A bunch of writers pick their favorite
A bunch of writers pick their favorite novel -> movie adaptations. (thx, david)
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kottke.org posts about books
The Life Project is a series of
The Life Project is a series of photographs that, from photographer’s Frans Lanting’s perspective, that are a journey through time, from the formation of the universe to the present time. Also available in book form.
As people exchange their land lines for
As people exchange their land lines for mobile phones, phone books are getting smaller. “Americans have not been eager to list their cell numbers in phone books. Consumers and privacy advocates balked at the idea in 2004, when most of the big wireless carriers said they wanted to compile a nationwide directory. Cellphones may make it easier for people to reach each other, yet Americans are very guarded about whom they want calling them.”
David Plotz has finished his Blogging the
David Plotz has finished his Blogging the Bible series at Slate…he wrote about each book of the Old Testament. “While I’ve been blogging the Bible, I have tried not to take myself too seriously and not to pretend more insight than I actually have. I just wanted to read the book and write about what it’s like to read it. No essays, no philosophy, no experts.”
Reconsidering Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring: it was
Reconsidering Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring: it was an influential book…too bad the science was all wrong. “She cited scary figures showing a recent rise in deaths from cancer, but she didn’t consider one of the chief causes: fewer people were dying at young ages from other diseases (including the malaria that persisted in the American South until DDT). When that longevity factor as well as the impact of smoking are removed, the cancer death rate was falling in the decade before ‘Silent Spring,’ and it kept falling in the rest of the century.”
Update: Scienceblogs’ Tim Lambert has been following a campaign to discredit Carson and her book. More here and at Google. (thx, jim & paul)
From a poll in the Guardian: George
From a poll in the Guardian: George Orwell’s 1984 is the definitive book of the 20th century. Gatsby, Grapes, and Brave New World also make the top 10 list.
Some prominent writers (Eggers, Foer, Nicole Krauss)
Some prominent writers (Eggers, Foer, Nicole Krauss) tell us about what they’ve been reading recently. In other summer reading news, Rebecca Blood is keeping track of various summer book lists that are popping up around the web.
Last 100 posts, part 8
Here are some updates on some of the topics, links, ideas, posts, people, etc. that have appeared on kottke.org recently (previous installment is here):
The Celluloid Skyline exhibition at Grand Central is well worth checking out…I was up there this past weekend. Pentagram collaborated with Saunders on the exhibit and wrote up a brief piece on how it came together.
My short post on Nina Planck’s reaction to the recent “death by veganism”, as she calls it, of a baby boy is a good reminder that I don’t always agree with the things I link to. My only criteria for posting a link is that it’s interesting, whether I think it’s right or wrong or am still trying to form an opinion about it. Anyway, I got lots of mail about this one, much of it that said that the parents’ veganism was beside the point — which the prosecutors and jury in the subsequent criminal case agreed with (thx, matt) — and that a headline like “Death By Stupidity” was probably more appropriate. After all, you don’t see “Death by Omnivorism” headlines every time a baby with a more traditional diet dies of starvation.
Debra from Culiblog pointed out that contrary to Planck’s assertion that “there are no vegan societies”, the Jainists practice vegetarianism and veganism. On the other side of the aisle, meat fan Michael Ruhlman chastised Planck for going too easy on vegans, saying that “Veganism is a colossal arrogance, a refusal to admit to our own nature, a denial of our humanity. Sometimes it kills people. And it’s not very much fun, besides.” You can imagine the discussion that generated…although it was nothing like the 300+ comment thread on MetaFilter.
My opinion of Cars improved with a second viewing.
Discover’s chat bot conversation reminded a reader of this old interview with the Ask Jeeves search engine (thx david). Back in 2002, I interviewed ELLEGirl magazine’s AIMbot:
jkottke: Do you do anything to celebrate or recognize the changing of seasons?
ELLEgirlBuddy: do you do anything to celebrate or recognize the changing of seasons? that’s a tough choice.
jkottke: yes, to celebrate or merely recognize. that is a toughie.
ELLEgirlBuddy: yes to celebrate or merely recognize that is a toughie? i dunno.
jkottke: you seem like an actual 13 year old girl.
ELLEgirlBuddy: i haven’t really made a decision ‘bout that.
jkottke: growing up is tough, isn’t it?
ELLEgirlBuddy: i dunno.
And whoever posted the chat bot story to Digg (5696 Diggs and counting!) used the exact wording from my original post. You’re welcome!
Prime, David Burke’s quarter-million-dollar Black Angus bull, has his own web site. (thx, brian)
Regarding Alex Reisner’s excellent baseball statistics web site and, in particular, the pennant race graphs, here’s another interesting visualization of the pennant races…you can see the teams race to the end of the year like horses. (thx, scott)
Re: my post on better living through self-deception, I’ve heard that pregnant women tend to forget the pain of childbirth, perhaps because “endorphins reduce the amount of information trauma victims can store”. Also related tangetially is this article on research into lying and laughing, which includes this simple test to see if you’re a good liar:
Are you a good liar? Most people think that they are, but in reality there are big differences in how well we can pull the wool over the eyes of others. There is a very simple test that can help determine your ability to lie. Using the first finger of your dominant hand, draw a capital letter Q on your forehead.
Some people draw the letter Q in such a way that they themselves can read it. That is, they place the tail of the Q on the right-hand side of their forehead. Other people draw the letter in a way that can be read by someone facing them, with the tail of the Q on the left side of their forehead. This quick test provides a rough measure of a concept known as “self-monitoring”. High self-monitors tend to draw the letter Q in a way in which it could be seen by someone facing them. Low self-monitors tend to draw the letter Q in a way in which it could be read by themselves.
High self-monitors tend to be concerned with how other people see them. They are happy being the centre of attention, can easily adapt their behaviour to suit the situation in which they find themselves, and are skilled at manipulating the way in which others see them. As a result, they tend to be good at lying. In contrast, low self-monitors come across as being the “same person” in different situations. Their behaviour is guided more by their inner feelings and values, and they are less aware of their impact on those around them. They also tend to lie less in life, and so not be so skilled at deceit.
The skyscraper with one floor isn’t exactly a new idea. Rem Koolhaas won a competition to build two libraries in France with one spiraling floor in 1992 (thx, mike). Of course, there’s the Guggenheim in NYC and many parking garages.
After posting a brief piece on Baltimore last week, I discovered that several of my readers are current or former residents of Charm City…or at least have an interest in it. Armin sent along the Renaming Baltimore project…possible names are Domino, Maryland and Lessismore. A Baltimore Sun article on the Baltimore Youth Lacrosse League published shortly after my post also referenced the idea of “Two Baltimores. Two cities in one.” The Wire’s many juxtapositions of the “old” and “new” Baltimore are evident to viewers of the series. Meanwhile, Mobtown Shank took a look at the crime statistics for Baltimore and noted that crime has actually decreased more than 40% from 1999 to 2005. (thx, fred)
Cognitive Daily took an informal poll and found that fewer than half the respondants worked a standard 8-5 Mon-Fri schedule. Maybe that’s why the streets and coffeeshops aren’t empty during the workday.
Nina Katchadourian’s Sorted Books project, photographs of
Nina Katchadourian’s Sorted Books project, photographs of book spines arranged to tell short stories.
The BLDGBLOG book will likely be as
The BLDGBLOG book will likely be as interesting as the BLDGBLOG blog. Topics will include “plate tectonics and J.G. Ballard to geomagnetic harddrives and undiscovered New York bedrooms, by way of offshore oil derricks, airborne utopias, wind power, inflatable cathedrals, statue disease, science fiction and the city, pedestrianization schemes, architecture and the near-death experience, Scottish archaeology, green roofs…”
The entire prologue and first chapter of
The entire prologue and first chapter of David Weinberger’s new book, Everything is Miscellaneous.
Celluloid Skyline exhibit at Grand Central
Let’s say you’re interested in movies and New York City. Then you could do worse than check out the Celluloid Skyline exhibit being displayed in Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central from May 25 through June 22. The exhibit is based on the book of the same name by James Sanders, an exploration of how New York is portrayed in film. The exhibit includes “scenic backing” paintings made for movie sets in the 40s & 50s, film footage of films set in NYC, production stills and location shots, and other artifacts of NYC’s intersection with film. Sanders was kind enough to send me a photo of one of the scenic backing paintings:
I left the tool chest in the foreground for scale…the paintings are three stories tall! I’m always down for a trip up to Grand Central so I’ll definitely be checking this out.
For the four or five of you
For the four or five of you that haven’t yet read Moneyball, the entire thing is available online, courtesy of a Russian site presumably out of the reach of the American legal system.
Mocketing: making fun of your product or
Mocketing: making fun of your product or brand in order to sell the product and build the brand. Found out about mocketing from this Book Design Review post on a book called Unmarketable.
Harry Potter = Luke Skywalker. Also, entire industries
Harry Potter = Luke Skywalker. Also, entire industries created by Harry Potter are due to come to an end with the publication of the final book.
Amazon’s running a contest to see which
Amazon’s running a contest to see which town in the US orders the most copies of the final book in the Harry Potter series. Towns in Virginia, Washington, Pennsylvania, and Georgia seem to dominate the rankings so far.
Hilariously crude review of the third Lord
Hilariously crude review of the third Lord of the Rings movie. “The ring is also evil but you keep thinking, while you watch it, that someone should put it on and check out some boobs. I have a feeling those scenes will be in the DVDs.” (via clusterflock)
For decades, Robert Caro’s The Power Broker
For decades, Robert Caro’s The Power Broker has been the definitive account of Robert Moses and how contemporary NYC got built. The portrait Caro painted of Moses was less than flattering. Now folks are thinking that, hey, maybe the guy wasn’t so bad after all. “That Moses was highhanded, racist and contemptuous of the poor draws no argument even from the most ardent revisionists. But his grand vision and iron will, they say, seeded New York with highways, parks, swimming pools and cultural halls, from the Belt Parkway to Lincoln Center, and thus allowed the modern city to flower.”
A father and son team have deciphered
A father and son team have deciphered a 600-year-old code hidden in a church featured in The Da Vinci Code. “The music has been frozen in time by symbolism. It was only a matter of time before the symbolism began to thaw out and begin to make sense to scientific and musical perception.” Whoa, that’s bad enough to be worthy of Dan Brown himself.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
The cashier at Barnes and Noble, she sure saw me coming. “You trying to catch up before Book 7 comes out?”
“Yes’m,” I said, staring at my shoes. My vacation reading plan had gotten me hooked on the Potter series and I was now devouring the series at a work-shirking rate. Oh sugary literature, I can’t resist you! The first three books were bit boring (I’d already seen the movies) and had I not been on vacation, I might have given up on the whole thing. I decided to press on, and, like my friend Adriana assured me, it started to get more interesting about halfway through Goblet of Fire when Rowling starts pulling back the curtain on an entire world of wizardry and backstory. I raced through Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince. Since I somehow hadn’t heard any spoilers about the series, the end of HBP left me reeling, my mind racing, my body jonesing for another hit. _______ killed ____________!!!1!1ONE!
That was all a few weeks ago. The other day, I did a very bad thing. While in the bookstore on non-Potter-related business, I stopped by the kids section to see if they carried a book that my friend David had alerted me to, Mugglenet.Com’s What Will Happen in Harry Potter 7 (warning: spoilers). When David told me about it, I was adamant about not wanting to know anything about Deathly Hallows before it comes out. But now that I was confronted with the thing in person, I was unable to resist taking a peek at the table of contents. Snape. RAB! Horcrux!! Are my pet theories true? I flipped through a couple of chapters, little kids flowing around me in the aisle, feeling exhilarated (and a little disappointed) that the authors’ theories agreed with mine and ashamed at what I’d become, a 33-yo man with deeply held theories about future plot developments in a children’s book series.
My willpower finally returned and I returned the book to its shelf, but I think I might go back for it. I just need to think of a good hiding place so that Meg doesn’t catch me with it. I fear for the future of my marriage and, more importantly, the fates of Harry, Hermione, and Ron! Hurry July 21, you cannot come soon enough.
Due to problems off the field, defensive
Due to problems off the field, defensive tackle Walter Thomas hasn’t played a lot of college ball. But his stats — 6-foot-5, 370 pounds, XXXXXXL jersey, runs the 40 in 4.9, can do backflips and handsprings, benches 475 pounds — guarantee that he’ll be drafted into the NFL this weekend. Shades of Michael Oher, Michael Lewis’ subject in The Blind Side. Also, this may be the first NY Times article to use the phrase “dadgum Russian gymnast”.
The NY Times has an excerpt of
The NY Times has an excerpt of the first chapter of The Black Swan by Nassim Taleb. Accompanying the excerpt is a review by Gregg Easterbrook. “History, he writes, proceeds by ‘jumps,’ controlled by ‘the tyranny of the singular, the accidental, the unseen and the unpredicted.’” Sounds like punctuated equilibrium.
How not to write a science book. “6.
How not to write a science book. “6. Avoid mentioning scientists or experiments. You’re a journalist, so it’s your job to explain things to people in ways they can understand. You always found science class difficult, and that class was taught by a scientist and involved experiments. Therefore no one can understand scientists and experiments.”
Old Language Log rant about how crappy
Old Language Log rant about how crappy the writing is in The Da Vinci Code.
Photographer Cara Barer creates twisty, rumpled sculptures
Photographer Cara Barer creates twisty, rumpled sculptures out of damp books…the results are beautifully fractal in nature. (via your daily awesome)
Publishers Weekly’s summer books preview, with new
Publishers Weekly’s summer books preview, with new stuff by DeLillo, Chabon, and William Gibson. (via rebecca blood)
Nice in-depth interview with Steven Johnson about his books.
Nice in-depth interview with Steven Johnson about his books.
David Shipley and Will Schwalbe have written
David Shipley and Will Schwalbe have written an email style guide, an Emily Post for the cubicle set. I can’t abide by the endorsement of excessive exclamation points, but maybe the rest of the book is more useful? Send is available at Amazon.
Short interview by James Surowiecki of Nassim
Short interview by James Surowiecki of Nassim Taleb about his new book, The Black Swan. “History is dominated not by the predictable but by the highly improbable — disruptive, unforeseeable events that Taleb calls Black Swans. The effects of wars, market crashes, and radical technological innovations are magnified precisely because they confound our expectations of the universe as an orderly place.” Malcolm Gladwell wrote an article on Taleb for the New Yorker in 2002, which Taleb said “put too much emphasis on the far less interesting, more limited — and rather boring — applications of my ideas to finance/economic, & less on the dynamics of historical events/philosophy of history, artistic success, and general uncertainty in society”. See also an interview in New Scientist, a NY Times op-ed, and a long piece on the Edge site about the black swan idea.
No One Belongs Here More Than You
Miranda July, who you might remember from her film Me and You and Everyone We Know, has a book coming out in May, a collection of stories called No One Belongs Here More Than You. The book has a web site that’s one of the most effective and creative I’ve seen in a long time. Here’s a screenshot of one of my favorite pages, just to give you a taste:
The really intriguing thing about the site is that it breaks pretty much every rule that contemporary web designers have for effective site design. The site is a linear progression of images, essentially 30 splash pages one right after another. It doesn’t have any navigation except for forward/back buttons; you can’t just jump to whatever page you want. July barely mentions anything about the book and only then near the end of the 30 pages. There’s no text…it’s all images, which means that the site will be all but invisible to search engines. No web designer worth her salt would ever recommend building a site like this to a client.
Yet it works because the story pulls you along so well; July’s using the site’s narrative to sell a book that is, presumably, chock full of the same sort of narrative. If you think the site sucks and quickly click away, chances are you’re not going to like the book either…it’s the perfect self-selection mechanism. The No One Belongs Here More Than You site is a lesson for web designers: the point is not to make sites that follow all the rules but to make sites that will best accomplish the primary objectives of the site.
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