Date Archives → September 2009

Pigeon vs Adsl: 1-0

Pigeon/adsl

“A Durban IT company pitted an 11-month-old bird armed with a 4GB memory stick against the ADSL service from the country’s biggest web firm, Telkom. Winston the pigeon took two hours to carry the data 60 miles – in the same time the ADSL had sent 4% of the data.”

[read more here]

The Airport Graveyard

airport graveyard

“I thought it was a mirage the first time I saw it. I was driving through the wastes of the Mojave Desert, two hours from anywhere, when off in the shimmering distance appeared the silhouettes of a hundred parked jetliners. I pulled off and tried to get closer to them, but a mean-looking perimeter fence keeps onlookers far away. All I could do was stand and stare, wondering what the hell this massive armada of airplanes was doing here, silently baking in the 110 degree heat. For years afterward I’d ask people what they knew about it, and I kept hearing the same thing: the place has been on lockdown since 9/11, and they won’t let civilians anywhere near the boneyard.”

[read more here]

China Channel

“Experience the censored Chinese internet at home!

The Firefox add-on China Channel (by Aram Bartholl, Evan Roth and Tobias Leingruber) offers internet users outside China to surf the web as if they were in China. Take an unforgetable virtual trip to China and experience the technical expertise of the Chinese Ministry of Information Industry (supported by western companies). It’s open source, free and easy.”

http://chinachannel.hk

[via rhizome]

The Tree

Sebastian Errazuriz, The Tree
The Tree (2006), is an artwork by Sebastian Errazuriz:

“A 10-meter high, real magnolia tree planted in the center of Chile’s National Stadium where dictator Pinochet tortured political prisoners 30 years ago. For a week the stadium was open to the public as a park. A soccer match played before 15,000 people, with the tree in the middle, was the closure of the piece.”

[via iheartmyart]

Powerpoint Karaoke

“Imagine this: You have to deliver a PowerPoint presentation about an unfamiliar topic, with slides you’ve never seen, to an audience eager to heckle and laugh at you. If you’re in your underwear, you’re having a nightmare. If you’re clothed, it’s called PowerPoint Karaoke…”