Here are pieces that are either my personal favorites or have been well-received.
(Click here to see more of my published work.)
AI in Cinema & “Her” — The Verge
Sci-fi films are bad at depicting AI but Spike Jonze’s “Her” shows how it should be done.
Steven Yeun’s Perfect Accent in “Minari” — The New Yorker
On the film “Minari” and the experience of living as a non-native speaker in America.
The Magic of Tiny-Home Videos — The New York Times Magazine
About my year of watching tiny-home videos on YouTube.
The Hypocrisy of Judging Those Who Become More Beautiful — WIRED
About lookism and the immorality of disparaging people who “artificially” enhance their beauty (e.g., leg-lengthening surgery or plastic surgery).
When Literature Meets Philosophy — On Philosophical Science Fiction — The New Republic
A review of Philosophy Through Science Fiction Stories in praise of philosophical science fiction.
A Reading List on Why We Run — Longreads
An essay and commentaries on six pieces of writings on running.
A Tale of Two Clubs — Nassau Weekly
On Princeton’s eating clubs: Ivy and Terrace.
JavaScript Runs the World—Maybe Even Literally — WIRED
A defense of JavaScript — a silly-ass language that everyone loves to hate but more powerful (and egalitarian) than you think!
What We Lost When Twitter Became X — The New Yorker
About my time at the bird app and what the future might hold.
The Case for Software Criticism — WIRED
Why isn’t there “software criticism” like there is film criticism or book criticism? Software may be the defining cultural artifact of our time. So why isn’t there a culture of critical analysis around it?
How Google Docs Proved the Power of Less — WIRED
A piece of software criticism on Google Docs.
The Hidden History of Screen Readers — The Verge
On blind programmers who have, for decades, created screen readers for the visually impaired community.
How Manuel Blum—a Turing Award winner—became a legendary PhD advisor — MIT Technology Review
A profile of Turing Award-winning theoretical computer scientist Manuel Blum, who is also known as the greatest PhD advisor in the field. On what makes a great teacher who produces extraordinary scholars.
How to Write Software With Mathematical Perfection — Quanta Magazine
Q&A with the Turing Award winner Leslie Lamport on distributed systems (e.g., Paxos consensus protocol, Byzantine faults), computer science education, formal verification, and LaTeX.