#longform.org

We are thrilled to welcome longform.org to the Federated Media publishing family!

About Longform.org:

Longform.org recommends new and classic non-fiction from around the web.

Article suggestions, including writers and magazines submitting their own work, are encouraged. Longform considers pieces over 2,000 words that are freely available online and offers high quality content from both established and emerging editorial voices in a variety of categories.

Did I read a lot of sports articles this week because I can't get my mind off the Olympics? Or were there a lot of sports pieces written in the past few weeks because no one can get their mind off the Olympics, and I just read a usual amount? Perhaps we'll never know. 

This week's pick is:  "Merv Curls Lead," by Guy Lawson, Saturday Night, April 1999, reprinted on Longform.org First of all, "Merv Curls Lead" is quite possibly the greatest three syllable phrase of all time, and certainly the best headline. This is a story from 1999 about a guy, named Merv Bodnarchuk, who really really likes curling, and is only sort of good at it, and has decided that the best thing to do for curling is to use lots of his money to make a team of the best curlers, and take them to the USA in fancy jackets, and also, he is going to play on this team, too. It goes about as well as you expect, but it also doesn't go in the way you expect. This article is just so pleasantly written, so friendly and open and honest, understated and not showy, just setting the scene, putting you in the bar with these curlers, in the rink for this wacky sport, hanging out with Merv and the people around him. It is a perfect little capsule piece, a distillation of this person, this sport, this moment, nothing more, which means, of course, that it is a lot more than that.

Runner-ups: "The Strongest Man in the World," by Burkhard Bilger, The New Yorker, July 23, 2012 The best sports articles, to me, aren't the ones full of like, training regimens and physical mechanics and statistics. Like all great articles, they are the ones about why people do what it is they do, and for that reason I usually like articles about lesser known sports - curling, weight lifting - more. It's less about the specifics and more about the concept of sports, in general. This article is about one of those "strongest man" competitions in Ohio, and it is full of fantastic characters and interesting things to think about.

Dear longform.org,

I love you so much.

I check you almost every day. You post the greatest stories from across the internet and help me find so much to aspire to as a writer. I love your ability to curate the greatest longform writing, from the past and present.

I have learned so much from you. You've helped me discover magazine writers to admire. You've taught me so much about the coolest, most random shit. You are not greedy with your content like longreads.com is, which seems like it updates at a snail's pace compared to your constant outpouring. You are somehow predictably topical while also delightful in your spontenaity.

If your iPad app cost $20 I would buy it just because I want your website to stay around forever, or at least long enough for me to write something that maybe finds its way into your archives. But forever is preferred.

Thank you longform.org. You have helped to change me as a reader and a writer.

I love you so much.

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