Even more threatened than their beleaguered colonial cousin the corals reefs, we learn that over eighty-five percent of coastal oyster beds, living shorelines, have been destroyed by human activity over the last two centuries through dredging, development, pollution and overfishing. Recent efforts to restore the habitat of this indicator species, however, are demonstrating that oysters are keystones of their ecosystem, purifying, filtering waters, recycling organic materials and preventing algal blooms, building a sheltering environment for various fishes and crustaceans, sustenance for water fowl, carbon sequestration in their shells, and acting as a breakwater structure to reduce the impact of storm surges and runaway erosion. Learn more at Kottke at the link above.
Friday 10 September 2021
Friday 13 August 2021
6x6
clink clink: a snappy little animated short of guests at cocktail hour
samarkand: an East German couple’s tour of Uzbekistan fifty years ago with photography from 1971 and 2021expectation management: a comprehensive look into how the Delta variant changes the pandemic endgame—via Kottke
noah’s violin: the twelve metre long wooden stringed instrument is a floating stage, inaugurated along with Project Moses to protect Venice from flooding
the rural juror: a spoof streaming service (see also)—via JWZ
the effect is shattering: a vodka advertising campaign that became a snow clone
Monday 2 August 2021
6x6
roll for perception: the official video for the 1987 Rick Astley hit (previously) surpasses one billion views
until proven safe: EURIDICE, the eponym from the mythological Eurydice who Orpheus failed to retrieve from the Underworld, is the acronym for European Underground Research Infrastructure for the Disposal of Nuclear Waste in a Clay Environmenta clokey production: a bot scours Gumbasia for random screen-grabs
pelagic waters: exploring the oceans’ midnight zone beyond the reach of the sun’s rays
portrait of a teenage alcoholic: a 1975 after school special starring The Exorcist’s Linda Blair and Star Wars’ Mark Hamill
an eternal golden braid: some crib-notes and a course on the 1987 classic Gรถdel, Escher, Bach
Wednesday 28 July 2021
7x7
imprint and intaglio: a treasury of antique book illustrations—via Swiss Miss
antipodes: find the furthest populated place away from your home town—via ibฤซdem
endless loop: a superb collection of vintage Japanese cassette tapes and related accessories
dolce come il sale: an Italian town furnishes the Pope with an annual delivery of gourmet salt
full-house: the Guardian profiles the outdoor venue in Cornwall, the Minack Theatre, as it welcomes back audiences
down periscope: the Viewfinder installation affords visitors to Sydney’s coast a look at the roiling ocean below
etidorhpa: John Uri Lloyd’s 1895 pharmacologically inspired science fantasy novel
Tuesday 8 June 2021
6x6
scream real loud: The 1954 “Pinky Lee Show” that prefigures in a way Pee-Wee’s Playhouse
7/10: promoting health for the high seas on World Oceans Day—previously
avian aftershave: crows treat themselves to ant baths
squirrels under the hood: an AI researchers illustrates how algorithms are dangerously regressive reflections of the worst of us (previously) and are far from artificial or intelligent
###: a short from Optical Arts repeats a range of actions with different objects in the key of A
that’s my name—don’t wear it out: do yourself a favour and check out the blog of Pee-Wee Herman
Friday 21 May 2021
watershed moment
Via Web Curios, we are directed towards an application for our fans in the continental United States of America (for the present) called River Runner that allows one to drop a raindrop anywhere and trace its path to the sea through run-offs, watercourses, creeks and rivers and explore the precipitation cycle drip by drip, navigating their path over the terrain and residence times through reservoir, adjacent table and flow.
Saturday 1 May 2021
moraines and drumlins
Via Maps Mania, we are confronted with the profound and consequential loss of the world’s glacial cover visualised with an animated comparison of ninety of the planet’s largest and best surveyed moving, dense bodies of ice (see previously) on the march and on the retreat. Scientists project that the rate of melting will double by the next decade and will contribute some twenty percent to sea-level rise rather than being the natural water towers and frozen reservoirs that they were meant to be.
Thursday 8 April 2021
under the sea
catagories: ๐ฏ๐ต, ๐ง, 1971, architecture
Monday 29 March 2021
7x7
disaster capitalism: paintings of banks alight and other artworks by Alex Schaefer (previously) via Everlasting Blรถrt
convergent evolution: sea life becomes the plastic that is polluting it
do geese see god: a documentary about the world palindrome championship
full-stop: punctuation can really set a tone—see also
№ 2 pencil: a fantastic Eberhard-Faber catalogue from 1915
r.u.r.: online sci-fi dictionary (see previously) sources the term robot to 1920
living with the consequences: government austerity raises COVID deaths
Sunday 21 February 2021
calving and bergy bits
Thursday 11 February 2021
8x8
penne, named for the nib of a quill: a trilingual exploration of past etymology—see also
i’m live—i’m not a cat: kitten-filter mishap for attorney’s teleconference is could become this era’s poster image
so this is how liberty dies… with thunderous applause: the honourable senator from Naboo was the deciding vote that allowed the Palpatine to become Emperor as explored scene-by-scene by a group of screenwriters constructing the finest Star Wars story that will be never made
opmerkelijke zaken: mushroom bricks, bricks reinforced with plastic waste plus more from the peripatetic Pasa Bon!
pelagic zone: winners of the 2021 Underwater Photography contest announced
cosy web: the Multiverse Diary project, a collaboration that celebrates the old school blog and wiki aesthetic for branching out
pov: Ancient China on Rome, the Islamic world on India and other historical perspectives narrative on Voices of the Past
uunifetapasta: where the phenomenon of TikTok Pasta came from and where it might lead
Saturday 23 January 2021
earthrise
Via Kottke we are treated to a rousing recitation and call to action that poet Amanda Gorman composed in 2018 for the Climate Reality Project inspired by the awesome, humbling image of the Earth dawning over the lunar surface by the crew of Apollo 8. Riffing on the climate emergency, one stanza of Gorman’s words:
Where despite disparities
We all care to protect this world,
The riddled blue marble, this little true marvel
To muster the verve and the nerve
To see how we can serve
Our planet. You don’t need to be a politician
To make it your mission to conserve, to protect,
To preserve that one and only home
That is ours
To use your unique power
To give next generations the planet they deserve.
More to explore at the links above. So, Earth, Pale Blue Dot. We will fail you not.
Thursday 21 January 2021
domestic agenda
Signalling a radical shift in policy priorities, Joe Biden for his first day and a half in office signed a tranche of executive orders reversing the direction that his predecessor (lest we forget the catalogue of horrors) had taken the country and the first steps to positioning America as a leader and innovative force. Redressing the pandemic crisis, Biden’s spending proposal for economic aid and relief and accelerating vaccination comes in at just under two trillion dollars, imposing a mask mandate on federal property and interstate transportation, extend student loan deferments and a moratorium on evictions and re-join the World Health Organisation. Moreover, Biden moved to bring the US back into the Paris Climate Agreement plus reimpose pollution restrictions recently relaxed and cancel the Keystone XL pipeline project that would shuttle a particularly pernicious type of petroleum from Canadian fields to American refineries. On immigration, Biden has directed the travel ban on some Muslim-majority countries to be repealed, reversed the inhumanly cruel practise of separating immigrant families at the border and ended the declared National Emergency that funded the Wall. In the Oval Office, the bust of Winston Churchill (previously) is replaced—in the background—by one of Cรฉsar Chรกvez.
Sunday 17 January 2021
motown
Via the always excellent Things Magazine (with several other utopian visions to explore and debate in this instalment), we learn about Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe (*1900 – †1996), town planner, landscape developer and architecture and his 1959 project Motopia, which despite its automobile-centric name, really was dedicated to the prevention of sprawl and spill-over and the preservation of green spaces where no car or lorry could encroach—see also. Instead what Jellicoe envisioned was a grid of mixed-used residential towers connected by elevated jetways, whose intersections were all roundabouts following the roofline of the blocks with the option to spiral down to one’s home or office, leaving the land below pristine and even wild. Though never realised according to plan, districts like Shanghai’s Oriental Pearl Radio and Television Tower were informed by Jellicoe’s design. Much more at the links above.
Friday 15 January 2021
pequod
Prior to the arrival of the pilgrims the small, isolated island of Massachusetts Bay Colony whose name in Wampanoag means “sandy, sterile soil tempting no one” and the brunt of many a Limerick was home to a small and sustainable population of Native Americans, evicted by the rapidly increasing settler numbers, soon realising that Nantucket lived up to its name. And so not content with their misguided incursions, the colonisers looked to the sea to support their growth, including whaling operations. Public Domain Review has collected dozens of visually brilliant ship’s logs and personal journals of crew sourced mostly to the cusp of the age when waters were depleted and boats had to venture further and further for their quarry and cheaper alternatives to the risky enterprise presented themselves.
Wednesday 6 January 2021
8x8
ruminant digestive process: whilst bovine flatulence makes the headlines, burps are the chief source of methane and could be neutralised with a special mouth guard—via the New Shelton Wet/Dry
caporegime: via ibฤซdem, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project names Jair Bolsonaro Corrupt Person of the Year, trouncing with a narrow margin Trump, Erdoฤan and Netanyahu
commander-in-cheat: First Minister Nicola Sturgeon won’t allow Trump to visit his golf course in Scotland during the pandemic lockdown to bow out of attending the inauguration in Washington, DCgeorgia on my mind: Reverend Warnock declared winner in Senate race and Democrats poised to take control of the Upper House
grogu pains: The Mandalorian reimaged as 1990s sitcom
die abenteur des prizen achmed: the incredible silhouette animation technique of Lotte Reiniger—more here
population density: housing ten billion humans in one mega city could help vastly reduce our footprint, freeing up the remaining land mass for rewilding and argiculture
all the trimmings: for this traditional day of ceremonially discarding the tree, ways to transform it into garnish and a tasty treat
Sunday 20 December 2020
8x8
before times: one narrative of 2020 as told through fifteen objects and artefacts—see previously
marsha, marsha, marsha: Trump acknowledges months’ long cyber-attack on US government networks for first time—oddly defensive about Russian involvement
systemic bias: when bad decisions are blamed on algorithms, bad actors are exculpated and trust in science erodesbreakthrough listen: musing on the nature of signal detected from Proxima Centauri by the Murriyang Radio Telescope
tape/slide newsreel group and friends: brilliant early 80s photo archive showing Hackney to Hackney—via the splendiferous Things Magazine
engineer, agitator, constructor: the visual vernacular of utopian graphic design
creek and culvert: the movement to resurface and revive long buried urban waterways—see previously
off-limits: virtually visit nine sites not accessible to the public in Washington, DC
a modern hanukah miracle: there are extra doses of vaccine in each vial—stretching out supplies to inoculate twice as many individuals than expected
Tuesday 8 December 2020
6x6
message in a bottle: researchers tagged plastic waste with electronic trackers to monitor their journey—from the same team that brought us Mister Trash Wheel
pfizer-biontech: British nonagenarian first to receive the coronavirus vaccinewunderpus photogenicus: deep sea diver photographs an incredible infant octopus with a transparent head
toot your own horn: more butt trumpets and other bizarre imagery in manuscript marginalia
catsa lander mark-1: a gorgeous space-age cat bed—though our feline friends would be more pleased with a shoebox
2014-076a: Hayabusa2 (previously) successfully returns its asteroid sample to Earth
Saturday 24 October 2020
the past is another country
Wednesday 21 October 2020
♨
The always brilliant Present /&/ Correct directs our attention to a website dedicated to exploring the bathhouse (sentล, ้ญๆนฏ) culture of Japan.
There are lots of resources to dip into plus plenty of photographs of interiors in all their pastel glory. These communal spas—meant for relaxation and engender feelings of empathy by proximity and vulnerability, for are distinguished from onsen (ๆธฉๆณ, the above map symbol or the hiragana character ใ, yu, mark their location on maps and signage), another type of public facility, which are fed by hot springs.