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Inauthentic Authenticity and the Best Way to Sell Yourself (Short)
A terrifically astute article by Stephanie Rosenbloom appeared in this past weekend’s NY Times on the subject of Authenticity. Specifically, how “authentic” has become the buzz word de jour in US...
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Another Week Ends: Frictionless Sharing, Death Penalty, Modern Family,...
1. A rather frightening article on Slate about Mark Zuckerberg’s proposed “frictionless sharing” entitled, “Not Sharing Is Caring.” As per usual, the vehicle in the world with the most potential for...
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Another Week Ends: Hitch, Facebook Blues, Baby Morality, Auden’s Conversion,...
1. By now you’ve no doubt heard that legendary journalist/polemicist/personality/Atheist Christopher Hitchens died yesterday. Hitchens was always my favorite of the New Atheists, and not just because...
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Why Am I So Obsessed With That Person From Sixth Grade? Cyberstalking and the...
The rejection we feel when we find out that someone has de-friended us on Facebook or stopped following us on Twitter must be the definition of a ‘modern problem.’ We usually discover these things by...
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If Only You Were Lonely: Social Media, Self-Forgetfulness and Yvette Vickers’...
Lord have mercy! The Atlantic just dropped the article of the year, at least as far as this website is concerned. Underneath the slightly been-there-done-that title of “Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?”...
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Another Week Ends: Blue Like Jazz, Youth Ministry, Franzen, Facebook, and...
Filling in for DZ this week as the Mockingbird Conference is now in full swing! 1. Our very own Cameron Cole wrote a wonderful piece on youth ministry over at The Gospel Coalition, highlighting its...
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Instagram Knowing: Why Little Sips Don’t Equal A Big Gulp
As if there weren’t enough people writing about it already, I suppose for posterity’s sake we’ll continue unfurling the scrolls. Apparently there’s an opinion out there that says that if we’re...
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Another Week Ends: Celebrity Body Image, Depression Chemistry, the Burden of...
1. On Slate, Emily Shire asks, “Should Celebrity Body ‘Struggles’ Make Us Feel Better About Ourselves?” and her insightful little response doubles as quite the treatise on the function of Standards (of...
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The Crazy-Making IPO: Facebook Madness and the Compulsive iDisorder
Add one more to the tally, after Franzen, after Marche, after Turkle. The Wall Street Journal‘s “Smart Money” blog, Pay Dirt, which does a lot of interesting behavioral economics writing, performed a...
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The Wounded Soul of Social Media = Connected but Alone
This post may not break any new ground, but it does summarize about two years worth of Mockingbird analysis on the psychology and law of social networking. We’ve profiled Sherry Turkle’s work before,...
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From The Onion: Number of Users Who Actually Enjoy Facebook Down to 4
At the risk of beating a dead horse, I’m not quite sure how we missed this shot of hilarity when it went up a couple months ago: WASHINGTON—A comprehensive and groundbreaking new report released Monday...
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Another Week Ends: Exceptional Children, Holiness Holes, AA Slogans,...
1. An encouraging number of signs of life in the bibliosphere this week. First, over at The New Statesman, much to my surprise (and much to his credit), renowned atheist Alain de Botton selected...
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Browser Histories and Manic Mental Ticker Tape
An amazing little post appeared on The New Yorker culture pages a couple of days ago, Andrea Denhoed’s “A Fake Facebook Wedding.” She kicks off with a description of an ingenious if enraging prank...
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Another Week Ends: Assurance Anxiety, Genesis Lessons, Tumblr Love, Lost in...
1. First off, a little pop theology. Phillip Cary contributed an encouraging review of J.D. Greear’s sensationally titled Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart to the recent issue of Christianity Today,...
View ArticleKilling Independent George: Some Thoughts on Grace and (Social) Media
The good folks at Liberate were kind enough to post my talk from last month’s conference this morning and what better way to illustrate the point(s) about compulsive self-presentation than to re-post...
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Another Week Ends: Forgiveness, Giving Trees, Therapists, and Aging with Grace
1. Forgiveness and apology seems to be a theme in the news as of late, or at least it was prior to Monday’s heartbreaking news from Boston. CNN’s belief blog highlighted the story of one man’s quest...
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From Stickers to Likes: Validation, Authenticity, and Social Media for the...
Modern Reformation’s May-June issue is out! If you haven’t already picked up a copy, this issue, entitled “Wired and Tired,” deals mostly with this our age of technology, and the unexpected weight it...
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Gordon Ramsay Isn’t Jesus, Or, Criticism Is Not on the Menu at Amy’s Baking...
Until yesterday, I had never watched an episode of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares, but, according to its website, here’s how it works: Ramsay, a notoriously mean chef, visits struggling...
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They Shall Be Known by Their Pretty Food Photography
Maybe it’s just my friends, but I think you might agree that your Facebook and Instagram feeds these days have begun showing less and less of the faces you “follow” and more and more of the, well,...
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Bread and Jam for Frances Ha
Another pearl from Charlotte Hornsby on the newest Noah Baumbach film. We, the followers and the followed, the tagged and untagged, the liked and the retweeted are building a Xanadu writ in html, a...
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