You know what would be really useful? A list of some of the best lists of 2024. Well, you have come to the right place. I really enjoy lists and the end of the year marks apex listing time - the moment when lists come home to roost.
Lists are a traditional end of year festivity and consequently can be clichƩ. But they are also irresistible, so there must be a reason why. I suspect it has to do with a sense of reflection and evaluation. It's a shorthand way of getting perspective - at their worst, the shorthand is too short but at their best they tidy up, close down, and capture the moment.
The publication that really puts its back into lists is the online culture magazine, Vulture, which covers everything from the obvious: movies, TV, books, art, shows and video games.
Vulture Editors
The lists are pay-walled, but I like the sector summations:
On television: peak TV was in 2023, which marked the first significant decline (14 per cent) in new scripted series since 2009 and 2024 continued in that wake, offering some good but few great TV series. āAnyone who makes or consumes television knows the ever-swelling bubble of more and more TV would eventually burst ā¦ā wrote Jen Chaney. For me, the exception that proves the rule was the third series of Slow Horses, which just keeps getting better.
On music: āThis year was one big stress test that presented artists with a choice: Face uncomfortable realities or serve distractions to the audienceā¦ with a keen awareness of what lies on both ends of the spectrum of human kindness and cruelty, 2024ās best music documented an unbreakable will to keep pushing past the worst days to get to wherever the peaceful ones were hiding,ā wrote Craig Jenkins.
Interesting, but honestly, I think it is hard to do better than a local list: Mark Rosinās Songs of the Year. It's possible that he reflects much of my personal taste but I think a lot of international music lists revolve around that terrible thing: the critics' curse - the desire to seem more knowledgeable and erudite than your public, which leads to obscure, unlistenable choices. Markās list is fabulously free of that tendency and is focused on great songs. Listen here.
On podcasting: Podcasting is becoming further integrated with digital video, specifically YouTube, allowing shows to achieve viral attention and reach even bigger audiences. āA strange thing happened with podcasts in 2024. After a year from hell, podcasting was repeatedly thrust into the spotlight over the past 12 months owing to a preponderance of head-turning moments and a presidential-election cycle that radically foregrounded the mediumās consequential natureā, Vultureās Nicholas Quah wrote.
The point of the list is not just the list but how the list is created, who chose it and, importantly, how it is presented. And here I think the FTās list of the 25 most influential women of 2024 did a great job. Each of the selected women, chosen by a combination of readers and editors, was introduced, if you like, by another notable personality.
Taylor Swift by Sheryl Sandberg (ā ā¦ a model of vulnerability and resilience, passion and purpose, generosity and ambition ā¦ ā); Kristalina Georgieva on Ursula von der Leyen (ā¦led the European Commission through a period of turbulence with grace and determination); Fei-Fei Li by Melinda French Gates, ā ā¦ the godmother of AI, Fei-Fei Li is one of the most important leaders on artificial intelligence in the world today, and one of the most creative and compassionate scientists Iāve ever metā. etc.
Gushy, but you know, not out of place in a world where men still dominate at the top.
The problem, often, with ābest books of the yearā lists is the imagined reader for whom they are compiled. They skew towards nationalities (too American, too British) or toward politics (too woke, too conservative) or toward a niche (the best Croatian novel by a Swedish translator into English, and yes, I AM making this up) or toward specific genre.
Decent recommendations can be found on the major publications with a team of reviewers: The New York Times The Guardian The New Yorker The Financial Times The Paris Review and by individual āinfluencersā (TikTokās BookTok aside), like Bill Gates and Oprah Winfrey but there really is no substitute for the recommendations by people who know you and people whose taste you trust.
Vox magazine did a list with a title I thought was provocative: What really mattered in 2024. But unfortunately, the list itself is kinda obvious and it strikes me that if you ask that question, you are inviting the obvious response.
Kelsey Piper
The list goes roughly like this: President Job Biden dropped out, Donald Trump was convicted and elected, Elon Musk helped, self-driving cars, bird flu, Gaza, Syria and above all AI.
In a way the list is interesting for a totally different reason than its author probably intended: it adds a note of caution about lists, citing one of its own lists! āIn hindsight, the most important things that happened in 2019 by far were reports in Chinese-language media in late December of a strange new disease. Yet Voxās 2019 year in review highlighted the first Trump impeachment (remember that?) and the longest government shutdown in history (Iād forgotten that one entirely)ā, it points out. Available here.
On the subject of AI, I asked the AI (ChatGPT in this case) for a list of ways the AI will change our lives. Yowzer, it gave me a real mouthful! You wonāt believe how keen the AI is about the AI and how very explicit it was about how the AI is going to change the world. Turns out, all your fears about it taking over the world are overwrought and on job losses, the AI is itself, rather sanguine. Shocker.
It mentioned the obvious: the healthcare revolution (diagnosis and personalisation), finance (fraud detection, customer service), job transformation (role displacement), and so on. But what surprised me was the extent the AI lauded itself for its ethical prowess. Turns out the AI, according to the AI, is going to really help in the future with bias mitigation and breaking down global barriers through language translation and accessibility tools.
Not a terrible argument, in fact.
Locally the two lists to look out for are The Maverickās Person of the Year, which is decided by reader vote off nominees chosen by staff, and the Mail and Guardianās traditional end of year Cabinet Report Card. Both are not out yet, but the Maverick list is always controversial and fun; vote here.
If you have seen a great lists, please do reply to this newsletter and I will add it here.
From the department of just drink it FFS
Scotch has performed badly as an investment, creating the opportunity to actully drink it
Scotch as an alt investment has not performed super well in 2024 with prices declining rather rapidly. The market for fine and rare whisky is experiencing what we might call "the morning after the party" -and there is some interesting stuff going on with counterfeiting, too.
After years of seemingly unstoppable growth, 2024 has brought a sobering reality check. The secondary market, which is probably worth around Ā£75 million annually at auction based on Noble & Co's dataset tracking approximately 45% of global auction sales, is experiencing its first major correction since tracking began. The numbers tell quite a story: a 16% decline in volume and 18% drop in value over the past year, with the premium segment taking an especially hard hit.
The reason broadly seems to be the decline of the Asian market. In 2019, around 80% of ultra-premium whisky buyers were from Asia but that dominance has markedly shifted West, with American buyers now making up a significant portion of high-value sales.
From the department of flights of fancy
Why does anyone invest in airlines ever?
According to a newly released outlook from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the industry is going to consummate its bounce-back next year and hit the historical milestone of $1 trillion in industry revenues. So, great investment, right? Not so much: net profit per departing passenger in Europe $8. In Africa, 80c US.
Rafat Ali
ICYMI: My Daily Maverick columns this week
Tim Cohen
Tim Cohen
Tim Cohen
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