This week on HOME: Stories From L.A.:
Who were we? How did we live, and what did it look like? The vast archive of castoff slides captures, in vivid colors, images of the American family at midcentury. But the stories that go with the pictures are most often lost, and we’re left to create our own, and reflect on millions of conscious decisions to untie the knot of memory.
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iTunes | Android | Email | Google Play | Stitcher | TuneIn | Read the rest
Archilogic, an online architecture viewer/editor designed to be easier for laypersons to use and share from than Sketchup, is spectacular stuff... at least on a fast computer. You can upload plans and convert them to 3D, move and replace furniture, mess around with the layout, push the results to friends or real estate agents, and so on. Some of the demos posted to the company's blog are fascinating: exploring Don Draper's apartment in the first-person is eerily voyeuristic. An unbuilt Frank Lloyd Wright design is more majestic and less, well, sleazy.
Now do the Overlook Hotel! Read the rest
Filmmaker, writer, and trans activist
Andrea James on the current state of post-disruption journalism and its unhealthy addiction to Twitter, and LGBT brain drain.
I'm really enjoying Jason Colavito's reviews of The History Channel's hilarious/infuriating hit show Ancient Aliens. What makes them better than the average blog? Colavito is an author who has written extensively about the anthropology of pseudoscience, and the connections between pseudoscience, religion, and science fiction. So his recaps are less about debunking the claims made on Ancient Aliens (because, really, that's just too damn easy) and more about exploring where those claims come from, pop-culturally, and what makes them so appealing, to begin with. Fascinating stuff. Read the rest
Whether you think Tesla > Edison or Edison > Tesla, perhaps you're missing something important. In reality, technology isn't shaped by one guy who had one great idea and changed the world. Instead, it's a messy process, full of flat-out failures and not-quite-successes, and populated by many great minds who build off of and are inspired by each other's work.
The 52 Hertz Whale is the cetacean equivalent of a pop-culture phenomenon — a strange creature, known only through recording of whale songs picked up in the Pacific Ocean, who seems to not be a part of any identifiable whale group. Also known as The Loneliest Whale in the World it is a source of pity and fascination among the general public. At PLOS Blogs, Hannah Cheng has a three-part feature on what we do and don't know about the Loneliest Whale. Why, despite 20 years of tracking this thing in sound recordings, do we not have any direct observation of the Loneliest Whale? She's got the answers. Read the rest
A friend of Boing Boing introduced me to the work of artist Kii Arens this weekend. We visited his studio for a karaoke party. It was great. I love his work. You can buy it in reasonably affordable poster form, through his website: lalalandposters.com. I would like one of everything, please. Kii is on Twitter and Facebook. (Thanks, Alex!) Read the rest
A gap separates people who do science and the people who make science fiction, but that's no problem, thanks to the people who bridge the two.
At "
BargainBinBlasphemy," vinyl album covers of pop-rock icons are upgraded into Black Metal.
How a 19th-century fascination with x-rays turned deadly.
[Video Link]
A parody of the theme song from The IT Crowd (a fantastic Channel 4 TV series which you can buy here). "This is a collaboration between Superpowerless, Sparkles* (From Area 11), MC Wreckshin, B-TYPE and Happi."
(thanks, Tara McGinley!) Read the rest
A style piece in the New York Times about a trans-Atlantic trend: "Artisanal food trucks have been making inroads in Paris, adding a new twist in culinary culture to a city where diners rarely eat on the go, much less with their hands." Read the rest
Richard Metzger at Dangerous Minds introduces us to Call of the Giles, which he describes as a "gun-totin’, Bible-quotin’, homo-hatin’, and obviously over-compensating for sumpthin’ macho, macho man douchebag Doug Giles and his “kickass” Christian family’s low-brow version of Keeping Up With the Kardashians." Read the rest
REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Revellers attend the Wave and Goth festival in Leipzig, on May 25, 2012. The annual festival, known in Germany as Wave-Gotik Treffen, features up to 150 bands and musicians playing Gothic rock and other styles of the "dark wave" music subculture attracting a regular audience of up to 20000, according to organizers. The festival runs through May 28. Read the rest
Muslim women hold posters during a protest objecting to U.S. singer Lady Gaga's Indonesian concert, at Jakarta's business district May 24, 2012. Pop star Lady Gaga has been refused a permit to perform in the Indonesian capital on June 3 over security concerns, police said last week. Three Islamic groups have expressed their opposition to the concert, demanding it be stopped, national police spokesman Saud Usman Nasution said by telephone. More on the controversy: WSJ, AFP, Washington Post, NYT, AP, Jakarta Post. (REUTERS/Supri) Read the rest
REUTERS/Daniel Becerrill
Above, Alin Nava (C) stands in a checkout line at a supermarket in Monterrey April 5, 2012. Nava, 25, is dressed in the so-called "Lolita" fashion style (ロリータ・ファッション Rorīta fasshon), a fashion subculture from Japan influenced by clothing from the Victorian or Rococo eras. The basic style consists of a blouse, petticoat, bloomers, bell-shaped skirt and knee-high socks. Nava is the co-founder of the "Lolitas Paradise" club in Monterrey and for members of the club, the Lolita style is not only a fashion statement but also a way to express their loyalty, friendship, tolerance and unity. Read the rest
Image Link. From the excellent Flickr collection of MewDeep (lots of '60s-'70s ad scans), via BB Flickr Pool. Read the rest
