jail, when?

• Don Toliver’s chin…chinned.

• SAM RUBIN RIP!!!!!

• The trad wives, the Mormons, and religious cult members disguised as influencers

• Diddy and friends got a whole damn playlist

• Blue MAGA tried to make Jack Schlossberg a thing…

• ARIANA WE LOVE YOU!!!!!

• Very quickly…for Ms. Chappell Roan

• The only book I read (re-read) this year

• The Brat King of Echo Park

• Justice for Viola Fletcher

• I’m kinda tired of this…

Mood all 2025 unless you’re paying me.

• Oh, also I re-discovered baseball!

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Shoutout to Gabriella Karefa-Johnson, Craig Mokhiber, Jazmine Hughes, LitHub, and everyone who didn’t stay quiet. 🇵🇸

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Let’s keep going. On to the awards! 🏆

Janice Combs and Maye Musk were both frontrunners in the race, but neither could top Tina Knowles and her exhaustive coddling — whether in IG comments or on the record — of her daughter. Beyonce is 44, I think she could tell us herself if she got paid by the Harris-Walz campaign or how she really feels about the CMAs.

Top contenders included Paul Mescal, Jacob Elordi (no beard), Jacob Elordi (beard), Nicholas Chavez and both actual Menendez Brothers. Luigi, they listened to you in a way they didn’t listen to Aaron Bushnell. The question remains, “are CEOs scared enough to prioritize ethics?”

Really tight race for this one and the decision came down to the wire!!!!

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RIP 🕊️: Josephine Wright, Cecilia Gentili, Lourdes Portillo, Medo Halimy, Toni Vaz, Wally Amos, Dominique Brown, Louis Gossett Jr., Judith Jamison. And, all the doctors, journalists, parents, sons, daughters, bakers, farmers, students, and infants obliterated via the foreign policy of “civilized” countries.

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In 2024, it was “no” to Daily Mail, “no” to TMZ, and “no” to the DNC, AIPAC, and friends.

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Nothing. This wrap-up sent me spiraling through my photo album and the thousands of videos and photos that never end up as vlogs. I’ve decided LA has me growing scales and that I’m actually hotter and happier in NYC.

It was also my first time out of town without Honey and maybe I just forgot what it felt like to strut and not be dragged from bush to bush by a 30lb dingo with zero leash skills.