escalator to nowhere

Having gleaned no lessons learned from other municipalities like Berlin and Barcelona—not to mention the panoply of remorseful cities in the US—who count their decision to open up their thoroughfares among their biggest miscalculations, this week Wiesbaden allowed the installation of e-scooter stations that one can rent via a smartphone platform and abandon anywhere.  It’s not so much the question of liability and the potential for bodily harm to the operator and cross-traffic that bothers me so much but rather the gimmickry of it all, the luring away of people content to walk and take mass-transit otherwise and the greenwashing that belies the considerable infrastructure and how very smart people are lapping it up. “Well sir, there’s nothing on Earth like a genuine, bonafide, electrified six-car monorail. What’d I say?” That’s one way I suppose to get your town on the map.

8x8

contemporary scolds: take this quiz and guess whether writers’ are complaining about e-scooters or new-fangled velocipedes

art house cinema: a look at some of the experimental documentaries that defined Icarus Films

dabangs: South Korean “stress cafés” are a revival of an older tradition supplanted by the invasion of Western chains

anatomy of the ai: a smart speaker depicted as an anatomical chart intersected by natural resources, data and human labour by Kate Crawford and Vladan Joler

tunteet: a large Finnish research project to identify, classify and map the range of human feelings

slithery sam: the life and work of printmaker, illustrator and upholsterer Enid Marx

a soft murmur: adjustable background noise for any occasion, via Dave Log 3.0

lenticular lens: this thousand piece jigsaw puzzle changes colours depending on the viewers’ angle—via Kottke’s Quick Links  

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revamp: the classic Vespa (previously) reincarnated as an electric vehicle whose dash console is one’s mobile phone, via the always splendid Nag on the Lake

white noise: a multimedia appreciation of the pioneering electronic composer and sound archivist Delia Derbyshire, who also created the opening theme music for Doctor Who

peafowl: an Australian community is divided over whether the urbanised birds are a nuisance or nice to have around

electroconvulsive shock: a FOIA filing includes an unexpected manual on the use of “psycho-electronic weapons,” via Boing Boing

exonym: in order to disburden itself of its past as a British colony—and possibly reduce confusion with Switzerland—Swaziland will return to its precolonial identity of eSwatini 

flóttamaður: still at large, the suspected ring leader behind the mass theft of computers for bitcoin mining in Iceland escapes prison and flees to Sweden on the same flight that carried the Prime Minister

a state in new england: making the Massachusetts oath of office more concise and assorted other constitutional conventions

subliminal education: an educational material publishing house (previously) conducted a massive experiment in classrooms across the US to test the efficacy of its new material without disclosing the “interventions” (previously) to any of the unwitting students and teachers, via Marginal Revolution

droide astromeccanico

From the Italian word for a jaunty saunter, Gita the cargo droid from the company Piaggio (famous for their Vespas—that is, wasps in italiano and Popemobiles) meant to accompany humans on errands and help bare burdens that are two heavy or awkward to convey otherwise.
Designed with the goal that it should be able to carry a case of wine—and leave it’s human’s hands free for other things, Gita is self-navigating and can avoid obstacles and balance a load of up to twenty kilogrammes and seems to be a disruptor somewhere in a happy medium between (segue to) Segways and unaccompanied delivery robots and drones, which have both earned derision. Visit the links above for a demonstration and to learn more.

italy week: backseat driver

Though I am sure my perspective as just a passenger was quite different, driving in urban Italy was certainly a challenging and formative experience.
We have visited other parts of the country before but had not yet been confronted with the swarms of Vespas zipping pass on both sides and the fact that although lanes were clearly marked, there was no customary lane usage.  Somehow it all worked and we are certainly not ones to buck the system and impose an order to perceived chaos or road-anarchy.  I guess the biggest huddle to overcome was the change in attentiveness and reaction—certainly it is difficult to forecast ones next move but it was easier in the end to relinquish trying to make a prediction.

Also, those mopeds deftly negotiating are not wanting or expecting special accommodations—and to try to yield to them would be a unwelcome kindness, with more potential to cause an accident.  I found these traffic sign decals by a Florentine graffiti artist profiled on-line some time ago and was pleased to see in person that some of the clever additions still remain.  I can appreciate the humour and message even more now.

droide astromeccanico