Journalist Natalia Antonova on writing about abuse: “Being vulnerable is not just about opening up to other people — it’s about opening up to yourself. Knowing yourself. Knowing what you are actually capable of.”

“We are superficially more connected than ever before but we don’t feel any better […]. It is up to us to realise self-love doesn’t stem from a selfie and emojis will never qualify as real emotions.”

“Little things — things that used to be simple and all my own — became packaged and delivered out into the world. My life was ready to be consumed.”

“Why is sentimentality considered such a ‘sweet fear’? It can portray an overly saccharine and false portrait of the world, for one. And as many have declared, that sentiment has no place in climbing.”

“The concept of authenticity is much over-hyped these days, and it seems to me a sad state of affairs that it’s something we need to cultivate — as if being authentic is just another act.”

When little Tommy has the ability to pop in contact lenses to play in a virtual world and doesn’t come out of his room for a month, that generation of parents will express the same type of concern their parents did about spending time on Snapchat.

He died while I was off Facebook, and news had not reached me by any other channel. But there it was. Out of nowhere and without warning my browser was haunted by the very real presence of death. Momento mori.

“We’ll take ’16 for a whimsical joyride and nonchalantly kick it out the passenger door into the potholed street and leave it there, bruised and bewildered, and yet mildly respectful of what it got itself into when it crossed us, as we ride toward the dawn of 2017 in our 2003 Nissan Micra.”

. . . there are some important philosophical questions that are being ignored in the startup bonanza. The basic ethical question of whether society wants to be disrupted, for a start. Startup entrepreneurs treat societies and economies as raw material to be hacked.