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Moss’ Email

​​Hi Never Post!

My name is Moss (she/her) and I am trans.

Your recent segment on before and after pics got me thinking about the particular variety of before and afters that are shared online in the trans community. I think that this became a lot more visible to me after being witness to the early chaos of unconstrained trans horniness and wild openness in the early formation of Bluesky last year, which is a whole fascinating bit of platform ecosystem history, especially seeing how much Bluesky has leveled out into something much more "presentable" and twitter-like now that it's operating at scale—but I digress.

On sites like Twitter and Bluesky (and surely elsewhere...) there is an established trend of trans beings (queer beings) sharing before and after pictures of themselves. These are occasioned by trans holidays, like Transgender Day of Visibility, by personal events like transition anniversaries, and by quote chains of such pics (not to mention special occasions of steps taken towards transition). I think it's important to mention these not only as a queer phenomenon, but as something that illuminates how before and afters work for everyone in a variety of situations (as is the case with many things related to transness—it's not [only] about being trans: it's about living more freely). The trans case highlights a few aspects that I want to explore here:

1) The pics, by virtue of being in a trans discourse, would seem to point to something deeper about how life is structured—an identity, a gender—rather than merely an aspect of life—weight, appearance, dwelling, &c.—not of course that identity and gender are not merely aspects of life nor that what seem to be mere aspects are not structuring, but thinking about the weight these are given culturally. What does it mean to see one photo and then another and think, and be encouraged to think by the poster, to see the second as more in line with their gender, as "more woman," "more animal," "more thing," "more man," "more..."? But perhaps above all "MORE THEMSELF." I think we can reasonably be quite ambivalent about this: as your segment points out, the after of the before and after is actually a changing state, and that perhaps it's harmful to over-fix (and that it might fix norms that should be taken as fluid and contextual), but, on the other hand, the fixing function of the before and after photo may be precisely the point for the trans poster—a trans performance to reinforce self. We might further ask, what is visible and what is invisible about transition—does the before and after pic over-reinforce the visible (and how does it then interact with the endless discourse of "passing")? There is also of course a great potential for rupture with norms with queer people—the after often completely rejects standard norms (but then is it rejection or creation...? and so on and so on and so on).

2) The before pic is possibly quite contentious for trans beings, when it is understood to be a pre-transition pic (and not say, both before and after being after the start of transition). This is because

Georgia chats with Emmy Award-winning investigative reporter Hilke Schellmann about the job market, and the increasing prevalence of Artificial Intelligence in hiring. Mike talks with comedian, writer and podcast host Jamie Loftus about her show Sixteenth Minute (of Fame), and the curse of becoming an Internet Main Character. Also! Every YouTube video the team watched in the last two weeks.

Show Notes:

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Why Is It (Hiring) Like This? with Hilke Schellmann

Find Hilke:

Other Sources:

Georgia digs deep into the enshittification of dating apps, and pays dearly as a result. Mike talks to Aftermath co-founder Luke Plunkett about recent, massive changes to Google’s Page Rank algorithm, and the risk of reconfiguring entire industries to pander to search traffic. And also: An AI Voice Clone of Mike is set to *maximum chaos*. 

Show Notes:

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Intro Links

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Dating Apps (derogatory)

The second and final installment of our two part collab with Slate’s ICYMI! Mike talks with mis- and disinformation researcher Joan Donovan about the line between gossip and conspiracy; then ICYMI’s Candice and Rachelle join us to talk about what it feels like swimming in the wide open sea of monocultural event discourse. Also: C-SPAN’s earliest internet memories!

Special thanks to Candice, Rachelle, Se’era, Daisy and the whole ICYMI team! Please listen to them on slate.com and wherever you get your podcasts.

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Everyone is a Journalish

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Never Post’s producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show’s host is Mike Rugnetta. 

vertigo of too many nuances

don’t drown in their rapidity

choose the nuances you love

and settle down with them

Excerpt of #45 - butter colored slacks and rubber rum balls by Wayne Koestenbaum

Never Post is a production of Charts & Leisure

This week, we got TWO episodes coming at you - one today and one on Saturday. Both are a collaboration with the incredible team at the Slate Podcast ICYMI.

In today's episode, the first of our collaboration, Mike guests on ICYMI, where they break down one of 2024’s biggest internet stories and ask: what's the recipe for a rare monocultural event?

It's been more than a month since Kate Middleton announced she'd started preventative chemotherapy treatments following a cancer diagnosis. Which means it's also been just over a month since conspiracy theories about the princess ran rampant across the internet. As an increasingly algorithmic internet silos us further into our own little content niches, all-consuming events like Kate Middleton's disappearance are fewer and far between. So what does it take, in 2024, to capture the internet's attention and create these rare monocultural moments?

ICYMI is produced by Se'era Spragley Ricks, Daisy Rosario, Candice Lim and Rachelle Hampton.

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Never Post's producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show's host is Mike Rugnetta.

Never Post is a production of Charts & Leisure

Senior producer Hans Buetow investigates the transit vacuum that’ll result when Uber and Lyft leave the Twin Cities; Mike looks at how the car has become a default setting for vertical, short form video. Also: PLANES, TRAINS… BIKES

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Twin Cities Transit Vacuum

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The American Car 

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Never Post's producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show's host is Mike Rugnetta. 

It’s easier to read the mind of a fox than to guess   

what a man’s about to say when he returns   

from the woods         head full of roots         veins   

more like branches         shoes in one hand         feet   

blistered         and none of this necessarily   

an indication of how the feet feel         what miles   

uphill and back have done to the soles   

and to the small bones that propel a man

Excerpt of Rest Before You Sleep

By Dionisio D. Martínez

Never Post is a production of Charts & Leisure.

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Never Post's producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show's host is Mike Rugnetta. 

Never Post is a production of Charts & Leisure.

Contributing Producer Marie Kilaru discusses the emotional impacts of making and seeing Before and After posts; Charlie Harding of Switched on Pop joins Jason to talk about what pop-musical acts have sounded like the internet. Also: Georgia reads Franny Choi’s “Unrequited Lovesong for the Panopticon”

Join us on Twitch, Friday, April 12th @ 2pm ET to chat about audio production!

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Intro Links

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Before and After Photos

Special thanks to Hannah Meacock-Ross for editorial support

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What (Pop Music) Does the Internet Sound Like?

• You should listen to Switched on Pop generally, but also here’s the interview they did with 100 gecs.

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Unrequited Love Song for the Panopticon was used with permission 

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Never Post’s producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton and The Mysterious Dr. Firstname Lastname. Our contributing producer this episode is Marie Kilaru. Our senior producer is Hans Buetow. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholtzer. The show’s host is Mike Rugnetta. 

After the accident we had

the phrase after the accident.

Also this: before the accident.

We had a drawer marked

before and after, and after

and before happenings

we'd add atrocities and

incidents and the wild

asters someone before

and after keeps leaving.

After By Andre

Georgia and guest producer Luis wonder why there is so much audio online that seems to sound bad on purpose; Mike talks to Gabriele de Seta and Paolo Berti about how the “megadungeon” is a productive model for understanding the internet. Also: posts from the field!

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Intro

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Burnt Toast Audio