ekranoplan (12. 576)

Recent intelligence suggests that China might be attempting to revive a Cold War leviathan known as the Soviet sea monster of the Caspian, the semi-legendary ekranoplan (экранопла́н, a screen-glider or ground-effect vehicle) an airfoil designed to fly just over the crests of the waves, invisible to radar, impervious to mines riding on a cushion of high air pressure and achieving speeds ten times faster than traditional maritime vessels, leaving fleets and coast defences no time to react. Photographs have emerged of apparent trials in the Sea of Bohai, near the Korean peninsula. DARPA was working on its own for the US navy—called a Liberty Lifter, the concept vehicle also known for its increased cargo delivery capacity with advantages other both ships and planes—but the programme was abruptly cancelled last month.

synchronoptica

one year ago: claim-jumping in the Arctic (with synchronopticæ), reproductive care in international waters, a local air show plus a failed assassination attempt on Donald Trump

thirteen years ago: the Period Table typeface 

fourteen years ago: debt and pensions 

télégraph aérien (12. 575)

Having previously learned about the invention of the optical or semaphore communications system of Claude Chappe, we appreciated this retrospective and chance to revisit the contentious innovation that informed public perception and art movements into the nineteenth century. Hailed as a great advancement, the tachygraphic network that was being introduced just as the French Revolution was beginning in 1792 as a series of relay towers throughout the countryside and in metropolitan areas was by turns regarded as an achievement, condemned as an eyesore and viewed with suspicion. The cellular masts (or windmills) of their day, their addition to the tops of buildings, profane and sacred, was considered despoiling aesthetically—numerous examples of paintings from that period feature them prominently, sort of like the scaffolding that encased the Statue of Liberty during the eighties that become as iconic and emblematic as the unobscured monument—and the coded messages (the arrangement of the blades or wings corresponded to ninety-eight numbers) to be deciphered and passed on the next operator) were taken as something sinister, prompting the destruction of some towers either as signs of witchcraft (compare to the attacks on the 5G masts during COVID either as its cause or a government conspiracy to implant microchips in the population to control it) or to hinder accelerated responses to quell uprisings, the government privileged with this speeded up reaction not available to the protesters. A group of investors in Bordeaux were jailed, though ultimately acquitted, for bribing operators to transmit stock market figures from Paris hours ahead of when the gains and losses would be available to the competition—an abuse for the sight-lines that was never envisioned. Much more from Hyperallergic at the link above.

steudadoù karnag (12. 574)

Via Strange Company, we are serendipitously directed to an academic update in partnership with the University of Gothenburg with its share of megaliths (I still need to repair those posts from our Sweden trip made on a third party app...) on the Carnac Stones, excavating alignments in a previously unstudied area, Le Plasker adjacent to the ten kilometre stretch inland from Erdeven to the Bay of Morbihan, dating after several trials the original placements to 4700 BC (the landscape and the inventory has been significantly altered in pre-historic times and going forward) and thus not only confirming their age but also pre-dating other standing stone arrangements in Europe, like in England and Malta.

think the tide is with us (12. 573)

In deference to the silver anniversary of the Peter Benchley and Steven Spielberg and Peter Benchly collaboration—which agreedly holds up and worth a rewatch—Clive Thompson’s Linkfest (lots more great stuff there) directs us to a text-based adventure game inspired by the film authored by programmer and designer Matt Round, that follows the plot pretty faithfully scene by scene but from the point of view of the titular shark with some pretty compelling internal monologue (see also).

boule de lille (12. 572)

Having purchased the bright orange cheese—owing to the natural seasoning and colourant annatto, derived from the seeds of the achiote tree native to the tropics, similar to nutmeg but from more accessible climes in the American tropics and adopted by cheesemakers to imbue their product with the more intense colours of summer time cheeses year around (the higher carotene content in fresh grass that cows grazed on would pass through to the milk)—in slices at a supermarket during vacation—as opposed to a fromagerie, thinking it was the equivalent of cheddar, we were not aware that traditionally that Mimolette, originating in Nord and Lille, was created as a native substitute for the very popular variety of Edam cheese from the Netherlands. To distinguish it from the import, it was coloured, first with carrot juice and then later with the rise of the French East India Company (see previously) the more exotic spice—as are many other cheeses—and is aged as a ball, appearing like a a cantaloupe when sliced—the rind, grey-coloured, is infested with mites (see also) during the ripening process which enhances the flavour. The name comes from the French mi-mou for “semi-soft” referring to the slightly oily texture to the otherwise hard cheese.

synchronoptica

one year ago: plural forms of compound expressions (with synchronopticæ), assorted links to revisit plus Disco Demolition Night (1979)

eleven years ago: our VW bus plus the cost of camouflage 

7x7 (12. 571)

edge of eternity: Poseidon’s Underworld’s cinematic vacation to the Grand Canyon 

the open-hearted many and the broken-hearted-few: the venerable and ongoing Leonard Cohen Files—via Metafilter  

litra: an ancient Byzantine scale complete with a set Greek letter-shaped counter-balances discovered in Türkei  

voulez-vous danser avec moi: the mambo scene of Brigitte Bardot and Dario Moreno from Michel Boisrond’s 1959 « Come Dance with Me? »  

flatland: the four dimensional world of Alicia Boole Stott—see also  

and if i haver: an endurance run of The Proclaimer’s I’m Gonna Be—via Web Curios 

it happened here: a contemporary table-read of Stephen King’s what-if premise of Apt Pupil considered during a staycation from Today in Tabs—via ibidem

qin shi huang mausoleum (12. 570)

Having been discovered by a group of farmers, Wang Puzhi and his neighbour Yang Zhifa (with his five brothers), in March of the year prior, the archaeological community marked a pivotal moment on this day in 1975 in the excavation of the site, unearthing the central burial pits around the tomb of Qin dynasty’s founder and first emperor (皇帝, huángdì) of a unified China to reveal a retinue of some eight thousand life-sized terracotta figures of soldiers and horses standing guard for his journey into the afterlife.  The necropolis is a microcosm of the imperial palace with halls, offices and the thousands of replica units, armed, standing in formation. The tomb itself at the centre of the terracotta army (previously) is hermetically sealed and remains unopened to prevent degradation of the body, artefacts and grave goods inside as well as out of concerns for safety of researchers, with artificial rivers of mercury and other toxic decorative elements suspected to be contained within—possibly also an element of revenant superstition. Aside from the Qin emperor, a mass though ceremonious grave holding the remains of one-hundred-twenty-one individuals has been uncovered, whom researchers believe to have been labourers and artisans that built the necropolis.

synchronoptica 

one year ago: double-click jargon (with synchronopticæ), more on the zombification of the legacy web plus Biden vows to stay in the US presidential race   

thirteen years ago: a hundred-handed cactus plus subversive stickers 

fourteen years ago: odious debts 

trump dump (12. 569)

As a made-for-television drama and the only interesting side-show from the administration, we’ve been ignoring Trump’s decision to reignite the trade war over his gimmicky tariff regime. Only two real negotiations successful between the UK and Vietnam, Trump is again threatening to levy punishing export duties against Canada, Brazil and many others by the first of August, and whilst investors and businesses (over-stocked in preparation for the first round that never materialised) have likely factored in this bullying and charade—there’s no reciprocity in reciprocal tariffs—markets could still react with disfavour to all this chaos and uncertainty. There’s nothing substantive behind the threats and the interlocutors know this, but for the sake of appeasement, the aggrieved parties put on the line other so-called barriers to trade as a trade-off that Trump could count as a win and the real stakes come in the form of compromising environmental, health and safety standards. In other recent news, Trump has toyed with the idea of federalising New York City and Washington, DC to put both irksome metropolises directly under his control. The Department of Justice is directed to sue sanctuary cities in order to end their policies of protecting migrants and the same time prioritising cases to revoke American citizenship. The budget for ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) is tripled under the One Big Beautiful Bill and now surpasses that of the Marines. The US supreme court, in recess, issued a shadow docket ruling that allows the administration to deport individuals to third party nations with which they have no affiliation. Whilst no new sanctions are being levied against Russia, Trump is expressing increasing exasperation with Putin—and it was revealed by an audio clip to donors during a fund raising event (an exchange during the campaign and not released until now) that Trump reportedly told Putin and Xi he would bomb their respective capitals should they continue incursion on Ukraine and Taiwan—“he said ‘no way’ and I said ‘way.’ Reversing a very pregnant pause, however, Trump is restarting weapons deliveries to Kiev and supplying US air defence materiel. National weather agencies are ordered to scrap climate websites and collecting data—Trump praising the botched response of his Federal Emergency Management Agency director who is tasked with dismantling it and devolving the responsibility to the states in the wake of devastating flooding in Texas. Invoking a high school football analogy, the state’s governor said that only losers focus on their mistakes. Such winning.