The best longform journalism we consumed this week
Welcome to The Long Story, the weekly newsletter where we curate the best longform journalism on the internet. If you want this newsletter landing in your inbox every Friday, click on this handy little button:
Let’s jump into it…
How Medium finally pivoted its way to profitability
When Ev Williams stepped down from the CEO role of Medium in 2022, the company was losing $2.6 million a month and experiencing a net decrease in paid subscribers. Luckily, the person he handed the reins to, Tony Stubblebine, was a longtime Medium power user who had developed some novel theories on how to reward high quality content. [Simon Owens]
Under Siege From Trump and Musk, a Top Liberal Group Falls Into Crisis
This is hard to read. No other organization devotes as many resources as Media Matters to monitoring the vast right wing media ecosystem that gave rise to the MAGA movement, and yet it's on the brink of shutting down because of bogus lawsuits from Elon Musk and a bunch of Trump allies. If you can spare a few dollars, maybe shoot them a donation. [NYT]
How McDonald’s Lost Its Value Edge—and Is Trying to Claw It Back
McDonald's used to be considered recession proof, since it could offer cheap meals to cash-strapped families, but in recent years inflation has cut into its ability to offer discount items, and meanwhile a bunch of fast casual competitors have eaten into its market share. [WSJ]
When Fact-Checking Meant Something
The New Yorker is famous for running the most rigorous fact checking department in journalism, with even the most mundane statements receiving granular scrutiny. One of the fact checkers from Tina Brown's rein at the magazine wrote about what it was like to chase down information in a pre-Google era. [Yale Review]
How Hims Became the King of Knockoff Weight-Loss Drugs
For a few years, Americans were able to benefit from an FDA loophole that allowed them to buy inexpensive, off-brand versions of GLP 1 drugs from compound pharmacies, but that loophole ended earlier this year. Now, a buzzy telehealth company is operating in a legal gray area to continue sending GLP-1 injectables in the mail, and it's making a calculated bet that Trump's FDA will leave it alone. [Bloomberg]
If GLP-1 Drugs Are Good For Everything, Should We All Be on Them?
A few decades from now, we may look at GLP-1 drugs in the same way we view the discovery of antibiotics or the development of modern day vaccines — as an innovation that changed the course of humanity for the better. Right now, they're mostly used to treat diabetes and obesity, but studies have shown benefits across a bunch of ailments ranging from cancer to Alzheimer's. Will we reach a point where we're simply all on the drug? [Derek Thompson]
Pod of War
One of the world’s most popular podcasters got his start interviewing military veterans about their trauma, but he's recently branched out into all sorts of conspiratorial obsessions, including UFOs. He caters to right wing listeners who distrust the government but don’t want to reflect on their own role in making our democracy considerably worse. [Mother Jones]
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America's next big land grab
The US is experiencing a severe housing shortage, and high interest rates combined with a tariff-inflicted economy are dampening demand for new home building. A growing group of investors called "land bankers" are buying up billions of dollars of empty lots in anticipation of the next housing boom, and right now they're just biding their time. [Business Insider]
The Website at the End of the Internet
It's kind of strange that Reddit, the website that most resembles the old school internet forums, has become one of the biggest platform success stories in the last few years. Despite the rise of influencer culture, there's still a need for semi-anonymous internet users to hang around and explore their interests without feeling like they have to pump up their personal brands. [New York]
Where Are All the AI Drugs?
So much of new drug development just boils down to repetitive trial and error, with scientists creating new chemical compounds and then combining them with cells to see how they interact. An infinitesimally small number of these experiments lead to FDA-approved drugs. Several new AI startups hope to speed up this process by running millions of molecule simulations in a completely virtual setting. So far, though, not a single disease has been definitively cured with this method. [Wired]
Everyone Wants a Piece of Pedro Pascal
For most of his 20s and 30s, Pedro Pascal struggled to get by with bit parts in TV shows and films, and it wasn't until his 40s when he started to land the meaty roles that transformed him into a star. Now, it's almost impossible to enter a movie theater or open up a TV streaming app without encountering Pascal as a leading man. [Vanity Fair]
Elon Musk’s Empire Is Creaking Under the Strain of Elon Musk
Elon Musk may go down as one of the dumbest leaders in business history. First he alienated his main customer base by embracing Trump and pushing through genocidal cuts to foreign aid. Then he turned Trump against him, ensuring both sides of the political divide will avoid buying Teslas. He's also made governments all across the world more wary of developing too much reliance on SpaceX. [Bloomberg]
Hollywood’s being reshaped by generative AI. What does that mean for screenwriters?
Maybe I'm naïve, but I actually think screenwriters are the last people in Hollywood who should be worried about AI. It's much more likely to impact the production side of a TV show or film than the actual script itself. Generative AI does a pretty poor job of writing any sort of longform fiction, and I doubt it'll get much better at it anytime soon. [LA Times]
Is the U.S. Ready for the Next War?
The Ukraine-Russia war has upended modern warfare, with inexpensive drones often outmatching expensive machinery and firepower. It's left many Pentagon officials worrying that the Defense Department's sclerotic procurement process is ill-equipped to face a nimble enemy able to inflict massive damage with low-cost tech. [New Yorker]
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