7x7 (10. 195)

also sprach zarathustra: Raquel Welch dances to a disco-funk version of the Strauss classic 

information overload: a survey of pictorial statistics’ evolution to the infographic  

great chain of being: Evard d’Espinque illustrates the fifteenth century De Proprietatibus Rerum 

this lady is for turning: after precipitating markets instability and provoking decent from within the party, the Prime Minister and Chancellor walk back unfunded tax cuts for the rich  

fancy dress party: Jane Asher’s book of costumes  

search engine: glean answers to queries from passages in literature, conversation rather than Google Search—via Swiss Miss  

phone a friend: 1-900 hotlines in the United States 

daisy, daisy—give me your answer, do: witnessing a demonstration of the IBM 704 in 1961 inspired Arthur C Clarke

8x8 (10. 187)

vendedores ambulantes: the sonic landscape and signature cries (see also) of the street vendors of Ciudad de México—via tmn  

from erdapfel to equator: a globemaker’s glossary of cartographic terms—via the Map Room  

queenhithe: photographer Frank Merton captures London’s churches in the mid-1950s  

anti-cyclone: a proposal to tow a barge laden with jet engines blasting to dissipate the strength of an oncoming hurricane  

hyla orientalis: black tree frogs in Chernobyl demonstrate evolution in real time—via Slashdot 

blogoversary: a belated congratulations to Diamond Geezer on twenty years of posting   

the feral atlas: a journey of discovery and triangulation through our made environments from Stanford University and via Web Curios  

tlaltecuhtli: the iconography of the Aztec pantheon

<…> (10. 178)

Initial specifications first published on this day in 1980 by Xerox in association with Intel and the Digital Equipment Corporation (standardised by the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers, IEEE, in 1983), Ethernet technologies are based on a shared medium of communications, similar to the common platform of radio systems and takes its name from the disproven proposal of a luminiferous aether as an omnipresent, subtle and rarefied propagator (see also) of electromagnetic waves and enabled the first collaborative networks of computers.

don’t surround yourself with your self—move on back two squares (10. 171)

As belated blogoversary tribute to fellow internet-caretaker the Everlasting Blört, we wanted to remark on one of the rotating interstitials on their page, “for the Queen to use,” that never fails to prompt us to hum the Yes song or at least the diddit, diddit, diddit, diddit, diddit, didda part. The progressive rock number that was first put out in 1971 and included on several later albums consists of two movements, “Your Move” followed by “All Good People,” played as a single seven-minute track. Utilising chess as allegory for negotiating relationship, the song also makes reference to John Lennon lyrics. Here’s to many, many more years of blogging.

ticker and crawl (10. 161)

 Via Web Curios, we are directed to a rather dangerous aggregator and infinitely scrolling, constantly updating feed of the internet—at least a portion thereof, in real time. Aesthetic (as the input allows) and intuitive, it displays three shifting columns, one each devoted to images, missives and statistics and draws from a range of sources including Wikipedia edits, police dossiers, the socials, trending topics and searches and the news. Here are a couple of screen-grabs—we wonder if their might not be a way to make this a plug-in that one can customise and add to one’s website. 

 

the followers (10. 147)

Via the morning news, we discover that artist Dries Depoorter has triangulated the open surveillance of public spaces and a respectable social media viewership with the help of artificial intelligence to match poses in front of a range of landmarks with their sidling up to it and perfecting their casual-seeming pose. Confounding this perfectly staged moment with the apparent necessity of monitoring share-worthy sites speaks volumes to our definition and expectation of privacy tempered by desire for curation and what it is like to be spotted, caught.

7x7 (10. 136)

ernie-vilg: Baidu enters text-to-image generating AI—reinforces government censorship  

kusugibashi: a rebuilt bridge washed away in 2018 combines traditional carpentry (see also) with computational design technology  

naysayer: exocentric verb-noun compound agents 

if you give a bot a cookie: pop ups are ruining the internet experience—see also—outside of walled gardens, via Digg  

we’re making earth our only shareholder: founder of Patagonia gives his billion-dollar company away to combat the climate emergency 

bademaschinen: floating saunas for Oslo harbor—see also   

nervous laughter: researchers hope to deliver more natural human-robot conversations

8x8 (10. 124)

the girl from ipanema: the Yahoo! GeoCities (previously) Midi project has gathered a collection of over one-hundred and fifty thousand chiptunes, via Web Curios  

summer island: a graphic horror novella that’s a collaboration between a story authored by a human and illustrations courtesy a machine 

bill-of-sale: receipts and letterhead of the Old East End  

null island: the imaginary location at the intersection of the Equator and Prime Meridian (see previously) that exists by necessity  

premium vector: a selection of 90s cursor effects (trails, rainbows) that can be incorporated into one’s website—via ibīdem  

trichromacy: fascinating etymologies of words for colours—via Damn Interesting’s Curated Links  

b-poty: avian photography of the year  

pattern recognition: more on mondegreens and misheard lyrics

6x6 (10. 117)

command authorisation code: the timing of the Artemis (previously) launch hinges in part due to its self-destruct system  

best in show: an painting generated by an algorithm won first prize in a competition at a state fair, prompting philosophical questions  

greenday moment: instead of tearing down those out of the loop, bring them up to speed  

cauldron computing: researchers propose liquid crystal machine whose calculations move like ripples through water 

$ape: two American states introduce legislation to tax NFTs  

speculoos: researchers at the University of Liège discover (see previously) discover two Super-Earths

8x8 (10. 095)

clippit: a biography of the MicroSoft Office virtual assistant  

banana for scale: megalophobia-inducing images to make you as a human feel small and insignificant  

scotty, bones and chekov: Tom Snyder (previously) interviews Star Trek personalities during a 1976 convention 

flagship store: fashion brand Gucci opens up in Detroit—via Nag on the Lake  

pillow-talk: the history of bundling, the sixteenth and seventeenth custom of allowing pre-martial sleeping arrangements—via Messy Nessy Chic 

sabbatical: oh no—after seventeen years Futility Closet is taking a hiatus—see also  

it’s a reference to don quixote: a selection of literary nods from They Might Be Giants—see previously  

book it: incentivising reading with pizza

pandora’s box (10. 090)

Finally getting some lab time with Open AI (previously), Andy Baio of Waxy shares some of his first impression as he came to the realisation that the apparent virtuosity isn’t just a parlour trick but the unnerving, new uncanniness that comes with the wholesale laundering of the canon of human illustration and creativity—a genie that cannot be put back in the bottle. In addition to the ease of conjuring up any number libellous scenarios and the fraught, inadequate legal framework to address intellectual rights and licensing disputes. Though perhaps not the embodiment of the quandary and more of the magic remixing that make the platform so compelling and conflicted, but we were quite taken with the response to these prompts of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater and Pizza Hut and the highly specific, not disappointing “two slugs in wedding attire getting married, stunning editorial photo for bridal magazine shot at golden hour.”  See a whole gallery of images at Waxy at the link up top.

7x7 (10.082)

the traffic cone preservation society: a venerable and conserved web artefact—see also—via Weird Universe  

red light, green light: authorities in China are not changing traffic-control scheme despite rumours to the contrary 

harmonices mundi: listening to Johannes Kepler’s music of the spheres—see previously  

wagahai wa neku de aru: selected sayings about cats and dogs in Japan  

45°, 90°, 180°: after more than half a century, Michael Heizer’s lost desert city is complete  

perfect impasto: ongoing research into Rembrandt’s Night Watch—see previously  

happy belated blogoversary: Miss Cellania turns seventeen

wish you weren’t here (10. 079)

Via Things Magazine, we are directed to a quite repulsive, compelling masters thesis from Natacha de Mahieu on overtourism that explores not only the growing chasm between social media and reality but about the performative instincts that have emerged as the leading edge of sharing society like a prisoner’s dilemma especially when we think that no one is watching, aptly titled Theatre of Authenticity. This representative image of the lone national park in Portugal, Peneda-Gerês, properly radicalises me as we together use these composite photos taken over the course of an hour help us reconcile and resolve our own conflicts over travel and picture-taking and quite as the most jarring staging and unreality of nature’s quiet spots but rather for its backstory, de Mahie relating that she had to rig up her camera to take this shot remotely since otherwise people would politely stand out of frame to allow her to take her perfect souvenir. What do you think? Have you experienced such disconnect and struggle to create the illusion of leisure and discovery? I can understand the urge to want to see, experience something pristine before it’s all lost to our bad stewardship of the planet and feel some sympathy for those vying for one last pose. Much more at the links above.

happy blogoversary: we are fourteen years old today (10. 061)

As PfRC passes this milestone, we want to once again extend our gratitude to our readership for your encouragement and sustaining interest and as well to our fellow chroniclers and internet caretakers. We hope that we’ve given you all something to pique your curiosity and aspire to keep the internet engaging, weird and old school. 

Since our last celebration, here are the most popular posts (measured by traffic): 

10: A 1969 series of record albums from celebrity astrologer Carroll Righter 

9: A post on expressing large numbers in Cyrillic script  

8: A 2021 post on World Aids Day and other on-going pandemics 

7: A 2013 post eulogising the weird old web  

6: top Japanese laundrette designs of 2019  

5: Once again—the seat of power shifts from Rome to Constantinople  

 4: Another perennial favourite, Martha Gellhorn from Art for Housewives  

3: Not another COVID conspiracy 

2: An unsolved UNICODE mystery 

1: A picture of photographic solidarity 

Warm greetings and salutations to all of you and wishing you nothing but the best for the balance of 2022.

7x7 (10. 046)

chorizo: prominent French scientists apologies after posting a sausage slice and claiming it was an image from the JWST—via the always excellent Everlasting Blört 

gall stereographic projection: D’Arcy Thompson’s mathematical transformations and correspondent biological speciation—see also 

chapel of sound: otherworldliness of a monolithic amphitheatre with views of the Great Wall accentuated with a film short that evokes the landscape of Prometheus (see also)  

a bridge too far: there are no crossing over the Amazon—via the New Shelton wet/dry (at a new home at the New Inquiry)  

casino clock: a flip-face time-keeper sourced from a card deck  

scenic route: a navigation device that emphasises fun and adventure—via Swiss Miss  

when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie: the Solar System rendered as food items (with the help of Midjourney—Mercury as a cookie looks a lot like the Disc of Nebra)—via Super Punch

6x6 (10. 043)

blue plaque special: a curation of the City of London’s Blue Plaque scheme—via Nag on the Lake (see also)  

harry potter and the chamber of narcissism: McMansion Hell (previously) show a yassified property in the Atlanta suburbs  

warwolf: a closer look at Edward I’s siege machine—via Strange Company 

i² = -1: the fundamental realness of imaginary numbers 

pferd is the word: some AI-generated horse-hybrids from Janelle Shane (previously)  

delft on a shelf: a house on Fournier Street with some animated tiles

7x7 (9. 999)

featherbase: a consortium of ornithologists join their collections and make them freely accessible on-line—via Web Curios 

cut-up technique: Artbreeder (previously) creates collages with your help—via Waxy 

harry and the hitman: Oklahoma man pleads self-defence, claiming potential assailant had summoned a Bigfoot to kill him  

deep scatter library: stellar cartography mapping a billion stars in the Milky Way  

culmen > columna > compagna colonnella > coronnel > colonel: explore etymologies with this interactive tool from the creators of Interlinear Books and Language Hat  

unsleeved: an exhibit on the art of the record cover and designer Alex Steinweiss 

trainspotting: an obsessive database of European rolling stock—also via Web Curios

numb & spicy hot pot

Via our peripatetic friends Messy Nessy Chic and Present /&/ Correct, we are introduced to a world of flavours in these Lays potato chips attuned to local tastes and palettes. Whilst not really a crisp person and generally a little repulsed by the anticipation of the diminishing returns and remorse of processed savours, I would stake my snacking reputation, untasted, on some of these combinations, like Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup, Vintage Cheddar & Caramelised Onion, Yogurt & Herbs from Jordan or Seasoned Seaweed plus fifty-five other varieties available in Thailand—each regaled with a haiku.

9x9

web revival: rediscovering the serendipity of hyperlink daisy chains—via Joe Jenett  

free-range children: relocating from London, Ontario to Amsterdam  

sure-footed: a goat-like heavy-lifting robot called BEX under development—via Super Punch 

lavender fields of surrey: a seasonal stroll through an aromatic patch of land  

mono men: the Punk, Grunge aesthetic of Art Chantry 

hyakutsuki-in: a beautiful locker-style cemetery in Toyko  

hounds of love: a 1992 interview with Kate Bush (previously), breaking down her 1985 album track by track  

sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment: an enigmatic sign spotted on a nike trail 

jacob hive maker: first streaming film Wax; Or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees (1991)

7x7

null island: errant data lands at this imaginary place at the intersection of the equator and the prime meridian (see also)

miscellany № 95: assorted links from Shady Characters, including some emoji code for illicit drugs  

fairlight synths: Kate Bush rediscovered by new audiences with her 1985 hit “Running Up That Hill”—previously  

mullet sneakers: for mental health 

¶ the encyclopedia of light is a curious mode of escape:the strike-through as a form of shadow writing, contextual undoing  

linkroll: your friendly reminder to pay a visit to the cabinet of hypertext curiosities of the illustrious Mx van Hoorn—previously 

terra nullus: a tour of ten off-limits places