8x8 (13. 923)

das horst-wessel-lied: propaganda and public enlightenment in Weimar-era Berlin  

👎: the great data theft bait-and switch  

forever blowing bubbles: for China, lofty valuations for AI collapse as sign of what’s to come for the rest of the world

a tavola senza schermi: a consortium of Sardinian restaurants are banning smart phones and tablets during dining  

flock: the first automobiles were EVs 

clucksville: OG Readmore’s take on Chicken Little  

eveready: after a slate of emergency preparedness campaigns, including US military bases to ready themselves for a ninety-day period of self-sufficiency, America public told to stock up

tamara in a green bugatti: artist Łempicka who defined the Art Deco aesthetic

day two hundred thirty one (13. 920)

Labelling Norway another shithole country for denying him the Nobel Peace Prize once again—following Obama’s unchecked personal jokes at the expense of the president, ridicule that encouraged the failed businessman and sex-pest to run for political office in the first place, Trump disinvites the theoretical Norwegian immigrants he embraced during his first term with his Muslim majority country travel ban. María Corina Machado, who presented the US president her medal after kidnapping political rival Nicolás Maduro, returns to Caracas from exile to engage in talks with the puppet regime of Delcy Rodríguez, hoping to achieve real reform and perhaps torpedo US plans to steal Venezuela’s oil resources. Chief of German automotive company Audi under fire for pledges to build up manufacturing capacity in American amid domestic lay-offs and appearing in a campaign rally. Egyptian parliament authorises military aid for Saudi Arabia as the Mecca Alliance meet with Iranian officials in Tehran and agree to seek peace in the region, the inclusion of the Islamic Republic in the newly-formed defensive pact signalling a significant realignment of regional cooperation. Kremlin official Medvedev issues a public appeal to Trump to direct the CIA to assassinate Zelenskyy.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronoptica), superlative drone photography plus the Archbishop’s Palace in Charing

two years ago: The Terminator plus half-baked ideas 

three years ago: a rare vintage Japanese synthesiser plus an AI generates Halloween treats

four years ago: more adventures in Crete

five years ago: a Roger Corman classic (1958),  Austria declares neutrality (1955) plus more links to enjoy

six years ago: William Shatner in an Esperanto language film, even more links plus the Trump-Biden debate

seven years ago: assorted links worth revisiting 

eight years ago: Monster Mash, time travel with the dictionary plus Star Trek: Lower Decks

 

 

day two hundred thirteen (13. 860)

Canadien separatist party wins provincial elections in Quebec—promising another referendum on leaving the nation, but not whilst Trump remains in office. The internationally recognised government of Yemen claims gains in counteroffensive with the Houthis, retaking the port city of Mocha. Washington issues further warnings to foreign financial institutions doing business with Tehran, saying they may be subject to sanctions without notice. Garnering strong denouncement from the state’s governor, Trump intimates that Iran could “take out Los Angeles or San Diego,” maintaining that the pain at the pump is a small price to pay to ensure that the Islamic Republic never obtains a nuclear warhead. At the same rally in Nebraska, the American president brings auto-pen Natalie Harp on stage to sign an impromptu executive order rescinding the federal excise tax on so called red-dyed diesel and allowing any one to purchase it, whereas beforehand, it was the reserve for agriculture. Whilst this manoeuvre may temporarily lower prices by the 24¢ per gallon that government taxes, it does nothing to increase supply or address delivery shortfalls, and perhaps worse than doing nothing, it could create shortages for farmers who use the off-road formulation (it is normal fuel, just coloured to differentiate it from non-tax exempt sales and not at all related to that bizarre hoax a decade ago involving “red mercury” in hopes to extract the mythical substance from antique Singer sewing machines in hopes of miniaturising atomic weapons) during harvest season, stripping the Department of Transportation of revenue for highway maintenance and perhaps increasing prices overall with new demand pressure. Despite the weak US dollar, the euro looses value as contagion fears spread over the French bond market. IDF storms Bethlehem and demolishes homes in East Jerusalem.

synchronoptica

one year ago: US television networks decline request to pre-empt programming to carry a presidential speech from Ford (with synchronoptica) plus aura farming

two years ago: more adventures on the Mecklinburgischer Seeplate 

three years ago: touring the Mainschliefe plus island universes

four years ago: more research in the paranormal plus a 1975 McDonaldland mascot specification manual

five years ago: more streamlined designs,  a unique underpass plus a beloved Soviet cartoon character

 

six years ago: Trump emerges recovered from COVID, fascist nihilism, assorted links to revisit plus the first exoplanet confirmed (1995)

seven years ago: German-American Day

 

eight years ago: more fascist nihilism plus Carter debates Ford (1976)

 

day two hundred nine (13. 850)

According to Trump, European countries, at his bidding, agree to release a “massive amount” of diesel reserves as fuel prices continue to soar worldwide, the American president blaming Ukraine for the supply shortage. EU stockpiles dwarf those of the US (as do China’s) because the bloc requires members maintain a ninety-day emergency contingency, and the energy shock was blunted by Beijing’s decision to tap its reserves rather than buying on the open market and further tightening the stocks and driving up prices even further. The reasons behind this magnanimity remain unclear but EU should at minimum leverage their decision with a demand for ending tariffs or be consulted before casting the world into chaos—or perhaps it’s just like the potash from Belarus deal.  Houthi rebels clash with Yemeni forces in Sanaa as the struggle for control of the country escalates. Iraq is granted an exemption to US sanctions on Iranian air carriers and allowed to administer a limited number of flights between Najaf and Tehran. The supreme court of Israel unanimously overturns the earlier decision by the country’s central elections commission to exclude Arabic parties from the upcoming parliamentary vote.

day two hundred two (13. 830)

Tusk offers financial incentives to Trump to expand American military presence in Poland. Pezeshkian offers to dilute its stockpiles of enriched uranium and allow international inspectors into Iran if the US returns to the conditions of the MoU, Tehran presenting a seven-day roadmap to reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Clashes continue between the Saudis and Houthis. Israel bulldozes more villages in southern Lebanon. The US continues to mull an export ban on diesel fuel. German Bundestag agrees to cut fuel taxes.

day one hundred ninety-seven (13. 815)

Ukraine bombards Moscow with hundreds of drone strikes on the final day of its elections for the Duma, angered that ballots were sent to illegally annexed territories. It is day one thousand six hundred seventy for that conflict. Two weeks after AfD strong results in Saxon-Anhalt, Berlin and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern go to the polls with the chancellorship of Friedrich Merz hanging in the balance. Through Qatari and Pakistani mediators, Iranian security chief Mohsen Rezaei conveys its conditions for resuming talks with Washington (only for reopening the Strait of Hormuz), demands including the unfreezing of Iranian assets, lifting the naval blockade and an immediate end to fighting on all fronts, to include Lebanon. Saudi forces attempt to repel Houthi attacks on the capital. Tehran rebuffs claims by US treasury secretary Scott Bessent that the sanctions of Operation Economic Outcast are working and that Iranians are queuing for hours for petrol, calling his propaganda baseless lies and projection as American filling stations report shortages, all time high prices and airlines cut marginal domestic routes. Bucking concerns that accelerated deployment of the technology could kill us all, Trump pledges to create an “AI Force” and appoint an artificial intelligence czar, whilst also proposing to rename it Eloquent Intelligence.

ped-xing (13. 813)

Though strangely excluding the iconic Ampel-männchen of former East and West Germany that arguably started people noticing the difference and municipal and national varieties, we nonetheless enjoyed—via Kottke—this travelinlg exhibition of crosswalk signals, more or less comprehensive the world over series of exhibitions celebrating the lexicon of pedestrian traffic symbols—see previously. Are your environs represented? There are no waiting men, however. What are some of your favourites?

day one hundred ninety-six (13. 811)

Eleven percent of petrol stations in France have run out of fuel. The storage depot at the King Khalid International airport in Riyadh is in flames. Trump’s banishment of CNN and other news outlets is apparently linked to reporting that over-reliance on AI in military planning and picking targets (which resulted in the bombing of a school in Minab on the first day of the first day of the joint Israeli-US war of choice, killing one hundred fifty-six civilians, including one hundred twenty students) that nearly led to the American navy boarding a Chinese vessel in the Gulf, based off faulty intelligence that the ship was transporting equipment for a nuclear centrifuge. Trump again reminds the American public that price at the pump is a small one to pay to ensure that Tehran does not obtain a nuclear weapon as gas and diesel prices climb to new heights, the price not double than the already crippling cost because China tapped its reserves and curbed demand, for pragmatic reasons—and definitely not as a favour but perhaps as leverage, Xi scheduled to meet with the American president next week for a state dinner and trade talks. Cuba faces another nationwide blackout amid continued US blockade.

lütschetalsperre (13. 768)

Having to get the camper seen for its annual inspection, we decided to make a long weekend of it and returned to the Ilm district, near the workshop, and took a camping pitch on the Lütsche reservoir outside of the town of Frankenhain on the northern slope of the Thuringian Forest. On the way there, we stopped in Geratal and saw the memorial to the death march to Buchenwald from one of the three concentration camps in the area (see more)—again missing the garden gnome factory, maybe next time.

The water levels looked pretty low after the drought conditions of the summer but the reservoir was being slowly replenished and the surrounding woods seem to have survived successive heat waves, still we know that nature is under stress. Sustainably logged and protected since the first human settlements around the sixth century, the area has always had a thick cover of woods, the inhabitant at the edge of the Thüringer Wald primarily making a living from carpentry, resin, tapping, pitch production and escorting merchants and travellers through the rather dark and foreboding forest. The Stauseen (see above) were later additions with the development of industry and agricultural was only suitable for certain, limited areas of the basin.

Petrol and diesel is always more expensive on the Autobahn and we saw these prices at noon, the one time per day that German stations are allowed to raise prices since the start of the Iran war, but it was nonetheless pretty shocking, coinciding with learning that diesel prices in the States had hit an all time record, even surpassing the jump experienced when Russia invaded Ukraine. Thankfully, it was not a very long trip to this landscape that feels very different than home.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the second assassination attempt on Gerald Ford (with synchronoptica), a mad-lib style search engine comparison plus comics captions swaps

two years ago: America begins its bicentennial celebrations, coordination problems plus Trump announces the Department of Government Efficiency  

three years ago: assorted links to revisit 

four years ago: Tainted Love (1981) plus more links to enjoy

five years ago: DW Griffith’s Intolerance (1916),  European coats-of-arms mapped plus The Muppet Show (1976)

six years ago: the Gotthard Tunnel opens (1980) 

9x9 (13. 766)

tokyo drift: where potential car owners have to show proof to the dealership of a place to park before purchase, Japanese architects carve automobile shaped voids in urban houses 

trickle down economics: diesel prices hit a record high in the US  

pew pew: laser-washing gives jeans a broken-in look  

mo6: Finnish company introduces carbon-negative building material produced from waste lignin from the timber industry  

tasting notes: visualisations and maps of coffee origins  

ceramic dalmatian: the Wheel of Fortune consolation prize added to the History of America in 100 Objects speaks to the evolution of the game show format and our collective aspirations  

a modified neublon-b escort frigate: Lucas Museum of Narrative Art opens in Los Angeles—see also  

newman’s own didn’t drop a these colours don’t run salad dressing: the attempt to rename Lake Ontario is a dumb distraction but with sinister, Orwellian undertones no matter how pathetic  

handmade utopia: the architecture of the back-to-the-land movement of Northern California of the 1960s and 1970s

synchronoptica

one year ago: linking celebrities across time and space (with synchronoptica) plus assorted links worth the revisit

two years ago: more links to enjoy

three years ago: Kenneth Anger’s first film plus hot labour summer

four years ago: the reservoirs of Saalfeld 

five years ago: AI generated movie posters, less and more of the old weird web, Space 1999,  a bluesy rendition of the Seinfeld theme, the Goethe-Schiller monument plus another MST3K classic

six years ago: Trump undermining public confidence in elections 

9x9 (13. 633)

scrubbed launch: SpaceX has lost over a trillion dollars since its initial public offering on 12 June  

off-sides: the extensive rules and regulations governing tournaments in the Middle Ages—via Strange Company  

outside the far side: a short biography of comic creator Gary Larson—see previously 

two birds, one stone: alkaline thermal treatment of plastic waste produces high purity hydrogen as a fuel source 

memento: how memories and stored in the brain and how retrieval alters them  

street view: gorgeous photologs of San Diego in the 1970s plus more about this municipal mapping method  

the king’s great fortune: a fairy tale written in classic style with contemporary resonance 

from the chinagate hoax department: documents Trump ordered declassified to demonstrate meddling from Beijing cost him the 2020 presidential race show instead that Moscow was championing his re-election  

vikram-1: India’s first private rocket reaches low Earth orbit and deploys a satellite

accessibility settings (13. 524)

Via Boing Boing, we learn that the operating system for iPhones have had a feature for a couple of years now called Vehicle Motion Cues that makes it more comfortable for a car passenger and potentially lessens the effects of motion sickness from staring at one’s phone by taking readings from the device’s gyroscope and accelerometer and placing flecks on the edge of the screen that harmonises with the motions of the automobile. When I am the passenger seat, lately, I am usually too enamoured with the passing scenery to even glance at my phone, but the author, whom road-tested it during an extended excursion—a working-vacation, swears by the magic dots and it could offer some relief (see also) during a bus ride or for a moment’s research and consultation, when I can feel the nausea creeping up trying to focus on one thing for too long.  Motion sickness comes about when our own gyroscope, the inner ear, detects that we are moving but the eyes, fixed on something static, presents a contradiction.

z—is for zoning that marks off the land, so that homes, schools and factories are properly planned (13. 374)

With an energy and outreach similar to India’s census for the people, via Boing Boing, we are directed towards this rhyming abecedary produced by the Committee on City Planning (in full here) in 1937 under the mayorship of Fiorello La Guardia (previously)seizing an opportunity to educate in youngest residents in the field of civil engineering and instil the concept of considered regulations on maintaining the metropolis. Some of the entries reflect a certain agenda, foreshadowing NIMBYism and getting rid of the elevated trains in favour of expanding the subway and promoting municipal markets over street food vendors.

7x7 (13. 311)

jack-in-the-box: a list of restaurant franchises nominatively housed in unusual structures by order of appeal of the dining experience in said edifice 

: – ): this generation will never the struggle of emoticons—see previously  

smelting operations: with the world’s supply of aluminium stuck in the Persian Gulf and major production facilities disabled, automakers are cutting production of electric cars 

fallout boy: Trump’s East Wing ballroom to act as shed atop of a war-graded military bunker  

fahr’n, fahr’n, fahr’n auf der autobahn: Kraftwerk’s pioneering electronic music masterpiece in full—see previously  

as slow as possible: Pippin Bar assesses attention span with meditative remakes of classic arcade games—via Waxy  

smoke ‘em if you got ‘em: startups hope to put biometric age-verification technology in flavoured vape cartridges

day twenty-five (13. 289)

Despite counterclaims that there has been no dialogue between Tehran and Washington since the outbreak of the war, Trump insisted on multiple occasions that he has talked with Iranian leadership—no, not the Supreme Leader but someone very high up—and they are making progress towards a deal. Pakistani (engaged in its own battle with Afghanistan) and Egyptian diplomats have acting as intermediaries, and whilst attacks continue by the US on Iranian military targets, Trump has relented on his original threat to destroy energy infrastructure if the Strait of Hormuz was not reopened within forty-eight hours, extending the deadline for five days, Iran calling him out for spreading fake news to manipulate oil and financial markets. Israel has launched widespread bombardment of Iran and southern Lebanon, announcing plans to occupy the security zone up to the Litani river. Slovenia begins fuel rationing as Vietnam slashes domestic flights and New Zealand introduces a stipend to make petrol more affordable. 

synchronoptica

one year ago: pioneering moments in rocketry (with synchronopticæ), Trump sends a delegation to Greenland plus assorted links to revisit

twelve years ago: gustatory hallucinations 

thirteen years ago: the pineal gland plus the Dutch East India Company

fourteen years ago: patio plants 

fifteen years ago: Japan rebuilds plus narcissism and social media

sixteen years ago: social safety nets for the US plus zoo babies

seventeen years ago: moving house and home 

general directions (13. 156)

Via the weekend links of { feuilleton }, we enjoyed this profile of Margaret Calvert whose work in graphic design and typology brought together road signage in the UK under a standard for uniformity and visibility still in use today, in Britain and beyond. Her pictograms and eponymous typeface, the slab-serif Transport font, the result of a survey that reformed protocols more in line with European conventions with the expansion of expressways, shifting away from traditional fingerposts are used not only for motorways, the rail system, airports and for warning of potential hazards, the farm animal caution based on a cow called Patience Calvert recalled from her childhood and the wildlife iconography inspired by Eadweard Muybridge’s studies of animals in motion. More from the Guardian interview at the link above.

autobiography (13. 120)

Courtesy of Public Domain Review, we enjoyed this propaganda piece touted by the overseas film unit of the US Office of War Information, released in 1943—two years after the vehicle’s public debut—which was not only addressing an audience of soldiers and patriots as the all-terrain concept that will defeat America’s enemies, but also consumers for the eventual surplus market, narrated from the Jeep’s perspective as a radical, utilitarian departure from the normal decadence of most domestic models by Irving Lerner, soon hereafter blacklisted as a left-wing filmmaker with allegations of espionage for the Soviets for displaying over-interest in the Manhattan Project which he was commissioned to document, although later rehabilitated with posthumous credits for Spartacus, Steppenwolf and Executive Action. Accompanied by his friend the American GI and featuring cameos by Desi Arnaz and the Queen Mother, Wendell Willkie and FDR, the Jeep mentions he comes from a highly developed country with many roads and cars and how pre-war plans for expansion of highways were sacrificed for the effort, finally given a field exam crossing deserts and fording rivers.

*     *     *     *      *

synchronoptica

one year ago: Yellow Submarine Crocs (with synchronopticæ), the Church commission plus a lean large language model

twelve years ago: a stolen relic of John Paul II 

thirteen years ago: guesthouse signage 

fourteen years ago: artificial sweetener plus Der Zauberberg and Davos

sixteen years ago: old thing—undesirable; new thing—desirable 

bespoke commissions (13. 092)

Corresponding with the aesthetic of McMansion Hell or the yachting-set, we are directed to these custom models put out by Rolls Royce recently that indulge every whim of those who can afford conveyance in excess of a half a million above and beyond their standard luxury appointments gleaned from the errant news alerts and newsletters from a former automotive journalist’s mailing list. The individuals clients are not clients are not named and don’t need to be as all their conspicuous ostentation is on display and illustrates the uncanny valley of human experience that the rich find themselves in—adoring one’s pets is universal so is embracing one’s hobbies or expressing one’s favourite colours but its as if this hyperbole, achievable by much less costly means (the dog certainly doesn’t know the difference) is as if an alien or AI tried to understand these qualities and way over did it. Much more from Victoria Scott—including a gamer edition that compelled her to write the article (I drive a Rolls-Royce because it’s good for my voice) at the link above.

motor city agate (12. 721)

Recalling a recent look at the much accelerated process of synthetic geology, we quite enjoyed this introduction to this gem of industrial inefficiency (which illustrates how the push for optimisation comes at a cost, though waste and pollution is to be avoid, the drag and misalignment that meant non-targeted ads for everyone was what enabled journalism and broadcast entertainment in the first place—which are no longer free and still serve commercials and designed obsolescence and the inability to repair and upgrade over replacing) that by dent of its relative scarcity and specific epoch has become one of the most appealing media for jewellery makers. Technically a cabochon, from the French to distinguish a stone that is not cut and faceted but rather shaped and polished, the agate was the byproduct of applying enamel coats to automobiles by hand, with overspray accumulating in paint bays and the layers of slag, ages within epochs, particularly from the late 1960s and early 1970s, when “high impact” colours were in fashion, have become highly sought after. Changes in bodywork by the 1980s saw the adoption of electrostatic painting, basically magnetising the enamel to the chassis, meant the end of this era.

10x10 (12. 639)

we don’t serve their kind here: “clanker” from the Star Wars franchise has become a universal slur for robots 

jeanine, you’ve changed: a thread about how a consultancy firm in 1987 was responsible for making late 80s and 90s cartoon characters bland and unanimated—via Super Punch 

retrospective: an interview with photographer Dennis Morris whose expansive portfolio of music royalty and documentation of the East End offer a correspondence and symmetry  

do you take this burger to be your dinner: the return after a long hiatus shows that King of the Hill was always about food 

regolith: former reality TV star, Fox News anchor and acting NASA administrator (plus also US Secretary of Transportation) announces the acceleration of the building of a lunar nuclear reactor, as well as freeing commercial drones from line-of-sight supervisor requirements 

ásatrúarfélagið: the resurgence of Norse paganism in Iceland 

bakeneko: superstition and myth regarding cats in Japanese culture—via Nag on the Lake and Everlasting Blört—see previously, see also 

hamburger royal ts: some facts about the McDonald’s Quarter-Pounder  

just another way to claim our attention, so that beautiful certainty we had starts to fade: set in 1984 California during Ronald Reagan’s reelection campaign, the critically polarising 1990 Vineland by Thomas Pynchon (previously) speaks to the present 

flivverboob: a 1922 slur for a careless driver that didn’t not seem to catch on