595. - Kyle Chayka

All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Stateside with Kai and Carter, a new podcast from The Guardian. And they are using this podcast to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions that we all have about what's happening in the world. And they do it three times a week, Jason. Does that sound familiar to you? We don't really talk about, you know, a lot of international global news items and climates and cultures and sports and things like that. We do talk about fashion and wellness, but for everything else, Kai and Carter are a great place. All right, so who couldn't use more news? Listen wherever you get your podcast. or watch on YouTube. How Long Gone is here. My name is Jason. I just made a plain French omelet. I'm going to eat it a little bit and I'll edit out the cheese. Sorry. What's up, Chris? That's actually funny. I had an omelet for lunch at Balthazar just moments ago. What flavor? Plain. That's what I'm having. Yeah, plain with a little Gruyere, which makes it a little bad boy. But if they offer cheddar Gruyere, it's not even French cosplay. I just prefer a Gruyere and a French style omelet with just a light dusting of herbs on top. Oh, now there's herbs. Wow, this plain omelet. This plain omelet's taking a turn. It was nice though. It was a nice quiet. If you go to Balthazar at like 1130, it's the perfect time because it's not lunch and breakfast is over. So there's like a 30 minute, 45 minute window where people aren't there. Or it's less busy than normal. It's like when I go to horses at 515. I did see a friend of the show, Kid Leroy, having lunch as well. It was a heavy room. It does sound like a heavy room. How is Balthazar doing nowadays? I don't know if I'm ever going to go there again. I mean, it's fine, but there's so many places to go to. It's absolutely rammed at all times, except for like 1130.

actually a mix of tourists and locals yeah like it might even be 50 50 you know what i mean even like i think it's at that it's beloved enough where it's not totally overrun with a family you know a rich family from minneapolis and 50 50 is a pretty aspirational split i got do you think um what do you think sometimes split at uh at superiority burger is i mean I think there are... I'll say 70-30 local to tourists. Yeah, there's definitely tourists at Spurity Burger, but they're like, you know, they work in a bar in Milwaukee and they're here to see a band play for the weekend. You know, it's an easier proposition. No way. No way. Just because it has a working class feel, it's still like written about and reviewed in major newspapers and publications. Bro, I've been to that place 10 times. The crowd don't look like people that are reading. Food publications. I'll tell you that right now. How do these set builders afford to eat there is what I want to know. Also, I think the thing about Superiorty Burger, a place like that, is that... if you're a vegetarian or vegan or whatever, you are, it's like a, it's a fun thing to like splurge on. You know what I mean? It's like a foot, like that's, there's always been places like that in like vegetarian and vegan eating where it's like, yeah, this is a little more than I'd like to spend, but there's not that much for us. So I'm going to go crazy, but also spirit burger last night, Cho and I didn't go crazy and it wasn't that bad. You know, if you go crazy, it's bad, but we were also gifted. We were also gifted some desserts from the kitchen, so that took some off the bill. If you go crazy, that is bad. That is bad. Just in general. What was the dessert? Yeah, just in general. What was the dessert of the night? They're always doing something with the sweets over there. We had the malt cake thing, which I've had before, but Cho is an expert, and he ordered something called, I think, pearl pie that was kind of like a guava, like a pie with tapioca, but like a pie crust, and it was... fucking delicious and he thought i wasn't gonna like it and i loved it actually actually i have a good pearl pie at superiority burger story the last time i was there i went solo on a by myself mission i ate there at the bar you know standard shit i ordered my classic peanut coca-cola add bourbon

And then there was a guy who sat right next to me, also a solo diner, and his only meal for dinner was eating two slices of pearl pie. Bro, say what's up next time. So I did. He was looking around. He knew. He wasn't performatively ordering and eating it, but he wanted to know. He wanted everyone in the room to know. this guy you know it's like the t-shirts that say who has two thumbs and likes to fuck yeah yeah it was like he was like that like he wanted everyone to see this motherfucker loves pearl pie so much and i so i asked him about it And he's like, yeah, it's just like my thing. I might get a third slice. Do you think that's great? To be fair, the dessert portions are quite slender. They are. You're not getting a San Vicente bungalows level cake slice over there. It's a delicate slice. It's not a cheesecake factory. It's more of a cheesecake, what would you call it? What's a good word for a small factory? What's the antithesis of a factory? I don't know. Okay, it's a cheesecake DIY craft project. I mean, it's very DIY. But we were talking last night, and they're like, I guess they're pushing their, like, people don't realize you can go drink there. Like, at night? Like, you can go at midnight and get a vodka soda and a piece of cake or whatever, which is... Yeah, it's been like that the entire time. No, I understand that, but I don't think people are... They're trying to push it. Yeah, I don't think customers... Like, I think they realize it, but they don't think of it. And in the East Village, your options are shitty, disgusting bars. Or Superiority Burger. I'm choosing Superiority Burger if I had to, especially desserts. Are there any more information on these shitty, disgusting bars? I mean, the East Village is basically one shitty, disgusting bar with a sprinkling of great restaurants and some bookstores. That's kind of what the whole proposition is. Really quick, I wanted to do a quick plug. There's a lot to talk about, but I think we can talk about all of it, all of our intro stuff with our guests, so that part is good.

For our L.A. residents, I'm DJing a charity event on January 20th at the Lodge Room where we've done a couple Hell and Gone shows. It is the second annual Abortion Access Benefit Series. It's a night of music bands, DJs, and all that stuff. It'll be me appearing alongside. Who else is DJing? Joyce Manor. So Fred from Burger Lords is stoked with that band's ceremony. Black Marble. They happened to Kate Bollinger, Patriarchy, Reggie Watts. This is Eastside LA royalty plus them jeans. Plus them jeans. They were nice enough to... There's two rooms. There's the main room where the bands are going to play and then there's the side room where the DJs are at. They gave me that nice... 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. time slot in the side room, while Blondeshell and Tim Heidecker are playing in the main room. So it's going to be awesome for me. Oh, sorry to hear that. Yeah, I mean, you know, I guess because it's for charity, you couldn't really kind of clap back on that. You know, you kind of have to just... No, I clap back in the email. Shout out to my girl over at Ground Control. I'm sorry for being C-U-N-T-Y, but... You know, we've got to have a little fun with it. And she listens to the pod. So I am giving a plug for it, even though I just went to the website and noticed that it is sold out. Oh, wow. I don't know how this works. If me doing a plug for this on how long gone. I mean, obviously, brands pay, what, tens of thousands of dollars for that. So I don't know how many drink tickets that is. I want to be clear. I want to be clear, though, to people that know Jason. You can't ask me the list for a charity event. Just so you know, that's not. That's just kind of. That's just kind of bad form in my personal opinion. Would you believe me if I told you I've tried? No, I'm sure you've tried. I'm just letting people know if you're thinking about that, don't. You'll have to take it up with them next year. Your name's not down. Yeah, so I will be doing an hour-long set, and since it is for charity and I can't find my DJ bag with my USB in it, I will play the new burial.

It's two songs, so that should cover 38 minutes of my 60-minute set. The songs are not released yet. Of course, I have the high-resolution WAV files ready to go. white white label rips so come it'll be a burial listening party for charity did you did you actually listen because i i got the email with the songs in it but i didn't listen to the songs are they did you listen to the songs i mean i i pirated them last week uh of course oh okay okay okay i didn't know it was something that is okay so is it as boring as usual is it less boring what's the now that he's on xl you know i know things have changed according to you so did the music suffer the music is the same you fucking Bitch. That's good. No, that's good. It is weird to see the kind of forward-facing PR email in the inbox. Like, what's up, fellow DJs? Here's the new one from Burial. Drop me. That kind of thing didn't really happen for the old Burial when he was on Hyperdub. Because it would be like a blurry YouTube video? No, no. It would be like there's two different tiers of DJ. promo marketing emails where it's like the one that you sent me where it's like more mainstream PR shout out to all of our PR fam but you know it's like it's like a nice bio and there's like colors and highlights and links and here's this and embargoes and dates and a full bio a full bio at the bottom just in case new pictures blah blah blah and then the other one is just straight from the DJ themselves blank at gmail.com it's just a text email that says like Instead of saying like, hey guys, it just says safe with a comma. And then it's like a couple new tunes. Okay. If you like them. So it's a little. And then it's just a simple Dropbox or WeTransfer or whatever. Okay. So, I mean, obviously both of these serve a purpose, which I understand the necessity for. Yeah, of course, of course. But I. Just something for the weekend. Something for the ravers. Something for the weekend.

Speaking of the weekend, I'm going to see The Charlatans and Ride tonight at Webster Hall. Nice. And I'm taking my friend Adam that I work with at J. Crew, who's British and grew up in the same town. So he's very excited to meet Tim. He must be chuffed as. He's chuffed as hell. So I'm excited. I'm actually, before that, though, I have to go to a sponsor of the show, Hauser & Worth. The Cindy Sherman show opens tonight on Worcester Street. So I'm going to go tap in with the Shermanator and then head over to big, big, cold New York night out. I can't wait. I was still wondering. I was asking about this when we did the episode with Tim from The Charlatans. And I was like, in the episode description, do I say The Charlatans or The Charlatans UK? And if you look at the photos of his tour so far where he'll, like, post a billboard or a marquee sign, still it's, like, 50% of their out of office or any, like, it still says sometimes UK and sometimes not. Like, the one tour poster will say UK. One of them will just say The Charlatans. And I wonder if there's continuity issues. What's going on here? It's so strange to me because I think that that's like promoters taking poetic license. But I also think that there's not another band called The Charlatans. So there's no need to say. You know what I mean? Maybe there was at one point. I just remember being a teen and getting into Britpop and being like... It's cool that this band lets you know that they're British in the name. I bet it's something weird that stuck. I bet the first time they came to America, somebody did that and they thought it was funny and they went with it for a while is probably what it... what it was, and now there's some confusion in the marketplace? I feel like it must have been some sort of lawsuit thingy. Maybe it didn't even need to be a ban, but it was just some kind of thing. Oh, named. Where they're like, all right, we're just going to add the UK to the end, and then, you know, whatever, 30 years have passed, and everyone's like, we'll just... We're grandfathered in. Yeah, the copyright's actually expired. All right, we do have a guest today.

Friend of the show. He's been on before. New Yorker staff writer. His new book, Filter World, is out everywhere now. Kyle Chayka is going to join us. I think he's actually in New York because he did a reading last night at the McNally Jackson Seaport location, which was... Hosted by Huey, who we also had on the show. Yeah. So it's just a real family affair over here. Pulitzer Prize winning author of Stay True. Yes, yes, yeah. Stay True Sue. You guys, I'm sure, follow Kyle online and his beat of the internet and trends that surround it. It speaks to me, especially because... Kyle and I are very similar in age. Like he just wrote this thing about the New Yorker, about like the early days of his internet. And it's like, it mirrors, you know, it's very, very similar to mine. So I think that's much to discuss. You want, you want to, if I'm an editor and I need 11,000 words on coffee shop. and how they used to be. Kyle's the man you're going to call for that, right? Why do they all look the same in Sydney, New York, LA, Hong Kong? Why is that happening? Why did Millennial Pink rise to fame? It's because of the filter world. There's only one man with the answers. Okay, cool. That sounds great. Why don't we give Kyle a zoom and we're going to get into it, man. Oh, this is huge for me personally. This episode of How I'm Gone is brought to you by TaskRabbit. Oh, baby, let me tell you something. This is not a joke. I use TaskRabbit a lot because I can't do anything. You need some art hung? TaskRabbit. You need a fucking something put together? A cabinet? Got to reach that cheese grater on the top shelf? TaskRabbit. Anything you need, TaskRabbit can take care of it for you. And, I mean, it... How it works, TaskRabbit connects you with skilled taskers in your area. They can help you move. They can assemble furniture, repairs, yard work, mounting, and more. You can search for a tasker based on cost, skill set, availability, and past client reviews so you know exactly who's showing up and can have confidence that they know what they're doing because taskers have assembled over 3.4 million pieces of furniture, completed 700,000 home repairs.

handled 1.5 million moves, and the numbers are just going up, Jason. Yeah, throw a little money at the problem. It's not so expensive, and that job that you really don't want to do is something that another person out in the world is very good at doing and would gladly do it in exchange for a little bit of money. So when life happens, your to-do list grows. Get ahead of it now and get $15 off your first task at TaskRabbit.com or grab the TaskRabbit app using promo code how long taskers book up faster, especially for same day tasks. So book trusted home help today. That is $15 off your first task using promo code how long with the TaskRabbit app or at TaskRabbit.com. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by a new podcast from The Guardian stateside with Kai and Carter. This is covering a lot of our bases, Jason. It's trying to slow down. the news and wrestle with the questions we all have about what's happening in the world and i know you particularly have quite a lot of questions a lot of questions but how often because we do this podcast three times a week and that's a sweet spot how many times do they do three times a week and i i have a feeling just based on the platform and these talking points that they're maybe going to be covering different stuff than we do that's just a guess the guardian is not some billionaire owned They're not afraid to say what they want to say, brother. Yeah, Rupert ain't sniffing around in what journalists Kai Wright and Carter Sherman are up to over there at Stateside. But yeah, listen wherever you get your podcast. You can watch it on YouTube. It's three times a week. And who couldn't use more news? Especially when it's not from here, let's say. Give it a listen. Give it a listen. I have a podcast mic. If that is better. What do you got? Let me see. Whip it out, King. Audio Pro, pull it out. Did you just say pull it out? I don't know what they're saying nowadays, Kyle. I don't know. God, don't grip it like that, you little... Okay, well, yeah, you should use it. If it's right there and you brought it in your suitcase, you might as well, right? I literally did for all of these press hits.

Don't worry. We've noticed that you've gotten every piece of press possible. Shout out to our friend Elena. But I just don't. I was literally like, people say How Long Gone gets good press. Kyle just lapped us. Just lapped us. Imagine if How Long Gone wrote a book. Oh, my God. The cover of Time. Bestseller list. All the best reviews for How Long Gone. Well, I just wanted to talk about it. You've done some other podcasts, like some smaller, less prestigious podcasts this week, and I just wanted to just remember what you did first, Kyle. You know what I mean? Exactly. Terry Gross wasn't calling a couple years ago. It was like episode pre-100 or something. I don't remember. Yeah, definitely. I was a baby then. Those early additions. Early edition. You did the NPR. What was it? You just said it, Chris. I forgot. Fresh air. Fresh air. Fresh air. And then what else have you done? Ezra Klein really kicked off the tweets. Everyone. Kicked off the tweets, huh? Everyone and their mom loves Ezra. Not us. Not us that much. Don't worry. I mean, he's fine. He's just a little boring. I did listen to your NPR episode, and I noticed she was like, Kyle, you're like a master of algorithms. I'm very into plants, and I see a lot of plants in my algorithm. And then you're like, yeah. Yeah. That's how it works. That's what they deliver. They give you the plants. So what was it like being on that roller coaster ride? Well, it's kind of like the generational divide is very clear. Some people are very online and totally get it immediately, and other people you have to be like, no, this is the reality I live in. I'm bombarded by fiddly figs all day long. This is really my life. Right now, I'm getting so many neck... fixers because I have my neck has been hurting me a little bit and I bought something on Amazon probably eight months ago like a little

Like a little foam thing that you lay on that kind of helps launch your net. Chris, you shouldn't have said the N-word. I know. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I know. Now all of our phones are going to be blowing up. So are you going to get the iron neck where you attach it? Well, no, I get iron neck, but I also get this one that you put on that's almost like a – I get iron neck too. It goes on almost like shoulder pads, like NFL style. It goes over the neck. And then there's like a – You twist it and it straightens your... No, no, this is so medieval. This is like the rack. You're putting yourself on the rack right now. So the yassified medieval torture and Klarna is available for it. Unfortunately, I am susceptible to this kind of marketing. I'm like, damn, this looks pretty sick. It's only 50 bucks. Who cares? But I've resisted. And also, as we're all old... And the world of pain remedy, you know, the pain market is, what, trillions probably. It's the opioid epidemic. Yeah, exactly. Well, that leads me to my next point. One, he can buy an exercise thing off of Instagram every day and still not spend as much money as people spend on pills. No, I could buy everything I see. So all that is to say, Chris, treat yourself. I could buy everything I see for years and not spend as much money. There's so many things. Chris, just say the word. plantar fasciitis into your phone right now oh yeah it's gonna be and you are gonna go i get some foot i'm into foot stuff as well you know that we're all aware of that kyle what about you i thought the like talking to your phone thing was fake like i thought oh yeah they're not really listening to you but i literally said the atlantic out loud yesterday and the first instagram ad was for the atlantic the ocean or the magazine The ocean is advertising to me. Fall in love with the Atlantic Ocean all over again. We know you've been, but when's the last time you've been? My taste. Well, Kyle, you were talking about different generations and older people might not know about you being bombarded with fig and things like that. It had me thinking, when you write a book like this, Filter World,

it makes me wonder who is it exactly for because you kind of have like the people like us and who are younger who like this is all stuff that we all know but you're chronicling it and you're writing it out in a very well-written prose and it's it's like for posterity it's nice to see somebody who's really good at writing lay it all out so the generation you know in 50 years i could tell my grandkids about avocado toast and kyle wrote about Or is it the older generation who are just like, the world of algorithms is frightening and evil, and I'd like to learn a little bit more about it? Because if I was old, I'd be like, don't show me that. I don't want to know how the sausage is made. I don't want to know how the world is filtered. I think every book is for everyone, and everyone should buy it for a fun thing. But it is like, I don't know, I wrote it to try and explain the situation we're in, to just be like, okay, here's how it works right now. like here's what how the 2010s internet what it was like and i think like for me i want to talk to my peers and like break down our brain poison kind of like like oh let's all kind of step back and think about what like feeds have done to us but it has the the other positive effect of like explaining why why we're so fucked up to other people. Like, to a different generation. Or maybe to a younger generation, too, who are like, why are millennials so stupid? Yeah, I feel like we have enemies on both sides these days. The old heads don't like us, the young people don't like us. Ironically, I wrote a book about why I'm so stupid. A thing that most stupid people are not able to accomplish. Yeah, yeah. The self-awareness is really breathtaking. It's breathtaking. Now, do your parents understand what you're talking about? Are they like, oh, Kyle wrote another book and we're not going to read this one either. A lot of, like, my parents and their friends sometimes have read these books and be like, yeah, the writing was really nice, but I have no idea what you're talking about. Yeah, you said, yeah. The writing felt good, but there's some words in there I didn't understand. I can tell you worked really hard on this book, but, like, why? What? No, no. What is this? Why and what? My parents read the New Yorker essay I wrote about, like, my life on the internet. Oh, they didn't like that? My dad was like...

Oh yeah, I wondered what you were doing on that online video game for years of your life. I knew he was jacking off. Yeah, exactly. The family computer at that stage was truly only used by us. It was purchased by my father because he had one in his office and he thought we should have one at home. That motherfucker was never on it. I was on that shit in a chat room eight hours a day. You're immersed in it. Yeah, he couldn't get in if he wanted to. And wait until I got zip drives, it was over. So it was just like, you know, it's... What are you putting on those zips? All kinds of stuff, man. JPEGs, you know, music, all kinds of stuff. Just my JPEG collection. I have a nice JPEG collection, but I remember that... But there was a thing with family computers during this era where, like... Was it in an area of the house that was easy to access or was it in like a basement? Because it was mostly about jerking off. And that is, that is the parents knew that the basement was, yeah, the basement was more effective in that way. Yeah. No one's walking by the screen, you know? No one's walking by the screen. Yeah, but I would argue, is the basement a little too easy? Is that kind of like bumper bowling? It is. Do you need the thrill of being, you know, that door could open up at any moment and it's all over for you. In my house, it was in a room that was very unused. by the front door that was in a little area where people just weren't, there wasn't a lot of foot traffic. Unless one was jacking off, there's no real reason to go in there. Exactly. The things that you bought to hold your computer were these giant kind of like armoire-esque pieces of furniture that had like a, we had like a pull-down desk that when you opened it and the computer was here. So it was like, it didn't, it wasn't, they were just so rare, you know, or there was, it wasn't. It wasn't, it's crazy to think about them not being portable, I guess. They're fixed in one place. They're like hidden away. It's like a treasure chest that it's locked away. It's like an occasional object. Yeah, yeah. Whereas now we're just like computers are everywhere at once and they're just like floating in the ether. I look at a screen all day, every day. That's all I do. That's all I fucking do. Well, was that healthier? Was that healthier to be able to go in, use your punch card, put your internet punch card. I'm going to do my intranet work. I'm going to research what I need to research, send my emails.

put the hat back on, punch card, and then walk out, and then you go back into the real world. I feel like that was a little bit of a... Of a healthier situation, right? Yeah, you can close it away. I remember the transition from checking my email sometimes to just being on Gmail 24-7, basically. And I felt much better when I was only looking at my email once every hour or two instead of just this ambient awareness. It was like you're in Spain on gap year and you had to go to the internet cafe, you know what I mean, to check your email. It was a simpler time. The internet should be only in cafes. Yeah. It's nice. The same way mail should only be in your mailbox. It's like if wherever you are in the world, when a new letter or piece of junk mail arrives, a small man comes and finds you at the grocery store at the park and hands you, here's your bed and bath and beyond, you know, after a while. Here's a bill. That's the answer to that. It's just shouting in your face all day long. That is. No, it really is. Push alerts. When you put it like that, well, I turn off all, I have no alert. I have email, but I don't have any other alerts. Yeah, I don't do alerts. People that have all the alerts and you see the home screen, I'm like, you're a psycho. Instagram messages coming up on the home screen? That's crazy, dude. That's annoying as hell. That's so annoying. It's not urgent. Email at least could be urgent. Well, it's annoying for you, Chris, because you have a life. But if that Instagram is your only real lifeline, then that's everything to you. I was at the gym today. Also, Kyle, do you think gym is the new... selfie wall we'll talk about that later put a pin in it but i saw i saw a girl set up her phone and she used like the big you know when they have the big metal hydro flask that kind of looks like a like a jug yes like it's like a full gallon like something you'd buy like cider in in the olden days whatever she set her phone up use that as a tripod to film herself putting a baseball hat on in a cool way How many takes did we get before you had to look away? Well, before that, she was filming herself jumping rope. The entire time I was at the gym, which wasn't, you know, it was like an hour or so, she filmed herself jumping rope in different parts of the gym and then putting on this hat in like a...

In a very badass kind of way. It's just like a content studio. It's a content studio. Yeah, that kind of person loves. So yeah, the gym is the new angel wings painted on the Williamsburg brick wall, right? Right, because you're just posing. It's like posing rather than exercising. You're creating the image of exercising more so than you're actually exercising. And it'd be weird if you weren't wearing no clothing. Yeah, I mean, you have to dress up, look hot, take the selfies, take the videos. This takes me... back jason to the story that you told me about like the the only fans girls coming in super early in the morning and just kind of like pulling their titties out and working out because they need to get gym shots yeah yeah yeah and they're just like fuck it i'm at equinox at 5 a.m and they you said to me they just stopped saying something because the employees were like i don't know what to do they just keep coming it's so insane ma'am could you pull put the titty back Yeah, but I mean, if I'm like some lunkhead fucking juiced up guy drinking a Celsius at 530 a.m. and some girl has her tit out on the thigh machine, I'm going to be like... I fucking love my job, dude. This is sick as hell. No, no, of course. But it feels like there should be somebody in the Equinox organization that's like, maybe this isn't okay, you know? But everything is a content studio, but the gym is a place that I see it the most. Do you guys produce gym content? No. Like, are you doing the videos? Are you making proof of your... I posted a mirror selfie on the rowing machine at Equinox yesterday, and then... Some gay guy on Instagram said aesthetic AF. Should the gym be an aesthetic experience? I thought it was just about lifting heavy stuff. It depends on how much money you have. Kyle, it's funny you ask that, but as somebody who would love to be in a jail-style weight room, those aren't really available. They're not available. It might exist in Ridgewood or some shit, but in the areas that I frequent,

All of the gyms are obnoxious and have too many TVs and have a store and a cafe. The one thing I notice at Equinox that really blows my mind is that people work there. If you go at the wrong time, every table is full of people on their laptops working, like headphones on taking calls. Equinox is the only place in New York that has a bathroom you can use. That's why. You've got to be a member. Done. I can't do it. I won't use my laptop in public if I can absolutely help. We should just separate the areas of our life into different places. Do we really need to do our emails and work out and film ourselves and go to the cafe all in the same place? It's like, no. We used to go to... different places there used to be different places for different things and now there's just one space for everything and you never leave you're kind of right honestly it really is like people i'm like so are you here for three hours because you work out you shower you use the free you know keels and then you go downstairs and bang out a couple zoom calls like it just it feels insane i want out of there as fast as possible I want to do my thing and get out. This is like the staying home culture too. I feel like once people started doing everything in their own home, now they're just used to doing everything in some other place. You have the sense of never leaving or just doing all that you can everywhere. I really don't understand it. What do you think about the return to the office? Because it's happening slowly. But do you think we'll never be back to full tilt? I feel like it's going to happen eventually. I mean, we forget human civilization for guests in a way, and people trickle back to the office and figure it out. But I do think offices are getting smaller, which seems like it'll make them suck even more. It's like, okay, now your office can only fit 60% of your employees, and they have to all pack themselves in. get a hot desk or whatever. The rising obesity rates? Is that what you mean? I think you mean just lack of space. Yeah, you cut down on your real estate and they're like, everyone's downsizing. We're divesting from real estate over here in corporate America. The population is growing. There's no housing. There's all these giant office buildings with no occupancy. Aren't we all just going to eventually just never leave our little house? Yeah, turn the offices into apartment buildings with gyms.

Yeah, exactly. Never have to leave. Sleep in your gym. Yes. Equinox has hotels, Kyle. You know that. They're doing the best they can to get you to do it. But, Kyle, you said eventually we will return to the office culture, but I feel like, you know, I don't like this, but I feel like we are on the path to one day just not really ever leaving the home for anything. All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Quince. Jason, the temps are warming up. It's getting hot out there. Summer always changes how I get dressed. I need pieces that feel lighter, more breathable, and they're just easy but still put together. I don't want to look like a slob. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. They focus on high-quality essentials that feel and look amazing. Breathable linen and soft organic cottons. Well-made basics but without the luxury markups. That rare balance where everything feels elevated. but still effortless. Yeah, Chris, linen season is here. I wore a linen blazer to dinner a few nights ago in the warm California sun. But, you know, you got that Italy trip coming up this summer and quality European linen pants and shirts. Upgrade that look starting at just $34. You know, if you get a nice linen suit, a little t-shirt underneath it, some chill shoes, you're looking good, but you're staying cool. The inside of your special areas are nice and dry as you turn up with your besties. So elevate that summer wardrobe. Go to quince.com slash how long for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns, even on a nice holiday now available in Canada. That is Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash how long. That'll get you free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince punto com slash how long. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Squarespace. Obviously, Jason, you and I spend a lot of time on the World Wide Web. So do our peers, our listeners, our friends, our colleagues, maybe even your parents if they're freaky. And if you're doing anything in the world.

writing, taking pictures. I do topless boxing. You need a website. Exactly. A website that works, that does what it's supposed to do, that allows you to be creative but also business-minded. Jason, there's one place to go for that, Squarespace. Yeah, Chris, I'm over here. I'm modifying calculators and putting Claude inside of them so you could cheat at school. And I just want a place where I could have everything all in one place. I can have the SEO tools. So those future graduates can find me. And, you know, I'm able to accept, quote, unquote, donations for my services that might be gray area. You know what I mean? And then email campaigns. Hey, I got a new, you know, 2.3 version upgrade. Boom, boom, boom. Get the analytics going. Raise some money. You know, show your investor all of your cool analytics of what's going on. They're going to want to get in early. And we can use Blueprint AI to make your website look as professional. as your competition, if not more. So head to squarespace.com slash how long for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use offer code how long to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain. Yeah, I think that will also happen. I mean, I'm kind of like a weird case because I've been a freelancer for a decade and like now I'm on staff at the New Yorker, but I still work from home. So I kind of like fetishize the office in a way. I'm like, why don't you want to go somewhere? Why don't you want to be in a different space? I go to the J.Crew office like once or twice a week if I'm in New York. And it's truly a novelty and it's like fun. And I feel so productive. It's a whole different thing. It's this thing of dividing your life, too. You can do work in your workplace and sleep in your sleep place. When I get home and I put my lunch pail down and take my hard hat off, I feel like I did something. It's very similar to when you hear people talk about therapy, going to your therapist's office once a week.

That is a big part of it. But the ritual of walking there and walking home, that's the real part of it. That's the real destination, not the journey or whatever. And I feel like that process of leaving your house and going to an office and coming back is like a necessary journey and destination for everyone's life. Or else you just kind of like you almost don't even need better help if you just walk to your. job and walk home every day yeah yeah but if you do use the promo code howlonggone at checkout for 20% off do you go kyle do you work at home or are you going to a local washington a district of columbia he's typing in hipster coffee shop on yelp and that's where he's working chris what the fuck yeah around my home yeah literally i mean when i was writing this book like in the real throes of it i was literally walking a block away to the lobby of this line hotel dc I would see the same baristas every day. I would sit in the same spot and just write the book. Kyle, I've been to that. I've stayed at that line. It's the only nice one. The only nice one. I'm so surprised that it's in D.C. of all places. Yeah, I think they actually had a bunch of tax dodges and stuff and subsidies. So I think they've got a good deal on it for some reason. I like that. So you would go there. Just to change spots. For sure, yeah. And literally have a routine. I would go at 1 p.m. every day and then stay until 4 and write 1,000 words, and that would be my work. And it felt good. What a bad-breaking schedule, that 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. How did you manage that and have relationships or anything like that? I know, it's hard to balance that. No, but honestly, 1,[redacted address] to finish a book, right? Yeah, it's not easy. Shout out Jamie Attenberg's book, A Thousand Words, which will help you do that. But yeah, I think A Thousand Words a Day is good. I feel like you need the mental preparation for that. And then you're like, okay, I'm going to sit down and do nothing but write. Do you guys have writing routines? No. I do it when I got to do it. I do my best work laying down. I will say that. But I can't.

Classic bottom. The thought of being like, okay, for the next three hours, I'm going to sit in front of this laptop. I just can't do that. That's all I can do. That's why you have two books, and I have a bunch of 600-word columns, Kyle. That's the difference. Do you write in your phone ever? Do you write in the Notes app? That's crazy to me. I've never done that in my life. I'll write notes in my Notes app about something to write later, but I won't actually write right. full paragraphs like drafting your thing and your notes up i'm just not i'm not a i'm just not really a phone guy i'm like a computer guy i i can't really like jason knows this i start i didn't start like i book flights like people that book flights on the the phone i'm like that's crazy oh man i totally feel that it's like it lends some seriousness to the endeavor when you're on your yeah that's what i really know this is a real task i need to do it on my laptop and this is the legacy of the desktop computer yes like we're like no you need the objects you need the the totemic thing in front of you to really be doing answer network so you're saying if something comes to you and you need to go a little deeper you can do that on the notes app in transit or whatever and then get it back and craft it later right you can just like take down your random thoughts like inspiration or whatever and then you flesh it out i love random i love random thoughts i just i know there's people that actually like used and not just celebrities apologizing but like people writing like real shit on the notes app like going crazy and i just don't know i can't do that that's not how my thumb they're going eggers mode on the notes app chris you okay over there you look chris looks like he's at a strip club right now why You keep looking at somebody in front of you and going like this. Yeah, something was thrown at me. That's why. Was it some ass? Yeah. Chris, what's your poster here? It's Triscuits. It's my Matthew Cerletti Triscuit print that I bought from Karma. Incredible. That is one of my prized positions. I grew up with a Triscuit-loving father.

so it really hits close to home. This is the nostalgic art object that brings back your childhood. See, I knew you'd put it in Kyle's speech for me. I can't help it. I'm sorry. I just can't help it. That's how I am. Kyle, do you want to talk about Pitchfork? Oh, yeah, totally. So Pitchfork is dead. Che Diaz is dead. There's a rule of thirds. What else is going to come next? Something else has to fall. I don't know what. So they're putting it under GQ. Like Pitchfork is getting absorbed by GQ. I mean, friends are telling me, oh, Chris Flack is going to take over. I made one innocuous tweet. I got a couple DMs. If I took over Pitchfork, it would be a lot more listenable music, which may be better for the bottom line. Pitchfork was how I figured out my tastes as a teenager. That's where I found music and discovered stuff. found people whose tastes I admired, and that was super great. Yeah, me too. And I used to use our computer at our mommy and daddy's house in the jack-off room, too, and now things have changed. I mean, the hysterics online about it are funny because it's one of those things where it's like, if you guys went to this site more... It would probably be fine, but you are nostalgic for it when you discovered it and used it. You haven't looked at it in 10 years, and now you're up in arms that the bills weren't getting paid. When you do tweet about it, it's negatively. Always. It's about how it sucks, and the review is awful, and this is blah, blah, blah. People did love to hate on it. For years and years and years, there was... critiquing whatever review is up. Because they're very opinionated and they graded people's life's work with a decimal point numerical scale and that pisses a lot of people off. We do need more opinionated shit. Chris's columns are opinionated. We should all just be having strong opinions. I just don't think a business model of paying $200 for a record review is going to really... But I don't...

I guess that the hysterics about it that I've seen, because I've seen a lot of people talking about it, and it's like they really act like it's something, I don't know, it's just the seriousness of it. And it's like, well, guys, it just didn't make business sense. It wasn't making enough money, so something has to change. That's just what happens in life. I don't know what... It's not a subsidized utility. Yeah, they don't owe you this. They don't owe you. I just don't understand the attitude about it. Publications are always coming and going in a way. Sometimes Pitchfork is under GQ. Maybe it'll get revived. Maybe someone else will reboot it. We see magazines now bought and sold. Multiple times a year. We're like, okay, who owns... the gawker ruins now or like who like yeah yeah for when you can't afford a basketball team like jezebel is owned by stereo gum yeah yeah it's like why not why not you know it's like mad libs and the readers don't notice in a way like like only people like us pay attention to media parent companies yeah no one gives a shit no that's what i mean no one gives a shit and i think that people like where's where's this stuff going to go? And I'm like, I don't think it needs to go anywhere. And that's the problem. I think that we might have moved past the need for overly educated dorks to intellectualize Ariana Grande as well as a Spanish-speaking flamenco album. And now we're done with this project. I just don't think it's someone's responsibility to shine a light on niche. music or culture. That's not a business. Where do you find stuff, though? You guys are tastemakers. I'm not fucking telling you, Kyle. Are you kidding me? This is what everyone is asking me. Where do you find the good stuff? I'm like, I don't know. It's hard. Oh, I use blogs. I use a series of blogs. Yeah, same. Twitter, blogs. I actually read Stereogum. I read Pitchfork. I looked at it every day, but I'm not going to miss it because it's not...

It was like a habit, and every once in a while there's something good, but it's basically a news aggregator with reviews of shit I don't care about. Kind of. You know what I mean? That's what it was. If you want the news element, you hire one person. They can do that. That's not hard. I feel like you guys are critics. You guys are the new critics. I'm introducing people to stuff and explaining things. I mean, that's fine. I mean, there's also a pretty good, robust... kind of like british the line of best fit and like there's like weird british ones that are quite good yeah we should hunt that stuff down like it's cool to go read a blog that's in another country like we should i mean broaden our horizons and like see what else is happening there yeah how am i going to find out about a new you know rape charge and a member of arcade fire i don't know i don't know i don't know where to go for that i don't know i don't know where to go i'm gonna have to go to brooklyn vegan or stereo gum brooklyn vegan and let's not forget our friends over at lamb goat for the more extreme music you know there's all kinds of there's all kinds of these things that exist But I think Pitchfork was the, you know, Pitchfork was the delta of the shit. But Kyle, speaking of criticism and us being critics, there's the New Yorker podcast with Nomi Fry. They just had an episode today about criticism itself, and it was quite good. So I recommend listening to that for a friend of the show, Fry. Yeah, it's like everyone wants critics. We want criticism. And we want people to tell us what to like and why they like it like that. I feel like that never goes away. I think a point that they made on that episode was part of being a good critic or a successful critic is you have to have a sense of humor and you have to use it a little bit because if you don't, then there's no way of knowing or proving to the reader that you like anything at all. And if you don't like anything at all, why should I be reading your criticism? And some of the best amazing Pitchfork reviews are ones that are funny. Yeah, for sure. And I don't think I could really recall the last time I read a Pitchfork review that had even a line of humor in it. Like, you can't hate everything. Like, everything can't be bad. And you can't love everything. Yeah. No, but this is the thing. I mean, this is the issue with something like Pitchfork is that, like, as a writer.

that kind of writer, you know that it's probably more fun to shit on something, and shitting on something will get you more clicks. That's the reality. A glowing review is not as exciting as a monkey pissing in its own mouth review. The famous jet album. What we said yesterday, or on the last episode with Stav, nobody wants to hear a comedian Talk about how good their relationship is going. Yeah, no, it's right. It's the same idea. The internet incentivizes pans. You do the pan, you are vociferously negative, you hate it, and that's what makes people quote it. They're like, oh shit, this book just got knifed in the back. It's like spectating on a crime. Yeah, and since Pitchfork does have that hyper-specific scale down to the decibel point, I feel like nowadays in 2024 with everything going on and all of our TikToks and blah, blah, blah, unless it is a best new music or a 1.4. Nobody is ever going to even care to read further than the subheadline. Yeah, like what is the 7.5 versus the 8.2? It doesn't fucking matter. The thing that killed them made them stronger, and that was the numerical scale. I think you're right. No one reads past it. Well, it was awesome at the time, but I think now that the classic or trash, the destruction of the middle class of opinions. And, you know, they had to adapt or die. And now we just evaluate everything by numbers anyway. Like we look at how many views on a TikTok. We look at how many likes on Instagram. Like that numerical thing is not, we're overwhelmed by it now. Yeah, that's what we do. I mean, I think the other thing that really affected the whole business of criticism is like Stan culture, honestly. Like you can literally, you're going to get doxxed if you don't give Taylor Swift or Nicki Minaj or Ariana Grande a 10. And it's just. I'm not going to risk my life for 500 bucks. It's going to ruin my mentions if nothing else. Yeah. Like fandom, like fandom is not the same thing as appreciation. I think like the fan, the fandom is like rabid consumers of a personality cult and they will demand that you like everything and they look like everything. And like, that's not how you relate to culture necessarily. Like you don't have to be obsessed with the persona of the artist. You can like an album without being like,

going nuts over the person. I like a lot of music and don't want to wear the singer's skin. It's fine. Damn, this rocks. It's totally cool. Speaking of wearing someone's skin, you tweeted about how nobody knows where or how to buy pants. Have you found any leads on your journey? Oh my god, no. This is my criticism. Everyone needs to tell me where to buy pants. What are you looking for? Let us help you, Kyle. I mean, Uniqlo is my standard. That's where I'll just like buy jeans and they're fine. Are you looking to upgrade now that your second book is out? You're making a little bread. You got a staff job. Yeah, I got caught between the like two skinny jeans era and now the wide legged pants era, which like I was in London a few weeks ago and all of the pants are like 1.5 times wide. and like two inches shorter than america and i was kind of into it yes so but you're a slender guy so i feel like you're sample size you know what i mean so but brands like what are the brands i need to look for here i mean this is funny because there was a big debate about this in lauren in the in lauren's line sheet about men buying jeans because she was stunned to find out that all men just by rag and bone. And she's like, what? Like, I haven't thought about that in fucking 10 years. You know what I mean? And so I think that the suggestions were all over the place. But if you want jeans, I mean, you can stick with an APC or an acne. You can go to Orslo if you want something more Japanese. I mean, you know, there's options. But there's like a whole world of like the black kind of Chino-ish thing. Yeah. But it doesn't look like a Chino. I have some pants like that. They're from The Row. You should check those guys out. Yeah, that'll be my next book advance. You can blow the whole thing on one pair of pants. I think that what you're talking about is because of the effects of athleisure where all guys want a pant they can run in but also wear to the office. I need a pant that I'm able to defend my family against minorities in at any given moment. Defend my family.

I can't storm in these trousers. Look, you might have to do it at any moment. Like, you never know. Look, in Biden's America, anything can happen. And I think that you don't need – you're not a guy on the front lines. Like, you don't need pants that you can react in. You just need some nice, well-fitting kind of selfish denim. Yeah, exactly. I just feel like I'm stuck between the Uniqlo and, like, the Brunello Cuccinelli shit that I obviously can't afford. Do you shop online or do you like to go IRL? to go IRL. I'm still not adjusted to fashion e-commerce. The idea of ordering a bunch of clothes and then trying them online or trying them on and then sending a bunch back is still totally out of my... Well, that's what I do. I go on the RealReal. I order 10 pairs of Brunello Cuccinelli pants that are $110 because they're on sale. And then, you know, three out of those 10 work. You take the seven over to the RealReal store. Some guy who's on drugs. Gives you instant credit on the MX back, and then you go have lunch. It's a beautiful thing. Okay, this is what I need to do. That's the process. No, Jason's got it dialed in. If I buy something online that doesn't fit, I give it away or put it in the closet. I can't return. That's the thing. You have to buy it in bulk because that way you get the free shipping, and then that way you have those options where you're just like, if I just get one hit out of these five, I drop my line in the ocean, I get one fish. I'm happy. I feel like Chris, though, I'm like, once the thing is in my house, it's like I'm responsible for it. And it's just, it was my mistake, basically. Like, when I see people returning things to Amazon, I'm like, what's in that box costs less than $20? This is a waste of your time. Like, this is literally a waste of your time. Unless it's, like, I just, I can't be bothered. I love going to the post office. I'm a big FedEx UPS. I like that. I'm good at it. Big parcel guy myself. I'm a big parcel guy. I have a PO box. I'm a mail forward guy. I get mail every day, but I only want to be on the receiving end. I don't want to be giving the mail. I like putting stuff on the street. Just put it on the curb. Kyle, I love putting stuff on the street. DC has a lot of those little free libraries where people leave books. I just take all of my galleys.

And the like endless same books that people send me and then put them out there. And I'm like, I feel like I'm stocking the neighborhood bookstore. You know, you can get all the latest release. This shit ain't even out yet, bitch. Exactly. It ain't even out yet. I mean, I, I leaving stuff on the street is arguably one of the best parts about living in New York city. That it really is. You can drop something off and it's, it's, there's. a foot of snow on the ground and it's a broken mirror and it's gone in 30 seconds that's so satisfying it's crazy that's like who needs algorithmic feeds when like a random person will absolutely walk by and think they need that exact thing and like it has a really cool kind of third world feel to it guys sounds awesome just you guys live in the center of the world and culture where people sort of pick up each other's garbage off the street. It really is. Well, and it's like an Eames chair. You're like, oh, why did you leave this Eames chair on the street? I don't know why, but it's there. It's only a 65-inch flat screen. Yeah. Let's just put it out. It's just a knockoff Eames. It's not the real thing. I've actually put an Eames chair on that because it was broken and I couldn't get it fixed properly. And I had to get it out of my apartment because I was moving. And I was like, you know what? There's somebody who can fix this chair. And they're going to be so psyched to find this. And I felt good about it. Like, it doesn't feel wasteful because somebody's actually probably happy to find it. Yeah, you're giving them happiness. You're like, they're going to be so happy and joyful when they find this thing on the street that they totally wanted. And I just serendipitously found them. So great. I say that every time I litter. When Jason throws the In-N-Out wrapper out of the Tesla, that's exactly how he feels. Yeah, when I pull a penny out of my pocket and look at it like Sean Puffy Combs looks at a dollar bill and I throw it on the sidewalk. Same feeling. Someone's going to really enjoy this. Kyle, why do you live in D.C.? Are you from D.C.? Or do you just love being around politics? No, my wife is a politics reporter.

So that is the reason that we're in D.C. Okay, she's got to be in on the hill. She's got to be on the hill. It's the family business. Okay, she's got to be on the hill. Yeah, yeah. But the weird thing about politics reporters is that they're always leaving D.C. Sure, sure. They're always gallivanting around somewhere else. Doesn't the politics happen here? They're always gallivanting to Afghanistan and Kiev. Exactly. Okay, babe, if you have to go to Iowa, I guess. That's fine. Literally, I mean, Jess is a saint. She flew back. She drove to Chicago and then flew back from Chicago to D.C. to be at my book event. Oh, that's very nice. That's very nice. That's wifey shit right there, baby. Exactly. It is wifey shit. Thank you. There's this one thing that someone told me about D.C. that is scarred into my brain forever, and I will never forget. I need to credit this person. But they describe D.C. as the world's conference room. They were like, everyone just shows up, does their business, stays for as little time as possible, and then leaves again. That's the vibe. Somewhere around 1 o'clock, everyone gets a sweet green? Yeah. It's definitely consultant lunch vibes in D.C., 100%. Yeah, so it's just like you leave every weekend. Everyone's always leaving. It's an odd dynamic. Sounds like a great place to live. Honestly, D.C. is low-key beautiful. I didn't discover that until years after going there frequently and being like, wait a second, there are parts of this that are just breathtaking. And I had no idea. But the summer, my parents made us go there for a summer trip once, and the heat was oppressive. And I do have scars. Yeah, August is horrific. But yeah, the architecture of the residential areas, the houses are really beautiful. It has some great art museums. There's a lot to recommend it, except for the politics. Oh, man, the city would be amazing if it wasn't the hub of the American government. So if there's a hot restaurant in D.C., is it, like in L.A., it's full of celebrities in New York. It's full of rich people, maybe some celebrities in D.C. It's full of, like, fat white guys with gray hair? It's full of, like, house reps and, like, think tank people. I'm like, you know, here's so-and-so's publicist or, like, here's the comms director. Yeah.

blah blah blah it's like a whole well do you think do you think jason and i should look get into lobbying i feel like that could be kind of a profitable it seems so lucrative right what would you lobby for like water drinking we mostly lobby for mcnugget buddies at this moment but renewable and fossil fuels Stuff like that. The thing about us is we'll lobby for anything, and that's why I think it's a problem. Not anything. I mean, I wouldn't do maybe nuclear weapons, but anything kind of. I mean, I'll do Halliburton. Sponsored by Raytheon. Buy the new war drone. Yeah, exactly. Offer code how long gone? 10% off your $100 million war plan. I don't think I would lobby NRA. No, I wouldn't lobby. But you could be like the cigarette lobby, like the Hestia lobby or whatever. They're paying. Tobacco pockets are still fat, Jason. They still got money. Yeah. And Hestia, I'm running low. I'm going to need another drop ship. pretty soon here. Thanks, Kyle, for teeing that up. Have you guys done a live event in D.C. ever? No, but it's funny. I was talking to our agent, and he was asking about it. He was asking if maybe we wanted to try this year, and I was like, I don't have any data to support this, but it is a city that is so rich with young people with incomes. that it feels like it could work for us, but I don't know if... They might be hate listening to us in D.C., though. You know what I mean? We're getting their ad rep. They could hate see you in real life. Yeah, they could hate pay money to come see us. Yeah, yeah, they'll totally do that. It's very masochistic, D.C. I feel like D.C., I feel like there's also not a lot going on. I mean, besides like... I mean, I know every band plays there because it's like a legendary kind of city for music, but like beyond that, is there... Is there stuff happening every night? No, no. There's a good restaurant scene. There's a lot of shows, events, etc. But I feel like, actually, Chris, you would really like DC because the main form of entertainment is getting up at 5 a.m. and running 20 miles. Everyone's just like...

Oh, no, I have to go to bed early because I have to wake up at 5 a.m. and train for my DIY marathon by running along the mall. I'll see you on mile five at the Lincoln Memorial, and then I'll hit you on the way. Kyle, are you running at 5 a.m. every day? No, absolutely not. Though I have taken up jogging in Rock Creek Park. I run with my dog, which I think... from my how I'm gone listening is judged as bullshit. Kyle, unfortunately, Kyle, that's not exercise. That's more of an outing with your animal. Jogging is exercise, Chris. Jogging is exercise. No, I think jogging is exercise. When you add the element of a dog, it becomes a dog walk at a higher rate of speed. But I have an argument against this because actually the dog is a form of resistance. It's basically just a band. It's a weighted band. Yeah, literally. And it's random. It has a mind of its own. This could help with the stability work, which I think is something that we kind of take for granted. And also, if you have a fast dog that's a pace car that you're trying to keep up with, it could get the PR built up even higher, Chris. Yeah, it's like having the winds at your back. I have a feeling that Kyle's dog is not fast, is my guess. I don't know why. I don't know why I have that feeling. Kyle, do you have an Italian greyhound? Yeah. That would be very cool. We have a dog named Rhubarb, who is a plot hound, like, southern mountain dog. Plot hound, southern mountain dog? What the fuck is that? Slow. So the plot hound is a... It really feels like a slur, I'm going to say, Kyle. Sorry, go ahead. P-L-O-T-T. It's actually a German family. Two T's. Even worse. Oh, that's bad. Yeah, you're making your case first. Yeah, yeah. So they were bred to hunt bears in the woods, and they were like kamikaze bear-killing dogs. Wow. I'm back. Rhubarb is far too refined for that and could not kill a bear, but the spirit is there, maybe. You feel that when you're in your little run, little jogs. Yeah, yeah.

Vicious. Vicious momentum running after those bears. So this book tour, it's pretty real. I feel like you're doing, what, like eight cities or something? Let's see. D.C., New York, Boston, L.A., San Francisco. Like the standard by coastal. Do you get a per diem? I do, yeah. Which is very nice. I feel very supported. Shout out to Doubleday and Elena and Thomas and all my pals there. That's because That's because these are the kind of books that actually sell. These are cool fiction books these chicks get half a million bucks for, then I'll sell. I feel like The Guest sold. Like, Catherine Lacey is doing good. The Guest is one book. You know what I mean? Like, that is one book. I mean, there was that airmail story about how, like, the industry was basically like, I don't know how long we can keep doing this. Like, I don't know, like... how this keeps working we keep giving advances and no one's delivering you know what they say like all my my publisher everyone i talk to podcasts sell books yeah because people trust you really people trust your voices we have a built-in audience yeah yeah i'm gonna buy the books that that chris and jason tell me to buy that's good i mean even if the book is bad they'll fucking buy it oh yeah books are just objects anyway Tell me about it. Oh, I know. That's the truth. I definitely ain't reading them. Yeah. I like mine with pictures. So I have a room full of those. But I also know I've been reading more lately. I've actually very proud of myself for like being able to put my phone down for an hour. And it does it does bring me it gives me a kind of because I used to be like a crazy reader when I was younger. And so it gives me. that feeling sometimes and i really i didn't know that would happen so i'm very glad that i've been able to figure this out it gives you the feeling of being a crazy teen reader just being like so engrossed in something that you like cannot put it down like i'm like you do you lay face down on the bed and then have your feet up in the back okay yeah only for

The best books. Yeah, only for the good ones. The best books make you kick your feet in the air, you know. Kyle's book, I'm on the couch, legs down, but if it's a... Communing seriously with it. I just wish there were books that made me do that, but there's just so few books that... Well, the thing is, it's only gonna be... The only way that happens is fiction. For me. I'm not going to lose myself in a book about the Civil War. You know what I mean? Everyone has a different taste. It's like the fiction immerses you. Someone else might do the Civil War. Clearly many people get immersed in my critiques of the internet. Many. Many such cases. It's a real page turner. Hundreds of thousands. But I think there's different reasons to read. I feel like there's... Reading fiction is for entertainment. Reading a book like yours is to, like, actually learn something. You know, it's a different – it is entertaining, but there's – You learn from nonfiction as well. Yeah. Like, nonfiction is self-help now. Yeah, yeah. It's like you read a book to make yourself better, to improve your mind. It's like thinking in a different way. That's true. Books work for that. But I just – I can't – I don't – As a person who doesn't watch movies, I just feel like a book is so much more work, but it gives me... That's the feeling I think people get at the movies when they like it. It's like they've lost themselves in it. It doesn't matter that it's four hours long and the music sucks. It's like, I'm going to sit in this chair and finish it, and I think that's what I'm missing. Yeah, you're having a full experience. But it's so amazing to find that until something hits you, but you never know what it's going to be. It's so hard to predict. Yeah, you're telling me. Don't look at my Amazon history, sweetheart. We got some hits and misses in there. No, no. The books that everyone's telling me they can't stop reading are like the sexy dragon romanticcy books. Have you guys heard of these? Well, you kind of lost me a dragon. Is that literal? Literal. Literal dragon. So they're like fantasy books with like fucking in them. Okay. They're like...

Sexy dragons and dragon riders. Who are the people telling you that this is dope? Oh, everyone. Publishing people. Oh, okay. Publishing people are telling you that because they're selling. Yes, they are definitely selling. But then they read them and they're like, oh, wow, it actually is good. Like, I'm actually stuck reading this thing. Are the dragons having sex with other dragons? Or is it like a beast? Are they having sex with humans? I think it's both, Jason. I don't want to. I don't know. Are the dragons hot? Great question. Are the dragons hot to each other or to their riders? You're cute. You're cute. Not classically hot. I like a very certain kind of dragon, so I don't know if this would be for me. I'm very particular about the kind of dragons. Is that very bad for humanity? Dragon fantasy erotica is number one. I don't think that's what's happening. I mean... No, I think it's good in a way. It's like people are buying books, they're reading stuff, you know, reading is good. Yeah, that's true. It's better overall. Very strong stance there, Kyle. Okay, no, no, I have a... Reading good. Think about this. Buy books good, reading them good. Would you rather have the Sexy Dragon books or have them be a Netflix show that everyone's bothering you about? Great point, books. Yeah, yeah, the books, Sexy Dragon books. Better than the TV show. Well, that's only because you can't show fucking on Netflix, especially Dragon... That's true. That Dragon Vein on Netflix? Ted doesn't... Covering my kid's eyes. Ted doesn't allow Dragon Play on his little streaming service. Dragon Hole? So it's a little bit... Have you been... Kyle, have you been following the Barnes & Noble? Yes, it's coming back, right? And it's due to the CEO guy who ran Daunt Books in the UK. One of my favorite third places. Easily one of my... But I went to the one over Christmas at The Grove in LA, and I've been there many times, but they've fully redone it. And it's kind of insane, because I thought it was going to just be like...

records and greeting cards and like you know like tchotchkes and games but it's actually mostly books it's like actually optimized for books like magazines are hidden the starbucks is hidden but it's like actually about books which is very surprising to me it's great i mean i think his strategy is like let the stores choose what to put out like let the stores be different in different places let the worker like the staff influence what gets shown Because they know what sells. Yeah, and that's also, like, that's why we go to McNally Jackson is because there's recommendations from the employees that are nerds that read all day. Like, they know what the fuck they're talking about. So Barnes & Noble's destroyed the independent bookstore and then took their business model. Yes. And used it against them for the second round. And now they're, like, the underdog once more. Now we're the little itty-bitty indies. I think that feels right, but I also think it might be the kind of situation where it, actually like a barnes and noble opens and it helps the independent bookstores you know what i'm saying like that happens with certain businesses where it's like it doesn't really rising tide yeah but but i i think that that could be true but i mean but barnes and now when you go to a barnes and noble there's nowhere to sit anymore whereas there used to be a pretty good amount of seating sup with that kyle filter man No, they're specializing. They're not trying to help you do everything in one place. You want them to put a gym in the Barnes & Noble, too? Yeah. You want to go work out in the bookstore? Can we put a stationary bike over here in the sci-fi section? I think there's a spectrum between working out at a bookstore and not wanting to stand while you read. Who reads a book while standing? Perverts. Do you read a book in the bookstore, though? Yeah, who reads at the bookstore? That's the whole issue. Homeless people. Yeah, I mean, that... That's the thing. Barnes & Noble is no longer a public restroom. It's a place where they're trying to sell some literature. That's a good move for a corporation. I hope it works. The more books sell, the better it is for everyone in books and humanity. Mostly you, but everyone as well. It's really great for me and my people and other people as well. Reading is good for you. I agree.

I commented on Instagram a couple days ago saying, I won't have time to finish your book before we podcast today. And then you replied, you don't need to read the book. You are the book. I think, did I say you live it? You live the book? More or less, that's the gist of it. And I was wondering if you meant that derogatory or not derogatory. Oh, no. I think we're all implicated. We're all very online. We're all getting pushed around by the Instagram algorithm. Our tastes are all shaped on the internet. We're all trying to make our voices heard in a way. So if we're all that, then no one needs to read your book? Is that what you're saying? The future people need to read the book. So you can know what the 2010s were like. My book will be there. Buy Filter World for your child, your cousins, your little sister, your little brother. They need this more, Jason, than us, I think is what he's saying. Yeah, we've lived it. We've experienced it. We know it sucks. Now we have to tell other people. You're doing God's work. As a cog in the algorithmic wheel, I have to tell my story. Yes, exactly. We have to monetize our content, obviously. Kyle, who do you think is online more, me or you? That's a tough one. Pull up the screen time, hos. I don't measure it. I don't even want to see that. Also, most of my screen time or a lot of it is on the computer, so it's not a fair representation of just phone. I feel like you might be on Twitter more, but I might be on other stuff more. Like Instagram, TikTok, you know? I don't use TikTok. I am on Twitter a lot. I was saying this at lunch earlier with my friend Nathan, but I was just like the the for you is so dialed in right now for me that it is just like the pitchfork shit on for you right now is killing me it's so funny it's so good and it's like it works for you it works the algorithm is working the algorithm that's my whole point the algorithm is working that's my whole thing because you've trained it so well you've like given it your whole self and now it's

Giving yourself back to you. Hard work pays off, brother. I gave the algorithm all of myself. Thank you, Kyle, for joining us. Filter World's in stores everywhere. Everywhere you get books. And in L.A., we're going to be... L.A., 23rd. Kyle and I are going to be chatting at Skylight. I think it's 7 p.m. on the 23rd. Yeah. I'll be there. Yeah, we're going to do a literary scene. Them jeans will be there. Kyle and I will probably have a similar conversation to this where we don't cover a lot of the book, but it'll come up. You know what I mean? It'll come up a little bit. Yeah, mostly it'll be sexy, I guess. Yeah, exactly. That's the real point here. What do you find sexy about dragons, Kyle? Thank you. Thank you for joining us, and we'll see you next week. We're looking forward to it. Yeah, thank you, guys. Peace out, player.