Plain English with Derek Thompson · The Ringer
Why We're Addicted to ‘Sh*tty Flow’
March 31, 2026·49 min·4 clips
Derek Thompson explains how 'the machine' replaces our inner values with external metrics like social media scores and journal rankings.
As heard by us
A sharp conversation about metrics, ambition, and why satisfaction may hold up better than happiness.
Modern life becomes a scoreboard in this episode, and the argument works best when it stays close to recognizable pressures: academic rankings, status metrics, wearable tracking, social media counts, and the broader lure of make-number-go-up thinking.
Why you'd press play
You want a smarter way to think about success, status, and how metrics can hijack what you value.
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