Author: kumbhorg

Good morning! The Oscar nominations are officially in the books, and thanks to a very game Bowen Yang and Rachel Sennott doing the announcements, it seems the nominees even had their names pronounced correctly. As always, there were surprises both good and bad; that’s the way it goes when ten thousand people collectively vote based on their taste (or based on who they sipped champagne with at a campaign event). Some of the unfortunate omissions were known long in advance, as when Jon Batiste’s kinetic original score for “Saturday Night” didn’t even make the Shortlist last month. (Also pour one…

All the celebrities spotted at the Australian Open 2025

Australian tennis player Arina Rodionova and Australian Football League player Tyrone “Ty” Vickery announced they are getting a divorce after nine years of marriage. The Australian athletes announced their split in a Tuesday, Jan. 22, Instagram video. The former couple married in 2015, one year after the Russian-born tennis player received her Australian citizenship, per her WTA bio. “Hey guys, we have a quick announcement to make, we’re getting divorced,” Rodionova, 35, said. “We’ve been separated for about a year. Friends and family know, but we just wanted to let the wider community know about this situation.” Arina Rodionova and Ty…

The products featured in this article are from brands available in NBCUniversal Checkout. E! makes a commission on purchases. Valentine’s Day doesn’t have to be about romance. It can be a day to celebrate all kinds of love. But your besties are special. They’re so special that they deserve a day all for themselves – which is why we’re so happy that Galentine’s Day exists. After all, romantic realtionships come and go, but real friendship is forever.  There’s no better way to show your girlfriends how much you love and appreciate them than by throwing a Galentine’s Day party on Feb.…

Between this newsletter, my podcast, my books, and my New Yorker journalism, I offer a lot of advice and propose a lot of ideas about how the modern digital environment impacts our lives, both professionally and personally, and how we should respond. This techno-pontification covers everything from the nitty gritty details of producing good work in an office saturated with emails and Zoom, to heady decisions about shaping a meaningful life amid the nihilistic abstraction of an increasingly networked existence. With the end of year rapidly approaching, and people finding themselves with some spare thinking time as work winds down…

By Katie Azevedo, M.Ed. Throughout high school and college, you’ll make many decisions that impact not only your school experience but the kind of life you’ll live (yikes!). Some decisions will be significant, such as choosing which college to attend. Other choices will be more subtle, yet will have the potential to be equally important in the long run. In this blog post, I unpack seven decisions that will shape your high school and college experience. If you are a high school or college student, it’s my strong suggestion that you consider all seven of the following decisions with care.…

In 2006, a high school student from Ontario named James Hobson started posting to a new platform called YouTube. His early videos were meant for his friends, and focused on hobbies (like parkour) and silliness (like one clip in which he drinks a cup of raw eggs). Hobson’s relationship with YouTube evolved in 2013. Now a trained engineer, he put his skills to work in crafting a pair of metal claws based on the Marvel character, Wolverine. The video was a hit. He then built a working version of the exoskeleton used by Matt Damon’s character in the movie Elysium.…

By Katie Azevedo, M.Ed. Most students will fail a test or an assignment at some point in their school lives. While this isn’t ideal, it’s normal and won’t likely jeopardize your overall class grade too much. If you fail a test, follow these strategies here. However, failing a class is a totally different situation.   Failing a class requires an intentional strategy. (Nope, you cannot rely on hope in this situation.) In this blog post, I’m laying out the roadmap to follow that shows you exactly what to do if you’re failing a class.  What to Do If You’re Failing…

On Saturday night, in compliance with a law that the U.S. Supreme Court had just upheld, TikTok shut down its popular video-sharing app for American users. On Sunday, after an incoming president Trump vowed to negotiate a deal once in office, they began restoring service. It’s unclear what will happen next, as some lawmakers in the president’s own party remain firmly in favor of the divest-or-ban demand, while some democrats seemed to back-pedal. From my perspective as a technology critic, the ultimate fate of this particular app is not the most important storyline here. What interests me more about these…

By Katie Azevedo, M.Ed. Thriving in school takes more than raw intelligence. While it’s true that school success requires discipline, good study habits, regular attendance, and curiosity, there’s something far deeper behind it all. And what is this mysterious “something”? Self-awareness.  Self-awareness is the single most important indicator of a student’s potential to do well in school. In other words, we need self-awareness in order to do all the other things required to thrive in school. Self-awareness is not a guarantee of school success, as self-awareness needs to be followed by action. But without self-awareness, it’s nearly impossible for a…