Currently reading Naomi Klein’s excellent book No Logo, on corporate culture, the commercialisation of private space, worker explotiation and culture jamming. And then I come across a particularly fine set of culture jams: All Your Brand Are Belong To Us.
Author: Alasdair
Sadly Gone
Monkee fans for Christ! Hallelujah, brothers and sisters! The Lord has given us back Mickey Dolenz and his mates!
But It Has Now
One day, this sort of thing will cease to surprise me. But not yet.
Came To Nothing
Metafiler: All your .org now belong to Verisign!
This is not good, and the outcry has been precitably massive. Here’s hoping it doesn’t go through – I’d finally found a domain name I was planning to stick with for as long as I could, and now the bastards are suggesting that it should be taken away because I’m not a non-profit corp? No chance. Anyone want to mail me and tell me how to set myself up as a non-profit corp?
This Got Me More Hits That It Should Have
Your strange perversions for the week, presented without comment beyond a barely-repressed shudder of fear:
- http://www.gimpix.com/ – leg fetishists with a difference.
- http://ld5.dyndns.org/ – anthro-macrophiles.
Roundup
That was a fun weekend, even if the Saturday I’d planned to spend working was in fact a complete write off, as I went to a party Friday night, intending to stay for a couple of hours, missed my train, and was menaced by a Norwegian bearing something that they claimed was rum, but was obviously paint stripper, and as a result got in at half eight in the morning, and wound up sleeping through to half four, just in time to head off for Birthday drinks with the vilest man on Earth, Sick Tim. Low turnout for that, but a good laugh. Sunday, round at Andrea’s with the usual suspects for a very pleasant afternoon. So, the usual huge thanks to all involved, and apologies to all the readers I’ve just put to sleep with the dull minutiae of my life. In penance, some links.
- Strange Machine. Writings by Warren Ellis. Enjoy.
- Marie’s World Tour. Comics professional and acclaimed madwoman Marie Javins is off round the world for the year, without leaving the surface of the earth at any point. Marie is a vastly entertaining travel writer, so you really ought to stop by.
When memes weren’t that fast
I have just watched All Your Base Are Belong To Us. My head is in new and pleasing shapes.
Suicide Air
Saw The Virgin Suicides last night. Currently listening to the soundtrack by Air. It’s good throughout, but the last track “Suicide Underground” stands out as a wonderfully chill and strange piece of work. Get hold of it.
Drinking and Writing
Busy again. Weekend good – Drinking with the WEF(UK) mob again, always a laugh. New record set for attendees, and I was, of course, very, very drunk. Sunday: Chinese New Year fun. From my notes:
“The crowds have thinned from earlier, which is good. The Lion dance comes past, trailing its rhythmic cacophany of drums and cymbals, on its way to another resurant. The air is thicker than usual, filled with the smells of food cooking, sizzling in the woks along the street – vendors breaking every hygiene law in the books, but everyone having a great time. This is the sort of time London is at it’s best – packed with life and madness, something new around every corner.”
I Still Remember
Yeah, disgraceful length of time since last update. Been busy. Leave me alone. In penance, some notes from my palmtop, made over Christmas. Not that there’s anything interesting in them, but it’s content…
“The flight’s been cancelled. Everyone’s tired and sweaty and disappointed. Dad and I are trying not to pick fights with one another, but everything either one of says just gets on the other’s wick. We’re not normally like this. It’s the environment – harshly lit plastic and constant beeping. Bollocks.”
“These are the moments that make it all worthwhile. It’s about 4 on Christmas day, and I’m out for a walk. The air is cold and clear, here in Hillsborough. I can smell woodsmoke. The rest of the family went out for a walk en masse earlier, and I’ve just bumped into my cousin Richard on his way back. Standing at the top of a hill looking out across the fields and hills at the sunset. A huge flock of birds are dancing in front of it, swirling and circling as they begin to roost for the night.
There are other families out now, Christmas dinner over and done with, children riding new bikes and scooters. I’m down in the village proper, look across from the war memorial at the church, its spire eerily greenlit against the dusk-blue sky. Magic. On the way back, I stop at the top of the same hill, and look out toward Belfast’s lights, ten thousand amber jewels against the black land.”
It was a good christmas, and I’ve been meaning to mention it here for a while now.