Bulletproof Skims and Oxbridge Fanfic
Discover more from After School by Casey Lewis
Bulletproof Skims and Oxbridge Fanfic
friends in loewe places
A$AP Rocky drops “Riot (Rowdy Pipe'n),” his first solo single of the year; Euphoria star Chloe Cherry stars in Urban Decay’s latest campaign (brilliant casting, IMO); and beloved Y2K game Neopets begins its new era with relaunch.
KIM KARDASHIAN'S SKIMS HITS $4 BILLION VALUATION, axios
Skims’ sales are projected to grow to $750 million this year from $500 million last year, and 70% of customers are Gen Z or millennials. This valuation news — which broke ahead of the apparel company’s forthcoming IPO — hilariously (and coincidentally?) made headlines the same day as this viral TikTok by a girl who says her Skims body suit quite literally saved her life after being shot four times.
LOEWE IS NOW THE HOTTEST BRAND IN THE WORLD FOR THE FIRST TIME, hypebae
According to Lyst Index‘s Q2 list for 2023, searches for Loewe, designed by Jonathan Anderson, spiked 19% this quarter; it-items like the Anagram Tank Top and Raffia Tote Bag helped propel it to the top, while Anderson’s other brand — JW Anderson — also made it onto the Top 20. (Weekend subscribers will recall that Anderson is also the costume designer for Challengers, Zendaya’s highly-anticipated Luca Guadagnino movie.)
TIKTOK MUSIC ROLLS OUT TO MORE COUNTRIES, theverge
Just two weeks after the service first debuted in Indonesia and Brazil, they’ve expanded the closed beta for their subscription-only music streaming app to Australia, Mexico, and Singapore for testing. In addition to all the usual features — downloading songs to listen offline, creating collaborative playlists, viewing lyrics in real time — there’s also a Shazam-like feature to identify songs heard nearby and allows TikTok Music subscribers to leave comments and interact with other users.
THE “SCAMMER” AND THE SCAMMED, newyorker
“If “Scammer” is an authoritative account of the Instagram era, then the Calloway-Beach feud is a throwback to a moment in that period when the personal essay was king,” writes Tyler Foggatt. I cannot believe the New Yorker deigned to cover scam queen Caroline Calloway’s memoir, and while I won’t be reading “Scammer,” I did read every word of this. (If you’re unfamiliar with this name, start here. Or don’t! You may be better off.)
She leaned into a new brand that she called “Oxbridge fanfic.” Think the aesthetic of Blair Waldorf, combined with the personality of Serena van der Woodsen, living out the tropes of a Jane Austen novel—a millennial version of what Gen Z now calls “dark academia.”
MORE THAN 40% OF GEN Z THINKS A.I. MUSIC, MOVIES, AND ART WILL REPLACE HUMAN-MADE CONTENT IN 20 YEARS, fortune
According to a report from The New Consumer’s Dan Frommer, roughly half of Gen Z and millennials believe that A.I. creations — for example, an image generated by a tool like DALL-E or Midjourney based on prompts provided by a human — can be considered art, while only 17% of boomers hold that same view. Further, 41% of Gen Z and millennials agree or somewhat agree that 20 years from now, “most” movies, art, music, and books will be created by A.I. Given the current pace of things, I’d say 10 years. :/
85% OF GEN Z HAVE A BITMOJI. HERE’S WHY SNAPCHAT IS REDESIGNING THEM, fastco
In the coming weeks, Snap is shifting to 3D Bitmojis that will be fully animated, with more facial expressivity designed to translate better to AR. Snap reports that 85% of Gen Zers in the U.S. have created their own Bitmoji avatar, and 250 million people use them every day. “[Bitmojis] are a subtle way we can make someone feel like they’re there with a friend even when it’s text based,” says Jack Brody, Snap's VP of product.
One last thought:
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