The Death of Postmodernism
means the arrival of what Kirby called pseudo-modernism in 2006:
To a degree, pseudo-modernism is no more than a technologically motivated shift to the cultural centre of something which has always existed (similarly, metafiction has always existed, but was never so fetishised as it was by postmodernism). Television has always used audience participation, just as theatre and other performing arts did before it; but as an option, not as a necessity: pseudo-modern TV programmes have participation built into them. There have long been very ‘active’ cultural forms, too, from carnival to pantomime. But none of these implied a written or otherwise material text, and so they dwelt in the margins of a culture which fetishised such texts – whereas the pseudo-modern text, with all its peculiarities, stands as the central, dominant, paradigmatic form of cultural product today, although culture, in its margins, still knows other kinds. Nor should these other kinds be stigmatised as ‘passive’ against pseudo-modernity’s ‘activity’. Reading, listening, watching always had their kinds of activity; but there is a physicality to the actions of the pseudo-modern text-maker, and a necessity to his or her actions as regards the composition of the text, as well as a domination which has changed the cultural balance of power (note how cinema and TV, yesterday’s giants, have bowed before it). It forms the twenty-first century’s social-historical-cultural hegemony. Moreover, the activity of pseudo-modernism has its own specificity: it is electronic, and textual, but ephemeral.
I spent half the night worrying about this, particularly considering how much time I spend mucking around the internet.
data out of context
not a metaphor for something
Saw Tabloid last night
I count Errol Morris among my reasons to live.
[Not] the inside of my refrigerator…
from the comments
For the record, I love Indian food now. Still don’t want those seeds in the bowl by the door, though. I like many foods, and many ways of cooking it, and I like to try new things. Durian? No. I don’t like foods that seem to move in for good; I don’t like recycled foods (coffee beans some animal has shit, for instance); I don’t like foods made from pets; I don’t like foods that arise from hyperactive metaphor; I don’t like foods arising from a “more is more” belief, and I’m sure there’s more but I just ate great stuff Cindy made so I’m feeling pretty good about food in general at the moment.
from the comments
There’s more character in my freezer than in my fridge.
Kishi Bashi – Bright Whites
Thanks, Michael Lang
the 2011 Bulwer-Lytton winner
Cheryl’s mind turned like the vanes of a wind-powered turbine, chopping her sparrow-like thoughts into bloody pieces that fell onto a growing pile of forgotten memories.
(via Coudal)
I know this looks pathetic,
but I live alone, and I’m fixing to move soon.
My pantry is way better stocked.
dear clusterflock
Post a photo of your fridge.
Today’s lunchtime conversation
Daryl: Here, taste this.
Cindy: No.
D: Really, taste it. It tastes like zero. It tastes like chew.
C: Well, if you put it that way. [Prodigious chewing.] Wow. It tastes like chew, but there’s a lovely coconut aftertaste. Here, taste it again.
D: [Prodigious chewing.] You’re a liar.
C: God damn it, it tastes like coconut at the end.
D: You’re tasting the word Coconut.
C: I almost never taste words. Take this little bit.
D: [Prodigious chewing.] Nope.
C: You’re missing the coconut stripe on your tongue. You are deformed.
D: Am not.
C: Are too.
D: You gonna eat the rest of that?
photo in context
headline of the day
Hong Kong scientists ‘show time travel is impossible’
Mark Menjivar, You Are What You Eat
Delicatessen Attendant | Daphne, AL | 4-Person Household | Disowned by parents for marrying a black man.
You Are What You Eat is a series of portraits made by examining the interiors of refrigerators in homes across the United States.
I like that so many of them are from Texas.
(via marginal revolution)
the father of cryonics dies at 92
Robert C. W. Ettinger, a physics teacher and science fiction writer who believed death is only for the unprepared and unimaginative, died July 23 at his home in Clinton Township, Mich.
He was 92 and had suffered declining health in recent weeks, said his son David, who could not specify a cause. “We’re obviously sad,” said the younger Ettinger. But “we were able to freeze him under optimum conditions, so he’s got another chance.”
Mazel tov!
(via marginal revolution)
“The Chart That Should Accompany All Discussions of the Debt Ceiling”
From The Atlantic (via Andy Baio)
I don’t even know what this means
an interesting subplot to the horror in Norway
Norwegians tend to see “acts of extreme violence … as aberrant events, not symptoms of national decay,” Time Magazine’s William Lee Adams reported last year. Norwegian prison guards undergo two years of training, “don’t carry guns … and call prisoners by their first names and play sports and eat meals with them,” Adams reported.
That approach — and its underlying premise that people who commit crimes are troubled who should be given a second chance and prepared to live again amongst society — can perhaps be credited with Norway’s extremely low prison-recidivism rate — only about 20 percent of those imprisoned in Norway commit a repeat crime that sends them back to prison. Recidivism figures in the United States and the United Kingdom, by contrast, are much higher — 50 to 60 percent.
This in the context of the maximum prison sentence being 21 years in Norway, especially in light of the recent atrocity.
Florence + The Machine — Dog Days Are Over (2010 Version)
(thanks, Tim)
You don’t have to tell me how to do it
Product Review: Rite-Aid Brand Tweezers
Cost: $1.99
Weight: About 5 dimes, or two quarters perhaps.
Shape: Traditional metal, joined at one end, free-standing arms at the other, filed to a sharp slope to allow the grasping and pulling of hairs, splinters, etc.
The traditional slanted tip tweezer can be somewhat of a let-down if it isn’t perfectly filed, and these tweezers are pretty close to precision.
They feel good in the hand, a standardized item perhaps, nothing too fancy, but she didn’t want anything fancy. More or less she just wanted something that would work. Some of the things at the store were too expensive. She slid her card, hoping it would work. It did, someone at the bank must not have been paying attention. Pulling them from the packaging she wonders if she could have just stolen them, but that particular store had a lot of foot traffic and a lot of surveillance to go along with it. Given enough time she could have, it’s easy enough to slip items from their packages, but she didn’t feel like quibbling over a few bucks. Time enough for that later on. In the car she finally pulled that chin hair that’d bothered her for days. These were good tweezers. Felt good, in the hand.
Rite-Aid also seems to be running a special, buy one, get another half-off. Pick up some ice cream while you’re there. Prices are steep though, $2.49 for a double scoop. Plan accordingly.
I was not compensated or asked to promote this product.
quote out of context
For those of you under the age of 25, a magazine is a blog made out of trees.
quote out of context
This creates not only a digital, but a cheeseburger divide, between the two.
