Archivos mensuales: abril 2015

Play House. Según la descripción:

Play House is an automata that generates slow hypnotic acid house through mechanisms built from LEGO Technic.

Y efectivamente, ofrece un enorme deleite visual ver ese cacharro en funcionamiento.

Su creador, Alex Allmont, tiene bastantes otras creaciones en su web, que combinan todo tipo de elementos. Dice:

My research ties together aspects of cognition and performance and I am focused on making the experience as open as possible so that the audience can get better understand what is driving the performer – or become the performer in some cases. The intention is to blur the lines and responsibilities between them in an attempt to have a deeper connection with music.

Para los aficionados a LEGO, este otro vídeo puede resultar fascinante y educativo:

LEGO Sketchbook 2013 from Alex Allmont on Vimeo.

(vía Play House | ./mediateletipos))))

La revista New Yorker ofrece un muy buen perfil de Gene Wolfe, el mejor escritor de ciencia ficción vivo. Su magistral El libro del sol nuevo es una lectura maravillosa y una prueba de las cumbres a las que puede llegar el género en manos de un autor sobresaliente.

Wolfe has published more than twenty-five novels and more than fifty stories, and has won some of science fiction and fantasy’s most prestigious awards. But he has rarely, if ever, been considered fully within the larger context of literature. His books contain all of the nasty genre tropes—space travel, robots, even dragons—and he hasn’t crossed into the mainstream on the strength of a TV or movie adaptation. Wolfe himself sees the trappings of science fiction and fantasy, the spaceships and so on, as simply “a sketchy outline of the things that can be done.” But even within fantasy fandom, Wolfe’s work presents difficulties. His science fiction is neither operatic nor scientifically accurate; his fantasy works are not full of clanging swords and wizardly knowledge. But ask science-fiction or fantasy authors about Gene Wolfe and they are likely to cite him as a giant in their field. Ursula K. Le Guin once called Wolfe “our Melville.”

Origen: Sci-Fi’s Difficult Genius – The New Yorker

(vía “That Notoriously Picky Publication” — Crooked Timber)

Hay gente a la que uno simplemente debe admirar.

Fixing the world, one piece of hardware at a time.

Origen: iFixit Store Europe | Pro Tech Toolkit

Es el de toda tecnología: ¿quién decide cómo se aplica? No es tanto que se pueda o no se pueda hacer, sino para qué fines vamos a usar la tecnología:

Por otra parte, también es verdad que dada una tecnología, siempre decidimos que nosotros somos las personas adecuadas para decidir su uso. Nunca se nos ocurre pensar: «esto lo vamos a dejar que se lo miren en el futuro».

Origen: Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

Estupendo

Aparentemente, dedicarse al arte de mayor tiene enormes beneficios para el cerebro:

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota have found that beginning to paint, draw, or sculpt in old age could actually ward off the muddled thinking and slips in memory that befall many.

Origen: Picking Up Art Later in Life Could Help the Brain

Often nature itself gets in the way.

Source: The Anxieties of Landscape Painting

https://instagram.com/p/1zwUqvMliL/

Los de iFixit se sacrifican para que nosotros no tengamos que desmontarlo en casa:

Apple Watch Teardown – iFixit

Time flies: it’s been eight months since Apple announced its (digital) crowning achievement, the Apple Watch. Join us as we make time stand still by tearing down the Apple Watch—and see what makes it tick.