Matt King

Write about culture, tech, waste, wealth, skyscrapers | @TheAtlantic, @newrepublic, @thebafflermag | Best American Essays Notable ‘22, '23

[Matt King @_mattking]

🚨 The global "early warning system" for cybersecurity is breaking down—creating a growing gap between security "haves" and "have-nots." Most people have no idea their digital lives are becoming more vulnerable.

My latest investigation for @techreview:
https://t.co/J3TybStwhE

[Austin Elias-de Jesus @austineliasdj]

Richard Brody—long-time film critic, lifelong Knicks fan—on James Dolan, for today's edition of @NewYorker daily newsletter.

[“paula” @paularambles]

can we bring mail chutes back. i want to drop my letters down twelve stories

[Brian Callaci @brian_callaci]

Meanwhile, just down I-90: the W.E.B. Du Bois Library at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The tallest academic library in the world. Unlike what they do at Harvard or MIT, it is named for a scholar, not a donor.

[Teddy @WarnerTeddy]

i mounted a tiny microphone on my apartment balcony to listen for any birds passing by and built a site to collage them as they're heard

[Matt King @_mattking]

Consumer goods look similar across the globe. But what happens to this waste after it's thrown away is highly local, manual, and politically contested.

Thanks to @BaltCoGov and @bmoreheritage for the opportunity. Visit your local MRF if you can!

[Matt King @_mattking]

Here's the view from the top of "Recycling Everest."

It's where Baltimore County's collected recyclables end up. I toured their materials recovery facility (MRF, or "murf") yesterday.

From here, each item is given a new life, or sent to its grave.

[Matt King @_mattking]

Today, the US is spoiled by convenience. While Germany and Japan ask people to sort materials at the point of disposal, we've gone all-in on "single-stream," which boosts volumes but also contamination (and requires such elaborate $20M+ sorting facilities).

[Dead Wrong History @deadwronghist]

Tom Wolfe, 1987: The new vice of the 1980s is what I think of as plutography — the graphic depiction of the acts of the rich.

[Jazz Memes @JazzMemes]

Rest In Peace Sonny Rollins 🎷🕊️🙏

[Baltimore Orioles @Orioles]

COWSER WEAVER FOR THE WIN

[Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins @daniel_dsj2110]

Mamdani should implement a city wide involuntary trash service program in which all New Yorkers of all classes must work as garbage men/women 1 day each year for some period of their adult life barring reasons deemed acceptable for not having to do so: https://t.co/dmP4kdJrzb

[Joyce Carol Oates @JoyceCarolOates]

What seems important to know is that you may feel safe in the automated world of self-driving cars & high-rise living but only so long as the programs work. Boosters of the brave new world will never mention its vulnerability. Imagine being trapped 90 floors above ground.

[Matt King @_mattking]

@adamnfurman TY! I remember following you originally for your many stunning skyline photographs 😍

[Daniel Wortel-London @dlondonwortel]

If I had to pick the greatest single passage about New York City, this would be it: Lewis Mumford on the Brooklyn Bridge (1981)

[Pump Capital LLC @PumpCapitalLLC]

There are a handful of cities left in America where the decline was so rapid and sudden in the 1970s and 1980s that the amazing architecture from the late 19th century is still preserved because it was not economical to tear it down and put up glass and steel boxes in the 90s and early 2000s

Baltimore is one of them

[BOMB Magazine @BOMBmagazine]

Benoit Denizet-Lewis, interviewed by writer Adrian Brune, discusses his newest book, “You’ve Changed: The Promise and Price of Self-Transformation” (William Morrow, 2026), which sets out to explore the slippery science of becoming someone new.

https://t.co/OcJjleNqqY