[Much better choreography/movement design than most other installations of this type — tragically, a lot of the ones I’ve seen have been pretty boring. Still lots of room for improvement, I think. -egg]

Kinetic Rain: 1,216 Computationally Controlled Bronze Raindrops at Changi Airport in Singapore:



Berlin firm ART+COM just completed this stunning new kinetic sculpture in Terminal 1 of Changi Airport in Singapore. Kinetic Rain consists of two sets of 608 suspended raindrops made from lightweight aluminum covered in copper which are raised and lowered in a 15-minute computationally designed choreography controlled from motors embedded in the ceiling. ART+COM created a similar though somewhat smaller piece for the BMW Museum in 2008. (via hungeree)

Fretting about Facebook, 17th century style:
Economist technology editor Tom Standage, author of the 1998 classic The Victorian Internet (a history of the telegraph), gives us a glimpse of his upcoming book Cicero’s Web (due in 2013), which explores the social media revolution created by the coffee houses of the 17th century. As Standage points out, all the hand-wringing over time-wasting and intellectual decay attended by Facebook and its like are nothing new:

Enthusiasm for coffeehouses was not universal, however, and some observers regarded them as a worrying development. They grumbled that Christians had taken to a Muslim drink instead of traditional English beer, and fretted that the livelihoods of tavern-keepers might be threatened. But most of all they lamented that coffeehouses were distracting people who ought to be doing useful work, rather than networking and sharing trivia with their acquaintances.

When coffee became popular in Oxford and the coffeehouses selling it began to multiply, the university authorities objected, fearing that coffeehouses were promoting idleness and diverting students from their studies. Anthony Wood, an Oxford antiquarian, was among those who denounced the enthusiasm for the new drink. “Why doth solid and serious learning decline, and few or none follow it now in the university?” he asked. “Answer: Because of coffee-houses, where they spend all their time.” Similar concerns were voiced in Cambridge, where one observer noted that

it is become a custom after chapel to repair to one or other of the coffee houses (for there are divers), where hours are spent in talking, and less profitable reading of newspapers, of which swarms are continually supplied from London. And the scholars are so greedy after news (which is none of their business) that they neglect all for it, and it is become very rare for any of them to go directly to his chamber after prayers without first doing his suit at the coffee-house, which is a vast loss of time grown out of a pure novelty. For who can apply close to a subject with his head full of the din of a coffee-house?

The distractions of social media, 1673 style

(via Kottke)

Crochet Playgrounds by Toshiko Horiuchi MacAdam:






In the mid 1990s Japanese artist Toshiko Horiuchi MacAdam was showing a large scale crochet artwork at an art gallery when two rambunctious children approached her and asked if the sculpture, resembling a colorful hammock, could be climbed on. She nervously agreed and watched cautiously as her suspended artwork twisted and stretched as the kids climbed on top of it. Suddenly an idea was born. Almost three years later MacAdam would open her first large-scale crochet playground in conjunction with engineers TIS & Partners and landscape architects Takano Landscape Planning. She has since created several additional playscapes around Japan, photos of which were recently made available for the first time online only a few weeks ago. However the MobileMe site where the projects were hosted seems to be permanently down, but Paige over at the Playscapes blog managed to highlight a few of the most interesting shots. Hopefully a new site will go up before long.

July 03, 2012:

Hey geeks! I did a comic “translation” for this awesome anthology. Basically, Ryan Estrada took a Korean comic and had us “translate” the text. Hilarity, hopefully, ensues!

[Wait, what? No no no no, no thank you. -egg]

Cops in USA to drive around in pornoscannerwagons, covertly irradiating people and looking through their cars and clothes:

American cops are set to join the US military in deploying American Science & Engineering’s Z Backscatter Vans, or mobile backscatter radiation x-rays. These are what TSA officials call “the amazing radioactive genital viewer,” now seen in airports around America, ionizing the private parts of children, the elderly, and you (yes you).

These pornoscannerwagons will look like regular anonymous vans, and will cruise America’s streets, indiscriminately peering through the cars (and clothes) of anyone in range of its mighty isotope-cannon. But don’t worry, it’s not a violation of privacy. As AS&E’s vice president of marketing Joe Reiss sez, “From a privacy standpoint, I’m hard-pressed to see what the concern or objection could be.”

You know, I never looked at that way. I guess that’s why I’m not the VP of marketing and he’s getting the big bucks.

It would also seem to make the vans mobile versions of the same scanning technique that’s riled privacy advocates as it’s been deployed in airports around the country. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) is currently suing the DHS to stop airport deployments of the backscatter scanners, which can reveal detailed images of human bodies. (Just how much detail became clear last May, when TSA employee Rolando Negrin was charged with assaulting a coworker who made jokes about the size of Negrin’s genitalia after Negrin received a full-body scan.)

“It’s no surprise that governments and vendors are very enthusiastic about [the vans],” says Marc Rotenberg, executive director of EPIC. “But from a privacy perspective, it’s one of the most intrusive technologies conceivable.”

Also: “the vans do have the capability of storing images.”

Full-Body Scan Technology Deployed In Street-Roving Vans

[Can’t much argue with that. -egg]

Chuck D’s rules for the music business:

From Public Enemy frontman and hip-hop legend Chuck D’s Twitter feed, a short and useful list of rules for people who want to break in to the music business (hit the link below for the whole series).

Chuck D’s Rules for the Music Business

(Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

#387 Alien Concept:

Interactive Paintings on the Streets of Malaysia:

A great new street artist is making a splash in Malaysia this month. Painter Ernest Zacharevic created four new works where his painted figures of mischievous children are seen interacting with their physical surroundings: an old bicycle, a motorcycle, or even windows on the side of a building. His most popular piece of two small children on a large bicycle has become a major destination in the city with dozens of people stopping to take creative photos. I want to thank Annie and Ross of the very fine AsiaDreaming blog for providing many of the photographs for this post. The rest you can see on Zacharevic’s Facebook. (via lustik, art and seasons)