90ways - About

About Criticism
As in all our houses, we try to cast a broad net in Criticism. We want to discuss not only artistic ventures like movies and music but also cultural and political phenomena. We like some stuff. We don't like other things. But we're curious about it all. We try to catch some things as they happen and view others through glorious hindsight. Criticism publishes both short and longer pieces and is not afraid of the occasional poem. Criticism is our purview of the world at large through the rigorous application of our opinions.

Regular features in Criticism:

The Nostalgia Watch: where-in reviewers who have no particular attachment to beloved teevee shows give us the straight skinny. New episodesevery 6-10 week.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Judson Merrill on Dallas.
Episode 2, with Matthew Fisher on Punky Brewster.

Neologisms Spoken Here: where-in we review new English words. New episodes every 10-15 weeks.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Charles Badley, Umang Kumar, Robert Hartzell, and David Winstanley.
Episode 2, with Charles Badley, Judson Merrill, Umang Kumar, and David Myers.
Episode 3, with Joshua W. Jackson, Charles Badley, David Winstanley, and Judson Merrill.
Episode 4, with Umang Kumar, Jason Raymond, Charles Badley, and Joshua W. Jackson.
Episode 5, with Jason Raymond, Robert Klein, and Judson Merrill.
Episode 6, with Judson Merrill, Charles Badley, and Sonja Drimmer.

The 90ways Debate Team: where-in 90ways contributors argue both sides of contemporary issues in a stirring ABAB format. New episodes as we offend each other.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Ben Heasly and Seth Dutcher on Googlebombing.
Episode 2, with Judson Merrill and Joshua W. Jackson on "Merry Christmas."
Episode 3, with Judson Merrill and Joshua W. Jackson on fiction in memoirs.
Episode 4, with Judson Merrill and Holly McBain on the death penalty.

The Hoax Report: where-in we review great hoaxes. New episodes as people get conned.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Charles Badley on the embryo cloning hoax.
Episode 2, with Charles Badley on Terri Schiavo.
Episode 3, with Witney Seibold on the Amityville Horror hoax.
Episode 4, with Robert Regan on Edgar Allen Poe's Balloon Hoax.
Episode 5, with Witney Seibold on the Gallagher Too hoax.

90runs: where-in Joshua W. Jackson provides short, weekly thoughts on the Major League Baseball season. No new episodes.
Past installments:
Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 4, Episode 5, Episode 6, Episode 7, Episode 8, Episode 9.

Direct-to-DVD Reviews: where-in we review movies released directly to DVD. No new episodes.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Judson Merrill and Sara Schieron.
Episode 2, with Matthew Fisher and Sara Schieron.
Episode 3, with Sara Schieron and Judson Merrill.
Episode 4, with Matthew Fisher and Sara Schieron.
Episode 5, with Matthew Fisher and Sara Schieron.
Episode 6, with Matthew Fisher and Judson Merrill.

About Essay
Essay takes the longer view. We allow ourselves to step back and examine broad themes and happenings in the world. Pieces published in Essay are often longer than in other houses. It is our goal in Essay to examine the world through the rigorous application of fact.

Essay takes special interest in the Developing World, Prison, and Water. We think those things are important and even try to bring them up at parties we go to.

Regular features in Essay:

Dissect-o-Stat: where-in we look more closely at oft-cited, rarely-explained statistics. Every 4-6 weeks.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Carter Romansky on Unemployment.
Episode 2, with Carter Romansky on the Genuine Progress Indicator.
Episode 3, with Carter Romansky on the GINI Coefficient.
Episode 4, with Carter Romansky on Fuel Economy.
Episode 5, with Carter Romansky on Sabermetrics.

About Fiction
Fiction is a word we use loosely. If reality teevee and the memoir craze has taught us anything, it is that the supposed boundaries that separate fiction from fact are like putty in our hands. Our Fiction house strives to include creative endeavors across media, from the written word to the musical phrase, from the painted picture to the moving image.

Regular features in Fiction:

90words: in which folks express themselves in a finite number of words. New episodes every 6-10 weeks.
Past installments:
Episode 1, with Paul Gacioch, Gonzales, and Lindsey Morrison Grant.
Episode 2, with David Myers, Paul Gacioch, and Ollie Rasini.
Episode 3, with Carter Romansky, Oona Flaherty, and Paul Gacioch.
Episode 4, with Paul Gacioch, Seth Dutcher, and Daniel Heil.
Episode (X), with Paul Gacioch's complete 90word cycle.

The Family Tate: Two artists. One American family. An illustralogue in which Joshua W. Jackson and Sergio Sandino provide insight into the Tate household. New episodes every 6-8 weeks.
Episode 1.
Episode 2.
Episode 3.
Episode 4.

CoffeeCast: Gloria and Simon are two New York City Starbucks baristas with real enthusiasm for their work. This weekly podcast gives them a chance to share the things they love: coffee and aggressive, stylized marketing. No new episodes.
Download all the episodes at the CoffeeCast page.

About Science
The Science house exists to do make science fun again. Not fun like balloons or birthday cake, but fun like enjoyable and worthwhile. Sure, science writing for an audience of mostly non-scientists requires some explanation of "basic" concepts. But it's really just like telling a story and you wouldn't tell a story without introducing the characters. Science has made fantastic leaps in the past 50 years and is now intricately woven into all our lives. 90ways Science wants everyone to be informed about science, to be able to make choices, and not to just let the scientists and the wonks make all the fun and agonizing decisions.

Regular features in Science:

Animals Behaving Badley: where-in Charles Badley explores the animal kingdom in the style of the late, great William Cuppy. No new episodes.
Episode 1, the House Wren.
Episode 2, the Rhinoceros.
Episode 3, the Oyster.
Episode 4, the Earwig.
Episode 5, the Wolf.

Mr. Posner Goes to Science: where-in Sam Posner goes on science related field trips and reports back. No new episodes.
Episode 1, from "Bodies...The Exhibition."
Episode 2, part 1, from the Broad Institute.
Episode 2, part 2, from the Broad Institute.
Episode 3, from the Darwin exhibition at the Museum of Natural History.

About Weather
Rooted in the belief that meteorology works best when examining the past, our Weather house is our chance to give the forecast for the week behind us. It's a sort of cultural barometer. It's contemporaneous. It's not archived. It's wildly popular in Thailand. Just make sure you click the link embedded in the forecast or we might seem even more obtuse than we are.

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About Navigation
Getting around 90ways.com is all about the logo. Go up there and poke and prod to see what's on the site this week. Click an icon to visit our house archives and explore all that is and has been 90ways.

Our Contributions page offers a person-based listing of all our archives and, of course, our front page always offers an immediate glimpse of today's weekly.

Also, 90ways is equipped with hidden links to avoid clogging your reading experience. Find out what your tab key can do for you!

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About New Content
90ways is updated every weekday, one house at a time. Leading us to coin the marketing phrase, Every day a new weekly. It also means that for over a year, Monday through Friday, we have always been 20% brand new. So, on Monday you'll find something new in Criticism. On Tuesday, Essay will be new. Wednesday, Fiction. Thursday, Science. Friday, Weather. Alphabetical order throughout the week. And, if you ever blank on the alphabet, the 90ways logo lists the Houses in the order they are updated throughout the week.

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About Why
90ways is about addressing a perceptible hole in the way the Internet hosts art and analysis. Each day we unveil new content in one of five thematic houses - Criticism, Essay, Fiction, Science and Weather. The insightful, stylistically synthetic and thematically original web journal is definitely the exception to the rule of online words. 90ways is an online dailyodical dedicated to using the multi-media capabilities of the internet to inform, entertain and engage.

At 90ways we believe that ideas must not become ideologies. We believe that a good-faith sharing of well-reasoned ideas is essential to full citizenship. We believe that society is progressive only so far as we make it so. And we believe that it is ok to change your mind.

We take our inspiration from American wit and Franklonian Lester Buckets. In Lester's holistic approach to knowledge, we hear a voice long lost from our national political and artistic discourse. We see the type of generalist's intelligence so common to the Renaissance men of the late 19th century. And yet we also feel the tremor of ideas to come. Lester's keen intellect and salient wit foreshadow the modern age's relativism, pragmatism and sense of irony.

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About L. Buckets
Around 90ways you will see quotes from one L. Buckets. This is Lester Buckets, great American thinker and inspiration for 90ways. See also About Why.

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About the Ads
90ways is still growing. Ads were added after about 40 ad-free weeks. We did it in an attempt to pay our writers. Whatever we make, one way or another, it will go to our writers. For now, we do not have enough to pay all of our writers. Instead we will split our quarterly profits among those chosen to appear in our Quarterly Reviews (see About Self Congratulation below). They will have to accept their little honorariums on behalf of all who work hard to make 90ways an intellectually rigorous place.

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About Self Congratulation
Like most media ventures we're not afraid to sing our own praises from time to time. Most prominently, every thirteen weeks we unveil our Quarterly Review. Each QR reprints the best of the previous thirteen weeks and honors those chosen with cash prizes. The QRs are sometimes suspended for anniversaries, such as during our recent paper anniversary.

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About Rights
Any work featured on 90ways gives the site exclusive rights for one month. For one month from the date of posting we want to be the only place to find your work. Because we're the jealous kind. After that, although we leave all work in our archives, all rights revert to the creator. And, indeed, if the creator places her work elsewhere, we'd love to know so we can make a note of it in the archives. We love when that happens.

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About a Water Buffalo
In December of 2005 90ways' readers and writers bought a water buffalo. You can learn more here.

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About Contacting
We welcome submissions and support from anyone with whom our mission resonates. In keeping with our affinity for critical thought, we also welcome thoughts, suggestions, and moral outrage about 90ways at comments@90ways.com.

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