tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55628952011-04-21T18:09:35.038-07:00Counter TerraDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comBlogger701100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1166229304265254722006-12-15T16:29:00.000-08:002006-12-15T16:36:34.013-08:00Elsewhere RevisitedThis is actually a follow-up to a post I made a couple of years ago here.More on the video and Elsewhere (and a better quality video) here.Something about this one captures happy D.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1166227359067987642006-12-15T16:00:00.000-08:002006-12-15T16:06:11.266-08:00Dayvan CowboyDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1147109695981956222006-05-08T10:23:00.000-07:002006-05-08T10:34:56.910-07:00Strange Titan Landing MusicYes, it's been too long. There's a moderate backlog of things I've bookmarked for posting, but when I saw this I had to post it immediately. It is quintessentially counter terran.The movie downloadable from NASA's site here is a beautiful combination of art, science, and design. I think it would hold its own in a gallery.Now I want an interface like that for my car.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1127487391143840742005-09-23T07:47:00.000-07:002005-09-23T07:56:31.150-07:00Nuke 'Em AllThe Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory helpfully explains some of the impracticalities of using nukes to destroy hurricanes here.The main difficulty with using explosives to modify hurricanes is the amount of energy required. A fully developed hurricane can release heat energy at a rate of 5 to 20x1013 watts and converts less than 10% of the heat into the Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1121800535677457772005-07-19T10:57:00.000-07:002005-07-19T12:39:52.696-07:00The Poetics of CartographyHere's a This American Life episode on mapping. Not one of the better episodes, but it has its moments.Act 1: Maps of only the pools of light cast by streetlamps. Maps of neighborhood Halloween pumpkins. "It's almost like you're writing a novel, but with pure symbol, with maps."Act 2: "I arrived in a new job at a new office. In those sorts of situations, you are always Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1121795483981992592005-07-19T10:44:00.000-07:002005-07-19T12:15:51.176-07:00Too Many CooksNews to me. The original painting of the death of Captain Cook was discovered in 2004. It is not so noble.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1121794412784242642005-07-19T09:16:00.000-07:002005-07-19T12:16:02.843-07:00Nooks and CranniesWhile I know it's received a fair amount of attention already, the Degree Confluence Project (compiled nicely in a world map here) is worth a look. People upload photos and sometimes a travelogue for the degree intersections of latitude and longitude around the world. At it's worst, it's like sitting through your neighbor's vacation slide show--a neighbor who's one of those GPS Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1107594370008420302005-02-05T00:49:00.000-08:002005-02-05T01:06:10.006-08:00Do Not Fail Your Species
"When you look up at the evening sky know that we have conquered 48.729% of the known Universe."
If semester projects go as planned, I'll post a few satellite images displaying nitrogen content in mesoscale eddies off Hawai'i.
Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1104531196288007902004-12-31T13:48:00.000-08:002004-12-31T16:09:01.400-08:00Atom Feed
Not that I'm posting much, but here's the atom feed.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1104529501023160752004-12-31T13:07:00.000-08:002004-12-31T16:10:28.486-08:00Dot Matrix
So I'm reading one of my favorite blogs (Mimi) and catch a link to a Dallas band that actually doesn't suck, Tree Wave. They make stuff with old, reprogrammed computer hardware. Without sucking. "Sleep" apparently incorporates an Epson dot matrix printer (which must be heard to be believed). One of the bandmembers also gets a shout out for being a UTD grad and hacking a Homestar Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1098769525844838302004-10-25T23:44:00.000-07:002004-12-31T13:45:41.076-08:00Blogger Hosed the Comments
Sorry.
UPDATE: Seems ok. My mistake.
Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1098768895612242392004-10-25T21:55:00.000-07:002004-10-25T22:34:55.613-07:00Slow Boat Veterans for Truth
If you're like me, you have a secret, aching desire to be a tugboat captain, a freighter captain, or any officer on a big, otherwise unimposing seagoing vessel that doesn't feature buffet nights in the ballroom. The next best thing might be travelling by freighter. The days of the banana boats and such are largely gone, but it seems even modern container ships Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1098766269539607352004-10-25T21:48:00.000-07:002004-10-25T23:08:39.600-07:00Sunday Bloody Sunday
rx do mashups of Sunday Bloody Sunday and Walk on the Wild Side with W. on the mic.
The U2 cover was in the mix on this week's particularly good Solid Steel set with Strictly Kev and DJ Qwerty. I don't think they archive their shows anymore, so drop me an email if you want this one.
Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1087712603951658852004-06-19T23:07:00.000-07:002004-10-25T21:48:06.420-07:00World Subways and Chicago Snapshots
fake is the new real has some interesting bits:
Maps of the world subways at the same scale.
Snapshots of Chicago, taken at streetcorners at one mile intervals.
I miss Chicago. I miss Chicagoans.
Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1080579339578775772004-03-29T08:55:00.000-08:002004-03-29T08:59:09.513-08:00Google Me a River
Google Local lets you search the net by lat/long. US only at the moment, but a global version would be pretty amazing. And they need point-and-click functionality for the map.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1080509099981029932004-03-28T13:24:00.000-08:002004-03-28T13:33:02.280-08:00Back to Chernobyl
"The most exciting thing about rides in Ghosttown is to hit a red line on my bike's tacho and break this silence with roar of a wounded dinosaur and then to close throttle and listen how all those ghosts cursing 1100cc kawasaki engin."Joyriding in a nuclear wasteland on a jap bike.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1079072132520680962004-03-11T22:15:00.000-08:002004-03-11T22:22:07.670-08:00Archipelagoes in Our Minds
Ursula K. Le Guin interviewed here.Q: What effects have Ishi and his story had on your writing?
UKL: Nothing directly that I know of. I knew nothing about Ishi and his story until my mother began writing the biography, long after I was grown and writing and publishing. That a lot of my protagonists are alone of their kind among people of another kind - this is Ishi's Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1077561732734257352004-02-23T10:42:00.000-08:002004-02-28T15:11:46.780-08:00Counter Counter Terra
Terra Nova is an excellent blog dedicated to virtual worlds. Hopefully the * Terra * theme won't become overused.
UPDATE: NYT has an article on Ludology here.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1077560877190294002004-02-23T10:27:00.000-08:002004-02-23T11:35:13.793-08:00Truly Counter Terra Revisited
There.com, one of the big players in the virtual world market (?), has been contracted by the US Army to build a "second Earth.""...the Army needs a high-level training, mission-rehearsal and analytic capability for long-duration, asymmetric operations such as we're in the middle of today in Afghanistan, Iraq and other places. A capability that focuses on human Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1077440536833375682004-02-22T01:02:00.000-08:002004-02-22T10:23:41.936-08:00The Underwhelming Theorist and Other Morsels
Alex Golub has provided a nice evening of reading. Here are some jumping off points...
Rage Against the Academe:The point is not that the underwhelming theorist is a bad person. He's a nice guy who's a good teacher and - as I mentioned above - a jaw-droppingly detailed ethnographer. Nor is the point that jaw-droppingly detailed ethnography is a bad Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1077390538676522702004-02-21T11:08:00.000-08:002004-02-21T11:10:56.996-08:00Orkut Data Mining
Georeferenced Orkut users here. Search by lat/long or zip code.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1075171809341371812004-01-26T18:50:00.000-08:002004-01-26T19:16:42.483-08:00Killer Mapp
Please let me be the first to have coined that term!
Tim O'Reilly sparked some interesting discussion on Geowanking today regarding locative services like Mapquest and why they never became killer apps in the "first generation web". Responses ranged from the practical (spatial data/GIS is notoriously balkanized standards-wise) to more utopian visions (geoblogs --> Sim City Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1074494900327256182004-01-18T22:48:00.000-08:002004-01-18T22:49:44.530-08:00Friendly Blogs
Some friends have linked me. I link them back. Thanks Paula! Thanks Tom!
And I'll preempively link Chad too while I'm at it. And Jeff (kinda).Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1074493290625599652004-01-18T22:21:00.000-08:002004-01-18T22:28:12.186-08:00Electro Kabuki
Please, please, please let me be the first to have coined that term. Damn.
Sony demos dancing michelin man robots. I found it deeply disturbing.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1073708883270010992004-01-09T20:28:00.000-08:002004-01-09T20:29:18.780-08:00New Year
I'm back from the break. My Counter Terran resolution is to write more actual content and eschew the annotated link list format I've fallen into.
We'll see. The next year is looking like it'll be pretty tough.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1070857656404499642003-12-07T20:27:00.000-08:002003-12-07T20:37:09.920-08:00Other Suns
The Tate has an exhibit hall dominated by a huge, sun-like light source composed of "mono-frequency lamps [that] emit light at such a narrow frequency that colours other than yellow and black are invisible, thus transforming the visual field around the sun into a vast duotone landscape."
Exit Planet Dust.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1070857025898636612003-12-07T20:17:00.000-08:002003-12-07T20:44:19.856-08:00LANDSAT Exhibit
The Library of Congress has an exhibit of lovely LANDSAT images. Shame they aren't on the web at higher resolution.
Related to the post above, many of these are false color images. I must tell you since I've spent the last few weeks staring at LANDSAT and ASTER imagery, trying to interpret images in wavelengths unknown to the human eye for long periods of time causes some very Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1070253363355170702003-11-30T20:36:00.000-08:002003-11-30T20:37:39.360-08:00Worldchanging
Worldchanging is everything Counter Terra aspires to be and much, much more. Check it out. Thanks to the Viridians.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1068567067716287832003-11-11T08:11:00.000-08:002003-11-11T08:11:19.170-08:00Afar Depression
Very busy lately, but I thought of my negligence yesterday and threw together this mpeg using some of the data I've been working with. What you'll see is a short 3D flyover of the Afar Depression in Djibouti compiled from a digital elevation model of the region and overlaid with Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) data. The blank area in one part of the image is Djibouti Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1067534088677615172003-10-30T09:14:00.000-08:002003-10-30T09:17:38.250-08:00The Hazards of Reading Cryptonomicon?
In 1934, the Chinese Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-Shek was facing a twin threat - from the invading Japanese and from the Communist rebels of Mao Tse-tung. For safekeeping, his supporters sent 125,000 tons of Chinese gold to America and, in a covert deal with the president Franklin D Roosevelt, were given US bonds in return. The sum was so large that it led Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1067529914335264802003-10-30T08:05:00.000-08:002003-10-30T09:17:30.000-08:00Avian Terrorism
· Over 155 people have been killed world-wide as a result of bird strikes since 1990.
· Over 3,700 bird strikes were reported by the U.S. Air Force in 2002.
· Over 6,100 bird strikes were reported for U.S. civil aircraft in 2002.
· An estimated 80% of bird strikes to U.S. civil aircraft go unreported.
· Over 600 civil aircraft collisions with deer were reported in the U.S., 1990-Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1067231395149585122003-10-26T21:09:00.000-08:002003-10-26T21:10:32.703-08:00Frogs and Lobsters
Well, maybe the semantic web is nutty, but...
RDF, FOAF, RSS, SOAP... These acronyms seem to have the same effect on many technologists: eyes rolling, head shaking, and murmurs of "Ah, yes, the utopian Semantic Web. Isn't that a cute idea." Most think the notion of standardized, shared metadata being embraced by the masses is a pipe dream. My feeling is that it's more akin to Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1066288430240488662003-10-16T00:13:00.000-07:002003-10-16T00:16:24.490-07:00Mapparium
The Mary Baker Eddy Library for the Betterment of Humanity in Boston has a Mapparium, a 30-foot diameter globe made of colored glass in bronze panes built in 1935. Finish it with a walkway running through the center and some decent light and you've got something pretty bloody cool. Bucky would have liked it, I suspect.
Thanks, Nicole!Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1065812775248320432003-10-10T12:06:00.000-07:002003-10-10T12:06:40.893-07:00And Don't Forget PKD
"I forget whether, in the Virtual Light books, Arnold is president of the US or merely Governor of SoCal, but, hey, it looks like I've gone and been prescient again. I hate it when that happens."Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1065674806066636172003-10-08T21:46:00.000-07:002003-10-08T21:56:22.023-07:00Left vs. Right
"What gods do you pray to?"
"I pray to the Four Winds, and you?"
"To Crom, but he doesn't listen."
"Heh, what good is he than?"
"Crom is strong! When I die, I will go to Valhalla, and he will ask me: What is the riddle of steel? And if I don't know it, he will cast me out of Valhalla laughing. That's Crom, strong in his mountain."
"My god is greater."
"Hah! Crom laughs at your FourDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1064643831753138892003-09-26T23:23:00.000-07:002003-09-29T06:36:04.850-07:00Electronic Music Primer
This is an absolutely amazing attempt to provide a guide to electronic music genres. Know the difference between Darkcore and Darkstep? Glitch and Noizecore? This will give you an idea.
This is the first I've heard of the "infamous" Rio Funk:The street ghettos of Rio de Janeiro are the setting of this fucked up movement in which impoverished youths beat each other toDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1064558716389939102003-09-25T23:45:00.000-07:002003-09-25T23:53:00.706-07:00Planet of the Apes meets Bucky
Université Tangente has some interesting maps of things you might not expect--communisms, networks of corporate political power, the prison-industrial complex. If you can get past the politics (assuming you want to), they're playing interestingly at the edges of the quasi-panoptic aspects of maps as art, entertainment, and political instrument. This essay touches Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1064556254759542822003-09-25T23:04:00.000-07:002003-09-25T23:54:17.206-07:00More Quicksilver
Neal Stephenson has a wiki for Quicksilver annotations. I guess 944 pages wasn't enough.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1064349455646856092003-09-23T13:37:00.000-07:002003-09-23T13:54:29.540-07:00Modern Japanese Woodblocks
Making Light's post on the art of Yoshida Hiroshi points to an amazing set of images--mostly woodblock prints of Indian landscapes. They are not unlike some of the better landscapes by Moebius, some of which have made their way into my dreams over the years and even inspired an attempt or two at non-sequential art.
They also bring to mind one of my personal favoritesDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1064127954808223122003-09-21T00:05:00.000-07:002003-09-21T00:06:15.320-07:00Yo La Tengo
...kicked my ass tonight. Damn.
Thanks, Paula!Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1063214330078195912003-09-10T10:18:00.000-07:002003-09-10T10:24:28.826-07:00News Flash: Baudrillard Denies All Responsibility for Keanu Reeves
A rough mix:Le système produit une négativité en trompe-l’œil, qui est intégrée aux produits du spectacle comme l’obsolescence est incluse dans les objets industriels. C’est du reste la façon la plus efficace de verrouiller toute alternative véritable. Il n’y a plus de point oméga extérieur sur lequel s’appuyer pour penser ce Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1063211942101947072003-09-10T09:39:00.000-07:002003-09-10T22:05:39.050-07:00How to Use the Intel Teraflop
The amazingly good and highly recommended Idle Words has this post on Sandia National Laboratory's "comet porn.""Naturally they followed Ceglowski's Law of Urban Celestial Mechanics, which states that all computer simulations of objects hitting the Earth must be shown destroying Manhattan. This particular bad boy hits south of Brooklyn, ejecting eight hundred cubic Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1062707990148230832003-09-04T13:39:00.000-07:002003-09-04T13:57:20.220-07:00MetaCounterTerra
"Like National Geographic. With an edge."Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1062707924335858972003-09-04T13:38:00.000-07:002003-09-04T14:52:52.796-07:00All God's Anthropologists Got Politics
Margaret Mead, Tony Soprano, and the New Right. Micaela di Leonardo discharges a shotgun on a shocking spread of interesting memes in one article.
Originally went down this road thanks to this post on Easily Distracted.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1062125919432061672003-08-28T19:58:00.000-07:002003-08-28T20:11:50.856-07:00Counter World Peace
Comrade Floris performs a figure ground reversal on the former WorldPeaceRadio and joins the counter-revolution. And updates his site with pictures of garden gnomes in a Belgian trailer park...
"If there would be WP, there would be no more reason for us to exist, and, we find WorldWarRadio somewhat pompous-sounding. On the other hand, we've simply capitulated to the bush-ite Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1061865795065761092003-08-25T19:43:00.000-07:002003-08-25T19:47:26.620-07:00Topography Via JPL
This press release announces the release of new topographic maps of the world by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory last week. Links to images are at the bottom of the page. Really gloriously beautiful things...
Bonus link: This image of the Hawaiian Islands.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1061359900340251572003-08-19T23:11:00.000-07:002003-08-21T05:03:39.310-07:00Liberian Knickers
A brief blurb on the BBC gives a bit of explanation to some of the odd outfits you see among the soldiers in Liberia and other parts of West Africa.
I don't recall much of my little reading of things West African, but I do remember a bit in Jack Goody's Domestication of the Savage Mind (summarized here) that mentions the use of charms with juju and their power to ward off Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1061325854746843772003-08-19T13:44:00.000-07:002003-08-19T18:40:10.506-07:00Non-SF and More Enlightenment
Mr. Sterling points to this post regarding recent trends in science fiction. A comment on said post also has some bits from an "anonymous" reader of the Quicksilver draft....in Quicksilver the parallel is with the "age of enlightenment", wherein basic concepts were still struggling to be understood; the industrial revolution (when those concepts actually affected Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1061324634734168472003-08-19T13:23:00.000-07:002003-08-19T18:37:11.776-07:00Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds
A really nice collection of material on mass human follies as found on Making Light.
19th century London's "wassup!": Quoz!
The politics of long hair: When the Emperor Charles V. ascended the throne of Spain, he had no beard. It was not to be expected that the obsequious parasites who always surround a monarch, could presume to look moreDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1060277215324487792003-08-07T10:26:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:41:18.273-07:00GPS Landscapes
Here's a really neat collection of GPS drawings and art. There's something remarkably whimsical about this animation of children running about.
Also, here's a nice real-time GPS map project for Amsterdam.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1060234067021262312003-08-06T22:27:00.000-07:002003-08-06T22:34:10.470-07:00I Cannot Disclose Its Nature
Drugs, AK-47s, and Juju. Street combat in Monrovia."Seven youths broke cover and emptied their assault rifles in the direction of the other side, a collection of shacks hundreds of metres away."
"The seven dashed back behind a wall, panting. It was the turn of David Kollie, 12, nicknamed Deputy, to lead the next wave. He wore a red headband, a yellow T-shirt which Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1060223810881523092003-08-06T19:36:00.000-07:002003-08-06T22:33:17.150-07:00How to Bow
How-to-Bow is a very thorough primer on japanese business/social etiquette featuring scary flash characters. Notice how the senior-most manager is apparently expected to fall asleep during presentations. "At the end of the work day when saying good-bye to the colleagues who remain in the office, one bows several times in short intervals and apologizes for having to leave early. The Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1060105465790167822003-08-05T10:44:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:41:50.060-07:00The Art of Memory and The New Geomancy
Does the memory palace provide a good model for extensible, geo-friendly replacement mnemonics for DNS in the semantic web? Are spatial metaphors (decentralized and arbitrary, yet still machine-readable) better for human data navigation than well-established file hierarchies? Certainly, they should be a dimension of the possible metadata. I can't get my Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1059489066269825422003-07-29T07:31:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:42:01.780-07:00Map Art
Oddly enough, Miriam Dym, a former housemate from the Upper West Side (aka the Wilderness Years Part I), makes abstracted maps and geographies in the art world. She has a very nice screensaver also.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1059452952673214512003-07-28T21:29:00.000-07:002003-07-29T10:45:23.896-07:00Pynchon Me I'm Borges
That isn't enough for you? How about this?
"[The great thing about maps is that they are] the socialisation of obsession, even if counter-academy, an inscription/de-encrypting of obsession into discourse which can be empowering in a way that suggest R.D. Laing's description of psychotherapy as a way of recognising passively undergone processes and converting them into Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1059415392363920242003-07-28T11:03:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:42:16.156-07:00Carbon Sequestration
A dinner on a ranch in Tucson saw thunderstorms roll in, causing the dry wash to flood black with soot from the brushfires in the mountains. The frogs came out into the desert. So perhaps it was appropriate that I was dining with some of the fine folks who are working on greening the world's coastal deserts with seawater.
Their video took particular care to display the Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058947993649164402003-07-23T01:13:00.000-07:002003-07-23T01:13:13.680-07:00A Horse Named Toyota
I'll be on the road for the next few days. Planned stops in Santa Barbara, Tucson, and El Paso. Back soon.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058762647490060892003-07-20T21:44:00.000-07:002003-07-29T10:45:40.133-07:00The Market is Really the Blog
This post on Crooked Timber is an astonishingly refreshing reminder that the prevailing meme environment might just be a bit misleading.
"Because the market form is such a dominant feature of contemporary societies and of talk about them, applying the “x is really a market” trick to any given x is by now quite a common trick... It’s important to see, though, that youDanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058761831506868562003-07-20T21:30:00.000-07:002003-07-20T21:30:31.613-07:00Human Robotics
The guy in the red shirt about 30 seconds into this SoCal asian-american group's clip is phenomenal.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058422188141653572003-07-16T23:09:00.000-07:002003-07-29T10:45:57.310-07:00Simulation and Simulacra
More fun with philosophy and the end of the world:
"Unless we are now living in a simulation, our descendants will almost certainly never run an ancestor-simulation."
But who says they're descendants?
Plus bonus material on how to live in a simulation, viz.
"If you might be living in a simulation then all else equal it seems that you should care less about others, live Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058389995565019842003-07-16T14:13:00.000-07:002003-07-16T14:13:15.836-07:00I Against I
A GMU Geography grad student has been getting some attention lately.
"He can click on a bank in Manhattan and see who has communication lines running into it and where. He can zoom in on Baltimore and find the choke point for trucking warehouses. He can drill into a cable trench between Kansas and Colorado and determine how to create the most havoc with a hedge clipper. Using Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058228845994320102003-07-14T17:27:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:42:36.143-07:00Back to the Enlightenment
Maybe my favorite period of world history will come around again! At a cost of ~5.4 billion souls...
"Let's cut to the chase here and assume that a giant switch goes off in the Atlantic and ninety percent of everybody dies in ten years. That would leave 600 million people, about the population of the early 1700s. What are they going to do with themselves henceforth, Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1058204226489739682003-07-14T10:37:00.000-07:002003-07-14T10:47:31.256-07:00Navigating by the (Low-Orbit) Stars
An interesting Fast Company article on GPS is generating some discussion on Slashdot that serves nicely as a kind of primer on some of the applications and issues of the technology. There's a lot of breathlessness regarding money and privacy reminiscent of n number of technologies touted as the Next Big Thing, but in this case it I can see it being Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057955285419898342003-07-11T13:28:00.000-07:002003-07-11T13:28:44.480-07:00Angelika
This should make life in Dallas more pleasant: Angelika!
Thanks, Seyd!Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057948688113159882003-07-11T11:38:00.000-07:002003-07-11T13:48:43.303-07:00Texas the Long Way
Texas Bound!Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057909224662895382003-07-11T00:40:00.000-07:002003-07-11T13:30:18.556-07:00Geek Out
Okay, so I've blown hours going overboard adding lots of nifty doodads to this site which I'll probably end up removing in a few weeks anyway. The niftiest of all, Blogmapper, isn't quite working properly, however. It allows you to blog on a map. I'll see if I can sort that out later.Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057870950680752982003-07-10T14:02:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:43:02.680-07:00Drilling in Indonesia: Asian Pop Divas
More on that world music theme:
After seeing an incredible screening of morlam karaoke videos, my interest in asian pop divas has skyrocketed.
Particularly stunning was Jintara Poonlarb's "Arlai World Trade".
"Bare-midriffed disco dancers gyrate against still pictures of the attack on the World Trade Center. This is not a ballad, but rather a rocking Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057865638671340682003-07-10T12:33:00.000-07:002003-08-07T10:43:20.103-07:00Finding a Path
I'm still not sure what Counter Terra is. For the time being, it is another art/science/culture/politics/society/technology blog, a clearinghouse of links and (hopefully) discussion of things and people interesting to me and any who should choose to participate. It may also double as a personal blog.
In time, I would like to see it become part of some sort of community and Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057818609795939592003-07-09T23:30:00.000-07:002003-07-11T13:49:33.923-07:00Tradi-Modern
I thought this might be appropriate for a first post. It incorporates some elements of where I want this blog to go. Congolese electronica. Hand-made gear. "Merciless grooves."
"The musicians come from an area which sits right across the border between Congo and Angola."
I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess this is one of the more insane places in the world these days.
"Their Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5562895.post-1057789813355465282003-07-09T15:30:00.000-07:002003-07-10T15:28:10.866-07:00Welcome to Counter Terra!Danielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08118326911883542470noreply@blogger.com