vignette effect (13. 518)

Though the annoying and frustrating modal pop-overs might prefer a different nomenclature—like splash screen, the unwanted, though in some jurisdictions legally mandated for privacy protections or deployed as an obstacle to AI scrapping, interactions that curtain websites with phoney consent or relentlessly invite one to subscribe to a newsletter, engage with its app version or donate deserve the name dickover. We are primed to brace ourselves when clicking a link for this treatment and the placebo-buttons to bat them away but the impunity really heats up once one starts reading a post and the message stops one’s progress several paragraphs in—this article is for paid subscribers only or you have read your last free story—see also here and here. On some level, I get it, especially due to ad-hosting revenue being what it is, but it’s still a particular dick move.

optotype (13. 517)

The second star of the constellation Ursa Major (the Big Dipper or the Plough or in Arabic بَنَاتُ نَعْشٍ الكُبْرَى , the daughters of the bier—those who bear the funeral litter) and it was considered a test of visual acuity for those whose keen eyesight could resolve the second star of its tail or handle, Mizar (ζ Ursae Majoris, meaning apron or wrapping in Arabic) from its fainter companion Alcor (it’s name being literally that) with the eye exam likened to being able to distinguish a horse and rider at distance. Other civilisations had other asterisms used for the same purposes. The Latinised adage, Vidit Alcor, at non lunam plenam—for he saw Alcor yet not the full Moon, came to signify one whom couldn’t see the forest for the trees.

synchronoptica

one year ago: Iranian nuclear talks (with synchronopticæ), an Airstream inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, US tech CEOs enlist in the army plus a Simpsons rewatch project

twelve years ago: digitally curating street art plus East Germany strikes down legislation outlawing homosexual relationships (1969)

thirteen years ago: the Italian silk industry plus more fallout from Snowden’s revelations

fourteen years ago: the United States of poverty plus a Fathers’ Day greeting 

fifteen years ago: Iceland crowd-sources its constitution 

sixteen years ago: more on Afghanistan’s mineral resources 

day one-hundred six (13. 516)

After several tense hours when an IDF strike of the suburbs of Beirut looked to sabotage the entire negotiations—one Trump said shouldn’t have happened, “Let’s not blow it—Iran and the US reached a tentative peace settlement and approved the memorandum of understanding, to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end the American blockade of Iranian ports. Some twelve billion dollars of frozen Iranian assets will be released, with Europeans insisting that sanction relief must be conditioned on de-nuclearisation. The MOU is scheduled to be signed in Geneva on Friday and at this juncture, de-mining operations will start to clear the waterway to ensure safe passage—and whilst world leaders hailed the return to status quo ante bellum as positive, market reactions were less enthusiastic than expected, with energy prices not expected to come down soon and more time needed to restore lines of distribution and refining. It remains unclear whether Tehran will be able to impose tolls on transiting vessels. The issue of enriched uranium has been tabled for now and Israel was not party to the talks and has not yet responded to the outcome. Questions also remain with respect to Lebanon and the Israeli occupation at the southern border. Although calling it a grand deal, the United States is in a significantly weaker strategic position than when they started the war, failing to achieve objectives laid out for beginning the joint conflict in the first place and not substantively different than what was agreed to under the Obama administration in 2015 and uncertainty remains how enduring this peace might be.

someone like you (13. 515)

Published posthumously as a collection of YA short fiction from the author’s adult corpus among The Umbrella Man and Other Stories, problematic fav Roald Dahl in The Great Automatic Grammatizator (1954) deals with a mechanically-minded engineer (named Adolphe Knipe, almost certainly a lightly-veiled reference to Dahl’s own US publisher, Alfred A Knopf, who reasons that the rules of language are fixed by certain mathematical principles, like the advances in calculators he has recently delivered on commission for his employer, and applies this exploit by creating a mammoth machine able to create a best-seller (see also) in fifteen minutes. Ending on a cautionary note, writers from around the world are left with no choice but to license their authorship, and by extension, human creativity, to the machine, spurned by the industry that rejected his moonlighting endeavours and taking his revenge by making all writing mediocre and formulaic at best, acknowledging that quantity bested quality in the final reckoning.

forget it jake, it’s clankertown (13. 514)

Stealing the title from the OP at MetaFilter because it couldn’t be improved upon—a favourite snowclone of mine lately that usually withers away as I have to explain it to younger coworkers, though in a way that works on a level since I can repeat, “Forget it Jake, it’s Chinatown,” without substituting the place where we work or the client’s location—we enjoyed this analysis of social media gatekeeping, accusation culture with ‘AI slop’ rising to the top along with other strawman invectives like sockpuppet, astroturf and shill but without the overall calling out of fallacy not increasing in aggregate. Whilst not suggesting that online discourse may be plateauing with a new baseline of civility, findings may intimate that we are just more weary of feeding the trolls and know that it lies behind every engagement. AI shaming should definitely exist but labelling one a bot, especially falsely (which seems to happen more and more often) can also stifle or silence an honest conversation. What do you think? I wouldn’t invite a large language model to polish or tarnish my writing—for what it’s worth (even at work, despite it constantly being jammed down or throats), though I know it could always stand a second pass for proofreading purposes. More at the links above.

bread and circuses (13. 513)

Promising to end the stalemate in Iran and bring about peace in the Middle East for the war he started as a present to himself, Trump is throwing an incredibly crass spectacle on the south lawn of the White House that would make Caligula blanch at the idea for his birthday.His scheduled cage-fight inside of a mesh-wire octagon with gladiators (albeit staged) pummelling each other into submission follows being roundly booed by spectators at basketball game in Madison Square Garden and opting to skip the World Cup opener for fear of more of the same treatment and comes amid court orders removing his name from the Kennedy Center,restoring informational signs to national parks that Trump said disparaged the US with historical accuracies, raging inflation and gas prices stemming from that said war, and the upcoming mid-term elections will be attended by cabinet officials and four thousand audience members with thousands more watching from the Ellipse—G7 leaders postponed their summit in Évian-les-Bains so Trump could attend the next day. Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) which is running the event further announced an official partner—World Liberty Financial, a crypto company co-owned by the Trump family and special diplomatic envoy Steve Witkoff, which will create a quarter of a million dollar athlete bonus betting pool for the winners. Having used considerable government resources to bring this series of blood-sport matches together and standing to gain from it financially, I should think Hunter Biden’s laptop would have something to say about all this.

synchronoptica

one year ago: musical cicadas (with synchronopticæ) plus Orwell on No Kings

twelve years ago: a visit to Rapallo and environs plus spa day in Montecatini

fourteen years ago: Toothpaste for Dinner 

fifteen years ago: the Facebook IPO plus the tragedy of the commons

sixteen years ago: Afghanistan’s mineral wealth 

day one-hundred five (13. 512)

British maritime forces intercept a Russian shadow fleet trawling the waters of the Channel. Trump announces that a deal will be signed on Sunday, which will reopen the Strait of Hormuz to all traffic—although Tehran and Pakistani mediators, whilst agreeing that they are closer to peace than any point since the US and Israeli began their war of choice, deny the timing and the exact date when they will apply their digital signatures and are withholding any of the agreed upon terms, despite the US president posting that Iran has surrendered its nuclear dust, which America will retrieve and destroy at a later time. A settlement for Lebanon, one of the key sticking points for Iran, is apparently tabled for now; previous serial claims for the stalled talks to extend the ceasefire and reopen shipping lanes have dissolved amongst contradictory claims, rhetoric and breaches in the truce.

les étoiles d’ivry (13. 511)

Via ibīdem, we are directed to the ensemble housing estate of Ivry ˢ/ Seine, a Parisian suburb just southeast of the capital, designed by architects Renée Gailhoustet and Jean Renaudie constructed between 1969 and 1975, happily still standing though in need of some care and attention. The name of the mixed-used complex with forty residential units for social housing with commercial and office spaces refers the stellar rays of the triangular points of exposed concrete and whilst the overall style could be described as Brutalist (see also here and here), the open form structure with staggered verdant terraces and ramps and platforms connecting public and private spaces has an element of social engagement and spontaneity of interaction not found in all projects of the genre. See more photographs and floor plans from Architecture Lab at the link above.