Skin Feeling
What it is to be encountered as a surface, to be constantly exposed as something you are not.
Character Assassination
Though they foreground models over characters, systems-oriented video games can't evade the issues of identity politics
Boom and Rust
A Gold Rush ghost town embalms the risks that haunt all California settlements.
Vice is Hip
Inherent Vice evokes the possibility of a different California, one in which the hippies beat the cops
Thirst Trap
The Silicon Valley initiative to split California into six pieces was a stunt, but the water issues it drew from are real
The Oakland Raiders
While the housing markets of many post-industrial cities are still suffering, Oakland is absorbing the hopes, dreams, and dollars of a California tech boom that won’t be confined to San Francisco and Silicon Valley