The Computer Room

Gio and Katherine discuss the 2005 film Hard Candy, To Catch A Predator, Lucas' room, and the moral panic around and reality of chatroom pedophiles.  This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Katherine is DONE with Zoomers re-writing Internet history and being smug to her about it. It is NOT a girl's world, ladies -- at least online. Gio has some other ideas. She and Gio discuss WIRED's " Everyone Is A Girl Online ," miladys, Biggie Slonk, pregnant Megumins, and the myth of the "Girl Internet." They collectively mispronounce Tiqqun at least a dozen times.   This is a public episode. If...

Vers and Lukas  drop by and talk about e-dating, e-girls, e-ating disorders, and secret political Facebook groups.  This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Steff and Katherine discuss Lauren Oyler's Fake Accounts and Patricia Lockwood's No One Is Talking About This. Warning, Katherine struggles through a Harper's review. She got a little too big for her britches with the whole "reading quotes out loud" thing. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Is Chat-GPT sentient? What does it think about when you log off? Steff and Katherine explore new developments in AI, as only non-technical people can. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Katherine and Steff are joined by Perry Abbasi, a Chicago-based lawyer whose Twitter presence recently "made headlines" -- in other words, revealed just how reliant on Twitter modern-day journalists are. Katherine has also, once again, fucked with the theme. Someone help her. Pieces cited: Police district candidate’s social media full of racist and misogynist posts How the Online Right gave up on...

A little stroll through the history of the Internet's favorite gossip sites: Pretty Ugly Little Liars, KiwiFarms, The Dirty, lolcow.farm, Perez Hilton, and Lipstick Alley. And of course...honorable mention, the Encyclopedia Dramatica. This was recorded weeks before Katherine had her moment of enlightenment about random Internet strangers. Theme: Computer Love, covered by Envelope Generator This is...

Overworked, overpaid, and probably undertaxed: today, we dive into the world of /r/overemployed . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Happy New Year! Steff and Katherine the wonderful world of Internet fad diets: keto, paleo, carnivore, frugivore, Bulletproof Diet, Ana Boot Camp, Ray Peatism, Raw Egg Nationalism, and Whole30. Correction: At some point, Katherine incorrectly states Susun Weed was pro-raw veganism! Susun Weed merely debated raw vegans. Stuff gets fuzzy that far back. Link: Salo Forum Archive Theme: Computer Love b...

While Kat is in Colombia having a mental health episode, Steff interviews Alex Perez, "the Iowa Pariah," whose controversial interview with editor and writer Elizabeth Ellen inspired the entire staff of Hobart Magazine to resign.  Read the interview here .  Outro: "Guantanamera" by The Sandpipers  This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus...

Default Friend is joined by a new cohost, Poetry Grifter, to talk about two digitally native pieces of literature, Finally, Some Good News and Bronze Age Mindset . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

As a paying subscriber, you receive this episode a week early. Last week’s episode with Oliver Bateman is now available for free. Listen here: In this episode, I talk to the YouTube personality and fellow Fan Studies guy, Peter Coffin about YouTube, politics, and the mob. Check out Peter across the web: * Twitter * YouTube And his books here: * Cancel Culture: Mob Justice or a Society of Subscript...

One of my favorite TikTokers, Rayne Fisher-Quann, joined me to talk about TikTok, cancel culture, the futility of the culture wars, how people talk about casual sex, and a shared favorite topic, the Internet. You can find Rayne’s reading recs, advice column, and internet culture observations here (and you can follow her on TikTok here ). Theme: You’re Standing On My Neck by Splendora  This is a pu...

Meta-Nomad, the host of another one of my favorite podcasts, Hermitix, and I talk about cyclicacklashes, the frontiersmen of the Metaverse, walking the walk, and the importance of starting a garden.  I cut this one a little short because towards the end, it got a little inside baseball and we went on a long tangent about a specific book. Initially, I was planning on this being released in written...

Part one of a special series about Adam Lanza’s digital footprint. In episode one, I speak with the author of the essay, “ The Ghost of Adam Lanza ,” BlitheringGenius. This is still a work-in-progress— the un-paywalled version may see slight changes (certainly improved audio quality). Please feel free to flag anything in the comments. I’d also like to add a content warning . We don’t discuss the t...

On this episode, I talk to the hostesses my favorite podcast, Nymphet Alumni. We talk about the lolcowification of TikTok, Marshall McLuhan, what would happen if Tavi Gevinson met Curtis Yarvin, incel ascension, digital game, and a hell of a lot more.  One of my favorite episodes yet.  Also, I quote a hypothetical Russian person at some point. I'm not Russian. The person I made up for my example i...

I have a backlog of episodes! This is a conversation I did with Atoosa Rubenstein, former Editor-in-Chief of Seventeen and founder of Cosmogirl , in January (😅) about her career, the importance of content curation, and her wonderful Substack, Atoosa Unedited . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscri...

In this special crossover episode, Emmet returns to discuss Carmen Hermosillo's/humdog's iconic essay about self-commodification on the WELL (Whole Earth 'Letronic Link), "pandora's vox."  Read it below: This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit default.blog/subscribe

Jack Crum of 404Tales joins me for a conversation about internet ethnographies, the history of Tumblr, and what nobody had the balls to say about #GamerGate. Theme: The Great Fairy Fountain Etude You can also listen to this episode on  Spotify ,  Simplecast , and  Apple Podcasts . This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit...

Happy Wednesday folks. Audio posts are back, with more of my voice than anyone could realistically ever want to listen to. But first, I’m promoting this episode of ex.haust. Emmet Penney and I talk about one of my favorite pieces of tech writing of all time, Julian Dibbell's essay, " A Rape in Cyberspace. " There’s just so much to say about “A Rape in Cyberspace.” I think it’s one of those rare pi...

WARNING: This episode's audio quality is exceptionally, exceptionally bad. Special thanks to Will Kraus for cleaning it up. In future episodes, I’ll be using a better mic. Is a journalist who reports on virtual events that happen in a virtual world still a journalist? If you choose to present yourself as a rabbit online, does that say anything meaningful about who you really are? I spoke with Pete...

I talked about Usenet (and, incredibly, mispronounced it), elitism, and the lost civilizations of the Internet with the most famous blogger in the world. I’m not one of his readers, but I feel like I understand him a lot better after hearing him talk about the Internet. After this conversation, I’m left wondering… do we need to govern the Internet, as though it were a physical place? (I also wish...

Default Friend and friend of the pod and artist Gio Pennacchietti discuss internet-based creoles, the Internet's obsession with the body, the trad thots of yore, 'found footage' e-girls and self-posters, Girl Bosses as a sexual orientation, and why Default Friend wasn't bat mitzvahed. (If anyone can help me edit audio… I’ll take it… This was my first attempt.) Theme: Sara perché ti amo by Ricche e...