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Via Boing Boing, we are directed towards a mysterious, little used symbol on the Miscellaneous Technical block of Unicode known variously as Right Angle Downward Zig-Zag Arrow or by the name of an apocryphal (not on our demonic calendar but nonetheless can be summoned with an & into HTML) infernal earl called Angzarr, and going down this rabbit hole to find out more about the character (see previously) reveals a lot about the origins of typesetting, coding and what artefacts and skeuomorphs get preserved. No definitive answer is yielded up yet the value is all in the journey and of course one can—like with a suite of emoji—assign it a meaning. To me the sigil looks like a representation of three-dimensional axes and an easy way to convey depth. What do you think?

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mutually intelligible: interlocutors with no common language gravely overestimate the success of their getting the message across 

let’s have church: mystery artist of gospel album covers—via Nag on the Lake  

partygate: Prime Minister and cabinet members fined for violating lockdown protocols 

toto, i have a feeling we’re not in kansas anymore: watch an Iowa television station transition from monochrome to living colour  

coin-op: a comprehensive look at Gachapon (ガチャポン) across Japan  

1-bit: summon demons with this slightly racy tarot reading  

light verb variation: why some people make decisions and others take them

uzay yolu

Somewhat familiar with the adaptation known as Turkish Star Wars, we enjoyed the introduction to its counterpart in the Star Trek universe, which though unauthorised and non-canonical was a forerunner to any feature length treatment of the franchise by a good six years before any sanctioned production could debut. With the plot lifted from episodes of “I, Mudd,” “The Man Trap,” “Arena,” “Amok Time” and “What Are Little Girls Made Of?,” the hapless tourist Ömer is beamed up and inserted into the action mise-en-scène when Doctor McCoy is visiting an old girlfriend—Nancy—who in actuality is a murderous shape-shifter yearning after salt. The away-mission segments were filmed at the ruins of Ephesus.

tryzub

Officially adopted by the Rada after independence and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1992 and with historical precedence going back to the Ukrainian People’s Republic of 1918 and in the historic seals and brands (tamga, 𐱃𐰢𐰍𐰀, from the Old Turkic to mark the property of nomadic peoples—see also) of the Rurikid rulers of the Kyivan Rus, the country’s coat of arms, the Emblem of the Royal State of Volodymyr the Great, is described as a “trident” of gold (Тризуб) on an azure shield but likely was intended to represent the Trinity in the form of a stylised gyrfalcon (like this one from outside of St Petersburg connected to an eighth century Viking trading outpost on Lake Lagoda at the other extreme of the Rus’), consistent with the iconography associated with the Scandinavian extraction of the ruling dynasty.

facial recognition

Via Super Punch, we learn that one unique gashapon in Tokyo’s busy Shinjuku station is proving quite popular with commuters for vending capsules with the ID photos of strangers (though ostensibly fellow passengers) over the chance to connect on whatever social level with the crowd, unmasked. Those behind the concept are poised to launch the next series with people submitting their pictures to be added to the anonymous mix.

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improper fraction arena: Via friend of the blog Nag on the Lake’s superb Sunday Links and the depths of Wikipedia comes a list of articles submitted and ultimately rejected by dint of insanity  

possible to express in words: a useful term with a surprisingly sparse corpora 

reprise: another look at Davie Bowie’s 1973 The 1980 Floor Show through some raw footage—see previously 

a moveable feast: a look at the mode, median and mean dates for Easter and the method of computus  

a kitty bobo show: Kevin Kaliher’s pilot that went ungreen-lit in favour of Kids Next Door  

micromachines: researchers developing tiny molecular motors that could be deployed en masse to suck carbon from the air, supplement our own organs—via Slashdot  

did you know: from the depths to the Main Page

doctor tongue’s 3d house of pancakes

On this day in 1953, the American period horror film directed by André De Toth and starring Vincent Price (previously) as a disfigured sculptor who resolves to repopulate his destroyed wax-museum with murdered townsfolk coated in paraffin on display, House of Wax, had its premiere opening in New York City before general release on 25 April. Whilst Colombia pictures’ noir remake of Ralph Bellamy’s The Man Who Lived Twice, Man in the Dark was the first studio 3D release, albeit in black and white, bet this film by two days, this was the first major production company colour-presentation with stereophonic sound that could be screened in regular theatres (the independent Bwana Devil—which had packed audiences in cinemas in 3D glasses—preceded both by a few months and the success caught off guard). Also starting Phyllis Kirk, Dabbs Greer and Charles Bronson, the film featured some clever and startling foreground effects despite the irony of the director being unable to perceive depth himself due to blindness in one eye caused by an accident as an adolescent and wore a balck eyepatch for the rest of his life.

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r/place: Josh Wardle’s (previously) first viral success with this collaborative subreddit  

modern screen: an annotated read along of a February 1961 celebrity magazine  

hey hey, rise up: Pink Floyd reunites to support Ukraine  

see you later, percolator: a gallery of vintage, commercial coffee makers  

spotifictional: a streaming back-catalogue of bands from television and the movies 

cheese heist: dairy crime-rings around the world—see also  

scratchcard lanyard: a song from Dry Cleaning 

explordle: guess the global cities as webcam images flit by—via Web Curios