So this is basically the scariest thing i’ve ever seen relating to copyright laws and their abuse.

Happy Monday!

http://www.bestofartists.com/creative-sculpture/2008/7/7/you-could-lose-your-rights.html

Is awesome.

It is referenced in the Vanity Fair article linked below.

“The design of the new Central Chinese Television (CCTV) headquarters defies the popular conception of a skyscraper — and it broke Beijing’s building codes and required approval by a special review panel. The standard systems for engineering gravity and lateral loads in buildings didn’t apply to the CCTV building, which is formed by two leaning towers, each bent 90 degrees at the top and bottom to form a continuous loop.

The engineer’s solution is to create a structural “tube” of diagonal supports. The irregular pattern of this “diagrid” system reflects the distribution of forces across the tube’s surface. Designed by Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren and engineered by Ove Arup, the new CCTV tower rethinks what a skyscraper can be.”

This is amazing.  Modern and postmodern, form follows function, but you can literally see the forces on the building.  I am completely enthralled with this thing.  The irregular grid on the building’s facades is an expression of the forces traveling throughout its structure. I like the word expression.

The other cool aspect–as the author in the VF article pointed out, there is a slight nod to communism– is how in this skyscraper the relationship between individuals is completely different.  Unlike a traditional skyscraper, in which you can usually not see any other part of the building, the CCTV tower gives its denizens a sense of their surroundings, of the building itself and of the other people with which they are working.  The architecture creates a relationship among those within, as opposed to a verticle stack of disconnectness.

The architects also mentioned how the building is not overwhelming.  It can be broken down into three distinct building which are easily visually digestable, and b/c it is only 47 stories the viewer does not have to crane to see to the top.

China: Figuring their shit out.  more pics

America’s largest brewery sold to a Belgium company, that is really controlled by Brazillians, the third world.

Gov’t bailing the largest lenders in the nation.

Markets in trouble today after an overnight correction in the Asian Markets.

The dollar the weakest it has ever been agains the Euro

The upcoming Olympics are in Beijing.

Ford and GM cutting more jobs.

And in case you missed it, there was a run on a bank.  An honest-to-god line to get money out of IndyMac.

Strap in, it’s going to get interesting.

To wit: kind of.

Hugh Beaumont, who played Ward Cleaver, was born in Lawrence on 16 February 1909.

Motivational posters for your monday morning. Just a little something to get you through the week. (Should you find yourself wasting some time checking your friendly neighborhood cooperative blog this morning.)

Word.
http://www.geneticanomaly.com/RPG-Motivational/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-y5eBRWQerY

That dapper band in the background is “Pulp.” Shatner covered this song (Common Peoples) on his 2004 album “Has Been.”

This has been your VH1 popup video moment of the blog.

There is no doubt that the internets have entangled themselves into our lives. NPR has a fascinating interview with Jeremy Bailenson of Standford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab about how a person’s virtual persona (ala Second Life type virtual realities) affects their everyday life from gaining confidence to losing weight.

NPR’s Learning from the virtual you audio clip

I don’t have experience with Second Life version of me other than my Nintendo Wii mii, which looks a lot like Mr. Garrison crossed with Elton John crossed with David Cross - let me tell you, that is great for my self esteem :} I do think the internet has affected me in other ways, some for the better, some for the worse. The most apparent thing that sticks out to me is that I don’t read the same as I did 10 years ago. I tend to skim looking for bullet points and quick understanding rather than ruminating on points and trying to really understand the nut of a passage. Obviously, this is not a good thing. On the positive side, the internet has truly influence my position on intellectual property by observing remarkable people share their hard work for free. That truly amazes me in many, many ways, but I’ll digress from that for now.

My question to all of you is how has the internet changed/enriched/affected you?

Article about starting and quitting smoking.

Happy Earth Day.

Here is a nice stop raping the Earth video from Rocketboom!

Maybe the government should step in and start a “packaging tax” to stop the gratuitous package that companies are forcing upon us customers. If company’s can’t clean up their own act, then it is time for some good old fashion regulation through taxation. Who’s with me?