How Space Fills

July 10, 2003

Rhizomatic, space-filling poetry from Bataille: […]the earth first opens to life the primary space of the waters and the surface of the ground. But life quickly takes possession of the air. To start with, it was important to enlarge the surface of the green substance of plants, which absorbs the radiant energy of light. The superposition of leaves in the air extends the volume of this substance considerably: In particular the structure of trees develops this possibility well beyond the level of the grasses. For their part the winged insects and the birds, in the wake of the pollens, invade …

The Accursed (Samba) Share

July 10, 2003

Ben emailed me to ask me something about the provenance of some of my Discreet Computing stuff, which led me to thinking (although I don’t think I’ve answered his question yet): “There’s probably a riff to be done on how current tech burns away attention because of some link with the conspicuously consumptive assumptions of the business world — damn it I have 10,000 people in back offices staring at screens, and my machines are sucking the attention of that many minds, therefore I must be successful…” In fact that might be the way in — computers (used the way …

Cinema Scope / Pass the Pig

July 9, 2003

OLEDs and epaper with the contrast and resolution of the real thing, foldable and flypost-able like the real thing. Wait til you see what I have in my pocket. And cinema is worrried about HDTV! Let pixel-perfect flowers of the new new media bloom. From Headmap: The next generation of devices is going to give us new animals, less easilly defined with preconceived ideas An out-of-content excerpt which fills me with a dreadful excitement. Which reminds me. Banksy does live animals later this month.

Japanese Reprimanded For Denuding Media

July 2, 2003

According to the BBC, Japanese bookstores are set to launch a national campaign to stop so-called “digital shoplifting” by customers using the lastest camera-equipped mobile phones. The Japanese Magazine Publishers Association says the practice is “information theft” and it wants it stopped. It is the kind of thing that most Japanese young women wouldn’t think twice about doing. The Japanese use their phones for much more than just calling. They might spot a new hairstyle or a new dress in a glossy fashion magazine and they want to know what their friends think — so they take a quick snap …

Composition with Circles 1

June 20, 2003

Intense sun today. Dwelling on the rhythms in Bridget Riley’s Composition with Circles 1 (1998) which I was fortunate enough to have been able to buy with some options, back when having options meant anything…

Fleur de Sel

June 19, 2003

We were in Brittany a few weeks ago, and visited the salt fields of Guérande. There were no paludiers in evidence, only acres of neatly tended salt ponds. Guérande salt comes in two kinds — one grey and very moist, and the other the brittle, pinkish fleur de sel (‘the caviar of salt’), which is ludicrously expensive if you don’t buy it at source. Or you can make it yourself: the following directions, quoted in Salt. A World History, are from Cato’s De Agricultura: Fill a broken-necked amphora with clean water, place in the sun. Suspend in it a strainer …

Murmurs of Earth

June 16, 2003

Peters argues that SETI was to the 20th century what the spritualist movement was to the 19th, with serious researchers in both fields resolutely pursuing the inner strangeness of their chosen quests, and yet missing the point that all communication is inherently strange: SETI research reminds one of Thoreau’s quip about those who tried to measure the depths of Walden Pond: “They are paying out the rope in the vain attempt to fathom their truly immeasurable capacity for marvellousness.” (p. 257) Curiously, he doesn’t directly reference Carl Sagan’s Murmurs of Earth, effectively the ‘sleeve notes’ for the gold-plated records launched …

Dwelling

June 14, 2003

Watching Hiraki Sawa’s lovely Dwelling of which I only have a QuickTime cutdown (and thanks to EAST 2002 for the cutdown — anyone with the DVD who wants to sell, please let me know — I missed out through indecision). Looking for a new flat. I want one with aeroplanes…

Ceremony/In a Lonely Place

June 12, 2003

Thoughts after John Durham Peters’ book Speaking Into the Air — a History of the Idea of Communication

Entrances to Hell

June 6, 2003

It’s Friday afternoon, with a hangover. Today the best thing on the Internet is The Catalogue of UK Entrances to Hell. Lovely. Oh and it’s raining as well…

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