678 heartbreak (10. 960)

In the tradition of this literary clock by Johannes Enevoldsen and other fun ways of expressing data-sets, Pudding project contributor Russell Samora has created this time-keeping device that scours catalogues of songs to find tracks containing the hour and minute in the title. It’s rather incredible how many there are to pick from though not every minute of the day is covered (filled in with a random tune) and how certain times (not the above though I thought it would be on the playlist) have an abundance of choices.

teraflop (10. 959)

Via Kottke, we are directed to a rather engrossing exercise by writer Nikita Diakur (winner of the Deutsche Kurzfilmpreis last year) where by trial and error an AI avatar in a virtual environment learns about physics and human anatomy in order to perform a backflip in emulation of vloggers practising the stunt. Some of the contortions look really tortured and there’s an element of body horror to see it glitch and fail but its really fascinating to watch and unpack the process. Acknowledging that as an animator, the artist is in total control of the environment, the simulation afforded a way out of their domain and it is interesting how the computer needs twelve-thousand repetitions, like the human capacity to develop and hone a reflex, to master a move.

synchronoptica

one year ago: the Elvis 1968 Come-Back Special plus the European Day of Remembrance of Victims of Nazism and Stalinism

two years ago: your daily demon: Furcas, Vulcanalia, Ashes to Ashes (1980) plus the it of it’s raining, it’s sunny

three years ago: assorted links to revisit, the cult of conspiracy theorists, the beach photography of Harry Gruyaert, Stockholm Syndrome (1973) plus a short by Saul Bass on the nature of creativity

four years ago: another funeral service for a glacier, a classic music mashup plus a refuge for pollinators amid expansive fields

five years ago: NYC’s Trinity Church, customary units plus more links to enjoy

8x8 (10. 958)

☃️: brr (previously) on electricity and power generation at the South Pole 

blogoversary: Miss Cellania reflects on eighteen years of blogging  

©️: judge rules that generative art is not subject to copyright protections 

ascertainment bias: people who submit to genetic testing and studies are predisposed for it—via Kottke  

pulmonic egressive sounds: an individual who can talk backwards—via the new shelton wet/dry 

lending-library: appealing an injunction, the Internet Archive removes commercially available titles from its public database—via Waxy 

it’s-a me: the voice of Mario, Charles Martinet, retiring after a quarter of a century 

əʊ: lignuists observe the birth of a new accent forming among Antarctic communities

 synchronoptica

one year ago: the State of Idaho, assorted links to revisit plus the plague of overtourism

two years ago: Petra rediscovered (1812), the moon Iapetus, more links to enjoy plus My Little Occult Book Club

three years ago: a canine saint,  AI poetry plus happy birthday Ray Bradbury

four years ago: returning to the Bretange

five years ago: dualling Trump trial coverage, a Romano-Gaul called Ultragoth plus gravity wells and potential energy

i can listen to you—it keeps me stable for nights (10. 957)

Courtesy of our faithful chronicler, we learn that the foundational New Wave track by Gary Numan, launching his career as a solo artist after disbanding Tubeway Army, the lead single from his debut album, The Pleasure Principle, was released on this day in 1979. Although genre-defining first and foremost, the song is a bit transcend and bigger than its era—particularly in the postamble with rather epic harmonisation of a second synthesiser, a Minimoog and a Polymoog. The lyrics were inspired by an escalated road rage incident that Numan escaped by driving over the kerb and on to the sidewalk, the autonomy and splendid isolation responsible for both inciting and diffusing situations like this. In cars.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: medieval chess gaming conventions, assorted links to revisit plus the third album from Oasis (1997)

two years ago: visiting all the rudest toponyms in the UK plus The Baltics are Waking Up! (1991)

three years ago: only one saint per jurisdiction, please (1970), Comrade Gulliver, the history of paper ballots, the Hundred-Horse Chestnut Tree protected (1745) plus vintage Japanese meal wrappers

four years ago: GAP founded (1969), more links to enjoy plus face-swapping for 2001

five years ago: medieval alewives, a gigantic inner-bellum seaplane plus real-time tube maps

skolstrejk för klimatet (10. 956)

On this day in 2018, when Europe was suffering from droughts and a heatwave (also inspired by students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida who refused to return after the shootings), ahead of parliamentary elections and the first day of class after summer break, then fifteen-year-old Greta Tintin Eleonora Ernman Thunberg sat on the steps of the Svergies Riksdag calling for a “School-Strike for the Climate.” Alone in her protest, the image was picked up by the Swedish press and garnering criticism from her parents and teachers for her truancy and message, Thunberg returned everyday for three weeks until the 9 September ballot, demanding that the government commit to reducing carbon-emissions aligned with the pledges of the Paris Agreement. Thunberg’s activism inspired the Fridays for Future movement of millions of students globally using the day to rally for environmental causes and has been a necessary gadfly to spur action, calling out greenwashing and repeating that “our house is still on fire.”

9x9 (10. 955)

cucumber castle: a star-studded promotional film for the Bee-Gee’s medieval-themed, chivalrous 1970 album  

as big as a football pitch: the vague rulers of informal metrology 

good(bye) design: a tribute to the aesthetic of vintage consumer tech by Miki Nemcek with a special focus on Braun  

grand master: World Chess Federation places restrictions on trans competitors  

1:25: a tour inside the scale model of St Paul’s, hidden in a chamber in the attic 

 ⛔: like Zuckerburg explored before—in violation of app store policies—Elon Musk is threatening to remove Twitter’s block feature  

magalog: combination magazine-catalogue that was successful print model in the 1970s  

langue étrangère: faced with budget-shortfalls, US public university cutting foreign language from its ciriculum 

elephant in the room: the imprint of favourite songs of our formative years and what that says about our capacity for new things

wattstax (10. 954)

The name a play on the Woodstock festival, the benefit concert to commemorate the seventh anniversary 1965 Watts Riots and help the community and organised by Stax Records with all the label’s biggest stars took place in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on this day in 1972, selected for coinciding with the thirtieth birthday of major talent Isaac Hayes. Spanning the musical genres of soul, funk, blues and jazz and included sets by Kim Weston, The Staple Singers, Eddie Floyd, Rufus Thomas, Ernie Hines, Hayes and The Bar-Kays. Invocation and various speeches were given by civil rights leader Jesse Jackson. Tickets priced at a suggested donation of one dollar so everyone could attend, the festival was filmed by David Lloyd Wolper (the producer by the television mini-series Roots, North and South, and the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1984 LA Olympics) and released the following year to high acclaim.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: a visit to a potash mine

two years ago: Davy Jones & The Lower Third (1965), more miniatures from Tatsuya Tanaka plus links worth revisiting

three years ago: more words of Shakespearian coinage, quality control officers, the August Coup in Russia (1991) plus the ravens of the Tower of London miss the tourists

four years ago: a classic from Miles Davis (1959), a disembodied hand dominates the skyline in Wellington plus the plague of e-scooters

five years ago: dawn in the woods, the logos of Paul Rand, an on-screen marriage ceremony that may have been legally binding, winning-streaks plus Soviets crush reform attempts in Czechoslovakia (1968)

flying flo and tumbling tim (10. 953)

Though not the first Saturday Morning programming block aimed at child audience, the broadcaster ABC notably added two shows, more like matinées airing starting at 11:00 on this day in 1950. Acrobat Ranch and Animal Clinic, both produced live out of Chicago and thus no preserved recordings, marked the network’s first foray into the day-time TV field, with the former being a variety show with circus acts and stunts that the studio audience could participate in a Western setting and the latter hosted by a veterinarian who explained animal ailments and treatments with some comic-relief. Broadcasters began commissioning cartoons by the early 1960s—whereas before the weekend was relegated to re-runs of prime-time shows, using the technique of limited animation which reuses cells and frames to save of labour-intensive drawing (unlike the cinematic shorts that were bumpers for the main feature) and relied more on voice-acting and character development than dynamic scenes, realising that they could fill a five-hour segment of the programming day inexpensively and attract advertisers, particularly toy-makers and breakfast cereal producers.