kottke (Free subscription) | yesterday
Free Errol! orig. from Nov 20, 2009 * Q: Wha? A: These previously published entries have been updated with new information in the last 24 hours. You can find past updates here . Tags: post updates
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/21/2009
For some dumbcrap reason, the NY Times has redirected Errol Morris' excellent blog about photography and the truth -- formerly at http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com -- to some new thing called Opinionator . They did the same with Dick Cavett, Olivia Judson, etc. Oh, all the content is still there -- here's Morris' stuff -- and permalinks redirect, but there are no author-specific RSS feeds. There is only...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
Robert Parker, the world's foremost wine taster, tasted a bunch of bottles from Bordeaux 2005 (a great year for Bordeaux) and couldn't tell which one was which and ranked them differently than he had before . Blind tasting removes preconceptions about wines while maintaining the ability to rate wines in a peer group setting. Wednesday night, Parker upended the order of his published ratings of the...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
Britain is an militaristic lion with a Roman Imperial italic-type helmet. It sits upon a mound of riches gathered from its Empire. Drawn by Keith Thompson ...prints are available if you like. (thx, zoe) Tags: Keith Thompson maps wwi
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
The Trabant 601, 1963: Wikipedia notes of the Trabant: For advocates of capitalism it is often cited as an example of the disadvantages of centralized planning as even refueling the car required lifting the hood, filling the tank with gasoline (only 24 litres), then adding two-stroke oil and shaking it back and forth to mix. Pollution, poor construction, and lack of availability were also issues with...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
This article in the NY Times fits nicely with my belief that carbon offsets are bullshit. "The carbon offset has become this magic pill, a kind of get-out-of-jail-free card," Justin Francis, the managing director of Responsible Travel, one of the world's largest green travel companies to embrace environmental sustainability, said in an interview. "It's seductive to the consumer who says,...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
From advertisements for a Portuguese independent film group, several ideas and their enemies . (via heavy backpack ) Tags: advertising
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
Dead Caulfields maintains an unauthorized online collection of the 22 stories written by J.D. Salinger and published in Esquire, The New Yorker, The Saturday Evening Post, etc. These stories have never been collected into a book due to the reclusive author's resistance. Spanning his literary career between the years 1940-1965, these stories display changes in both the author's style and message. While...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
Jeanne-Claude, one-half of the art duo Christo and Jeanne-Claude, has died at the age of 74 . The front page of the couple's web site has a short tribute. I loved The Gates . Tags: art Christo Jeanne-Claude obituaries The Gates
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/20/2009
Over at Edible Geography, Nicola Twilley collects some information about wine and beer recovered from shipwrecks , some of which has been sold for thousands of dollars per bottle. It appears the ocean floor, if treated as a single entity, might actually be the world's largest wine cellar -- a sunken treasure trove of lost vintages awaiting rediscovery. Like squirrels digging up acorns, wreck-divers...
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
A short video in which Milton Glaser extols the virtues of drawing while drawing. It is only through drawing that I look at things carefully. Tags: Milton Glaser video
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
Microsoft has filed a patent application for sparklines and Edward Tufte, who came up with the idea for sparklines , is wondering what to do about it . (via waxy ) Tags: Edward Tufte Microsoft patents sparklines
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
The American Museum of Natural History is displaying a 11'x4' tapestry woven made completely of spider silk . It took four years, required more than one million spiders, and cost $500,000 to make. The task of silking a spider starts with a small machine -- designed centuries ago when the first attempts to silk spiders were begun -- that holds the spider down. "The spiders are harnessed ... held...
Drawn! (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
Wonderful little visual essay by Christoph Niemann in the NY Times using only leaves to illustrate his ideas. via Kottke Posted by Matt Forsythe on Drawn! The Illustration and Cartooning Blog | Permalink | No comments Tags: Christoph Niemann, Creative Thinking, photo-illustration
kottke (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
In The Gervais Principle, Or The Office According to "The Office" and the followup The Gervais Principle II: Posturetalk, Powertalk, Babytalk and Gametalk , Venkatesh Rao dissects and analyzes the American version of The Office to a degree I hadn't thought was possible. After four years, I've finally figured the show out. The Office is not a random series of cynical gags aimed at momentarily...
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