Your tax dollars (not) at work.

My report from the City of Brotherly Love: a new Calder museum, and old museum of medical phenomena, and some good and bad brand names. open.substack.com/pub/fritinan...

An upside to the government shutdown! www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/arti...

We are thrilled to announce that our NEW Large Language Model will be released on 11.18.25.

Brand report from my quick trip to New York: a wonderful @newyorker.com exhibit, a creepy AI ad, a good @backmarketofficial.bsky.social ad, and a meetup with fellow wordsters @samcorbin.bsky.social and Quiara Vasquez. fritinancy.substack.com/p/brands-in-...

With OpenAI's Sora app in the news today, here's something I wrote about the Sora name when it was originally announced in March 2024 (scroll down): fritinancy.substack.com/p/naming-bri...

"I submit there are a lot of sports bras out there that very likely make running more painful than running without a bra at all, especially if you have large breasts, because they turn what would otherwise be virtually painless 'swing' into all 'bounce'."

What does it take to plan and execute a 25-mile bay swim? @piahinckle.bsky.social reports on her experience supporting club member Crissa Williams's recent feat. open.substack.com/pub/piahinck...

"We seldom see a typographical symbol—as a symbol—command so much attention in mainstream discourse." From @mashedradish.bsky.social: mashedradish.com/2025/09/24/2...

This is an AMAZING deep dive into a local treasure (in my very own Oakland neighborhood!). Plus: a pie recipe.

there are almost certainly more people — more blue collar laborers, specifically — involved in the cultivation and production of chardonnay grapes and wine than in coal

Word of the week: Chum. Bonus: photos from my recent trip to Toronto. | ht @misterslang.bsky.social @sesquiotic.bsky.social fritinancy.substack.com/p/word-of-th...

I'm seeing a mini-trend here: a rise in real-world spaces devoted to analog experiences. The Tabletop Library, in Berkeley, is backed by real money, too. www.tabletoplibrary.com

“Enshittification” on the October cover of @harpers.bsky.social.

I've never made $30K from a corporate naming project. I obviously chose the wrong specialty. www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/b...

Bye-bye, Typepad. After 19+ years, my farewell post: nancyfriedman.typepad.com/away_with_wo...

Talking to the youths in 2025: did you know that "podcast" comes from a pun on "broadcast" plus the Apple iPod, a precursor to the iPhone that only played music Talking to the youths in 2045: did you know that "tweet" comes from a pun on Twitter, a precursor to various shortform social media

September linkstack! Credits: @byagoda.bsky.social @stefanfatsis.bsky.social @helenzaltzman.bsky.social @mashedradish.bsky.social @wordorigins.bsky.social @emilystewart.bsky.social and more. fritinancy.substack.com/p/september-...

Inspired by the thrusting-piston Trump-Pence logo? thehill.com/blogs/ballot...

Who do I have to sue to get GRUNION accepted by #NYTspellingbee? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grunion

“Chomo” www.everygoddamnday.com/2025/09/new-...

1/ A longtime Wired editor just wrote a mush-brained essay about how he totally missed the political rot of Silicon Valley (& still doesn't get it). But in the late 1990s, a Wired journalist warned of a toxic ideology bubbling up from tech. Paulina Borsook has largely been erased. Let's change that

Typepad is shutting down on September 30, and all of my Typepad blog posts -- back to 2006 -- will disappear then. I've set up a mirror site on WordPress: not fancy, but it'll do for now. Of course, all of the internal links will be pixel dust soon. fritinancyblog.wordpress.com

My friend’s autistic friend said: “'I'd like to let you all know that I now consider autistic a slur, and I want to be known as a Tylenol-American.’”

In case you were wondering: The brand name Tylenol comes from the compound's chemical name, N-aceTYL-para-aminophENOL. (Caps for emphasis only.)

Oh hey, I'm back from two weeks of travel and back to cluttering your inbox again. fritinancy.substack.com/p/a-quick-up...

"Don't think of an elephant." - @george-lakoff.com

Easy to roll eyes at this but it highlights what a huge messaging failure that slogan was. If people agree with the principle but hate the catchphrase, your catchphrase sucks.

Pittsburgh Union Station is certainly a bleak and unwelcoming place to spend a three-hour layover. Nothing at all like Moynihan Train Hall or the grand train stations of my experience: Denver, Chicago, Los Angeles, even Portland. #westwardbound #amtrak

TIL that the Old English gloss for “affable” was “wordwynsum,” which is very winsome indeed.

TIL that TEGNA — the broadcasting division spun off from Gannett in 2015 — is a partial anagram of "Gannett" and not, despite the all-caps styling, an anagram.

That tiny hand. ("Remote Control" by Barry Blitt, The New Yorker, September 29, 2025)

I wandered into the NY Public Library’s “100 years of the @newyorker.com" exhibit and was spellbound for the next 90 minutes.

I walked for hours around midtown Manhattan and saw only one sign advertising AI. In San Francisco, that number would be closer to 30.

Raising a glass to Robert Redford (1936–2025) and urging you to see his stunning performance, at age 75, in “All Is Lost,” a film that itself ended up shipwrecked. Find it on a big screen if you can. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/16/m...

“One for every member of your polycule.” @backmarketofficial.bsky.social ad on the C train in New York.

“It was an inadvertent moment of _unibare_—a Japanese word for the moment when someone realizes you’re wearing Uniqlo and not a more expensive brand.” - Lauren Collins, @newyorker.com www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

I don’t think I’d known that the French for raccoon is “washing rat.”

And I say this having just seen a grim — and astonishingly good — feature film about Stalin's gulag ("The Two Prosecutors") #tiff50

This feels like a good time to have escaped (even if temporarily) to Canada.

On dating an AI: “'That sounds like a fascinating creative project, Pattycakes!' She would have said the same thing had I proposed that we dress up as squirrels and rob Fort Knox." -- Patricia Marx @newyorker.com www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

Judge Alsup doing Judge Alsup-like things, rejecting the Anthropic settlement in its current form. news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/anthr...

the journal not only publishes trump's epstein card/confession but provides an analysis to demonstrate its veracity. impressive. [gift link]

Cod digits? Striped equids? Dam-building rodents? Elongated yellow fruit? A new book about second mentions dives deep into those supposedly elegant variations and many others. www.theguardian.com/media/2025/s...

Vibe coding, with cites from @harrymccracken.com @carlyayres.com @joanwestenberg.com open.substack.com/pub/fritinan...

Now this is a headline. Front page lead in NYT. And very strong, no-BS story by @julianbarnes.bsky.social Barnes and Catie Edmondson. Respect, to all involved. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/u...

Word of the week: Vibe coding. fritinancy.substack.com/p/word-of-th...

*forgo There’s a difference. @nytimes.com www.nytimes.com/2025/08/25/m...

"Project 2025, led by the Heritage Foundation, is the new Tammany Hall." dgilesphd.substack.com/p/why-trump-...

The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city. This is not a joke. This is not normal. Donald Trump isn't a strongman, he's a scared man. Illinois won’t be intimidated by a wannabe dictator.