Emdashes. Modern Times Between the Lines.
Best of Emdashes: Hit Parade
A Web Comic: The Wavy Rule
Before it moved to The New Yorker:
Ask the Librarians archive
About Emdashes | Email us
Features & Columns:
Headline Shooter
On the Spot
Looked Into
Sempé Fi: Cover Art
In the Future, All Campaigns Will Be Conducted in Twitter
Filed under: The Squib Report Tagged: politics, technology
On the heels of the stupendous success of our New Yorker Festival Twitter experiment, I still found myself wondering what the point of the service really is—the similar function on Facebook has the virtue of being integrated into pages that people will consult in the course of other activities.
But then in the course of just a few days, Twitter popped up in probably the two most attention-getting presidential campaign stories of the moment. It turns out that Michele Bachmann (the Minnesota representative who announced a desire to investigate “anti-American” members of Congress) and Ashley Todd (the McCain worker who faked the politically motivated attack by an Obama supporter) used their Twitter accounts just before they became notorious. In both cases their tweets actually bear on the reasons for their eventual fame.
In retrospect, Bachmann’s optimistic tweet a few days ago that she would soon be appearing on Hardball, where she made her unfortunate remarks, is almost touching: she had no way of knowing that appearing on the show would undo her career. And Todd intentionally used Twitter to lay the groundwork for her hoax, indicating that she was hunting for a Bank America “on the wrong side of Pittsburgh,” complete with helpfully racist conception of what constitutes the right side of that fine town. How odd. Does William Ayers have a Twitter feed? (“Watching Bears game w/ BHO, planning violent overthrow of TPTB, LOL.”) Does Levi Johnston?
About us
Hello! We're a small band of culture writers, editors, and artists based in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Emdashes, which spent its formative years as a New Yorker blog, is our collection of conversations—mostly civilized—about magazines, movies, design, punctuation, and other things that stir us.
Want to know more about the people who contribute to Emdashes, and the secret meanings behind our column titles? All about us.
We welcome tips, questions, comments, and corrections, and are always on the lookout for ardent, obsessive contributors. Click here to email us.
We host occasional book giveaways. Publishers, please email us for our postal address.
Our favorite things | Compliments and press
Looking for The New Yorker magazine? Kudos on your classy taste. Here's how to contact The New Yorker.
Tell me more
Dashes, some say, “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like an em dash itself—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. All posts before October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.
The site was designed by House of Pretty with illustrations by Jesse R. Ewing.
Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (author of our web comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The Emdashes pencil logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Reviews: theater writing (for Time Out Chicago)
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, bon vivant, New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Slide show: the Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for NYCgo.com)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Homage: Celebrating lindy-hop legend Frankie Manning (for NYCgo.com)
- Inquiry: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Interviews: four up-and-coming designers under 30 (for Print)
- Profile: novelist and dance critic Laura Jacobs (for Newsday)
Blogroll highlights
- Box Office Boffo
- World of Pollux
- Jonathan Taylor
- Carolita Johnson
- Songs for blogroll lovers (more links)
- Follow us on Twitter
- Befriend us on Facebook
- Get a t-shirt at the Emdashes store
No fear
Everything you tell or send us is off the record unless we ask for your permission to use it.
Comments
Twitter. Hmm. I’m too old for it, I guess. These e-interweavings do not make me too chirpy when they end up creating mischief. The Internet: a wonderful tool, a disastrous tool. Take your pick. Or take your, um, beak.