valkyrie or learning-curve

Here is another interesting find from the vintage science fiction archives of Project Gutenberg, which presents an eerily modern commentary on drones and action-at- a-distance, the short story from 1953 called “Watchbird” by Robert Sheckley. All these ebooks are available at no cost in a variety of formats, including epub for viewing on iPads. The images are taken from BLDGBLOG’s latest discovery of expansive bird’s eye view eye-charts, laid out in remote areas of US testing grounds (rediscovered via satellite maps) used to calibrate spy cameras dispatched on weather balloons from that same era.

Such test-pattern topology probably is not necessary for autonomous UAVs whose sharp sensors and acuity have become sort of a moral unto themselves, and that’s exactly the quandary that Sheckley’s prescient tale addresses, in a future-present where we’ve released judge, jury and executioner as stand-alone extensions of law-enforcement.

kiosk oder sehen, staunen, verstehen

There is a thoroughly enjoyable interstitial daily program, between talk-shows, the news and prime-time, on German television called Galileo that covers popular science, history and culture. There was a fun segment the other day, which prompted me to explore their internet presence and find that old, complete episodes are available to watch on-line with added profiles and references (one has to browse through the entire show to find a particular story but that’s OK and the commercials are entertaining as well).
The report canvassed Germany in search of its most unique Automats—discovering them in formats ranging from vintage photo-booths rescued, lovingly restored, and then installed by a pair of entrepreneurs in niches all over Berlin, including building lobbies—these simple and classic contraptions, which are not for passport-quality pictures, are proving wildly popular despite the fact that anyone with almost anything can take polished digital photos and make an omni-chronicle—to an out of the way coin-operated dispenser that a dairy farmer built that delivers fresh milk directly from a cow, robotically milked, to a promotional Automat in Köln’s train station that, in exchange for a good imitation of a cat’s meow, gives out a free sample of cat food. What sort of automated service would you invent? What convenience ideas from the past would you revive?

news round-up or won’t somebody think of the children

There has been a strange colluding focus in the reports towards the waning of the week with a somewhat strange commonality.

First, revelations that horse meat is being dished up in processed foods, albeit in frozen bricks of lasagna that seem a bit suspect to begin with, is sparking mass-hysteria among consumers, primarily because said horse meat was not on offer and some are a bit discriminatory, finicky about what animal they are eating. I think it’s perfect that the scandal coincided with the beginning of Lent and might make people rethink the importance of giving something up, a commitment that has lost a little bit of currency. The attendant panic, and more so in regions where horse is on offer and is husbanded and butchered quite differently than horses not meant for human consumption (as opposed to race horses and dray horses), concerns steroids and doping substances ingratiating themselves in the human food chain. Never mind that that’s already happened with all other livestock with antibiotics and the run-off from human over-medication that’s leeching into the environment from our sewers. The EU is forming a new task force to address these issues, and with more fell severity and forensic certitude than the mysterious food-poisoning cases of two summers ago.

The other strange headline was of course the meteorite that exploded over a populated area in the Ural mountains. That’s a pretty spectacular occurrence though its unfortunate that people were hurt and property damaged but surely something to remember. When I first half-attended to the story on the radio, I thought maybe it was the anniversary or new research into the Tunguska explosion in 1908 (though half a world away from the Urals) that perpetrated by a meteorite some a twenty times as big and leveled forests. The political reflex was to placate the shocked by pledge to protect the public from the threat of such impacts, which while it is possibly feasible to shield against something as big as the asteroid close to passing the orbits of Earth’s most high-flying artificial satellites (which supposedly had nothing to do with the impact but gravity has a far-reaching influence) could not provide an umbrella again every shooting-star.

eros, agape, xenia, storge, philia

civics lesson or universal sufferage

Along with the other city-state of Bremen and Brandenburg, surrounding Berlin but not the federal city itself, young people in Hamburg now reach the age of voting majority for state and local matters at the age of sixteen. Sharing responsibility and direction is of course not without precedent and probably the most opportune time for engagement, when outreach and not inculcation or unlearning the habits and attitudes of parents is the best antidote against feeling either in-between or later jaded and disenfranchised.  I hope that this trend sees wider adoption.