Hi all, I am currently on the hunt for some nice newsletters for my email. I ran into "Big" by Matt Stoller on here and I really enjoy it. I guess I am looking for something in a similiar enomonic, political, or macro vein, science works as well. Any and all recommendations are welcome.

Here in 2019 the overwhelming majority of all currency is virtual and commerce on any appreciable scale occurs electronically. But consider a sci-fi/space opera setting where reasonably fast FTL is commonplace, but FTL communications are not possible. Obviously one could still "communicate" at FTL with a courier, but you would still be limited to the speed of the courier ship. You certainly wouldn't have instantaneous communication between star systems, meaning there can be no interstellar electronic banking: transactions would take years to complete.

The Traveller tabletop RPG uses exactly this setup: FTL travel is common, FTL communication does not exist. In Traveller you have the Third Imperium minting currency that is accepted essentially everywhere, the currency is Imperial Credits and they're printed on polymer bills. The result is an effectively cash-only economy.

But what if your setting has no centralized government? Do people revert to using gold? Are there fleets of merchant ships schlepping precious metals around the cosmos, as if the American Old West has been transplanted into space? Would they come up with a cryptographic solution? Could something like a blockchain work without instantaneous communication cross the entire network that accepts the cryptocurrency?

What if quantum computing is widespread in your setting, rendering most forms of encryption obsolete? That would seem to eliminate the blockchain based option, FTL comms or not, and once again send us back to needing a fiat currency, or a gold standard.

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

In the shadows

Like a ghost you hide

In the single most foreign

Corners of my mind

Therapy and pills still

Can’t subside the angelic choir

Of your pretty lies

Promises you made,

The bones I broke

You once took my breath

And now I choke

Jesus let me breathe

Is there hope for me?

.

Now I desire

The obscure

All that reminds

Of being yours

Your oils, poison

My waters, pure

Your love is cancer

There is no cure.

.

I watched my grandfather take his final breaths as he kissed my head and you held my hand. Not two months later you foresaw our end, and decided not to keep me, even as a friend.

And now you’re off, marriage in the plans. I pray your time falls like the sand and hits the bottom of every glass as fast as it can.

I have no home. I’m lost and cold. You promised me a home would grow. We got a dog, and had planned for more. Mouth of this world, a fish at shore you took my breath and killed me slow.

I’m suicidal, I have no hope. I’ve not a gun, don’t have a rope. The only reason I’ve not a note, I’d end it all, I’d end it all.

---

I just want to feel pretty.

Pretty loved and pretty free

But for now I keep to getting

Pretty drunk, it isn’t cheap

But I can afford it/‘s kinda sweet

Too bad you’re not round

To drink with me.

I’d fill the bottle

We’d watch the office

Instead I scar

Until I am solid

An ugly rock

A useless object

I’ll break my stones

And build a coffin

And die in your name

Die in your name.

tw: self-harm; suicide; lost love.

i hit my cigarette

like an abuser hits her wife

because i'm a fucking coward

to afraid to take his life

i've felt love before

i beg it through the strife

but i only find a heart

at the wrong side of a blunt and useless knife

.

and it's only mine

at least there's proof

that i can feel

when blood protrudes.

but that's not "work appropriate"

so i get tattoos

what a shame i can't get paid to die.

i got a job

i got on meds

i got a car

still wanting death.

still here at night

alone in my bed

still hear her voice

ring in my head

“why do you look like i abused you?”

.

i bought a bottle

i bought some cards

can’t kill my thoughts

my god it’s hard

just make it stop

“i don’t think i love you anymore.”

.

anxiety’s

taken over me

every interaction

i worry

did i act weird?

what do they think?

i guarantee

they laugh at me

can’t beat it all

can’t bear it all.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.
.

.

don’t want to live

don’t want to die

i fantasize

(that) it’ll be alright

she’ll cuddle close

and hold me night

and pet my head

and kill the fright

i can’t escape

don’t want to fight

god let me die

god let me die