Friday, 10 September 2010
HA!
Q: How many hipsters does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: It's an obscure number, you've probably never heard of it.
US pastor cancels plan to burn Qur'an
Pastor Terry Jones has cancelled his plans to burn the Qur'an on the anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Photograph: Chip Litherland/Polaris/Eyevine
Terry Jones, the Florida pastor who planned to stage a Qur'an-burning protest on the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, has decided to cancel the event.
Jones, who heads the Dove World Outreach Centre church based in the university town of Gainesville, called off the book-burning after he claimed an agreement had been reached with Muslim leaders to move the controversial location of a planned Islamic cultural centre and mosque in New York.
The New York imam behind the development, however, said there was no agreement to move the mosque away from the former World Trade Centre site. Feisal Abdul Rauf said there had been no negotiations, while Manhattan real estate developer Sharif El-Gamal also denied that any talks had taken place. Gamal said the centre would go forward as planned.
The pastor's proposal to burn the Qur'an had drawn criticism from Barack Obama and religious and political leaders across the Muslim world.
It emerged tonight that the US defence secretary Robert Gates called Jones to ask him not to proceed with plans to burn the Muslim holy book, the Pentagon said.
Many people, both conservative and liberal, dismissed the threat as an attention-seeking stunt by the preacher. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs called him a "desperate man" who would endanger the lives of American troops abroad.
"This is a recruitment bonanza for al-Qaida," Obama said earlier in an ABC television interview.
"You could have serious violence in places like Pakistan or Afghanistan. This could increase the recruitment of individuals who would be willing to blow themselves up in American cities or European cities."
Obama, who has sought to improve relations with Muslims worldwide, spoke out in an effort to stop Jones from going ahead with his plan and head off spiralling anger among many Muslims.
The international police agency Interpol warned governments worldwide of an increased risk of terrorist attacks if the planned burning went ahead, and the state department issued a warning to Americans travelling overseas.
Jones's threat has caused worldwide alarm and raised tensions over the 9/11 anniversary, which this year coincides with the Muslim Eid al-Fitr festival ending the fasting month of Ramadan.
William S. Burroughs’ Lost Graphic Novel Ah Pook Is Here Gets Exhumed
Naked Lunch author and sci-fi visionary William S. Burroughs only wrote one graphic novel, but it quickly disappeared after bouncing around in the early ’70s. Now the long-lost book, Ah Pook Is Here, has been reborn with the help of indie comics standout Fantagraphics.
Fantagraphics will publish the resuscitated Ah Pook as a two-volume package next summer, no doubt to the delight of Beat-nuts and alt-lit loyalists worldwide.
Burroughs‘ collaboration with artist Malcolm McNeill on Ah Pook was ahead of its time in the late ’60s and early ’70s, back when the phrase “graphic novel” was merely a figment of some marketer’s imagination. Yet the story — about a filthy-rich newspaper tycoon who creates a Media Control Machine fueled by ancient Mayan images to achieve immortality in the midst of a plague-riddled apocalypse — reads like a monstrous offspring of Fox News.
William S. Burroughs mutated psy-fi and sci-fi in novels like Naked Lunch and Nova Express. But did he create, with artist Malcolm McNeill, one of the first graphic novels in Ah Pook Is Here?
Image courtesy Christiaan Tonnis/Wikipedia
Image courtesy Christiaan Tonnis/Wikipedia
Fantagraphics describes the tale like this:
John Stanley Hart is the “Ugly American” or “Instrument of Control” — a billionaire newspaper tycoon obsessed with discovering the means for achieving immortality. Based on the formulae contained in rediscovered Mayan books he attempts to create a Media Control Machine using the images of Fear and Death. By increasing Control, however, he devalues time and invokes an implacable enemy: Ah Pook, the Mayan Death God. Young mutant heroes using the same Mayan formulae travel through time bringing biologic plagues from the remote past to destroy Hart and his Judeo/Christian temporal reality.
The story originated in the ’70s as a monthly comic strip called The Unspeakable Mr. Hart in English magazine Cyclops. When the mag went belly up, Burroughs and McNeil attempted to develop Ah Pook into a unique book. It was originally designed to be a single painting featuring recombined images and text, packed in 120 serial pages that would unfurl as the narrative took shape. That arty ambition doomed it to a later millennium, where an evolved comics industry could handle the work’s innovation and experimentation.
Ah Pook Is Here was another distillation of the cut-up technique, popularized by Burroughs and Brion Gysin, that anticipated later massive media developments like sampling and mashups. Burroughs died in 1997.
Fantagraphics’ release includes accompanying book Observed While Falling, McNeill’s memoir about his seven-year collaboration with Burroughs, one of America’s most influential authors. Acquired by publisher and editor Gary Groth, Ah Pook Is Here is a feather in Fantagraphics’ already feather-stufffed comics-lit cap.
“Fantagraphics is honored to bring this major work into print and to publish what is quite possibly the last great work from one of America’s most original prose stylists,” Groth said in a press release Thursday. “Burroughs once said that, ‘The purpose of writing is to make it happen.’ We are proud to make Ah Pook Is Here finally happen.”
William S. Burroughs and Malcolm McNeill's graphic novel Ah Pook Is Here arrives summer 2011.
Images courtesy Fantagraphics
Scott Thill @'Underwire'
More Artwork
(PDF)
Images courtesy Fantagraphics
Scott Thill @'Underwire'
(PDF)
Traditional owners focus anger at Woodside
Kimberley traditional owners have come out swinging at Woodside, accusing the company of orchestrating the compulsory acquisition process triggered by Premier Colin Barnett.
Traditional Owner Negotiating Committee co-chair Frank Parriman, who had previously supported the bid to build a gas precinct at James Price Point, 60km north of Broome, said he was now reassessing his position.
"I believe a lot of this stuff was orchestrated by Woodside - my anger is at Woodside more than the Premier," he said. "They want this project and they're prepared to do anything to get it.
"But (Mr Barnett) should have had enough courage to stand up to Woodside and say you do the right thing by Aboriginal people and we'll be right.
"Instead, he's happy to knock down Aboriginal people - and he knows he's going to get public support, because it's easy to knock the old blackfella down.
"He's prepared to take land from us - he's not prepared to stand up to the company."
Woodside has said it is prepared to honour the terms of a $1.5bn benefits package it signed with the State Government and Kimberley Land Council in April last year.
But Mr Parriman said traditional owners, who met in Broome today, were "confused and very angry" about recent developments and it was "not about the money".
"It's about the social impacts, environmental impacts, impact on heritage and culture," he said. "They see this as the State stealing their country and that's what it actually amounts to.
"When we entered these negotiations, we did it on the basis of the benefits for the region and to create opportunity for Aboriginal people throughout the Kimberley.
"This situation threatens that … we don't want to leave anybody behind, we don't want to leave anybody worse off.
"The Jabirr Jabirr people are in a position now where if we walk away from it, nothing is going to change for Aboriginal people - if we stay with it, we don't get what we want."
Kimberley Land Council chief executive Wayne Bergmann called on the Premier to suspend the compulsory acquisition process and return to the negotiating table, warning history had shown when the Kimberley Aboriginal people banded together in a fight, they could "shake the ground".
He said the meeting was to ensure that traditional owners clearly understood their rights and the risks and consequences of proceeding.
"We're giving people advice about what are their rights in terms of objections, so they can make an informed decision about whether they continue to work with the State and Woodside or whether they sit back and oppose the project," he said.
"What fundamentally concerns us about compulsory acquisition is that it places traditional owners under enormous pressure. Ten days of negotiations between now and March would be bad faith on a project that's going to have 50 to 100 years impact on this region. It surely had to be an error … it is just so outrageous.
"This compulsory acquisition could well be the game changer, where Aboriginal people will not participate any further. If traditional owners instruct us to take a position for or against … that's what the KLC would mobilise its resources to do."
Mr Barnett said the decision to commence the compulsory acquisition process was necessary as the Kimberley Land Council and native title claimants had been unable to finalise an Indigenous Land Use Agreement despite three time extensions and $15.6 million in funding.
"The State Government would prefer to sign an ILUA based on consent, and I continue to encourage claimants to resolve the issues within their groups," he said.
A Woodside spokesman said the company accepted the State's rationale for instigating the process.
"Although the compulsory acquisition process has been started, there is still an opportunity for the parties to reach a negotiated outcome without compulsory acquisition running its full course," he said.
He said the support of traditional owners was "very important to Woodside".
"We want to work closely with traditional owners to maintain that support and ensure that the Browse project brings real and lasting benefits to Kimberley Aboriginal people," he said.
Flip Prior @'The West Australian'
Thursday, 9 September 2010
I agree!
iankatz1000 MP Tom Watson says Rupert Murdoch should be called before MP's inquiry into phone-hacking by News of the World News Corp. Is Freaking Out
Burial/Kode9 Mix for final Mary Anne Hobbs show on Radio 1
Burial and Hyperdub mastermind Kode9 collaborated on this mix for Mary Anne Hobbs‘ amazing send off show on BBC Radio 1, which aired earlier this evening. No tracklist yet, but the whole mix emitted a ghostly, warped vibe that felt like listening to a distant pirate radio broadcast. Brilliant and haunting as usual from these two:
Tracklist:
01. Speedy J – Tesla
02. Zomby – Natalia’s Song
03. Brandy – Never Say Never (El-B version 1)
04. Brandy – Never Say Never (El-B version 2)
05. Brandy – Angel (X-Men vocal mix)
06. Laurie Spiegel – Voices Within – A Requiem
07. Alena – Turn It Around (Hard House Bantons Mandy Mix)
08. Cooly G – Him Da Biz
09. Theo Parrish – Soul Control feat. Alena Waters
10. KMFH aka Kyle Hall – Girl U So Strong (Wild Oats)
11. Terror Danjah – S.O.S.
12. Darkstar – 2 Chords
13. Prince – Condition of the Heart
14. Erykah Badu – Telephone
15. Foul Play – Being With U Rmx
16. A Guy called Gerald – Silent Cry
@'Gorilla VS Bear'
01. Speedy J – Tesla
02. Zomby – Natalia’s Song
03. Brandy – Never Say Never (El-B version 1)
04. Brandy – Never Say Never (El-B version 2)
05. Brandy – Angel (X-Men vocal mix)
06. Laurie Spiegel – Voices Within – A Requiem
07. Alena – Turn It Around (Hard House Bantons Mandy Mix)
08. Cooly G – Him Da Biz
09. Theo Parrish – Soul Control feat. Alena Waters
10. KMFH aka Kyle Hall – Girl U So Strong (Wild Oats)
11. Terror Danjah – S.O.S.
12. Darkstar – 2 Chords
13. Prince – Condition of the Heart
14. Erykah Badu – Telephone
15. Foul Play – Being With U Rmx
16. A Guy called Gerald – Silent Cry
@'Gorilla VS Bear'
Scientists identify moves that make men irresistible on the dancefloor
The enduring mystery of why men rarely flatter themselves when they take to the dancefloor may finally have been solved. A team of psychologists used video footage of men strutting their stuff to pinpoint the killer moves that separate good dancers from bad. Men who were judged to be good dancers had a varied repertoire and more moves that involved tilting and twisting the torso and neck.
But the majority of men displayed highly repetitive moves that used their arms and legs, but not the rest of their bodies.
"It's rare that someone is described as a good dancer if they are flinging their arms about but not much else," said Nick Neave, a psychologist at the University of Northumbria, who led the study.
"Think about a head banger. Their head movement has a large amplitude, but it's not changing direction or showing any kind of variability. That's a bad dancer. Or someone who is just twisting and turning left and right? That's a bad dancer too."
While features such as body shape and facial symmetry are well known indicators of healthy development, a person's dance moves may send out more subtle clues about their potential as a mate, Neave said.
Neave's team recruited 19 male volunteers aged between 18 and 35 and asked them to dance to a simple drum beat in front of a video camera for 30 seconds. To capture the dance moves, 38 infra-red reflectors were attached to their clothing. These produce bright spots that allow the movement of every limb and joint to be tracked and studied in detail.
The researchers used software to transfer each man's dance routine to an avatar on a computer screen. This ensured that the judges ranked the dancers according to their moves and not their height, looks or other physical features.
The dancers were judged by 37 straight women, also aged 18 to 35, who watched the avatar perform 15 seconds of each man's routine before ranking them on a scale of one to seven, where one was very bad dancing.
"The head, neck and upper body come out as the key features that are important for good dancing and that surprised us," said Neave, whose study is published in the journal Biology Letters. "When you see brilliant dancers, you'll see their bodies, heads and necks are all doing ever so slightly different things in time to the music."
Will Brown, a psychologist at the University of East London, said more work was needed to disentangle why dancing is attractive and its biological significance.
"When you have so much movement data from a relatively small sample of dancers, you might get chance associations between certain moves and dance attractiveness," he said.
"Flexing the trunk while dancing may be attractive, but we need to show it is indicative of a better quality male using an independent measure of biological quality."
Neave said his group is working through the results of blood tests on the men, which appear to show that the better dancers are healthier.
Ian Sample @'The Guardian'
This Sucks
Meet Pastor Terry Jones of the Dove World Outreach Center, the 50-member church in Gainesville, Florida. Gainesville is where I live. This hate monger has turned our wonderful community into a lightning rod for hate and ignorance. Saying his church has 50 members is a stretch as he's lost some in the past weeks. On top of that, he has 9 kids so his family actually makes up 20% or more of the congregation. There happens to be a home football game of 90K fans this Saturday, 9/11/10. The FBI, Homeland Security are in town, and all local law enforcement are on super high alert. We have been informed by Homeland Security that we will not be reimbursed for the exorbitant costs of all this extra security, so our already overstretched local resources will be put over the limit all in the name of his selfish hatred for Islam. On top of all that, the image of our wonderful community will be forever tarnished.
Since the start of this, I've heard people say, "He should be ignored." However, stories like this are like crack for the media, and sure enough, the story is now international. The media satellite trucks outside this church now outnumber the vehicles of its congregation. It sucks to say Gainesville has fallen victim to fear and loathing.
Since the start of this, I've heard people say, "He should be ignored." However, stories like this are like crack for the media, and sure enough, the story is now international. The media satellite trucks outside this church now outnumber the vehicles of its congregation. It sucks to say Gainesville has fallen victim to fear and loathing.
Read more
@'The Gainesville Sun'
Mark Stewart on The Pop Group reunion
Mark’s a giant of a man. He’s one of those guys who has to stoop to get in rooms. He looks - to borrow his favourite word - like a clash of a 50s matinee idol, Reg Presley of The Troggs and an Easter Island Statue come angrily to life. His head’s velocity is too fast for anyone currently trapped in his orbit. I see Jim Sclavunous (Bad Seeds/Grinderman/occasional Quietus writer) afterwards and say that ideally I’d like to interview Stewart again because even though I liked him, maybe I'd caught him on a particularly manic day. Spending two hours with him was a bit like spending 20 hours trapped on a passenger jet that's full of children and constantly threatening to fall out of the sky. Jim smiles indulgently and says that he's always out there: "I've known Mark for years and he's always been far out on some distant cosmic plain that makes him hard to reach sometimes."
During the interview in The Griffin on Leonard Street, I feel like his brain is skimming on far ahead like a stone across a pond surface. I ask one thing and he answers some other question that I’ve not even dreamed up yet. He's like a chess grandmaster who has malfunctioned and found himself suddenly only able to play the moves that are the furthest ahead - ten steps into the future. These moves may make sense to him but don't always to those round him. There is much bright and probably brilliant talk occluded into partial uselessness by this. He reacts to everything around him. His face darts about changing expression constantly. He isn’t pulling focus and he’s omni-intent on the interview, my beard, the barwoman, his friends Andy Fraser of Some Friendly and Paul Smith of Blast First sat at the bar, the cold wave compilation being played on the stereo, his notes that he has written onto a sheet of paper in front of him, something else that he can see over my shoulder. He sneers loudly at nearly everything I say in about an hour and a half which can, and does, get slightly grating. Even if I had turned up totally unprepared, which I haven't, I still would have hit the mark with at least a third of the questions. He’s a nice guy though and an energizing presence. It’s sad he comes into this naturally presuming I’m on the opposite side to him. Part of him still acts as if it’s 1980 and the guy from the NME is here to stitch him up. In fact he constantly refers to me as being from the weekly (which I do write for) but he doesn’t hear when I tell him that the piece is for a more humble institution.
He admits himself that he's frozen in time in some ways: "I haven't changed since I was 14."...
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John Doran @'The Quietus'
John Doran @'The Quietus'
A virtual counter-revolution
The first internet boom, a decade and a half ago, resembled a religious movement. Omnipresent cyber-gurus, often framed by colourful PowerPoint presentations reminiscent of stained glass, prophesied a digital paradise in which not only would commerce be frictionless and growth exponential, but democracy would be direct and the nation-state would no longer exist. One, John-Perry Barlow, even penned “A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace”.
Even though all this sounded Utopian when it was preached, it reflected online reality pretty accurately. The internet was a wide-open space, a new frontier. For the first time, anyone could communicate electronically with anyone else—globally and essentially free of charge. Anyone was able to create a website or an online shop, which could be reached from anywhere in the world using a simple piece of software called a browser, without asking anyone else for permission. The control of information, opinion and commerce by governments—or big companies, for that matter—indeed appeared to be a thing of the past. “You have no sovereignty where we gather,” Mr Barlow wrote.
The lofty discourse on “cyberspace” has long changed. Even the term now sounds passé. Today another overused celestial metaphor holds sway: the “cloud” is code for all kinds of digital services generated in warehouses packed with computers, called data centres, and distributed over the internet. Most of the talk, though, concerns more earthly matters: privacy, antitrust, Google’s woes in China, mobile applications, green information technology (IT). Only Apple’s latest iSomethings seem to inspire religious fervour, as they did again this week.
Again, this is a fair reflection of what is happening on the internet. Fifteen years after its first manifestation as a global, unifying network, it has entered its second phase: it appears to be balkanising, torn apart by three separate, but related forces...
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