Edition #74: Longform Profiles

This edition features a professional card counter, Bluesky’s internet takeover, Davos unraveling, Ozempic confessions, and more.

Spotlighting outstanding longform stories and the journalists who bring them to life. Did you receive this email from a friend? Subscribe here.

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Credit: Eyal Yassky-Weiss

☕ From the Mouth of the Gods

Matt Rodbard | Taste

Coffee, one of the world’s most coveted commodities, is grossly—criminally—undervalued. And in particular, coffees from Ethiopia—the ancestral home of coffee, where it serves as a supportive backbone for a weakened economy and a society stricken with unmitigated disease and poverty—is one of the world’s great culinary treasures.

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🤖 ‘We’re Definitely Going to Build a Bunker Before We Release AGI’

Karen Hao | The Atlantic

Sutskever’s fears about an all-powerful AI may seem extreme, but they are not altogether uncommon, nor were they particularly out of step with OpenAI’s general posture at the time. In May 2023, the company’s CEO, Sam Altman, co-signed an open letter describing the technology as a potential extinction risk—a narrative that has arguably helped OpenAI center itself and steer regulatory conversations.

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🚓 3 Teens Almost Got Away With Murder. Then Police Found Their Google Searches

Raksha Vasudevan | WIRED

And like anyone who Googles something, he was thinking about the search result he wanted—not the packets of data flitting between his device and Google’s servers, not the automated logs of what he was searching for and where he was searching from. But this unseen infrastructure would be key to figuring out what happened at Truckee Street—and it may soon extend the reach of law enforcement into the private lives of millions.

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♠️ What It’s Like to Be a Professional Card Counter

Luke Winkie | Slate

Other times, I’m basically escorted out of a casino. The pit bosses at a gaming room are always on the lookout for anyone who might be card counting. You can see the results of those confrontations on my YouTube channel. I’m sitting at a table, making my bets, and before you know it, the pit bosses in my peripheral vision are making phone calls to the surveillance team upstairs. Suddenly, I get a tap on the shoulder from security telling me that they don’t want my business anymore.

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🎬 Jon Hamm Gets Back in the Driver’s Seat

Frazier Tharpe | GQ

Landing a truly iconic role, especially on television, is a blessing that—between typecasting and overinflated expectations for future projects—can become a prison. Hamm saw this coming, and after Mad Men he took the necessary steps to defuse it—and protect his sanity in the process. Now the fruits of those efforts on his career and his mental health are coming to bloom. Yes, Jon Hamm is “back.” But also, he never left.