This Week - Jul 25, 2014

But part of the reason people aren’t seeing it is because they, like me, have lost faith in the capacity of the summer blockbuster to even approach something like 'good.'

— Snowpiercer Should Have Been The Breakout Blockbuster Of The Summer (Anne Helen Petersen for Buzzfeed)

Everyone jokes about how supposedly soulless PR and marketing people are, but dealing with the masses is difficult, time-consuming, and an actual skill. To survive emotionally in a high-profile situation, you need a layer of protection between yourself and the raw feedback of humanity.

— The Bottom Feeder: Why Indie Developers Go Insane (Jeff Vogel)

At its worst, SEO is someone finding an inferior article instead of a superior article because the site does a better job of writing for Google, but a worse job for writing for humans. I think that’s when, in my view, you’re over-optimizing. You end up reaching people who are not satisfied with what they’re getting from you. Which isn’t good for a brand

— BuzzFeed’s Jonah Peretti Goes Long (Felix Salmon for Medium)

Vice was always a frustrating mix of brilliant writing and bottom-feeding bullshit. It asked to be taken very seriously, except on the various occasions it insisted it was all just a joke.

— No Country for Old Pervs: The Fall of the Houses of Terry Richardson and Dov Charney (Molly Lambert for Grantland)

Winning an award is about the least humbling thing in the world, and yet when people receive an Oscar or some other illustrious honor, they often say they feel 'humbled.' Really, what winners feel is immense pride—and immense fear of being seen as prideful—and so they cover for it by saying they feel the exact opposite, humility. No one wants to come across as cocky. Are winners right to fear backlash for expressing a natural emotion at their most exultant moment? New research finds that they are.

— Why Oscar Winners Say They’re ‘Humbled’ (Matthew Hutson for The Atlantic)