July 2010
4 posts
Vancouver FC aka The Whitecaps Brand New has an insightful article on the evolution of the logo of Vancouver’s soccer/football team Love the Avenir typeface. But it is hard to take the nickname ‘Whitecaps’ referring to the mountaintops rather than the waves. #
Copyright termination It’s obviously based on the American experience, but this audio discussion of copyright termination is fascinating. In it, copyright guru David Nimmer, UC Berkeley Professor Peter Menell and UCLA Professor Doug Lichtman discuss copyright disputes of Superman, Captain America, the Fantastic Four, Lassie, and Winnie the Pooh. #
Canadian gaffs and practical amusements Pal Ryan gets the blame, along with Canadian Notes & Queries editor John Metcalf, for the sorry state of Canadian criticism in The Walrus. Ryan is non-plussed. #
David Frum
Canada’s newly-built places are often homes to new Canadians. These areas carry too little memory of Canadian history and Canadian accomplishment. Public memorials, statues and other reminders of the Canadian past are crowded into older central cities. As things stand, the Surreys and the Woodbridges could be any suburbs anywhere. They too need their connections to the...
June 2010
16 posts
The five most difficult countries to visit Law is Cool) Some how-tos on visiting Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, North Korea, and Somaliland. #
Former Frank editor makes Gram Parson’s musical Michael Bate, founder of the Ottawa edition of Frank and its longtime editor, is also a fan of Gram Parsons. #
Writing advice from Ian Fleming From the Guardian, 1962, ‘How to write a thriller’ I never correct anything and I never go back to what I have written, except to the foot of the last page to see where I have got to. If you once look back, you are lost. How could you have written this drivel? How could you have used “terrible” six times on one page? And so forth. If you interrupt the writing of...
A typeface explains his viewpoint McSweeney’s Listen up. I know the shit you’ve been saying behind my back. You think I’m stupid. You think I’m immature. You think I’m a malformed, pathetic excuse for a font. Well think again, nerdhole, because I’m Comic Sans, and I’m the best thing to happen to typography since Johannes fucking Gutenberg. #
The Paris Review The latest edition has Robert Crumb and Katherine Dunne, both of whom I can always use more. #
That Bloody Sunday inquiry in full Every word. All ten volumes. Anyone who says the inquiry missed something, just point them there. #
US labels create fake lobbying group for Canadian copyright change Boing Boing
It’s really telling that the opposition to the Canadian DMCA has come from real grassroots: artist groups, citizen groups, technologists, educators, disabled-rights groups, archivists — people who don’t hide their funding or their affiliations behind false flags. Meanwhile, the only support for this law has...
Telegraphs and code words Code words for the day of the year
[Some enterprising telegraph operator] realised that telegraph senders charged per word rather than per character—thus transmitting “it is on” would cost the same as “raynor is maschalophilous.”
For example ‘crisp is short hand for “can you recommend to me a good female cook?” and ‘flank means “a fire is raging here....
Canada needs a population of 100 million people - then we will be respected
Global Brief (um, who? *) says that as a middle-weight country, Canada does not get the respect that it deserves. It’s got the money, it’s got the know-how, it got three-Ocean access (sucks, don’t it, Austria) but with 30 million population, nobody is going to care.
That’s why tripling the population to 100 million...
Freegans take over Buffalo mansion and live on dumpster divings from the nearby corner shop I like this story about a fluid commune that has taken over an abandoned mansion in a forgotten neighbourhood. The neighbours lobbied the housing court judge to let them stay. #
The worst ampersand designs in typographic history These are for you, Nyiri #
How to Get Your Camera Back When You Lose It Andrew MacDonald leaves this series of pictures on his camera. #
How the Mainstream Media stole Danny Sullivan’s story without credit Danny Sullivan, of Search Engine Land, discovered a lawsuit filed against Google by a woman who says Google Maps caused her an injury. Sullivan wrote it up here. The story goes viral – but few media outlets credit Sullivan, even though they use his graphic and his copy of the statement of complaint. It is a lack of...
A Eulogy for Law & Order Those that know me know my a) disinterest in most Hollywood exports and b) my devotion to the original Law & Order. This is its eulogy. #
Rushfield Babylon: Gary As I Knew Him →
In 1984 Gary Coleman came to Crossroads School, where he enrolled in my class.
Of all the schools in the world, Crossroads was probably the one were Gary probably had the greatest chance of living anything resembling a normal life, given the liberalisness of the school meant that people…
April 2010
1 post
Qatar votes to name the streets I thought that the street naming system here in the UK was screwy – building numbers go up one side of the street, come down the other; streets get seemingly get new names every 15 feet; signs are rarely posted. In most of the Arab world, they don’t name anything. Qatar, however, in a bid to improve business, is now naming thousands of streets. #
March 2010
2 posts
Murderous eds, underage prostituting investors, Church of Satan: another day in the newspaper biz I love this story in The Stranger about the San Francisco alternative newspaper war between the Village Voice-owned SF Weekly and the locally-owned Bay Guardian but I can’t improve over Fark’s one sentence description… Murderous editors, billionaires paying off underage prostitutes with cocaine, ties...
kung fu grippe: Entitled to Care →
Marco.org - News flash … Straw man, Marco. It’s not a question of entitlement. It’s a question of clear vision about the inevitability of painful, weird change, and whether we can each find the courage to face it without folding. If anyone’s acting “entitled” right now, it’s the many…
February 2010
18 posts
The last days of Moscow’s angriest alternative newspaper, The Exile Vanity Fair has a good article of the final days of Matt Taibi and Mark Ames’ Exile newspaper in Moscow.
In its time The Exile was arguably the most abusive, defamatory, un-evenhanded, and crassest publication in Russia, and Ames and his staff had paid for that fact, or at least for the fact that they were arrogant...
A picture of every page of the fourth edition of the London Weekly I never did find a copy of the third edition. If you did, would you please contact me here. Also, Shouldn’t you be following me on Twitter? Week One | Week Two
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How to start a container garden I’m posting this to remind myself. We have a tiny and dangerous balcony off the bedroom that would be perfect for falling to one’s death and growing tomatoes. This year will be the year that something actually grows. #
Ted Rall looking to his readers to fund his return to Afghanistan We ran Ted Rall periodically in Terminal City, often his pieces on Afghanistan. The actual trips were paid for by major media outlets – we just paid his bargain-by-comparison column fee. Now he wants go back back and he has set up a fund for readers to pay for it. #
Why are coups always led by colonels? The short version: They have a taste of power but not enough fiscal incentives not to rock the boat. This short article in Foreign Policy lays it all out. #
No sign of London Weekly #3 yet Although the website of the London Weekly says the third edition has been released, we have been unable to find it at our usual locations. All staff of RevMoonbeam remain on high alert. Hit Twitter #revmoonbeam or contact above if you have any leads. #
Or is it Phantom of the Paradise? Doesn’t this description of the sequel to Phantom of the Opera, Love Never Dies, sound a lot like the plot to Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park? #
Roger Ebert: The Essential Man This is a first rate profile with the last of the great reviewers. #
A picture of every page of the second edition of the London Weekly It seems that finding actual copies of the London Weekly is still a problem, so I’m posting the photos of the second issue. I picked mine up at Holborn Station at 7:30 am (after checking Oxford Circus at 7:20). The vendor was friendly but wasn’t forthcoming on anything. When I asked how I could get a job as a London Weekly vendor,...
New Yorker’s 85th Anniversary covers There is a secret image hidden in the four New Yorker covers commissioned to Chris Ware, Dan Clowes, Adrian Tomine, and Ivan Brunetti. PLUS: A bonus story by Chris Ware on Rea Irvin, the New Yorker’s first art director. #
Conan’s contract details The Hollywood Reporter, Esq. has seen Conan O’Brien’s contract with NBC – and it did include a statement that the Tonight Show begins at 11:35pm. #
The Return of the Baffler Thomas Frank’s excellent quarterly magazine returns with its 18th issue in 22 years. #
A short interview with Bill Watterson Why now? And why with the Cleveland Plain Dealer? I don’t know – but this is the first interview with the Calvin & Hobbes creator that I have seen since the definitive Honk piece in 1987. #
Return of the Jedi, Polish Movie Poster Designer Witold Dybowski nails it. #
Print your own first edition of the London Weekly
Everyone has been talking about the new London Weekly - but noone can find it. Yet, I did - in a binman’s cart. Click here for the pix of every page.
I mean not tolerated Popery
The US Supreme Court last week recognised that corporations have ‘free speech’ like natural persons and thus could not be barred from influencing elections through advertising. The argument, of course, is that corporations may have access to much more capital to use in advertising than the average, old-style, human-type person.
However, Douglas Rushkoff...
January 2010
51 posts
Charlie Brooker on how to report the news If you work in a newsroom and continue to do this, you have no excuse. #
The Secret History of Typography in the Oxford English Dictionary
:— Citing usage from 1949, the OED calls this mark the dog’s bollocks, which it defines as, “typogr. a colon followed by a dash, regarded as forming a shape resembling the male sexual organs.” This is why I love scrounging around the linguistic scrap heap that is the OED. I always come across a little gold. And by “gold,” I mean,...
Raise your Tom Collins’ in toast - a JD Salinger round-up The New Yorker has posted every story they published by Salinger from 1946 to 1965. This sandwich has no mayonaise, a 1945 short story in Esquire. The very satisfying NY Times obituary A smiling photo. #
Helvetica cookie cutters Mmmmm. Tastes modern. #
The new rules of libel for Canadian bloggers (and other online types) The Canadian Supreme Court decision of Grant v. Torstar Corp created a new protection for journalists, the “responsible communication on matters of public interest” defense. But as these guys point out, you may not be automatically protected if you are a mere blogger. #
The Ford logo that never was Designed by Paul Rand in 1966, Henry Ford II thought it was too radical. #
Polish poster design There must be something in the water that drives the Poles to create such great design. #
Uh oh The mysterious figure who has left roses and cognac at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe each year on the writer’s birthday didn’t make it yesterday. #
10 years of No Logo Naomi Klein on trying to avoid becoming a brand herself: The aversion extended even to the brand that I had accidentally created: No Logo. From studying Nike and Starbucks, I was well acquainted with the basic tenet of brand management: find your message, trademark and protect it and repeat yourself ad nauseam through as many synergised platforms as possible. I set out to...