With a significant portion of global power devoted to air-conditioning, the search for ways to shift the burden of keeping cool, passively, has garnered quite a sense of urgency. Researchers in Nanjing and Stanford, harnessing and enhancing the natural properties of silk and sericulture, learn from the New Shelton wet / dry, which deflects most of the radiant energy falling on it rather than absorbing it like other fabrics embedded fibres with nanoparticles to reflect the portion of the spectrum not already covered, thereby creating a sort of high SPF, super-conducting cloth that blocks fully ninety-five percent of heat, remaining cooler than ambient air temperatures by three-and-a-half degrees Celsius and a whopping twelve degrees difference for the skin’s surface, reducing the risk for heat-exhaustion and dehydration.
Friday 12 November 2021
Wednesday 10 November 2021
under the waves or government in exile
Soberingly and with an eye to a bleak future of runaway climate change, as Slashdot reports, the island nation of Tuvalu exploring its legal options to retain its statehood in the worst-case scenario that sees all land submerged and its population of eleven thousand relocated. With sea-levels rising, the land will eventually disappear and the government hopes to retain international recognition for its maritime zones and territorial sovereignty as well as compel domestically and internationally what the cultural impacts and losses of such uprooting will be for this and other coastal communities. More at the links above.
Saturday 6 November 2021
9x9
the audience effect: fellow blogger and internet caretaker Duck Soup passes a million page-views
ะณัะฐัะธัะบะธ ะดะธะทะฐัะฝ: celebrating the works of three pioneering Serbian graphic designers and topographers
mountain view: a prop gravesite used for film and television, interred and disinterred thousands of times, in a very real cemetery
subject matter expert: the street photography of Eric Kogan—via the morning newsutter rubbish: traumatising photographs of the garbage, sometimes neatly knolled, that humans produce
the briefing: a definitive guide to COP 26
greased falcon: a fan-channel dedicated to Star Wars! The Musical (2008)
time in a bottle: hackers are amassing encrypted data in the hopes that within a few years, quantum computers will be able to unlock it—via Slashdot
return to comfort town: more on brilliant housing development in Kyiv inspired by building blocks—see previously
Monday 1 November 2021
starting point
Via Super Punch, we are treated to a piece of superlative copy-writing in this advertisement from Patagonia outerwear outfitters displayed on a Litfaรsรคule in the vein of this powerful poem from Brian Bilston that invites, compels us to shift our perspective and not be resigned and nihilistic when the time for decisive action is urgent in the face of this climate crisis.
Saturday 30 October 2021
8x8
the motion picture that pits steel weapons against steel nerves: Joan Crawford in Herman Cohen’s 1967 Berserk! plus a medley of other horror films
phenaskistiscopic vinyl: animated record albums—see previously
cop26: designer installs a sinking Monopoly style house on Putney Weir ahead of this crucial climate conferenceghostly footsteps (with chains): in 1977, BBC’s foley artists (previously) released a best-selling record of spooky sound-effects
cloaca maxima: Rome’s revered sewer-system—see also
auchan daily mascarpone cheese: a decade of Russian music videos
the high-handed enemy: director Denis Villeneuve storybooks the gom jabbar scene
kitchen witchery: a tarot deck to divine one’s dinner
Wednesday 27 October 2021
field camp
Tuesday 26 October 2021
7x7
in the stacks: museum curators uncover what may be the oldest depiction of a ghost on an ancient Mesopotamian tablet
1928 porter: a look at the 1965 short-lived sitcom (see also) My Mother the Car this climate does not exist: visualisations of one’s neighbourhood under the climate crisis from Nag on the Lakeev: more outstandingly odd electric vehicles from the on-line market Alibaba—via Things Magazine
reasonable person: “a moron in a hurry” is codified in Anglophone legal statute—via the New Shelton wet/dry
graphics processing unit: glitch art in medical imaging—via Waxy
don’t go wasting your emotion: the ABBA classic, as performed by a vampire—via Everlasting Blรถrt
Tuesday 18 June 2019
keep britain tidy
As much of a focus-steeling, attention-grabbing sideshow Brexit and Theresa May’s leadership were her desired legacy and commitment—bringing the UK’s carbon contribution down to net-zero by 2050—is pretty admirable and make up for what she made everyone endure, notwithstanding a predecessor even more repugnant who’ll try to change course, though enshrined in law, it will be tougher to rescind.
Before leaving office nearly thirty years ago, Margaret Thatcher made a similar pledge, urging a global treaty on climate change and enacted policies to protect the ozone layer and curb acid rain. Would that all rubbish politicians had such redeeming potential. Although there’s quite some rough terrain yet to cover to attain that goal and admittedly we all ought to be in a better place by now, courtesy Maps Mania, we should pause and consider this interactive essay, chart and timeline from Carbon Brief illustrating the progress that the UK has already made in overhauling how it gets and uses its energy, an achievement encapsulated in the record-setting span of time that the country has gone without having to resort to coal. Records are made to be broken. Much more to explore at the links above.