Well, I'm installing this, and I strongly encourage anyone else with a wordpress blog to do the same.

I have no personal use at the moment for a 3d printer, but I'm sure the day will come when I will, and I'd really rather not have to pay through the nose for raw materials.

Someone has taken classic record covers, and re-imagined them as Pelican book covers. This is absolutely beautiful stuff.

Jon Gruber has implemented an anti-DiggBar tool for his pages. I will probably do the same for mine. Read about why and how he's done it, because while this may sound a bit like a crank thing to do, rejecting potential traffic from a popular source like Digg, the important principle here is that what Digg is doing is subverting on of the basic premises of how the web works, and it should be discouraged.

Truly, the confectionery of gods and titans.

I want to sit down and read this properly when I get time – an actual accessible book on the maths of energy consumption vs. possible energy production, as opposed the usual waffle.

A short retrospective of the first Matrix film, as it turns 10. a) it is horrifying to me that that movie is ten, because it means I am very old, and b) I particularly love the title of this article. It occurs to me that I have never satisfyingly run a game with all three of those elements, and I really must get around to having a go at that.

I think this is a fair trade. I will accept a three strikes copyright warning system only if all copyright enforcers are held to the same standard: three wrong accusations, and they're out, too. Want to bet me that they'd all be gone before the rest of us would?

Must remember this on in future – the basis by which two parties that are unable to communicate will still be able to select the same focal point in a game/challenge.

A companion to the other piece on monoculturalism, this dealing with internet communities and the origins of elites, and the social effects of these technologies, and some opinions on where these phenomena are likely to lead to.

Why recommendation engines are creating even more of a mononculture than we had beore, even though everyone feels like they're finding more niche stuff.

I have significantly less than fuck all architectural training, but it hasn't escaped my notice over the last few years that many of the most interesting creative types I know do have some history with the discipline, and I've increasingly found my own interests tending that way – not literally in the designing buildings sense, but in the sense of being aware of people's relationship with the space around them, and how to optimise that space to get the best out of life.

Postopolis therefore sounds like it would have been a fascinating event to be at, even if 90% would have gone sailing over my head. Any chance of holding the next one in London? It's at least as interesting as LA…

Dan Hill was at Postopolis and has written an excellent series of posts on it, and on LA in general. Thoroughly recommended reading.

Here's an interesting read: the currency of Iceland is basically worthless. The artificial currency of a computer game created in Iceland, however, still has value. In fact, it has more value then the "real" currency.

I propose holding anyone that describes themselves as an "e-marketer" (or anything remotely similar) down and beating them with sticks until they agree to tell all future prospective clients this simple truth from th above article: "instead of getting your company on twitter, paying marketers to mention you are on twitter, and paying people to blog about your company, forget all that and just make awesome stuff that gets people excited about your products"

You! Yes, you! Visit this link, and buy a copy of Matt Jones' "Get Excited And Make Things" poster. Then hang it some place where you will see it often. It will be morally uplifting for you, and the proceeds from the sale will benefit Creative Commons, which is a tremendously excellent thing to do.

I've been saying that using URL shorteners is a bad idea for for a while, so I thought I'd link to Joshua Schachter's more cogent and better put together argument that details a more specific list of the reasons why.

British art stalwart D'Israeli take a look at the architectual and design history of one of the greatest of all the future cities: Mega City One.

He starts out spelling how we're fucked on an economic and environmental level. And then he gets in to what we're doing about it. Some of this shit is fascinating – a set of tools for a completely new system of economics.

By the end of the 21st century, there are predicted to be 19 cities with a population of over 20 million. London is one of them, currently has a population of around 7-8 million, and large parts of it's infrastructure are creaking at the seams. We urgently need more thinking on how we will cope with the supercities of the near future, and I'll watch this project with interest.

100 quid. For the kind of computer you can shove in a corner, hook to a network, and hack to do lots and lots of different things. And it'll do it silently, and without eating power. This may be handy at some point in the near-ish future.

Steve Albini's breakdown of exactly how much a band can expect now to earn in a normal record industry contact. Figures would need to be adjusted for inflation, but I bet they're still proportionally the same. I've seen this a few times over the years, I just wanted to log it in case I need to refer to it again.

Some notes about the practicalities of nanomachinery in the body – both the propulsion/navigation, and the means by which they might operate on us.

Good to know that my future cybernetic implants aren't likely to need batteries.

After the links the other week, here's a talk about how they newspapers might yet be kept alive: by making them beautiful objects.

A fascinating talk on the some of the possible neuroscientific explanations for some of the more remarkable and ill-understood operations of the brain.

I shall be sending these in future. Well, maybe not, but there are a few things in here that made me laugh.)

This could be a really useful little learning tool.

I've got a few different quotes I'd consider having put on me, and this place might provide inspiration for design/context for them.

I don't have time to read this in full right now, so I'm bookmarking it so I remember to read it at some point over the weekend.

Mac App to lock email/internet away for periods of time. Killer feature: once started, it cannot be undone, unlike most other, similar apps. Handy for those days when you really have to just dig in and get something done.

Alan Moore's Big Numbers #3, made available on-line with his blessing. To say this is a big unexpected would be understating things a bit, but well done that man.