FRIDAY FOURTEEN ISSUE 124

May 20, 2022
This week: How a tweet about finding the cause of SIDS went viral for all the wrong reasons, a painful look inside the booming business of Brazilian butt lift recovery houses, a genius tool that finds the easiest IKEA items to assemble, parents all over the world weigh in on how they choose their kids’ last names, a love letter to Aldi, and more

This week, Twitter was abuzz with the news that scientists in Western Australian had found the cause of SIDS – except they actually hadn’t – and the project quickly went viral for all the wrong reasons

A terrifying and painful look inside the booming business of Brazilian butt lift recovery houses

A love letter to AldiIn tech news: Elon’s Twitter takeover is currently on hold (except Twitter says no takesies backsies), Meta is pushing publishers towards short videos, Wordpress’ market share is shrinking, TikTok has launched its first tool to help users directly tag and credit other creators, Instagram launched a brand refresh and we couldn't see any difference, and Qatar Airways has launched the world’s first MetaHuman cabin crew and it’s just as cool and creepy as you’d expect

Everything but the punctuationIf you’ve ever felt personally victimised by flatpack furniture (we’ve been there), you need this tool that finds the easiest IKEA items to assemble

Even the nuns are on TikTok now (and here’s proof)

Parents all over the world weigh in on how they choose their kids’ last names (you’ll want to scroll down to the comments on this one)

A refreshingly honest reminder that it’s okay to ask for help (“Celebrities and social media influencers make it look like they’re doing it all by themselves. The reality is most have a small army of people behind them.”)

Selma Blair opens up about living with MS in her new memoir and there’s a moving excerpt from it here (“When I stepped out on the red carpet, with my beautiful dress and my cape and my bejewelled cane, and saw the cameras waiting for me, I broke down sobbing… To my amazement, when the photographers noticed I was crying, they put their cameras down and stopped shooting. They waited, quietly, as I dried my face and found my balance.”)

Obsessed with this mid-century apartment restoration in Brisbane, this booklover’s apartment in Brooklyn, and this tapestry lawn 😍

TikTok’s newest beauty trend is the latest POC cultural practice to be gentrified by influencers (“Why is it that when I practise hair oiling, it's gross — yet if a white woman on TikTok does it, they're considered an influencer and it becomes a global trend with millions of views?”)

How Mercury Retrograde went viral

Annddddd…. Some niche Australiana for anyone who's ever sat inside a 90s demountable block, this is 100% how pastries would dance, the most used emojis by country, your work day probably wasn’t as bad as this Woolies worker’s, next they’ll be growing broccoli on the moon, nine sustainable sock brands, let us Google that for you, keeping the team check-in real, no one will ever do TikTok like Lizzo, honest weekly stand-ups, how every CEO joins a meeting, us on the internet in 2007 vs kids on the internet in 2022, and if you've ever worried about the perfect time to arrive at a party, here’s a mathematical formula

What we've been watching, cooking, listening to and reading this week...

Vanessa, content & strategy director -->

Eating: This ‘cheat’s ramen’ made with tahini and miso. Never not thinking about ramen
Watching: The Staircase on Binge (a fictionalised version of the 2018 Netflix true crime doco of the same name) and reading this fabulous profile of Parker Posey in the New Yorker, who plays a tight-laced prosecutor in the show and absolutely kills it

Lizzie, managing director -->

Eating: It’s officially soup season in my house and we kicked off with a cauliflower, potato and white bean soup topped with crushed chips
Watching: I went back into the SBS archives this week and found Iron Chef and lost a few hour of my weekend

Maddie, social media coordinator -->

Listening: Left Right Out, a podcast about Aussie politics for dummies in funny bite-sized pieces

Hamish, content coordinator -->

Listening: Liar Lair, about the Sydney con artist who stole millions before disappearing in 2020