No heartache, no getting over it…just good old fashioned fun… and a ton of hidden sub-text and auto-biographical mashery.
Available to download in a RAR, split in to tracks with full art and tracklistings at http://www.colatron.com/2011/10/last-dance.html
I particulary love the opening of this mashuppy mixtape - but really, everything about it is great.
“The Last Question”, as Isaac Asimov imagines it: “Can the net amount of entropy in the universe be massively decreased?” An amazing short story.
I had this idea for a new retro style aesthetic based on really old science fiction movies. Think 40′s, 50′s and 60′s science fiction where all spaceships are stylized slim rockets with the signature fins, where space suit helmets resemble fish bowls and computers are gigantic constructs which accept punch cards and print output onto spooled up paper rolls. Just tell me that this wouldn’t be awesome? Imagine a science fiction movie/show made today, with current state of the art aesthetic, but set in a world that closely resembles what people in the 50′s imagined the year 2000 would be like.
That would be beyond awesome.
By some estimates, more calculations go into a single set of [Google] search results than it took to put a man on the moon.Google Search Quality Meeting, Minute 2:22
Polar Bears in Space! Collage about lies within the media.
Ich hatte ja vor ungefähr einem Jahrhundert einen Post darüber geschrieben, was Kunst für mich bedeutet. Damals hatte ich geschrieben, dass Kunst schön aussehen und Menschen inspirieren soll. Na, fehlt was? Klar.
Die gesellschaftskritische Dimension habe ich vor fünfhundert Jahren fünf Monaten nicht erwähnt, und sie ist in der Postmoderne mit der wichtigste Grund dafür, Kunst zu machen und zu veröffentlichen. Das obenstehende Bild (das aus einer dreiteiligen Serie ist) ist ein fantastisches Beispiel dafür.
(by Sam Elliott John, via molar-ink)
I’ve been struck particularly by two things missing from the DS9 universe—one unpredictable in the 1993-99 span of the series, and one predictable but unattractive from the creators’ standpoint.
Nobody uses social media, and nobody wastes time. […]
In DS9, instantaneous information tech is available and evenly distributed, but the writers do not live in a world, yet, where anyone has begun to figure out what to do with it. So walkie talkies are still, in 1999, the model for communication. DS9 cares about physical presence in a way we are already beginning to leave behind. […]
The brave men and women of the future read (super old) books, talk to each other face to face, and even in their VR fantasies practice for things they will have to do in real life or, admittedly quite realistically, have space holosex. There is no WoW. There are no video games at all unless they are evil ones from Risa that will suck out your brains.
Cat Valente hat einen ausführlichen Artikel darüber geschrieben, wie sich unsere Gegenwart bereits fundamental von der in Star Trek dargestellten Zukunft unterscheidet: Es gibt dort kein Internet, so wie wir es kennen, keine Social Networks, kein Farmville, keine Lolcats. Stattdessen kommunizieren die Charaktere über Audio- und Videotelefonie und verbringen ihre Freizeit mit klassichen Offline-Aktivitäten - oder sie nutzen das Holodeck und lassen dabei meist Programme laufen, die mehr oder weniger mit ihrer Arbeit zusammenhängen.
Die Welt in Star Trek ist abseits vom Warpantrieb, dem Transporter und anderen technischen Mitteln, die für das Funktionieren eines Raumschiffs nötig sind, weit weniger “modern” als unsere Realität. Wir vernetzen uns zunehmend im Internet, verschwenden Zeit mit Games und Networks und fühlen uns ziemlich gut dabei.
Auf den Enterprises, der Voyager und Deep Space 9 sieht man nur sehr selten jemanden Zeit verschwenden. Alle Charaktere sind pflichtbewusst, tun ihre Arbeit und verbringen ihre Freizeit mit real life-Aktivitäten.
Star Trek is a butterfly in a glass. It is no longer meant to predict or exhibit the future, but to quietly stand for the world of the past, as much as the Shire ever was.
(via fefe)
The history of space station design is littered with concepts—some elegant, some strange, and some remarkably cute—that were passed over for one reason or another. Here, we look at some space station ideas that didn’t quite make it off the drawing board.
Verrückte Raumstation-Konzepte, die direkt aus Star Trek kommen könnten. Super!
Mein Favorit ist die Station, die sich dreht, um durch Zentrifugalkraft so etwas wie eine künstliche Gravitation zu erzeugen. Hach, ich bin ja so gespannt, was die Zukunft tatsächlich bringt. Ich fände es wunderbar, wenn Menschen eines Tages wirklich zu den Sternen reisen könnten, Klasse-M-Planeten entdecken würden und darauf ein paar Siedlungen errichten würden. Bevor das sinnvoll möglich wäre, müsste man natürlich die Fähigkeit erlangen, ein paar physikalische Gesetze zu brechen: Man will immerhin weniger als ein paar Jahrtausende brauchen, um von Sektor 001 zu einem Außenposten der Föderation zu kommen. Außerdem müssen wir mal diesen verdammten Subraum finden, damit Kommunikation mit Überlichtgeschwindigkeit möglich wird.
Außerdem will ich Commander Spock kennen lernen. So, jetzt packe ich den Star Trek-Nerd mal wieder ein.
(via thisistheverge)
In Event of Moon Disaster
On July 18 of 1969, as the world waited anxiously for Apollo 11 to land safely on the surface of the Moon, speechwriter William Safire imagined the worst case scenario as he expertly wrote the following sombre memo to President Nixon’s Chief of Staff, H. R. Haldeman. Its contents: a contingency plan, in the form of a speech to be read out by Nixon should astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin become stranded on the moon, never to return, followed by some brief instructions relating to its broadcast. Luckily for all those involved, the memo was never needed.
Image courtesy of The National Archives.
(via theatlantic)
![“A short film about two small spacecraft, an epic journey, taking risks and falling in love. Also Carl Sagan.”
Penny Lane:
In the summer of 1977, NASA sent Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 on an epic journey into interstellar space. Each spacecraft carries a golden record album, a massive compilation of images and sounds embodying the best of Planet Earth. According to Carl Sagan, “[t]he spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced space-faring civilizations in interstellar space.” […] While working on the golden record, Sagan met and fell madly in love with his future wife Annie Druyan. The golden record became their love letter to humankind and to each other.
(via Nerdcore and Brain Pickings)](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lx0xniMNbD1qjbmsxo1_1280.jpg)
“A short film about two small spacecraft, an epic journey, taking risks and falling in love. Also Carl Sagan.”
In the summer of 1977, NASA sent Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 on an epic journey into interstellar space. Each spacecraft carries a golden record album, a massive compilation of images and sounds embodying the best of Planet Earth. According to Carl Sagan, “[t]he spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced space-faring civilizations in interstellar space.” […] While working on the golden record, Sagan met and fell madly in love with his future wife Annie Druyan. The golden record became their love letter to humankind and to each other.
(via Nerdcore and Brain Pickings)
The main problem is, of course, funding. I don’t think that independent organizations will ever be financially capable of building and testing hundreds of satellites.
An indie internet would be great, tough - even with extremely high signal delays.
(via @LukeMaciak)
