iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

I wasn’t sure what to say to that so I hemmed and hawed a bit and then he said “Do you think you could serve as my ‘talking brochure’?”

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After a few hours I got so depressed that I called my friend Ty and did my pitch on him and he immediately said “Theater? Why would I pay money to see people pretending to be other people when I can look out my window and see people being their real selves for free?”

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As a nonprofit theater we have to keep our costs down, so I’m afraid I can’t send you something in the mail. But I can serve as your “talking brochure“ right now!

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 23h

Hi, my name is Gabe and I’m calling from the Studio Theater here in D.C. We’ve lined up a fabulous season of brand new plays, and we’d like to invite you to become one of our first subscribers!

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Congrats on a hell of a run. Excited to see what you do next. Personally I think you should write a book

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 16/10/2026

In the world of the movie where only one person remembers the Beatles, people are really puzzled about why they’re releasing movies about four random guys on the same day (and also why sex is only legal on one night)

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 16/10/2026

This is the most Andrew Hickey post of all time

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Reposted by Gabriel Roth

b. wolo @bwolo.bsky.social · 16/10/2026

It’s time for boomers to stfu about Pet Sounds. The best pop album of the 20th century is Elliott Smith’s XO

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 15/10/2026

Late 20th century British television advertising, man, bliss was it in that dawn to be alive

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Oh look they did Lilly Willowes, I love that one! I have been enjoying several of the UK’s Persephone Books, even though they keep the original typesetting which can be a chore

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Bowiesongs (C. O'Leary) @bowiesongs.bsky.social · 13/10/2026

“20th century novels that fell out of print and are now being rediscovered” is my favorite genre these days

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Reposted by Gabriel Roth

and "Hearts and Bones," sung here with the Roches in 1984. www.youtube.com/watch?v=TI5q...

youtube.com

Paul Simon - Hearts And Bones (live TV performance) - 1984

YouTube video by slydogmania

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An unbelievable surprise gift

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Small Factory ❤️❤️❤️

“Men can only write repetitive crap about fighting and crimes” — wrong! Henry James wrote a novel that culminates with person A seeing person B sitting down while person C is standing, forcing A to entirely revise her understanding of the relationship between B and C, and he handled it quite deftly

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Yes, sure, there’s no male equivalent of George Eliot or Jane Austen or Elizabeth von Arnim as of yet, but give them some time!

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Personally I find it quite surprising that we’re having this argument in 2026. Yes, they’ve produced a lot of shit, but there are some terrific books by men! Tolstoy, for instance, was really good, and so is Alan Hollinghurst

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

What if it has the same amplitude? And wouldn’t you need to know degrees of difference rather than just higher or lower?

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The thing I’ll never get over with Joni Mitchell is, you’re listening to the greatest love song of all time, absolutely capturing the wildest extremes of human passion, and you look it up on Wikipedia and it turns out it’s about the dude who wrote “our house is a very very very nice house“

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Reposted by Gabriel Roth

Kashana @kashana.blacksky.app · 09/10/2026

Every time someone on here is like watching anything funny? my heart breaks when all the answers are from pre-2020 shows. I miss new comedies. We should be being pummeled with the comedic sensibilities of 2026.

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Reposted by Gabriel Roth

Tom Ewing @tomewing.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

Really good thread about neurodiversity which also gets at what I feel is at the heart of a lot of the modern crisis - people who are able to update their models of How The World Works vs people who can’t or won’t

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

When I saw it I immediately hoped beyond measure that it would include my 2016 list of reasons we love to rank Coen Brothers movies, and I was proud to find that it does slate.com/culture/2016...

slate.com

What Is It About the Coen Brothers’ Movies That Makes Everyone Want to Rank Them?

A new Coen brothers movie was released this past weekend, which means everyone promptly began ranking the Coens’ movies in order of preference....

Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

I did a similarly trivial test recently (fed in a playfully allusive Bsky thread and asked the models to explain it) and found that Sonnet gave the dumb naive answer and Opus gave the clever sophisticated answer. Try the exact same prompt in Opus and see what you get

Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

What model were you using? This is the kind of thing where the difference between Sonnet 5.5 and Opus 5.5 could be night and day

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

I’m curious what you gained from your time in the course that you wouldn’t have learned autodidactically (not knocking the existence of such a course, just wondering)

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

I feel like it was something to do with the show becoming the dumb version of itself that many people assumed it had always been — hard not to wonder if they were right the whole time

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

You probably have to be a devoted viewer of actual GAME FOR A LAUGH to get it, but it’s fun to see young Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones mugging it up (and traumatizing children)

m.youtube.com

Not The Nine O'clock News Game for a Laugh

YouTube video by RetroCynical

Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

The GAME FOR A LAUGH parody on NOT THE NINE O’CLOCK NEWS genuinely traumatized me, I had therapy for it

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b. wolo @bwolo.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

This is kind of a fucked up thing to put on the wall at an airport

A mural with a quote from Lao Tzu: “A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving”

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Reposted by Gabriel Roth

What's your favorite spicy Indian dish whose name sounds like someone trying to remember Joe Rogan's name? Mine is probably "Lamb Rogan Josh"

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It would be really weird if he immediately pivoted to “yeah you guys are right, this movie sucks”

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For the 50th anniversary he should do something really special and just release the album without any bonus tracks

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Honestly I’m all good for bonus tracks from Elvis Costello thanks

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People sometimes talk about “popcorn movies” and “thrill rides” as though they’re easier to make than, say, character dramas, but most of them are terrible and RESIDENT EVIL is incredible, whereas most character dramas are, like, fine

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I don’t have any “guilty pleasures” (not because I’m self-accepting but because I’m anhedonic)

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Gabriel Roth @gabrielroth.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I’m sure you’re right, fortunately no one is really paying attention to me