Louis Rossetto is the co-founder and original editor of Wired. He was also the first investor and the former CEO of TCHO chocolate company. Rossetto and his partner Jane Metcalfe were publishing pioneers, and in the 1990s, were the creative sparks behind the Wired magazine. In 2015, Rossetto and Metcalfe were honored with a Webby Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2017, Rossetto is publishing Change is Good, an original novel about "the creation myth of the Digital Generation."
Posted byOm Malik
Introduction
Louis Rossetto, co-founder of Wired magazine, recently announced the publication of his first novel, Change is Good, a collaborative art project with designer and typographer Erik Spiekermann.
Last week, I met Louis and we walked down a memory lane, talking about our publishing lives, disappointments and emotional challenges of breaking up with something you create. We pondered about the state of the media, the emergence of President Trump and why we need to be optimistic about the future.
Here is an edited version of my conversation with someone I admire deeply.
Julie Zerbo is the twentysomething founder and editor in chief of The Fashion Law, a website dedicated to the field of fashion law and business. She is a vocal critic of fast fashion and dubious industry practices, especially when it relates to fashion media.
Posted byOm Malik
Introduction
The rise of social media has turbocharged global materialism and consumer culture, and nothing reflects this more than the incessant and unending chatter from the fashion industry. Fast fashion in particular is not only a challenge to our society but also a detriment to our ecology. As my awareness has grown around the challenges of fast fashion, I've found myself engrossed in a blog called The Fashion Law.
One fine day, I saw the blog stand up for a small designer in Scotland who had her design stolen by Chanel. A few weeks later Chanel apologized, and I became a fan of this fair-minded blog. I wrote an email to the editor of the blog — Julie Zerbo — and mentioned that I was going to be in New York and would like to get together to talk about the fashion industry. We met at Happy Bones in the Little Italy/Soho area and talked for hours. This is an edited version of our conversation.
Chris Young is a Seattle-based entrepreneur and professional chef with a background in theoretical mathematics and biochemistry. From 2003 to 2007, he worked at the Fat Duck with super chef Heston Blumenthal as well as opened the Fat Duck Experimental Kitchen. He left to work with Nathan Myhrvold on Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking. In 2012, he cofounded ChefSteps, which invents appliances and develops cooking methodologies for a postindustrial society.
Posted byOm Malik
Introduction
Chris Young is a rare combination of inventor, entrepreneur and chef. He is the co-author of Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking and the co-founder of ChefSteps, a Seattle-based company that invents appliances and develops cooking methodologies befitting the postindustrial society.
ChefSteps recently introduced Joule, a small and easy-to-use sous vide tool, the first of many of the products planned by Young and his team of over 50 chefs, scientists, photographers, writers and engineers. “One of the things that makes the kitchen such an interesting challenge from a technological standpoint is that it's not enough to move bits around, you need to push around some atoms too if you want to make people happier in the kitchen,” he wrote to me in an email. “So we decided we were going to have to take the lead on building some new tools for the kitchen if we wanted to see the kitchen get reinvented in a useful way.”
It was enough for me to get interested. We met for a chat in my office in San Francisco and ended up talking for hours about the future of restaurants, Munchery, Soylent, fancy Michelin-star restaurants and, most important, the future of food. This is one of my favorite conversations. I hope you get a chance to read and enjoy it.
Joshua Allen Harris is a 39-year-old New York–based visual artist and photographer. After studying graphic design and illustration, he worked for brands such as American Eagle and J.Crew as a men's wardrobe stylist. He became internet-famous with his Air Bear project in 2008, and he picked up a camera in 2012. Harris lives in Brooklyn with his wife Cameron.
Posted byOm Malik
Introduction
I was introduced to Joshua Allen Harris a few years ago by friend and photography enthusiast Bijan Sabet. I had admired Harris’ work on Instagram: His reductionist style of visual storytelling was something that spoke to me on a deep level.
Harris told me about a project he had been focused on: taking photos of Broadway, a street in Brooklyn. He wanted to chronicle the story of the street. He recently released his visual narrative essay in the form of three books: Tahoma, Belmont and Broadway.
As soon as they came out, I ordered the books and asked Harris to chat again, this time for pi.co. We ended up talking about his journey, the concepts behind the trilogy and the changing concept of photography, from art to language.
