Alex Jupiter

“Until recently, when both of them went extinct, there were two species of frogs, known as gastric-brooding frogs, that carried their eggs in their stomachs and gave birth to little froglets through their mouths.”
― Elizabeth Kolbert, The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

“How many refugees have fled from Britain, or from the whole of the British Empire, during the past seven years? And how many from Germany? How many people personally known to you have been beaten with rubber truncheons or forced to swallow pints of castor oil? How dangerous do you feel it to be to go into the nearest pub and express your opinion that this is a capitalist war and we ought to stop fighting? Can you point to anything in recent British or American history that compares with the June Purge, the Russian Trotskyist trials, the pogrom that followed vom Rath’s assassination? Could an article equivalent to the one I am writing be printed in any totalitarian country, red, brown or black? The Daily Worker has just been suppressed, but only after ten years of life, whereas in Rome, Moscow or Berlin it could not have survived ten days. And during the last six months of its life Great Britain was not only at war but in a more desperate predicament than at any time since Trafalgar. Moreover – and this is the essential point – even after the Daily Worker’s suppression its editors are permitted to make a public fuss, issue statements in their own defence, get questions asked in Parliament and enlist the support of well-meaning people of various political shades. The swift and final ‘liquidation’ which would be a matter of course in a dozen other countries not only does not happen, but the possibility that it may happen barely enters anyone’s mind.”
― George Orwell, Fascism and Democracy

“A few months later, Procter & Gamble tried something similar. Its CEO, A. G. Lafley, had begun talking about the need for P&G to get closer to its consumers. After reading about this, Facebook ad salesman Colleran did one of his masterful cold calls to find out if P&G was targeting any of its brands at the college market. It turned out that while P&G’s Crest White Strips teeth-whitening product had never been aimed specifically at college students, company data showed that the strips sold particularly well at Wal-Marts located near campuses. Colleran and P&G marketers came up with a Facebook campaign called Smile State. Much as Chase and Apple had done, P&G created a sponsored group on Facebook for Crest White Strips. It advertised the Smile State group only to users who were students at one of twenty large state universities located near Wal-Marts. Any student who joined got tickets to an upcoming college-oriented Matthew McConaughey movie called We Are Marshall. In addition, the schools that enrolled the most members in the Crest White Strips group got a concert organized by Def Jam Records. Over 20,000 people joined. To have 20,000 people explicitly expressing affinity for Crest White Strips using their real name is the kind of thing that gives marketers goose bumps. It was a huge win for P&G and for Facebook.”
― David Kirkpatrick, The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World

“Ralph Gerard, the neuroscientist, was reminded of a story. A stranger is at a party of people who know one another well. One says, “72,” and everyone laughs. Another says, “29,” and the party roars. The stranger asks what is going on. His neighbor said, “We have many jokes and we have told them so often that now we just use a number.” The guest thought he’d try it, and after a few words said, “63.” The response was feeble. “What’s the matter, isn’t this a joke?” “Oh, yes, that is one of our very best jokes, but you did not tell it well.”
― James Gleick, The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood