Three of my favourite things have been elegently combined and make me happy. The Simpsons have done a satirical take on Apple culture. So what can I say: Simpsons, Apple and Satire… three of my favourite things are all collected in a perfect package.
It’s on YouTube (for now). The best part is when comic book guy re-enacts the iconic 1984 Apple commercial. Or maybe when Lisa enters the “Mapple Store” and says: It’s so sterile!
Wonderful stuff.
Across the street from the cathedral in Göteborg someone has sprayed the words “Vila i frid Gud” which translates to “Rest in Peace God”. At first I just ignored it. Then I decided to photograph it, but still I didn’t think it was worth much. But the words stuck in my mind. Maybe even more so as an unbeliever.
The natural connection for me was to link the sentiments that God should rest in peace was that God was dead. This idea has it’s origins in Nietzsche’s “The Gay Science”
God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
Nietzsche used his idea of God’s death to present the important idea that theology was no longer able to provide a source of morality for modern society.
But still the grafitti on the wall did not ring true. It took some time before I got what was wrong. If god was dead and unable to provide us with a moral solace what was the point of wishing that he was to rest in peace? The real reason we tend to wish RIP is to act as a comfort to those who are alive, not to the deceased.
But those who do not believe do not need comfort – so what if god is dead? Those who do believe don’t need comfort – they don’t believe the sign! So why bother writing the words on the wall? Just plain vandalism, irony or a fact that the writer does not “get” his Nietzche?
Or maybe I should just stop reading the writing on the wall?
In 1781 the crew of the Zong, a British slave ship, killed 133 slaves and threw the bodies overboard in an attempt to claim compensation from the insurers for lost cargo. The whole thing ended up in court – but not for killing slaves since this was legal.
When the ship returned to England the owners of the ship claimed the full value of the murdered slaves from the insurers. They claimed they there was a necessity to throw the slaves over the ship because of water depletion. Well it was proven later that it was all a lie and that the captain had an opportunity for more water on December 1. By the time the Zong had arrived in Jamaica on December 22, they had 420 gallons of water to spare. (online here)
The owners demanded compensation of £30 for each slave. The judge of the case, Lord Chief Justice Lord Mansfield, stated that “no doubt that (though it shocks one very much) the case was the same as if horses had been thrown overboard”
The Solicitor General, John Lee, declared that a master could drown slaves without “a surmise of impropriety”.
What is this claim that human people have been thrown overboard? This is a case of chattels or goods. Blacks are goods and property; it is madness to accuse these well-serving honourable men of murder. They acted out of necessity and in the most appropriate manner for the cause. The late Captain Collingwood acted in the interest of his ship to protect the safety of his crew. To question the judgement of an experienced well-travelled captain held in the highest regard is one of folly, especially when talking of slaves. The case is the same as if wood had been thrown overboard. (wikipedia)
The comparisons of people to wood or horses shows the way in lawyers are indoctrinated into being able to interprete the letter of the law rather than attempt to arrive at justice and fairness.
James Boyle has published a new book. And it’s on the public domain. This is a must read affair. And if you dont believe me then you can download it first to check it out!
The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike License.
If you like it, please consider buying a copy.
Why am I allowing you to copy the book for free? And why is Yale University Press letting me? To understand why I am doing it, watch this video by Jesse Dylan. And if you want to understand why it makes economic sense to my publisher, read this short article.
Download the book as a pdf. (1.5Mb)
Martin over at Aardvarchaeology has written a post on the ethics of overpopulation that has generated a flood of comments. He begins by stating that there are too many people on earth and presents three suggestions:
- It is unethical for anyone to produce more than two children. (Adoption of orphans, on the other hand, is highly commendable.)
- It is unethical to limit the availability of contraceptives, abortion, surgical sterilisation and adoption.
- It is unethical to use public money to support infertility treatments. Let those unfortunate enough to need such treatment pay their own way or adopt. And let’s put the money into subsidising contraceptives, abortion, surgical sterilisation and adoption instead.
If we ignore the fact that ethics is a notoriously vague term I agree with all of his suggestions. I would like to go a bit further to than this. Considering the position of the earth today and the nonsensical religious pro-life arguments and based on the understanding that children are not a right, I would prefer to propose the following restatement of suggestions 2:
I fail to see why the concept of religion should be used as a valid argument for limiting contraception which can prevent the spread of disease, cause personal and financial hardship in addition to increasing a world population.
But I also find it bizarre that individuals can motivate spending (and/or demanding public funding) vast amounts of money for infertility treatments while there are children in need of love and care in the world. What is their problem? Sure, “natural” may be nice but if you cannot then please focus on the needs of children not on the egoistic desire to reproduce your DNA.
In the digital world space is not an issue. But there is a real limitation on the amount of information we want to receive. Ernest Hemingway, a man known for brief writing was once asked to write a biography in six words (a bar bet or a challenge) responding by writing the amazingly moving short story:
For Sale: Baby shoes, never worn.
That was the whole story and not the title. Six words that really hit you right where it should.
This was probably the inspiration for the book that began as a challenge by the editors of storytelling magazine SMITH in 2006 to write six word memoirs. The challenge resulted in the book: Not Quite What I was Planning: Six Word Memoirs from Writers Famous and Obscure.
By limiting space the author is forced to really think. Each word is weighed very carefully. Not really sure which six words I would use as my memoir as I still hope to add a few events in my life. But right now it might be something like: “Bits, bytes, inward outward journey onward.” Wow that was silly! But give me a break I just made it up on the spot. or maybe “Wish I was already standing there”.
What would you write in your six word memoir? I tag Martin at Aardvarchaeology, Kalle at Cyberlaw, Eva at Homespun, Andres at Technollama and Claire at Mummys Bracelet.
Gotland was really fun. The city of Visby is all it was supposed to be (you never know how much is just tourist hype) quaint small streets, city wall, cafés, restaurants and exotic shops. The seminar at the Riksantikvarieämbetet (Swedish National Heritage Board) went well and my project to help them move from static databases to a more interactive “web2.0” approach to users is on the way.
There are several interesting questions involved when a government body wants to open up it’s databases and let the users in. The idea is the rich collections of data this government body maintains will be made available. Thats the easy part – but not too easy.
The next stage is to allow users to add, edit, comment, tag and connect data. In addition to this this government body wants to allow the users to communicate with each other via the governments infrastructure. They are brave and exciting – not your typical image of a heritage board.
After the seminar today I roamed the street taking pictures until it was time to fly to Stockholm and wait for the train to Göteborg.
Not surprisingly online games are becoming mainstream. I always imagine that when I get into an old age home there will be a great network and lots of time to play advanced online games. Maybe it is unsurprising that one of Obama’s transition co-chairs is a level 70 Shaman in the Terror Nova pack (that World of Warcraft to the rest of us).
The networking element of gaming is similar to other traditional social interaction as with the country club, bridge group, saloon or golf club.
This will only get more and more common and is a real relief for us who have never managed to figure out the point or the method of getting the little white ball into the cup far, far away.
I read about this photography project on Boing Boing and thought it was worth the advert on this blog. Giving alternative groups of people access to photographic technology leads to the production of exciting new material.
Los Angeles-based photographer and blogger Dave Bullock says:
The Skid Row Photography Club‘s first show, The Beauty of the Street, premiered last Thursday during the Downtown Art Walk. The participants were ecstatic to see their beautiful work on the walls and the hundreds of people who came into the gallery loved what they saw.The SPRC started as an idea I “borrowed” from the movie Born Into Brothels . I wrote a proposal to the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council to buy digital cameras which we then gave to people living in Skid Row. I gave the participants brief lessons in composition and turned them loose. For the last six months we’ve met every Tuesday at UCEPP in Skid Row.
During that time they shot over 20,000 photos between them. An amazing body of work ranging from flowers to architecture to a man defecating in the middle of the street.
Dave asks if any Boing Boing readers might want to donate digital cameras to folks living in Skid Row, so they might extend the project. “The cameras we’ve been using are about $200 each,” he explains. “We’re just a club, not a non-profit as of yet.”
More info here on how you can participate. The short version: if you would like to donate digital cameras please email Dave directly at eecue@eecue.com.
Skid Row, in case you don’t know, is a massive, permanent homeless encampment in downtown Los Angeles — the largest such community in the United States. About 8-9,000 homeless people live there. This “heat map animation” provides a compelling visualization of the site, though data hasn’t been updated in a while.
One of the best things with this job are the occaissional opportunities to travel to places of interest that I may not normally have traveled to. Tomorrow I get to travel to one of those places which has been on my list of travel destinations for a long time. Tomorrow the first leg of the journey is Stockholm (lovely city but not much excitement here) but the second part is a flight to the island of Gotland and the amazing city of Visby.
Luckily I have the afternoon to explore the medieval city, I only hope that the snow lets up and maybe the sun will shine for enough time for some photography.
The real reason for the visit is a copyright and technology seminar at the Swedish National Heritage Board. So all in all a trip to look forward to: an exotic medieval city and a cultural seminar. This is my kind of trip.