Six great reads: Iran’s social media memes, an abandoned department store and a 1,200-year-old record of cherry blossoms

1. Viral victory: Iran is beating the land of tech bros in the social media wars

Illustration: Twitter/X

Patrick Wintour looked at how Iran has been winning the propaganda battle against the US with a barrage of memes, AI-generated comedy videos and Lego-style animations ridiculing the Trump administration. Despite the government-induced internet blackout, the country’s gen Z tech warriors have been engaging western audiences with creativity, humour and sarcasm.

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2. Art, sex, nature: why is everything sold to us as a means to an end, rather than an end in itself?

Illustration: Guardian Design/Anaïs Mims/Getty

double quotation markFor a long time, I have been privately lamenting the instrumentalisation of everything: how nothing seems to be of value in itself any more but is only seen as useful in the service of some utilitarian function.

The writer and philosopher Julian Baggini considered how the best things in life are being sold to us as means to an end, arguing that this reductive worldview is stripping meaning from our most valued activities.

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3. Abandoned Britain: the grand department store that became an illicit cannabis farm

Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

double quotation markThe panel is hanging from the wall by its wires and doesn’t look safe. I’d be nervous about stepping into this lift. Plus, it’s dark. I’m using the torch on my phone to read the sign.

In the first instalment from a six-part series looking at Britain’s empty buildings, Sam Wollaston explored a structure in Newport that once housed Wildings department store. But since its closure in 2019, the storied building has fallen into disrepair and been commandeered as a cannabis farm and a skate park. What can it tell us about the UK’s high streets?

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4. After 1,200 years, cherry blossom record to live on despite Japanese scientist’s death

Photograph: Manami Yamada/Reuters

For 1,200 years, cherry blossom records in Kyoto, Japan, have been meticulously tracked. The shifting bloom dates have become an important marker of the climate crisis. When Prof Yasuyuki Aono died last year, there were fears that no one would carry on the crucial work. Chris Baraniuk followed the hunt to find a replacement.

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5. Sperm whales’ communication closely parallels human language, study finds

Photograph: Mike Korostelev/Getty Images

A new study found that sperm whales communicate with each other in a series of short clicks, called codas, which are highly complex and remarkably similar to our own language. Oliver Milman reported on the findings, which showed that the whales can differentiate vowels through the short or elongated clicks, or through rising or falling tones.

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6. ‘I got everything I dreamed of – when I had no ability to handle it’: Lena Dunham on toxic fame, broken friendships and her ‘lost decade’

Photograph: Chris Buck/The Guardian

double quotation markThere’s [now] a sense of people learning how much vulnerability is useful and how much is not. And I did not have any of that. I didn’t have any sense about even just simple things like posing, or style, or how to show your body, or how to show your face.

Emma Brockes interviewed the writer and director Lena Dunham, who created the hit HBO series Girls at just 23. They discussed how stardom came fast and hard for the wunderkind – and why she was forced to retreat from the spotlight.

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