Here is an email illustrating how brands (Sprite, in this case) pay off reporters and bloggers with free stuff as a direct quid pro quo for coverage. There's also some info about a TOP SECRET Drake and Nas concert we would like to share.

Terrorism persists because terrorism works. Terrorism works because we let it.

The growth of Wall Street is detrimental to the health of America. Let's review.

Today is hashtag #GivingTuesday, a day when the act of charity transforms into an act of #viral #marketing for #brands. Reject it!

Many of you have jobs in which you are required to regularly attend "meetings." Meetings about budgets, or staffing, or strategy, or one million other arcane workplace topics. I would like to point out, to your boss: "meetings," as a practice, are an enormous waste of time.

There are many things wrong with the bloated, expensive American health care system. I would like to complain about one small part of it: the prices. It's not just that the prices are high. It's that... where the hell are the prices?

If you see a man sporting permanent stubble, it is appropriate to assume that he has character flaws that are very grave.

If we ever hope to be a truly fair representative democracy, we need to have campaign finance reform. The Republicans in the Senate have just blocked a proposed Constitutional amendment that might help do that. In America, the money owns the people. Not the other way around.

You, the American consumer, are much like a mildly sedated monkey: passive; easily distracted; focused upon only the most superficial occurrences. A clothing corporation celebrates these traits in a new advertisement that will certainly catch your attention, you shallow monkey.

In the writing world, there is a hierarchy. The writers are on the bottom. Above them are editors, who tell the writers what to change. This is backwards. How many good writers has Big Edit destroyed?

The New York Times editorial board has finally endorsed legalizing marijuana. This is widely viewed as a landmark moment in mainstream drug policy thought leadership. It should be viewed also as a testament to the ossified uselessness of mainstream thought leaders.

After breaking Iraq, America is now faced with the question of whether we bought it. As Iraq slides further into chaos, complex choices must be weighed. Does that mean that it's time to stop "the blame game" over how we got here?

A broad issue that's arisen as an offshoot of the whole Jill Abramson-getting-fired discussion: Do successful people (in the media and elsewhere) get there mainly by luck, or by skill/ virtue/ drive/ other endearing quality? It is luck, of course. Never forget that it is mostly luck.

Mary Barra, the CEO of GM, spent yesterday being grilled by Congress for her company's years-long failure to fix a known safety defect in its cars. Barra's lack of answers is being blamed on the size of the organization she leads. Which is a great argument against the salaries that CEOs earn.

Michael Lewis's new book Flash Boys, about the inherent unfairness of high speed trading, is the talk of Wall Street and the financial media. The backlash to the book is a familiar refrain: "Everyone already knows that." Well, that's the point, isn't it?

Robert Marcus took over as CEO of Time Warner Cable in January. Six weeks later, the company was sold to Comcast. When the deal goes through, Marcus will receive $80 million, "a severance payment that amounts to more than $1 million a day in compensation for the less than two months he ran the company." He earned it.

Shane Smith, the burly head of the VICE empire, is now worth several hundred million dollars, thanks to his company's peerless ability to sell counterculture cool to mainstream corporations. Don't mention that to Shane, though. It's a sensitive topic.

Uber is a luxury car service that sells increased convenience for a high price. It may be seen as a symptom of a wealthy lifestyle which rubs many people the wrong way. So what should you do if you don't like Uber? You should not use Uber.

The New York Times reported yesterday that JPMorgan Chase is under federal investigation for hiring the children of China's elite with the explicit goal of boosting the bank's business prospects. Good. Nepotism on Wall Street is just as gross as nepotism at the media outlets that cover Wall Street.

In 2011, I was approached by a shady online marketing firm that offered to pay me to quietly insert links to their clients' websites in Gawker posts. We imagined that exposing the practice might end it. Not at all! It's happened again.