Chloë Sevigny sends it | Simply Ranked

Plus: gossip, content to infuriate and inspire, how to up your Q-Rating, and more.

Cole Nowicki

Jan 21, 2022 — 5 min read

`The definitive weekly ranking and analysis of all the skateboarding and other online things that I cannot stop consuming and how they make me feel, personally.`

Covers, baby

Rank: +1
Mood: 📈

Improving one’s Q-Rating as a skateboarder doesn’t have to be confined to the old methods of appearing in skate magazines and videos or even the all-consuming algorithms of social media. Sometimes all it takes is a little creativity and chance. For example, see Hugo Boserup, 22, receiving a painful-looking PCR test in a series of photos for Reuters.

Taken in December of 2020, these images have been used as stock-image cover photos in multiple news articles in the time since their capture. For over a year, Boserup’s name has been quietly pushed into the brains of the general public. A fun treat for the initiated and an unconscious branding exercise for those who aren’t. Maybe they follow the young man’s name through Google and stumble across his part in Limosine’s debut video Paymaster. They’ll soon realize that not only is Boserup willing to take one for the health and safety of those around him, but he’ll take one for our entertainment, too.

An icebreaker

Rank: 1
Mood: 💘

Dating is hard. Putting yourself out there, opening yourself up to what could be love or a fling or friendship or a single shitty drink takes courage. Powering through a stale conversation to see if there’s anything on the other side is an act of bravery. But to even get to that stage requires serious nerve. Small talk initiated at a cafe, the shared charade of a Tinder chat, or a DM sent out of the blue—those all hinge upon an icebreaker. Which, for better or worse, can be anything. An observation, a shared interest, a joke you pray lands. Whatever it is, the inspiration is usually your struggle to fluster into existence on the fly.

Unless you’re Chloë Sevigny, and the paparazzi snaps the rippling mass of a newly single Jason Momoa doing Bertlmans (probably) across the length of some non-descript public skatepark, on a board that happens feature your teenage visage as its graphic. It took a universe of happenstance to compose these photos, for Sevigny to have this icepick fall out of the sky and into her lap. Can you blame her for using it?

Content can become you

Rank: 0101
Mood: 🤖

When you exist in an industry where your value is your image, content can become you. If your personal brand is waning, content can become you. When you genuinely love connecting with your fans and distracted driving, content can become you. If you participate in our world as we currently know it, content will become you.

Content can infuriate you

Rank: ugh
Mood: 😩

Former professional skateboarder and noted TikTok financial advisor/influencer Mikey Taylor recently spoke to former professional skateboarder and small business owner Mike Mo Capaldi about the latter’s latest venture: skateboarding NFTs. Like NBA Top Shots, Capaldi will be selling notable moments from skateboarding’s past, i.e. tricks, in the form of digital trading packs. Online collectibles whose ownership can be verified on the blockchai—oh god. Enough.

Admittedly, it is easy to crap all over this idea. Maybe it could be “interesting and fun.” At the moment, however, it looks like another person is trying to cash in on a predatory trend, selling clips from skate videos people already own back to those same fans at exorbitant prices.

Will skaters, filmers and companies see any money from this project? We have to take Capaldi at his word, which is difficult in this context because he’s now operating in an industry that’s rife with scammers. Scammers who can’t stand being scammed by their own scam.

“..you could just ‘right-click save’ the JPEG to your computer. Sure, you can do that, but that’d be equal to me going to a local printer and being like, ‘hey, can you print this Kobe Bryant rookie card for me?’ What’s the difference?” Says Capaldi while trying to explain the struggle of the public taking NFT authenticity seriously.

But interestingly, if you purchase one of Capaldi’s NFT packs, you’ll receive a complimentary “tangible collectible,” which is just a dystopian way to describe a trading card. The card we see in the video even looks pretty cool, this single physical item that no one else can own but you.

Content can inspire you

Rank: 1!
Mood: 😇😇😇

In a great interview with Christian N Kerr for Free Skate, WKND’s “newest oldest pro,” Andrew Considine, reflected on what his new role as a professional skateboarder entails.

“Like, what do pro skateboarders do? Make content for a company to sell skateboards. Maybe a kid or somebody will see me skating and balancing work, or talking about how capitalism’s a bop, and they’ll be stoked on it.”

Despite how we’ve come to know it, “content” doesn’t always have to be hollow and front-camera facing. It can be WKND’s latest video Street Fighters 2. Something created with feeling, content made to inspire you to (buy boards and) have a good time.