synchronoptica
one year ago: the mental radio interceptions of Grant Wallace (with synchronoptica) plus more on endonyms and exonyms
seven years ago: Teen Look magazine plus a demonic backlog of unfinished business
eight years ago: presidential pets, animator Tom Oreb, separating migrant families plus NASA’s style guide
ten years ago: assorted links to enjoy
eleven years ago: neglected bestiaries
Courtesy of our faithful chronicler, we learn that on this day in 1953, whilst stationed in West Germany Air Force staff sergeant Johnny Cash in Landsberg am Lech (which also hosted the detention facility 
where Hitler was incarcerated following the abortive Beer-Hall Putsch in 1921 and on the 1933 anniversary of the National Socialist party’s ascendancy in the Reichstag) was likely the among the first to learn about the death of revolutionary leader Joseph Stalin outside of the Soviet inner political circle. The General Secretary of the Communist Party had suffered a stroke a few days earlier and succumbed whilst recuperating in his dacha after extensive medical intervention (probably of a brain haemorrhage) and not announced to the public immediately and possibly disclosed due to this interception. Monitoring coded radio communiques, Cash broke the news through his chain of command to Eisenhower after the message was deciphered. Aside from this important intercept that penetrated the highest echelons of the regime, the balance of Cash’s three year tour was isolating and uneventful, leading to a formation of a band called the Landsberg Barbarians (a play on Bavarians) that played during off duty hours in local venues and saw the inspiration and development of such signature songs as “Folsom Prison Blues” and “Hey Porter.”
Meeting for the first time in the garage of founder and organiser Gordon French in Menlo Park California on this day in 1975, this informal association of electronic and programming enthusiasts was chartered as a forum for hobbyists to exchange ideas and create DIY personal computing devices to make the emerging technologies more accessible to everyone. 
Present for this inaugural gathering, Steve Wozniak (previously here and here) credited the demonstration and reverse-engineering of an Altair 8800 microcomputer as inspiration for designing the Apple I. Running regular meetings through 1986, Steve Jobs, John Draper (former phone phreak), Paul Terrell (proprietor of Byte Shop, the first hardware retail outlet), Jerry Lawson (creator of the first cartridge-based video game system, the Fairchild Channel F) and Liza Loop (who saw the potential to supplement classroom and distance learning and opened the first public-access computer labs) were also members.
Via Kottke, whose also turned coverage almost exclusively to stories about the Putsch unfolding in the United States, we are directed to Techdirt’s founder and senior editor Mike Masnick’s very resonant piece on why the technology site has pivoted its focus towards reporting on how rights and liberties are in peril and that it’s now a democracy blog (whether we like it or not), reemphasising that the venerable platform had always reported on not just technologic trends but moreover the intersectionality of innovation and policy—privacy, patents, intellectual property—and now that those institutions that fostered creativity and development are under threat. If they disappear, and those doing the dismantling are not offering something better to replace them in terms of education, access, autonomy or transparency, so does all of the other fun stuff that we internet caretakers curate, in tech and culture and science.
synchronoptica
one year ago: the Odyssey in the Baltics (with synchronoptica) plus assorted links worth the revisit
seven years ago: bizarre Philip K Dick paperback cover art, Picasso’s doppelganger plus more non-existent words
eight years ago: The Man in the High Castle, Banksy’s Walled Off Hotel, AI travel agents plus Trump as the Manchurian Candidate
ten years ago: America and moral panics, more links to enjoy, serving wine to cattle plus capturing the panoramic sweep of sacred architecture
eleven years ago: transdimensional carpentry plus more developments in fusion energy
Having been exposed to the avant-garde artistic performance directed by Oskar Schlemmer beforehand, we enjoyed this omnibus posting on the touring troupe put together for the Triadic Ballet to help spread the ethos of the Bauhaus movement from 1921 to 1929 through its various revivals and re-interpretations of choreographed geometry, privileging the form and function of dance to the level of appreciation for a well-conceived chair or building. Building off of multiples of three, the concept is to introduce and reinforce he unity of design across disciplines, as something transcendent despite and by dint of mass-production, the transformative power of art on industry. Much more at Colossal at the link above, including original costume designs and contemporary productions.
Inaugurated on this day in 1853 (see below—public ceremonies were held on 4 March with a few exceptions when the date fell on a Sunday from 1793 until 1933), William Rufus DeVane King became the thirteenth vice president of the United States—serving until his death about a month later. 
Previously a representative from North Carolina (under the constitutional age requirement of twenty-five but attaining that age by the time congress convened and then sworn in), senator of Alabama and ambassador to France and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, King assisted in the drafting of the Comprise of 1850 and generally held moderate positions (insofar as possible for such things) on slavery and westward expansion, opposing secession while resisting efforts to abolish enslavement in the congressionally administered District of Columbia. Suffering from a bout of tuberculosis, which would summarily be his demise, King was in residence at a sanitarium in Matanzas Cuba at the time of transition and by dint of a special act of Congress was administered his oath there by a consular officer. King and subsequent successor to the presidency, James Buchanan, were able to survive the political scandal of their long-term homosocial and homosexual relationship, having lived together for thirteen years, despite being mocked publicly as Miss Nancy and Aunt Fancy respectively by the Jacksonian camp. Shortly after the ceremony, King made his way back to Washington, expiring two days after his arrival, never having discharged any act in his capacity with the office remaining vacant until thr inauguration of Buchanan in 187, with John C Breckinridge, often summoned to the White House to speak with Harriet Lane, Buchanan’s niece and acting First Lady—one of eleven such designees but never a divorcee to service a bachelor or widower, an accomplished hostess, for private office with the president.
synchronoptica
one year ago: a televised version of the Star Wars saga with product placement (with synchronoptica)
seven years ago: Berlusconi returns
eight years ago: pan to the right, Kellyanne Conway plus Tรผrkiye takes a cue from MAGA
nine years ago: a trafficking board game plus a plant-identifying app
ten years ago: numeracy from The Simpsons, assorted links worth revisiting, executive functions plus the legacy of Bauhaus
Already taking certain cues from the dog when it comes to a vigorous shake of the head and big stretches as a reminder, from the New Shelton wet/dry comes another behaviour that maybe it’s wise to incorporate in that chewing wood may boost memory and brain antioxidants. Previous studies suggest that mastication has a positive influence on blood flow and brain function but new research points to how chewing wood—like a popsicle stick—as opposed to gnawing on piece of gum might stimulate production of glutathione, an important restorative that helps the brain repair oxidative stress, neutralising reactive chemicals. More longitudinal studies are needed to see if the correlation nets improved cognition and overall help.
Cory Doctorow couches the current pandemonium that America has inherited in the succession of dormant crises that neoliberal economics professor turned advisor to Reagan and Thatcher Milton Friedman and his acolytes (previously), recognising that external pressures and anxiety can quickly spiral out of control “ideas can move from the periphery to the centre in an eyeblink,” and in his role was responsible keep those regressive notions in his quiver and ready to deploy at a moment’s notice when the public was most vulnerable and susceptible to turning. 
As with the illiberalism that rose from the pandemic and second-wave inflation that followed, the US is emboldened to be disruptive but in ways that that are shortsighted, not sustainable and likely to backfire, repatriating off-shored industry is a process as gradual and fraught as any economic pressures that saw the loss of manufacturing capacity in the first place and won’t be fixed by tariffs, as bad as reversing posture on the environment are, clean, renewable energy is at a crucial juncture and looking less and less like that oil could ever recapture its primacy, dismantling the administrative state and defaming bureaucracy and rubbishing allies and a world order its helped maintain for decades does not put American interests first but rather risks its further descent into a pariah nation, a kleptocracy and failed petrostate with nuclear weapons. These uncertain times can also engender mainstreaming the fringe and reframing it something that people want desperately or reject categorically, but hopefully the cranks and charlatans have lost their lustre and those under their influence radicalised.
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronoptica), the inauguration of Andrew Jackson, Penrose tiles plus die variants
seven years ago: a quilted autograph collection plus modern day hobo symbols
eight years ago: Girls’ Day customs and doll displays, more links to enjoy plus US vice-president’s mixing of personal and official emails
nine years ago: sanctions imposed against North Korea, portable Macs for astronauts plus a robotic dog
ten years ago: even more links plus maps that never happened
