synchronoptica
one year ago: the Raelians (with synchronopticæ) plus a photo jacket
thirteen years ago: winter sports, a bounty for tax-avoidance plus the Feast of St Lucy
fourteen years ago: the UN climate summit in Durban plus sweet potato tortillas
fifteen years ago: vuvuzelas
you think hamilton wrote the federalist papers in trebuchet ms: Times New Roman turns rightwing
the night that the loving ended and the killing began: Hitchcock knock-off Crescendo! reviewed in depth
mercatino di natale: Brothers of Italy host a week-long winter wonderland named after the protagonist of The Never Ending Story—see also, see previously
running on empty: peak copper’s coincidence with peak oil and what that means for the renewable transition with or without the matinee darlings of Rare Earths—via Web Curios
castello di sammezzano: the Moorish and Oriental follies of Cesare Mattei and Ferdinando Panciatichi
asahi illusion: from the Japanese for morning sun, the centre of this optical deception is no brighter than the background
журнальная рубленаяa: Journal grotesque and typographical options in the Soviet Union—via Kottke
Via Web Curios, we are directed towards the US National Security Strategy with foreword by Donald Trump that was published in full earlier this week following leaks to international shock not only of its vision—one praised by Moscow as aligned with Putin’s own world-view—that’s little more than an addendum to the Monroe Doctrine, an isolationist policy demanding that Old World colonial powers stay out of the Americas and a posture focused on cultivating the US’s own regional empire, asserting a right to meddle in the politics of Latin America and taking over territories at the same time, like Cuba and the Panama canal, pretty audacious coming from a former colony only independent for a few decades at the time, and parsing the globe into three spheres of influence, a fantasy map of the United States and client possessions spanning from Greenland and Canada, the isthmus and further south with designs on the Falklands, the Indo-Pacific controlled by China and Europe—perhaps under control of Russia, uncontested and with no incursions upon the sovereignty of these domains, but more over repugnant for the unkindess it has for traditional allies and the US abandoning its commitment to uphold values of democracy and freedom, even if in principle only and not always in practise. 
“The days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over,” the NSS—the document mandated by congress to be periodically updated to provide a common understanding between the executive and legislative branches in terms of strategic priorities and a point of departure for dialogue and something dusted off and updated every other year to satisfy a requirement but never filled with blame and bombast. It identifies only vague and baiting threats like mass-migration, drug-runners, unfettered trade and globalism, echoing JD Vance’s earlier ill-received lecturing during the Munich Security Conference and warning Europe of “cultural erasure” with seemingly American interest in foreign policy to keep neighbours stable to quell refugee-seekers and immigration (questioning if NATO members whose populations are displaced by individuals with non-NATO heritage could be still considered reliable partners) and cites no concrete peril from Russia or China or North Korea and barely acknowledges its recent belligerence of record with bombing Iranian nuclear facilities or sabre-rattling in the Caribbean. Truly a scary read, this paper is only about thirty double-spaced pages in Times New Roman, written by AI (actually by Lt General Flynn—national security adviser kicked out during Trump’s first term) and at a basic reading level, so won’t take too much investment but is sure to haunt for a very, very long time.
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links to enjoy (with synchronopticæ) plus Jimmy who? for president
twelve years ago: a list of winter weather words
thirteen years ago: class architecture
fourteen years ago: visa reciprocity plus Clinton urges world leaders not to censor the internet
fifteen years ago: Mesopotamian dreamtime
Via Kottke, we are directed to a gem of a McSweeney’s contribution from Robert Rooney, on par with their perennial offerings, with an imagined dialogue amongst the marketing and development staff of Invicta Games, LTᴰ on their packaging for Mastermind, a two-player board game for breaking code invented in 1970 by an Israeli postmaster and telecommunications specialist and later refined and released by the UK plastics company after debuting and unsuccessfully shopped at the Nürnberg International Toy Fair. The resulting box art since 1973 featured this photograph of a mature man in a suit jacket in the foreground seated with a young woman in the background—the two amateur models, Cecilia Fung and Bill Woodward, reuniting in 2003 to pose for a publicity photo. “Yes. Let the box look like it could pass a doctoral defence and start a coup d’etat at the same time.”
helm of awe: taboos, tattoos and load-bearing iconography
esta: White House will vet social media history of tourists from visa-free countries
🕯️: holiday borders and decorative elements from an old Ricatype catalogue
forty winks: sleep habits in the animal kingdom—see previously
association football: Trump suggests changing the America name for the sport from soccer (with adjustments to current franchises) ahead of co-hosting the World Cup with Canada and Mexico
water of the sky: two thousand Japanese words for rain—see previously
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links worth revisiting (with synchronopticæ) plus parental guidance suggested
thirteen years ago: people in space right now
fourteen years ago: the 2012 US presidential race a year out
The latest from Neal Agarwal (see previously) evokes the chain-reaction of the zero-player Game of Life and is well worth playing on your desktop with the volume up to appreciate the stirring cello score with increasing intensity and tempo as you scale up. 
As one advances, there are interesting facts about the largest examples of the small and the smallest of the big, including long extinct species like the Arthropleura, an invertebrate as big as a tiger that roamed steamy oxygen rich forests during the Carboniferous period three-hundred million years ago and the extant but threatened giant barrel sponge, the Red Wood of the Reefs, that could hold a human and can live for two-thousand years.
Joining Spain, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Ireland, Iceland’s national broadcaster, RÚV, has voted to boycott the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest scheduled to be held in Vienna over the decision of the organising committee, the European Broadcasting Union, not to expel Israel for its conduct of the war against Hamas and occupation of Gaza. 
The announcement coinciding with International Human Rights Day, Iceland cites that “give public debate in the country…it is clear that neither joy nor peace will prevail” regarding participation. Members of the EBU voted in a general assembly last week to adopt stricter rules regarding alleged ballot manipulation favouring Israeli contestants during the last Eurovision but fell short of banning them, with the mounting walk-outs casting a pall over what’s supposed to be a feel-good cultural exchange (though it has never been wholly apolitical) with diminishing acts and those remaining seeming like a whitewashing of recent events.
In a cable from earlier in the week, US secretary of state reversed a decision taken during the Biden administration to use the modern, more legible typeface Calibri (also the default setting of the Microsoft Office suite of programmes), 
directing consular staff to resume using Times New Roman, criticising the move of his predecessor as wastefully woke, specifically taking aim at accessibility, saying that this would restore professionalism and decorum (we think that’s a lot to ask of some pixels–see also) to the foreign service, shaped through the typography of serif fonts. The formatting standard moreover aligns with the president’s One Voice for America’s Foreign Relations directive for communiqués, a magisterial order that does not admit for back-channel dialogue and outreach, notwithstanding appreciable readability for those with vision limitations and those whom might not cleave exclusively to Latin lettering.
synchronoptica
one year ago: the Pope declares a jubilee year (with synchronopticæ) plus Luigi Mangione apprehended
twelve years ago: meme trading cards
thirteen years ago: apocryphal holiday traditions plus the Fahrenheit and Celsius scales
fifteen years ago: decking the halls
