🏓 Is Everyone Playing Padel Without Us? — NY Times

The schism is yet another example of American sports exceptionalism. If pickleball is Fahrenheit, padel is Celsius. It’s the centimeters to our inches, the football to our “football.”

🌃 Chicago’s new mayor has one of the trickiest jobs in politics — The Economist

More on the Chicago politics scene. Reading this, I can’t help but think about this tracking shot from Steve McQueen’s Widows.

🏙️ Brandon Johnson Will Walk a Tightrope on Crime as Chicago Mayor — Jacobin

Pulling for him, but it feels like an impossible task and the tiniest misstep will get the idiots yelling. Not to mention, it’s a long term project that will take time.

🗑️ Phoenix Suns dismiss head coach Monty Williams — NBA

It kind of feels like a new owner trying to put his stamp on something that was already working… but maybe a change with Bud or Nurse is what they need to get over the hump… Still a mistake, imo.

🥸 Bill Hader Just Wants to Make Weird Things — The New Yorker

This whole interview is fantastic. I have all my stock in Bill Hader being the next great auteur writer/director and can’t wait to see what he does after Barry.

💬 A twitter video from Rick Wilson:

You are letting an insane person stand there and make people giggle and laugh when he jokes about rape… when he jokes about abortion, when he calls an African American police officer a thug.

💬 A tweet thread from Kelsey McKinney:

There are no “economic headwinds” there are no “evolutions in the media industry” causing these layoffs. The blame is fully and always with these rich dudes in charge, making bad business decisions, and never facing any fucking consequences for them.

These men have thoroughly gutted a profitable, talented industry because they are greedy and boring and frankly too stupid to know any better.

I’m so sick of making a fucking thread like this every 6 months when another guy decides he’s bored of his little hobby and ruins a bunch of people’s lives.

As a fucking small business owner of a media company, it is NOT THAT FUCKING HARD to do this well. They just don’t want to.

Well said.

🐂 NBA Draft Lottery: How it works and where the Bulls stand — NBA

A 1.8% chance to get the first pick and an 8.5% chance to get in the top four and keep their first round pick otherwise the Magic get it. Not the best odds, but it could be worse—we find out May 16.

🤖 Will A.I. Become the New McKinsey? — The New Yorker

So much good stuff in here.

We should all strive to be Luddites, because we should all be more concerned with economic justice than with increasing the private accumulation of capital.

We can’t evaluate A.I. by imagining how helpful it will be in a world with U.B.I.; we have to evaluate it in light of the existing imbalance between capital and labor, and, in that context, A.I. is a threat because of the way it assists capital.

They say it’s a world-changing technology. If that’s the case, then they have a duty to find ways for A.I. to make the world better without first making it worse. Can A.I. ameliorate the inequities of our world other than by pushing us to the brink of societal collapse? If A.I. is as powerful a tool as its proponents claim, they should be able to find other uses for it besides intensifying the ruthlessness of capital.

🎙️ Albert Hammond Jr. — How Long Gone

How Long Gone isn’t for everyone, but I’ve found myself glued to it over the last month and today they had Albert Hammond Jr. on to talk about his upcoming album Melodies on Hiatus, which released the first nine tracks already.

🎵 Drop Stop Roll (Single) — Rainbow Kitten Surprise

Just noticed RKS released a new single last month. Their last album was my AotY in 2018 so I’m excited to see new music from them.

🤡 George Santos Is Charged by Federal Prosecutors in New York — NY Times

Lots of 🤡 in the headlines today.

🤡 Tucker Carlson Will Reportedly Walk Away From Millions To Launch A New Show On… Twitter? — Uproxx

The idiots unite. I’m assuming Musk is paying something to lure him over, which is just further evidence of his fiscal irresponsibility.

🏀 Jaren Jackson Jr., Jrue Holiday, Brook Lopez lead All-Defensive team — ESPN

CARUSOOOOOOOO! Awesome to see Alex Caruso make the All-Defensive First Team. The lone shining light of an abysmal Bulls season.

🤡 Jury finds Donald Trump sexually abused columnist E Jean Carroll — The Guardian

The verdict for the first time legally brands a former US president as a sexual predator.

🧮 Better Living Through Algorithms by Naomi Kritzer — Clarkesworld

Finally got around to reading the first story in this months issue. Really enjoyed it given the Mrs. Davis meets Her vibes.

📚 Illinois set to become first state to end book bans — Politico

“In Illinois, we don’t hide from the truth, we embrace it and lead with it,” the governor said when the bill was first presented. “Banning books is a devastating attempt to erase our history and the authentic stories of many.”

📺 streaming variability vol.024

🛜 Cory Doctorow Explains Why Big Tech Is Making the Internet Terrible — Jacobin

Solid interview covering crypto, AI, capitalism, Twitter/Mastodon, and Google.

📺 Harsh Realities of the Writers Strike — Puck

The sorry news for writers is that, in declaring a strike, they may in fact be helping the streaming giants and their parent companies

Tough.