prosthetic knowledge
-
The 20th Anniversary of the SMS Text Message
20 years ago today, the first text message was sent by an engineer: “Merry Christmas”.
At BBC News, an interview is presented in text message format with Matti Makkonen, a Finnish Civil Servant who came up with the original idea. You can read the interview here
Also, why SMS messages are 160 characters long? Via The LA Times:
Alone in a room in his home in Bonn, Germany, Friedhelm Hillebrand sat at his typewriter, tapping out random sentences and questions on a sheet of paper.
As he went along, Hillebrand counted the number of letters, numbers, punctuation marks and spaces on the page. Each blurb ran on for a line or two and nearly always clocked in under 160 characters.
That became Hillebrand’s magic number — and set the standard for one of today’s most popular forms of digital communication: text messaging.
“This is perfectly sufficient,” he recalled thinking during that epiphany of 1985, when he was 45 years old. “Perfectly sufficient.”
-
Abstract Christmas tree sparks protests in Brussels
A minimal voxelesque Christmas tree hasn’t gone down well with some … via BBC News:
Thousands of people have signed a petition against an abstract light installation replacing the traditional Christmas tree in Brussels city centre.
More than 11,000 signatures have been gathered in the online petition and a Facebook page attacking the new feature has been launched.
Critics accuse officials of opting for the installation for fear of offending non-Christians, especially Muslims.
But the mayor’s office said it was part of a theme this year of “light”.
Traditionally, a 20m (65ft) pine tree taken from the forests of the Ardennes has adorned the city’s central square, the Grand Place.
This year, it has been replaced with a 25m (82ft) construction, though smaller real Christmas trees still decorate the square, a spokesman at the mayor’s office said.
The city’s website said the new “tree” was one of five “light” installations around the Grand Place this year, offering visitors the chance to climb to the top and enjoy “beautiful views” of the city.
Tourism councillor Philippe Close at the mayor’s office said the aim was to show off the “avant-garde character” of Brussels by blending the modern and the traditional, to produce something new and different.
-
![Twefax
Online web app presents your Twitter feed in the style of the old BBC CEEFAX information system, put together by @JonathanEx.
Discovered by the lovely harri80 - Try it here
Related - the old BBC service has been turned off in most of the UK, with only Northern Ireland left to go fully digital this week. So, to commemorate the end of a very British institution, the BBC have put together some items of interest.
Pages from Ceefax: Into the archives - a slideshow with accompanying cheesy library music [link]
Ceefax: The early days - An interview with one of the earliest workers with the system. [link]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcd028Hnh51qav3uso1_1280.png)
Twefax
Online web app presents your Twitter feed in the style of the old BBC CEEFAX information system, put together by @JonathanEx.
Discovered by the lovely harri80 - Try it here
Related - the old BBC service has been turned off in most of the UK, with only Northern Ireland left to go fully digital this week. So, to commemorate the end of a very British institution, the BBC have put together some items of interest.
Pages from Ceefax: Into the archives - a slideshow with accompanying cheesy library music [link]
Ceefax: The early days - An interview with one of the earliest workers with the system. [link]
-
Fearful Symmetry by Ruairi Glynn
‘Alien Art’ installation currently at Tate Modern - a glowing tetrahedron curious of the visitors. It is actually a computer-controlled puppet on a robotic arm, using Kinect sensors to detect people. BBC News has a short video (embedded below) about the piece, and is also a great ‘behind-the-scenes’ look at how a modern computer art installation is put together:
Artist Ruairi Glynn has premiered a unique piece of installation art at Tate Modern in London, using a technique he calls “mechanical puppetry”.
His “delta robot”, normally found on factory production lines, has been redesigned to work as a piece of interactive, performance art.
Fitted on a 21-metre rail, it travels the length of the Tate Modern’s new basement Tanks space, which opened at the end of July.
Part automated, it measures people’s movements with Microsoft Kinect cameras, as found on the Xbox games console. When visitors come into its vicinity, the robot responds with a set of pre-programmed reactions, from playful movements, to dramatic withdrawal.
More at BBC News here
-
BBC Sport: Usain Bolt and Jamaican relay quartet thank London crowds
YEAHHH BOI!
Post-relay interview of Jamaican team win, where Usain performed this. Yohan Blake ended with “Johnny English … You’re Great …”
Link to video here, but isn’t available outside the UK :(
-
Robert Hughes, Eloquent and Combative Art Critic, Dies at 74
If anyone who has seen ‘The Shock Of The New’ 8 part series on Modernism and art, then this is sad news - via The New York Times:
Robert Hughes, the eloquent, combative art critic and historian who lived with an operatic flair and wrote with a sense of authority that owed more to Zola or Ruskin than to his own century, died Monday at Calvary Hospital in the Bronx. He was 74 and had lived for many years in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y.
He died after a long illness, according to his wife, Doris Downes.
With a Hemingwayesque build and the distinctively rounded vowels of his native Australia, Mr. Hughes became as familiar a presence on television as he was in print, in columns over three decades for Time magazine. There, he served as chief art critic and often as a traditionalist scourge during an era when art movements fractured into unrecognizability. “The Shock of the New,” his eight-part documentary about the development of modernism from the impressionists through Warhol, was seen by more than 25 million viewers when it ran originally on BBC. The book that Mr. Hughes spun off from it was described as a “stunning critical performance” by Louis Menand of The New Yorker.
The series is available to watch on Ubuweb here (via Geeta Dayal)
-
The Listening Machine
Online generative music project plays continuous composition based on analysis of twitter feed:
The Listening Machine is an automated system that generates a continuous piece of music based on the activity of 500 Twitter users around the United Kingdom. Their conversations, thoughts and feelings are translated into musical patterns in real time, which you can tune in to at any point through any web-connected device.
It is running from May until October 2012 on The Space, the new on-demand digital arts channel from the BBC and Arts Council England. The piece will continue to develop and grow over time, adjusting its responses to social patterns and generating subtly new musical output.
The music could be considered Modern Classical, and while at times it may be repetitive, a new approach can come at any time.
You can find out more about the project and listen to the ongoing piece here
-
BBC Radio 4: In Our Time - Game Theory
45 minute radio show discusses the subject:
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss game theory, the mathematical study of decision-making. First formulated in the 1940s, the discipline entails devising ‘games’ to simulate situations of conflict or cooperation. It allows researchers to unravel decision-making strategies, and even to establish why certain types of behaviour emerge.
Some of the games studied in game theory have become well known outside academia - they include the Prisoner’s Dilemma, an intriguing scenario popularised in novels and films, and which has inspired television game shows. Today game theory is seen as a vital tool in such diverse fields as evolutionary biology, economics, computing and philosophy.
More information can be found here
-
The Digital Human
BBC Radio 4 series looks at the impact of digital culture on the lives of people:
Aleks Krotoski charts how digital culture is moulding modern living. Each week join technology journalist Aleks Krotoski as she goes beyond the latest gadget or web innovation to understand what sort of world we’re creating with our ‘always on’ lives.
Two parts of the series are available for listening - part one, entitled ‘Captured’, explores the drive of digital photography due to mobile phones and Facebook. Part two, embedded above, entitled ‘Control’, discusses online personalities.
To some, there maybe nothing new to learn from this, but there are some great interviews which give a personal account of the repercussions, both great and questionable, of the technologies they use.
The Digital Human homepage can be found here, though it should be noted that the downloads are available for a limited time.
-
Ceefax: A love letter
In the UK, the analog television signal was turned off, with it ending a pre-internet electronic information service.
Above is part of a short essay by Matthew Engel on the BBC News Magazine website, reflecting on the information service which many in the UK became familiar with over the last 38 years.
You can read the whole thing here
-
Commercial Breaks - A documentary about Imagine and Ocean Software
For anyone interested in retro computer games, this BBC documentary is fascinating, found via the great video curation channel Network Awesome.
The documentary takes a look at two of the biggest computer game companies of 1984 in the UK - Ocean Software (the UK Electronic Arts of it’s time) and Imagine Software. In the film, both companies are preparing for a big Christmas release. During the course of the filming of this, Imagine was experiencing financial woes and disbanded:
In early 1984 the Imagine team were working on a spectacular project known as Bandersnatch. The game was to come in an A4 sized box containing around 30 ‘goodies’ including a required additional piece of hardware for your Spectrum computer. The retail price of Bandersnatch was expected to be around £40 and it was to be a completely new concept in computer games. Apparently 10 professional artists were working on the graphics alone. Bandersnatch was never released. On the 9th of July 1984, Imagine went bust after only 18 months of operation. Interestingly, its demise was documented by a BBC television program.
-
Synth Brittania
A music documentary made by BBC4 (shown a couple of years ago) takes a look at the origins of popular electronic music. From the BBC site:
Documentary following a generation of post-punk musicians who took the synthesiser from the experimental fringes to the centre of the pop stage.
In the late 1970s, small pockets of electronic artists including the Human League, Daniel Miller and Cabaret Volatire were inspired by Kraftwerk and JG Ballard and dreamt of the sound of the future against the backdrop of bleak, high-rise Britain.
The crossover moment came in 1979 when Gary Numan’s appearance on Top of the Pops with Tubeway Army’s Are Friends Electric heralded the arrival of synthpop. Four lads from Basildon known as Depeche Mode would come to own the new sound whilst post-punk bands like Ultravox, Soft Cell, OMD and Yazoo took the synth out of the pages of the NME and onto the front page of Smash Hits.
By 1983, acts like Pet Shop Boys and New Order were showing that the future of electronic music would lie in dance music.
Contributors include Philip Oakey, Vince Clarke, Martin Gore, Bernard Sumner, Gary Numan and Neil Tennant.
-
Essential Mix - Flying Lotus (2008.11.29)
Almost two hours of LA beat scene and abstract downtempo, originally put together for BBC radio.
Tracklist:
01 [0:00:00] Alice Coltrane “Galaxy In Turiya” (1973) [Impulse!] (4:48)
02 [0:04:48] Charlie Hayden + Egberto Gismonti/GonjaSufi “Testament” (2008) [Warp] (2:56)
03 [0:06:44] Flying Lotus “Massage Situation (Stripped)” (2007) [Warp] (3:00)
04 [0:10:44] Dimlite “Sun-Sized Twinkles” (2010) [Now Again] (2:36)
05 [0:13:20] Flying Lotus “Robertaflack ft. Dolly” (2008) [Warp] (0:58)
06 [0:14:18] Flying Lotus “Robertaflack (Mike Slott Reflunk)” (2008) [Warp] (1:33)
07 [0:15:51] Mr Beatnick ft. Ahu “I Know All The Bitches (Bullion Remix)” (2008) [Altered Vibes] (1:14)
08 [0:17:05] Heralds Of Change “A Muse” (2007) [All City Records] (1:16)
09 [0:18:21] Carlos Y Gaby “Happy Summer Solstice (I Love You, I Laugh You)” (2007) [Alpha Pup] (1:26)
10 [0:19:47] Pudge “Yung Infamous” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:32)
11 [0:21:19] Dorothy Ashby “Myself When Young” (2007) [Dusty Groove America] (0:17)
12 [0:21:36] Nosaj Thing “Bach” (2009) [Alpha Pup] (1:03)
13 [0:22:31] Low Limit “Turf Day” (2009) [Rush Hour] (1:31)
14 [0:24:10] Flying Lotus “Infinitum (Dimlite Re-finitum)” (2009) [Warp] (2:11)
15 [0:26:21] Clark “Springtime Epigram” (2006) [Warp] (0:54)
16 [0:27:14] Burial “Shutta” (2007) [Hyperdub] (2:10)
17 [0:29:45] Nobody Pres. Blank Blue “Blank Blue (Flying Lotus Remix)” (2008) [Ubiquity] (2:00)
18 [0:31:45] Daedelus “I’m String Struck” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:31)
19 [0:34:22] MRR-ADM Ft. Malcolm Catto “Untitled” (2008) [Self Released] (1:39)
20 [0:34:35] Daedelus/Madvillain “Experience Accordion (Flying Lotus Live Remix)” (2004) [Stones Throw] (1:29)
21 [0:36:04] Hudson Mohawke “ZOo00OOm” (2009) [Warp] (0:45)
22 [0:36:49] Modeselektor “The Black Block (Rustie Remix)” (2008) [BPitch Control] (0:54)
23 [0:37:43] Teebs & Jackhigh “Idea 1 (Clutch)” (2010) [Svetlana Industries] (1:25)
24 [0:39:08] MatthewDavid “Tallahassee Tapes” (2008) [Plug Reaserch] (3:03)
25 [0:42:11] Martyn/Flying Lotus “Vancouver”/”Pet Monster Shotglass” (2008) [3024]/(2006) [Plug Research] (2:02)
26 [0:44:12] Fulgeance “Chico (Dorian Concept RMX)” (2008) [Musique Large] (0:59)
27 [0:45:12] Joker “Solid State” (2009) [Kapsize] (2:16)
28 [0:47:28] Rusko “Moaners” (2009) [Sub Soldiers] (1:31)
29 [0:50:25] Daddy Kev “Invite8” (2008) [Unreleased] (0:52)
30 [0:50:16] Ras G “Star Messenger” (2009) [Hit+Run] (1:17)
31 [0:51:08] Madlib “Unreleased Gem” (2008) [Unreleased] (2:03)
32 [0:54:37] Samiyam “Cheesecake Backslap” (2008) [Hyperdub] (0:40)
33 [0:53:51] Knowledge “Dawn” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:12)
34 [0:56:29] FLYamSAM “Princess Toadstool” (2009) [Bootleg] (1:07)
35 [0:56:10] Sa-Ra Creative Partners “Hollywood (Redux)” (2007) [Babygrande] (2:04) [1]
36 [0:58:14] Muhsinah/Flying Lotus “With Me”/”Melt!” (2008) [Unreleased]/(2008) [Warp] (1:36)
37 [1:00:50] Flying Lotus “Dissecto (Original Mix)” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:21)
38 [1:01:11] Flying Lotus “Breathe” (2008) [Warp] (2:10)
39 [1:04:47] Mike Slott “Home” (2009) [Fat City] (2:12)
40 [1:05:33] Flying Lotus “Sangria Spin Cycles (Ambient Mix)” (2010) [The Do-Over] (1:23)
41 [1:06:56] Danny Breaks “Cosmic Dust” (2008) [Unreleased] (2:18)
42 [1:09:14] Flying Lotus “Beginners Falafel (Free The Robots Remix)” (2008) [Unreleased] (2:21)
43 [1:11:45] Samiyam “Falafel Cannon” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:01)
44 [1:12:46] Flying Lotus “Beginners Falafel” (2008) [Warp] (1:01)
45 [1:13:27] Slum Village “Players (Instrumental)” (2000) [Good Vibe] (0:22)
46 [1:13:59] Flying Lotus “Cackle” (2008) [Unreleased] (0:31)
47 [1:14:30] Flying Lotus “Raise It Up” (2009) [Hit+Run] (0:31)
48 [1:16:27] Osborne ft. Ed DMX “Our Definition Of A Breakdown” (2008) [Spectral Sound] (1:01)
49 [1:16:02] Baron Zen “Burn Rubber (Däm-Funk Remix)” (2007) [Stones Throw] (2:38)
50 [1:18:40] Mono/Poly “Needsdeodorantbitch” (2008) [Unreleased] (2:31)
51 [1:21:11] Chocolate Star/Nelly Furtado ft. Timberland “Stay With Me”/”Promiscuous” (2007) [Stones Throw]/(2006) [Geffen] (0:57)
52 [1:22:08] Gonjasufi “Suzie Q” (2010) [Warp] (1:53)
53 [1:24:01] King Midas Sound “Lost (Flying Lotus Live Remix)” (2008) [Unreleased]/(2008) [Hyperdub] (2:00)
54 [1:24:59] Rusko/Flying Lotus “Terminal3”/”Tea Leaf Dancers (Live Remix)” (2008) [Unreleased]/(2007) [Warp] (0:58)
55 [1:28:25] Daedelus “Hrs:Mins:Secs (Beat Invitational Version)” (2008) [Unreleased] (3:41) [2]
56 [1:30:40] Kode9&Flying Lotus “Kryon” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:36)
57 [1:33:42] Zomby “Spliff Dub (Rustie Remix)” (2008) [Hyperdub] (1:30)
58 [1:33:46] Busta Rhymes “What Up” (2002) [J Records] (0:15)
59 [1:34:01] Samiyam “Crystal Lake” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:21)
60 [1:35:22] Weather Report “River People” (1978) [CBS] (0:18)
61 [1:35:40] Samiyam “Flintstone Car” (2008) [Unreleased] (1:46)
62 [1:37:26] Flying Lotus “Backpack Caviar” (2008) [Beat Records] (1:48)
63 [1:39:14] Radiohead “Reckoner (Flying Lotus Remix)” (2008) [Unreleased] (3:08)
64 [1:42:22] Björk “All Is Full Of Love” (1999) [One Little Indian] (4:17)
65 [1:46:39] Broadcast “Winter Now” (2003) [Warp] (0:37)
66 [1:47:16] Portishead “Elysium” (1997) [Go! Beat] (2:48)
67 [1:50:04] Linda Perhacs “Hey, Who Really Cares?” (2003) [The Wild Places] (2:32)
68 [1:52:36] Flying Lotus “Infinitum (Exile Remix)” (2008) [Warp] (2:56)
69 [1:55:32] Flying Lotus “Live Set Practice Run” (2:06)
[1] Redux ft. Vocals By Samuel L Jackson From: Jackie Brown (1997) Directed By Quentin Tarantino
[2] Samples Computer Voice From: WarGames (1983) Directed By John Badham Released by: Flyinglotus
Release date: Nov 28, 2008 -
Ancient Greek philosophers, Latin poets hoping to sell copies of their works, soldiers, athletes and pop stars, school children, peevish policemen and skittish network executives have all been aware of the gesture’s particular power to insult and enflame.
“It’s one of the most ancient insult gestures known,” says anthropologist Desmond Morris.
“The middle finger is the penis and the curled fingers on either side are the testicles. By doing it, you are offering someone a phallic gesture. It is saying, ‘this is a phallus’ that you’re offering to people, which is a very primeval display.”
The BBC takes a look at the historical origins of the middle finger insult, where the first known public instance happened in Fourth Century BC Athens by philosopher Diogenes.
Added: interesting Roman definition of the gesture:
digitus impudicus - the shameless, indecent or offensive finger
-
![Thom Yorke BBC 6 Mix 16 / 10 / 11
Someone kindly uploaded the mix to SendSpace [link]
The tracklist, from the BBC 6 Mix Page
Erykah Badu — The Healer
J Dilla — Geek Down
King Midas Sound — One Ting (Dabrye remix)
Aloe Blacc — Whole World
Owiny Sigoma Band — Margaret Okodo
Thom Yorke — Stuck Together (Remix)
Radiohead — Little By Little (Caribou Remix)
Low — Monkey
Zomby — Mozaik
Radiohead — Little By Little (Shed Mix)
Modeselektor — Kill Bill Vol. 4
2512 — The Wind Up
Steve Poindexter — Short Circuit (C64 Bypass Mix)
FaltyDL — My Friends Will Always Say
Ramadanman — Glut
Pangea — You & I
Gill Scott Heron & Jamie XX — New York Is Killing Me
Radiohead — Good Morning Mr. Magpie (Nathan Fake Harshdub)
Thom Yorke — And It Rained All Night (Burial Remix)
Untold And James Blake — Stop What You’re Doing (James Bake Remix)
DJ Slugo — Waiting For You Demdike
Felix da Housecat — What Does It Feel Like?
Tapes — Outro
Tapes — Gold Love Riddim
The Low Anthem — Matter Of Time
Aphex Twin — Hy A Scullyas Lyf Adhagrow
Radiohead — Codex
Illum Sphere Mix
Ricardo Villalobos & Max Loderbaur — Recat
PJ Harvey — When Under Ether
Radiohead — Paperbag Writer
Untitled
Emika –Double Edge
Radiohead — Bloom (Jamie xx Club Mix)
Autechre — Drane
Wiley — 100% Publishing
Kode9 — 9 Samurai (Quarta 330 Remix)
Flying Lotus — Zodiac](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lt7qeoQM2y1qav3uso1_1280.jpg)
Thom Yorke BBC 6 Mix 16 / 10 / 11
Someone kindly uploaded the mix to SendSpace [link]
The tracklist, from the BBC 6 Mix Page
-
Erykah Badu — The Healer -
J Dilla — Geek Down
-
King Midas Sound — One Ting (Dabrye remix)
-
Aloe Blacc — Whole World -
Owiny Sigoma Band — Margaret Okodo
-
Thom Yorke — Stuck Together (Remix) -
Radiohead — Little By Little (Caribou Remix) -
Low — Monkey -
Zomby — Mozaik -
Radiohead — Little By Little (Shed Mix)
-
Modeselektor — Kill Bill Vol. 4
-
2512 — The Wind Up
-
Steve Poindexter — Short Circuit (C64 Bypass Mix)
-
FaltyDL — My Friends Will Always Say
-
Ramadanman — Glut
-
Pangea — You & I
-
Gill Scott Heron & Jamie XX — New York Is Killing Me
-
Radiohead — Good Morning Mr. Magpie (Nathan Fake Harshdub)
-
Thom Yorke — And It Rained All Night (Burial Remix)
-
Untold And James Blake — Stop What You’re Doing (James Bake Remix)
-
DJ Slugo — Waiting For You Demdike
-
Felix da Housecat — What Does It Feel Like? -
Tapes — Outro
-
Tapes — Gold Love Riddim
-
The Low Anthem — Matter Of Time -
Aphex Twin — Hy A Scullyas Lyf Adhagrow -
Illum Sphere Mix Radiohead — Codex -
Ricardo Villalobos & Max Loderbaur — Recat
-
PJ Harvey — When Under Ether -
Radiohead — Paperbag Writer
-
Untitled
Emika –Double Edge
-
Radiohead — Bloom (Jamie xx Club Mix)
-
Autechre — Drane -
Wiley — 100% Publishing -
Kode9 — 9 Samurai (Quarta 330 Remix) -
Flying Lotus — Zodiac
-
