Don’t make something unless it is both necessary and useful; but if it is both necessary and useful, don’t hesitate to make it beautiful.
— SHAKER PHILOSOPHY
(via the digging into worpress book)
Author: jkordy
3D Printer of Human Tissue
Everyday I am amazed by how fast “the future” becomes reality, so I guess it was inevitable that with all of the 3D printers everywhere, someone would have the bright idea to start printing human tissue with these things.
“The company expects that within five years, once clinical trials are complete, the printers will produce blood vessels for use as grafts in bypass surgery. With more research it should be possible to produce bigger, more complex body parts.”
from this economist article (via kottke)
image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cabfablab/ / CC BY 2.0
The Limits of Control
The slow pace, the lingering visuals, the sparse dialogue, even the self-referential humor, I really enjoyed all of it. I knew where we were headed and I enjoyed the journey, even the title gave me food for thought. (Chalk one up for “imagination.”)
On occasion, it did glimmer with the feeling of the whole thing being an elaborate and filmic exercise in the art of stripping a story down to next to nothing, and occasionally parts felt almost trying too hard to be, maybe a little too constructed and falling into cliche. I chose to interpret these as little self aware inside jokes. As for the storytelling, absolutely minimal is where I like to be. And the cinematic visuals tip the scale for me, in favor of the directors skill.
If you’re a real movie buff or even a film afficionado, I can see why you dislike Jim Jarmusch’s offering. I however liked it a lot, probably in direct inverse proportion to the amount I dislike the types of items on a movie buff’s regular list.
Future of Magazines?
Is this really what the future of magazines looks like? More importantly, will people be willing to pay for a rich media magazine experience? What’s wrong with paper? Why do people gravitate towards bits and away from atoms? I love atoms.
1930’s NYC
This collection of amazing photographs of 1930’s New York City in the New York Public Library Archive are really worth a look. But really any of the 700,000 images they offer online are fascinating.
Videos
Young Jean Lee interviewed by Richard Maxwell
I just love artist interviews. I love being able to see into an artist’s mind.
***
Speaking of Videos, On the Boards recently launched a new project called OnTheBoards.tv. It’s a paid content site where you can purchase or rent videos of contemporary performance – theater, dance, performance art, etc. For example you can purchase a right to watch the entierty of Young Jean Lee’s excellent and thought provoking “The Shipment.” (see my review here)
The Gentrification of Brooklyn
I love these hilarious and most likely controversial street art pieces by Specter. I wish I could see them in person (miss ya brooklyn!). They are promotional items for, or maybe even part of, an exhibit about gentrification in Brooklyn, at the The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts [MoCADA].
Definitely check out the rest of Specter’s awesome portfolio.
(via wooster collective)
Quote
If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d have said a faster horse.
—Henry Ford
(Maybe the customer or customer survey or customer based algorithm is NOT always right?)
Twitter Code Swarm
Twitter Code Swarm from Ben Sandofsky on Vimeo.
I love this amazing video, it visualizes the complex process that goes on behind the scenes of a project in development. I love how clumps of data fly around form person to person and when huge amounts of new bits fly in. Trying to correlate that to my own dev experience is fascinating.
You can see more code development visualizations at
vis.cs.ucdavis.edu/~ogawa/codeswarm
Three Fun Reads
You Are Not A Gadget by Jaron Lanier
The line between a quack and a great thinker is very thin. I found much of this book hard to follow, but if you just let the ideas wash over you Jaron has a lot to offer. His critique of current digital trends, especially in the web 2.0 world, are definitely worth pondering. He is in direct opposition to people like Clay Shirky, whom he calls hive enthusiasts. Lanier believes The Hive will never amount to anything because of the old computer science adage: Garbage In, Garbage Out. His remarks that for all the hoopla about our “new” digital world, things are not that much fundamentally different from when he first started in this field more than 20 years ago, were interesting as well.
What the Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwell
More great and thought provoking essays. There is always a lot of fascinating stuff to learn from a Malcolm Gladwell book. This one is a collection of shorter essays, they don’t loose anything in their brevity and you get a lot more breadth. So far I was fascinated to learn why there are so many brands of mustard but really only one ketchup brand and more about the Popeil family history and their secret to success.
Death By Black Hole by Neil DeGrasse Tyson
A great, fun, and science filled romp through the cosmos. Not only do you get a detailed description of what happens when you fall into a black hole, you get some kind of scientific inquiry into almost any apsect of our cosmos. As an astrophysicist Neil touches on everything from our five senses, which in retrospect, seem to be very limited, all the way to the far reaches of the cosmos, which now seems even more mysterious and sublime.
p.s. some really good thoughts in this review of lanier’s book.