The Electric Typewriter

by Gary Wolf

Humans make errors. We make errors of fact and errors of judgment. We have blind spots in our field of vision and gaps in our stream of attention. That is, some of us do. Others use data.

by Gary Wolf

A band of intellectual brothers is mounting a crusade against belief in God. Are they winning converts, or merely preaching to the choir?

by Gary Wolf

Ryan is the king of a new Yukon gold rush, the biggest since the legendary Klondike stampede a century ago. Behind the stampede is the rising price of gold, and behind that price is fear. 

by Joey Anuff and Gary Wolf

Anthony Elgindy, the Mad Max of Wall Street, has seen the revolution: thousands upon thousands flooding into the electronically liberated stock market. “The public is there for one reason and one reason only, they are there to absorb the risk.” And guess who will drive you to maximum absorption?

By Gary Wolf

By the time of his death,  Marshall McLuhan had been dismissed by respectable academics. But in light of the digital revolution, McLuhan’s relevance is being recognised again.

As recommended by Gary Wolf

3 more classic articles as chosen by Wired contributing editor and Quantified Self co-founder Gary Wolf:

Cancerland by Barbara Ehrenreich - “This instantly classic “fuck you” to the pink ribbon racket helped me understand the marketing practices that take normal human fear and sorrow and turn them into a zombie parade.”

How Not To Commit Suicide by Art Kleiner - “The story began as a high libertarian assignment to give people proper suicide instructions. But that’s not what it became. From a collection I recommend to everybody: News That Stayed News, Ten Years of CoEvolution Quarterly.”

A Silent Childhood by Russ Rymer (subscription required) - “I’ve thought many times about why this story, now 20 years old, was so meaningful to me. The inspiration here is both in the fact that Genie - a child who suffered severe abuse, lacking everything, even words - fought so hard, in such a human way, for what she wanted, and that Russ Rymer had the moral courage to tell her story without bending it to an easier, more palatable ‘lesson’.”

Make sure you check out this collection of Gary Wolf’s outstanding articles, you can follow the man himslef on Twitter, and to find out more about data-driven living, check out the Quantified Self.

by Gary Wolf

The real message of media today is ubiquity. It is no longer something we do, but something we are part of. It is as if we have amputated not our ears or our eyes, but ourselves, and then established a total prosthesis – an automaton – in our place.

by Gary Wolf

Some look at the reconstruction of Berlin and see the heart of a new Europe. Others envision the hottest ticket in urban theater. Then again, maybe what’s really going on here at the border of the 21st century is the creation of a monumental branding event.

by Gary Wolf

Given the chance to observe our behaviors, computers can run simulations, modeling different versions of our path through the world. By tuning these models for top performance, computers will give us rules to live by, telling us when to wake, sleep, learn, and exercise; they will cue us to remember what we’ve read, help us track whom we’ve met, and remind us of our goals.