Emma Chamberlain, Omegle, and a shake-up in the UK 🇬🇧
+ Finally, a new pod studio!
Hi angels!!!! You may have noticed (and if you haven’t then you need to get on our podcast buzz) that we got a new studio this week! Finally! No more blanket forts or barking dogs! I want to personally thank each and every one of you for putting up with us as we navigated finding a studio (PS, SYSCA supporters, this is what your support goes towards! 🥺)
Hello new tech-bro-esque studio:
Can’t wait for Bel and I to come in and totally SYSCAfy it every week!!
And now feels like as good a time as any to ask that if you’re reading this, we’d love it if you’d go and check out both Culture Vulture and The Shit Show, and PLEASE, if you’re feeling kind, leave a review?? (We could appreciate this so much, even if you don’t listen to the pods religously 🥺)
And while I’m at it…
Culture Vulture: Emma Chamberlain and the 'What About Me' Effect
This week I was joined on Culture Vulture by SYSCA bestie
from and it was SUCH a joy and privilege to get to talk to her about Emma Chamberlain, and how we can consciously uncouple with our fave creator if we feel like we’ve grown out of them. Such a gorge chat, I think you’ll LOVE it.The Shit Show: The UK Government, Iceland, and Omegle are a Shit Show
This week Squish and I bring you a LOT of big news. From a shock reappearance in UK politics to an update in Gaza, to what's going on in Iceland, and how climate change is affecting BEER? Don't worry though, we end on some good news about the 'Attenborough Echidna.'
RIP Omegle, you were really weird
What is going on in the House of Commons?
TikTok’s newest feature lets you save your favourite songs directly to your streaming service of choice
Karlie Kloss bought i-D???
RIP Omegle, you were really weird
One thing Omegle taught me was how to use an onscreen keyboard. When we were in Year 8 and Rubes was staying the night at my house, we were tapping through various people to chat to, and with every exposed penis we came across (there were a LOT) we would let out a shriek. We were using the family desktop computer, and Mum and Dad’s room was just down the hall, so at some stage Mum came out, caught us, and confiscated the keyboard, telling us to go to bed. I told Rubes not to worry, because I knew a hack. I went into the computer’s settings, clicked ‘on screen keyboard’ and told her that from now on we had to be very quiet.
I’m sure if you asked any kid who grew up in the 2010s they’d have a very similar story - the thrill of having a website where we could chat to strangers, the naivety of how fucked up the things we were seeing on there were, and the idea that if you were lucky enough, you’d come across your favourite celebrity doing the exact same thing you were. It was something everyone did until we all grew up, moved to other platforms that gave us access to a world outside of our small town, and then forgot about. Well, at least I did until it was announced last week that this strange relic of the internet was shutting down, leaving with it an unexpectedly deep legacy.
In the statement about its shutdown, the founder - who launched it when he was only 18 years old, talks about the way it was used for good, the way it was used for evil, the constant legal battles it faced, and the people it’s helped put behind bars. But he goes further, like in this paragraph, where he talks about the war against the internet, and how the internet ‘for good’ may cease to exist:
“Unfortunately, what is right doesn’t always prevail. As much as I wish circumstances were different, the stress and expense of this fight – coupled with the existing stress and expense of operating Omegle, and fighting its misuse – are simply too much. Operating Omegle is no longer sustainable, financially nor psychologically. Frankly, I don’t want to have a heart attack in my 30s.
The battle for Omegle has been lost, but the war against the Internet rages on. Virtually every online communication service has been subject to the same kinds of attack as Omegle; and while some of them are much larger companies with much greater resources, they all have their breaking point somewhere. I worry that, unless the tide turns soon, the Internet I fell in love with may cease to exist, and in its place, we will have something closer to a souped-up version of TV – focused largely on passive consumption, with much less opportunity for active participation and genuine human connection.”
I have to say, I didn’t expect the founder of Omegle to be writing something so profound and sucker-punchy, but then again the internet wants us to misread people. I definitely thought the founder of Omegle would be a man in a suit or a total creep, but in fact, that doesn’t seem to be the case at all. I seriously encourage you to go and read his full statement, and if you’re into it, send me any thoughts you have on the state of the internet - it’s kinda my favourite topic to think about!
What is going on in the House of Commons?
Um so the UK had an unexpected comeback from former Prime Minister David Cameron the other day as he returned to be the new Foreign Secretary. You might remember David Cameron as the dude who campaigned in the 2016 Brexit referendum for Britain to vote to “remain” in the European Union, and when the “Leave” vote won, resigned immediately and has been out of politics since. Until now.
This government shake-up also saw the firing of Home Secretary Suella Braverman. Braverman recently published an op-ed where she blamed the police for being ‘soft’ on pro-Palestine demonstrators (which she’s legally not allowed to do because it’s interfering in police operations, and the article was not cleared by her boss Rishi Sunak!!!) She’s also described asylum seekers coming to the UK as an ‘invasion’ and said that people living in tents were making a ‘lifestyle choice’ to do so.’ Good riddance I say!
TikTok’s newest feature lets you save your favourite songs directly to your streaming service of choice
Finally, an update to an app that I can GET BEHIND! I am that Gen Z bitch who gets so much of my music from TikTok, so I’m often switching between the apps to go and look up the artist I’ve just found. Here’s how the new feature will work:
“Now, TikTok’s new “Add to Music app” feature will begin to appear as a button that says “Add Song” next to a track name at the bottom of a TikTok video in the For You Feed, allowing users to save the song to their streaming music app. The first time users tap this button, they’ll be able to set which music service they prefer as their default.”
Unforch, as I’m reading a bit more into it, it seems these updates will only be rolled out in the U.S. and U.K, but hopefully it works well enough that they want to spread it to the rest of us!
Karlie Kloss bought iD mag??
And she will NOT be putting Taylor Swift on the cover! JK. BUT in super strange news, Karlie Kloss has bought iD mag from Vice Media which recently restructured after ‘emerging from bankruptcy.’ Karlie is going to be the CEO of i-D, which she might not be too bad at considering this isn’t actually her first rodeo when it comes to purchasing a magazine (she was part of an ‘investor group’ that acquired W Magazine in 2020.) What’s her goal here do you reckon?
Some things for you to read this weekend xxx
Why Does This Bride Look So Mad? (NY Times)
The lie of “deinfluencing.” Influencers will never influence us to buy less stuff. It’s antithetical to the job. (Vox)
TikTok Is Turning the Publishing World Into Fast Fashion (Bloomberg)
We’ve been talking about this one with the bookies in our Geneva chat and I’m keen to hear your thoughts on it too!
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sorry i’m just pissing myself looking at the podcast studio blanket fort
They literally had to make David cameron a Lord so he could be foreign sec lmao