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London Bloggers [Comic Blogs][Other Blogs] | 21 March 2008
[movies] Standard Operating Procedure — trailer for a new documentary from Errol Morris about the events in Abu Ghraib prison. [via Kottke]
20 March 2008
[politics] The Boris Johnson Generator … a web page which creates a Boris Johnson speech automatically … ‘My friends, as I have discovered myself, there are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters I love tennis with a passion. I challenged Boris Becker to a match once and he said he was up for it but he never called back. I bet I could make him run around. Watermelon smiles Sorry.’ [via qwghlm]
19 March 2008
[comics] Rogues’ Gallery of the 1968 Marvel Bullpen … this is worth checking out just for the photo of Jim Steranko alone. [See also: Rolling Stone on Marvel in 1971]
17 March 2008
[tech] Therapist Emulator Eliza discusses the death of her creator Joseph Weizenbaum …
* Are you sad that Joseph died? Don't you care? 16 March 2008
[underground] Cooling the Tube … interesting look at the issues surrounding cooling the train carriages and stations on the London Underground … ‘When an underground train tunnel is first constructed, it’s at the native soil temperature of around 14°C. Temperature problems start to show up 20-30 years later; this timescale has been seen over and over again in different lines/metro systems throughout the world. Basically the tunnel is a closed environment with a lot of energy sources. The soil around the tunnel gradually dries out and becomes a much better insulator – they’ve measured this on the Victoria line and found that the soil is dried out for several metres’ distance from the tunnel.’
15 March 2008
[life] Spyware another Weapon for Domestic Abuse … ‘Safe computing has joined finding safe housing as a list of requirements for people fleeing abusive relationships.’
[books] The 100 Best Last Lines from Novels … ‘P.S. Sorry I forgot to give you the mayonnaise. -Richard Brautigan, Trout Fishing in America (1967)’ [via Kottke]
14 March 2008
[comics] “…He sure as hell is angry, but he does have moves.” … Progressive Ruin looks at the issue of Denny O’Neil’s The Question where he teams up with Rorschach … ‘Moore and Gibbons aren’t credited at the beginning of the comic with anything in this issue, but they are given a special “thank you.” I wonder if either of them were even aware Rorschach went walkies into this book, and out of their control.
Anyway, Vic and his ’80s hair start reading, and it’s apparently compelling reading since he immediately nods off.’
13 March 2008
[comics] The Daily Batman … ‘A Batman a day keeps the doctor away.’
12 March 2008
[comics] Flipped!: David Welsh Presents His Current Favorite Manga Series … interesting list of Manga to lookout for… ‘If your comics reading list doesn’t include any sexy pulp, may I humbly suggest that you’re cheating yourself?’
11 March 2008
[people] The Obituary of Count Gottfried von Bismarck … ‘When not clad in the lederhosen of his homeland, he cultivated an air of sophisticated complexity by appearing in women’s clothes, set off by lipstick and fishnet stockings. This aura of dangerous “glamour” charmed a large circle of friends and acquaintances drawn from the jeunesse dorée of the age; many of them knew him at Oxford, where he made friends such as Darius Guppy and Viscount Althorp and became an enthusiastic, rubber-clad member of the Piers Gaveston Society and the drink-fuelled Bullingdon and Loders clubs. Perhaps unsurprisingly he managed only a Third in Politics, Philosophy and Economics.’ [via Metafilter]
[tv] The Fonz Jumps the Shark … from YouTube – the origin of the phrase Jumping the Shark … ‘The phrase reached the height of its influence in the early 21st century. As it became more widely known, many fans began to consider the phrase over used. In particular, the phrase has become used by some to describe any development which they don’t like on a show. This has caused some viewers to conclude that “jump the shark” has itself jumped the shark.’
10 March 2008
[comics] The Further Adventures of Li’l Bruce Wayne … Chris’s Invincible Super-Blog on a long forgotten Batman comic … ‘It is notable, however, as being the first published comic book work of writer/artist Frank Miller.’
9 March 2008
[42] What on earth is 42? … BBC News on the Answer to Life, The Universe and Everything … ‘The answer can be interpreted in two ways. One is that it is a bad joke, implying that there simply is no answer, no meaning, no sense in the universe, and you would be no worse off if you jumped into the nearest black hole. But the other interpretation is that the joke was wise. It shows that seeking numerical answers to questions of meaning is itself the problem. Digits, like a four and a two, can no more do it than a string of digits could represent the poetry of Shakespeare.’
7 March 2008
[life] Possessed – fascinating online documentary about obsessive hoarders … ”POSSESSED’ enters the complicated worlds of four hoarders; people whose lives are dominated by their relationship to possessions. The film questions whether hoarding is a symptom of mental illness or a revolt against the material recklessness of consumerism. When does collecting become hoarding and why do possessions exert such an influence on our lives?’ [via Waxy]
6 March 2008
[conspiracy] Or perhaps: New Theories Suggest Kennedy Wasn’t Shot … ‘After 11 years of painstaking research, Musashi uncovered testimony from anonymous eyewitnesses who claimed that unopened packets of duck sauce and soy sauce were hastily removed from Air Force One after the assassination. According to the book’s findings, the extremely high levels of monosodium glutamate combined with the stress of mediating an intense international ballistic-missile crisis caused Kennedy’s systolic pressure to mount to the point where the right rear quarter of his cranium “shot clean off.”‘
5 March 2008
[funny] The Onion on Kennedy’s Assassination … ‘Kennedy slain by CIA, Mafia, Castro, LBJ, Teamsters, Freemasons – President Shot 129 Times…’
4 March 2008
[comics] Big Brother With a Bleeding Heart — interesting blog post critically looking at Alan Moore’s work on V for Vendetta and Watchmen … ‘Rereading this really crystallized for me what I think is the biggest problem with Moore’s writing — his weakness (to paraphrase Borges) for appearing to be a genius. Moore’s an extremely smart writer and plotter, and he fancies himself a metaphysician and political seer. As a writer, he tends to have all the answers, and while that can look pretty amazing when enmeshed in the story, when you take a step back, the discordant cacophony of all the begged questions starts to get a little irritating. Evie occasionally yells at V and tells him he’s a pompous asshole who cares more about puzzles and quotations than about human beings. Of course, Evie always backs down and accepts that V only tortured her because he loves her…but it’s hard not to feel that Moore is loading the dice. It’s Moore, after all, who sits behind that mask; it’s him who’s rigged the game.’
3 March 2008
[apollo] The Moon Museum — Apparently, there is a small museum of art on the Moon hidden in the leg of the Apollo 12 lander … ‘[Andy] Warhol’s contribution, which is obscured by the thumb above, is described as “a calligraphic squiggle made up of the initials of his signature. Actually, it’s a drawing of a penis.’ [via Kottke]
2 March 2008
[wikipedia] Nicholson Baker on The Charms of Wikipedia … ‘Without the kooks and the insulters and the spray-can taggers, Wikipedia would just be the most useful encyclopedia ever made. Instead it’s a fast-paced game of paintball. Not only does Wikipedia need its vandals-up to a point-the vandals need an orderly Wikipedia, too. Without order, their culture-jamming lacks a context.’ [via Metafilter]
1 March 2008
[books] 50 Crime Writers To Read Before You Die … ‘We wanted to compile a list of writers we had, jointly and severally, loved. We wanted to include writers like Dashiell Hammett, who brought something new and exciting to the genre; like Elmore Leonard, who turns an old trick in it with incomparable style; and like Poe, who invented it. We did not, except incidentally, take into account popularity.’ [via Metafilter]
29 February 2008
[calendar] Leap day – 29 leap facts for February 29th … ‘You have a 1 in 1461 chance of being born on February 29th. The odds are a lot higher if your parents have sex on May 29th the previous year.’
28 February 2008
[windows] Find As You Type for Internet Explorer — great little utility that adds Firefox’s powerful and simple way of finding text in a web document to Microsoft’s web browser.
[buffy] The Buffy guide to the Internet – 1997 style — amusing look-back at the portrayal of technology and the internet from an episode of Season 1 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer … ‘Buffy attempts to vanquish the demon by dragging the ‘Willow’ folder to the Trash, but all that happens is a very pixelated full-screen image of Moloch warns her to “Stay away from Willow”. Well, Buffy isn’t going to take instructions from some demonic computer virus, so they immediately try to find her, and expose a much bigger difference between 1997 and today. Buffy physically goes to look for her in the computer lab, and Giles and Xander are left to phone Willow’s house. You remember the days when you used to phone up a building and hope someone was in it, rather than call their mobile, right?’ [via Pete Ashton]
27 February 2008
[comics] More Alan Moore — unpublished excerpts from an interview in the March edition of Word Magazine … ‘In real life, Graham Greene based Harry Lime in The Third Man on Kim Philby, who’d been his handler in MI6. When Philby defected in 1963,the newspaper headlines read PHILBY IS THE THIRD MAN, but they were simply reiterating a literal truth from a work of fiction. Philby had been the third man all along. And then… Philby was named after Rudyard Kipling’s Kim. Kipling lived in Broadstairs which is where John Buchan wrote The 39 Steps, near the real 39 steps down to the beach. So it all ties together. There’s something about it all that’s more than coincidence. It drives you mad after a while.’ [thanks Fraser]
26 February 2008
[tv] Watchification — a sister blog to Speechification – curating the best TV from the BBC’s iPlayer, YouTube and other sources.
25 February 2008
[google] Google circa 1960 … ‘Mail to: Google Search Request. […] Please allow four to six weeks for results.’
24 February 2008
[quotes] Top 10 Quotes Against Work … Charles Bukowski: ‘It was true that I didn’t have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?’ [via Reddit]
23 February 2008
[funny] Funny Cinderblock Sale Post — another great posting from Craigslist … ‘Now listen, we’re all busy people here. You want the blocks? Come get the fucking blocks and give me one dollar for every block you take. How fucking hard is that?’
[religion] 20 Tacky Religious Products Guaranteed to Anger God … ‘As you’re no doubt aware, the most common complaint about nativity scenes is they’re too prejudiced against non humans. After all, who are the dogs supposed to pray to? Luckily, some intrepid inventor out there took a stand and made the Dog Nativity Scene featuring Mary, Joseph, some wise men and the Messiah Himself, all as partially clothed canines.’ [via GussetBLOG]
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