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Tedium. The newsletter all your other newsletters look up to.

Since 2015, Ernie Smith's Tedium has been hunting for the end of the long tail, and we've yet to find it. But we'd sure love it if you followed us on our journey. Especially now that we're ten friggin' years old and we're still using a Street Fighter II slogan as our subscribe button. Validate the use of obscure video game slang as a successful subscription strategy. Click the button.

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Combo Platter

Admit it, you were wondering where the hell the gas-station staples Combos came from just as much as I was. Anyway, I figured it out. At one point a drill was involved.

 By Ernie Smith • September 27, 2026  About  Archives  Sponsor Us Support Us On Ko-Fi
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Cursed Napster

If you haven't looked at the Napster website lately, get ready for some major AI-related indigestion. The former music-sharing rebel is now peddling AI digital twins of teachers and serving the Saudi market.

 By Ernie Smith • September 21, 2026

Corporate Sunset

Pondering the circumstances that led to the retirement of a 64-year-old cable brand in a merger. Turns out, brand loyalty matters less than we thought.

 By Ernie Smith • September 17, 2026

alt.time-capsule.reopened

A new tool for digging into Usenet history holds much potential for researchers. But it’s also a reminder that many users thought, at the time, that it was ephemeral. (They were wrong.)

 By Ernie Smith • September 14, 2026

The Worst Spam Emails

Making sense of iLands, the company whose AI agents emailed me half a dozen times in two days offering to do my research. Turns out they’re just bots trying to keep their own lights on by trying to take my job.

 By Ernie Smith • September 11, 2026

Automattic Minus Matt

Matt Mullenweg takes an involuntary leave of absence from Automattic, the company behind WordPress. Let’s hope he uses his time away thoughtfully.

 By Ernie Smith • September 10, 2026

Second Quest

In a normal culture, a company as gray-haired as MapQuest would not be having a straight-on cultural revival in 2026. But our culture is not normal.

 By Ernie Smith • September 2, 2026

Can Self-Hosting Be Simple?

You can go into the deep end way too easily with a self-hosting project. But is a less-is-more approach possible? Here’s what my attempt to build a “third-place” box taught me.

 By Ernie Smith • August 26, 2026

The Negative Option

In the 1980s and 1990s, Columbia House could do no wrong—it was a great way to get 12 CDs for a penny. But its business model kind of set the stage for a lot of bad e-commerce.

 By Ernie Smith • August 24, 2026

Card Sharks

The 1980s proved surprisingly fruitful for licensed greeting card mascots. It turns out American Greetings understood the Marvel playbook before Marvel did.

 By Ernie Smith • August 12, 2026 Want more? Check the archives! ⮕