vereinte dienstleistungswerkschaft (10. 623)

Established on this day in 2001 as a merger of the congresses of five individual trade unions—with a membership of around two million workers, including postal, banking, insurance, health, education, public service, media and transportation sector employees, Verdi represents the professional interests of its members and successfully lobbies—through political clout, collective bargaining and strike actions—for better compensation and improved working conditions.

𐙂𐘝𐘲 (10. 622)

Finally returning to the excavations and adventures of his academic years after serving as a reporter and secret agent in the Balkans for the Manchester Guardian and a long stint as the keeper of the curiosities for the Ashmolean of Oxford, organising the collection into a museum with many restrictions for conducting archeological digs imposed by the Ottoman Empire removed with the establishment of the Cretan Republic, Arthur John Evans (see previously) and crew began exploring a flower-covered hill in the central part of the island on this day in 1900. Over the course of three years, albeit with some creative liberties (see above), Evans discovered the Minoan civilisation, so named for the maze-like quality of the Palace of Knossos—which was a series of a thousand cells for artisanal work, storage and food processing—that invoked the myth of King Minos and the captive Minotaur.

foia follies (10. 621)

As illustrated in all its surreal qualities by this request filed by a Bloomberg reporter for the artwork created by detainees at Guantánamo Bay (see also) and other US government black sites finally fulfilled (with annotated redactions) last Spring, Muckrock again showcases the worst cases of resistance to transparency and flagrant violations—non-compliance—of Free of Information Act requirements. Beyond the mishandling of classified documents—whose fault lies partially with injudicious over-classification—there are several award categories, ranging from the pushback of the Federal Bureau of Investigations refusing to release its dossiers on that subversive band the Monkees to its last surviving member, the record number of GLOMAR responses of the National Security Agency, to the Burn After Reading Award for wanton destruction of public records.

cross-cut (10. 620)

Introduced with the invention of the process of paper recycling, pulping (plus the discussion of the printed page as the medium of record) in an exchange between Matthias Koops and King George III, Tedium presents an interesting historical survey of the development of paper shredding, destroying that record of information, promoting privacy and salvaging the base medium, the mechanism first patented in 1910 by Abbot Augustus Low, a serial tinkerer and possibly by modern reckoning “patent troll” now forgotten but contemporarily only surpassed Thomas Edison. The shredding strips, called fantastically paper excelsior, and how they were created were subject to a series of lawsuits beginning in the 1930s with the publisher of anti-Nazi material, Adolf Ehinger, adapting a pasta maker to destroy errant copies of his pamphlets with competitors suppressing the innovative process with legal wrangling and countersuits. While Ehinger may not have been the paper shredders first and only inventor, he was the first to recognise its practical use in the Information Age and informed (see also) the industry as it exists today. Much more at Tedium at the link above.

because it’s there (10. 619)

Entering the lexicon as the standard response for a risky or impossible undertaking, mountain climber George Mallory gave his reply to an interviewer from the New York Times when asked about his participation in the first two unsuccessful expeditions to the summit of Mount Everest (ཇོ་མོ་གླང་མ, Chomolunga—सगरमाथा, Sagarmāthā) on this day in 1923—adding his intention to try again the following year. During this climb, Mallory and his partner, Andrew Irvine, disappeared somewhere on the northeastern face near the summit, with their fate unknown until the discovery of their bodies in 1999—there being conjecture that they made it to the top and were on their way down. Edmund Hillary, whom along with Tenzing Norgay (བསྟན་འཛིན་ནོར་རྒྱས), are credited with reaching the peak first, welcomed the news, of a party achieving this goal three decades ahead of them, calling Mallory the pioneer and original enthusiast.

visoka moda (10. 618)

Via the always excellent Everlasting Blört, we are referred to the Socialist fashions of Yugoslavia’s premier designer, Aleksandar Joksimović. First assigned to create work uniforms for the City of Belgrade’s Institute for Household Improvement, the artist’s creations were a fusion of Serbo-Croat folk costumes and national dress and the revolutionary styles of the 1960s, with a nod to mod as well as to medieval Byzantine-influenced attire. More from Europeana (and grateful for the reminder to check out that institution) at the link above.

7x7 (10. 617)

aquifer: new research suggests that rocky exoplanets may have ways to sequester and protect their water until their host stars stabilise 

blogoversary: a very happy twenty-fifth to Kottke—home of fine hypertext products 

icc: the Hague issues an arrest warrant for Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and accomplice over child trafficking, forced adoptions from Ukraine to occupied territories  

hee-haw: an appreciation of donkeys—by any name—see previously  

the jabalaires: the gospel group active from the 1930s to the 1950s that helped inform the development of rap music  

👏: a selection of funny posts from Super Punch  

hot neptune: astronomers watch as an exoplanet has its atmosphere and ocean stripped away

tory scum (10. 616)

Via friend of the blog par excellence Nag on the Lake, we introduced to a new anthem by the Drop Kick Murphys, following a decades old tradition of reinventing unfinished works from the extensive archives of Woody Guthrie (previously) and plying the standards (with precious little alteration to the present) like with the sea shanty “I’m Shipping Up to Boston” and their 2022 album This Machine Still Kills Fascists, has reworked the union song “All You Fonies” to herald a conservative defeat in the United Kingdom after a string of mostly unelected prime ministers and austere government measures that has gutted social safety nets as “All You Tories.”