Mostly, I Write

Non amo particolarmente il Regno Unito e quindi non ho particolari cedimenti sentimentali nei confronti dei loro piatti nazionali, fossanche il famigerato "fish and chips". Però leggere che ce lo stiamo giocando un po' fa impressione anche a me. Money quote: "Plenty of people will tell you the East Neuk of Fife in Scotland is the best place in the world to eat fish and chips. So what happens when its chippies – and chippies across the UK – start to close?" https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/jul/20/a-funeral-for-fish-and-chips-east-neuk-fife-anstruther-scotland

Intervista a Francesca Tassini, l'autrice di "Snow Black" - il mio articolo per Fumettologica https://fumettologica.it/2023/08/francesca-tassini-snow-black-intervista/

Su qualcosa dobbiamo cedere, con i nostri figli pre-adolescenti. Le cose che costruite per dare dipendenza però no. Oggi non è McDonald o la tv quello che fa veramente male, bensì i social e i giochi come Fortnite. Su quello non bisogna cedere. Money quote: "A group of Canadian parents say their kids are so addicted to the video game Fortnite that they’ve stopped eating, sleeping and showering. Now these parents want to hold its tech-giant creator accountable." https://macleans.ca/longforms/fortnite-addiction-video-games-mental-health/

La storia di un bel gruppo di plane spotter e di altre cose collegate, ovviamente negli Usa. È un mondo. Money quote: "Situated right next to the longest runway at JFK—and outfitted with a full covered bar serving up food and cocktails and a turquoise infinity pool should you need to cool off—you couldn’t find a better planespotting vantage point than the rooftop at the TWA Hotel. And given the building’s history, it’s no surprise. In 1962, Finnish architect Eero Saarinen designed what was then Trans World Airlines’ main terminal or “head house,” now serving as the hotel’s entrance, in a style befitting a time when flying captivated the world. He envisioned the terminal’s exterior, with its swoopy silhouette and large windows overlooking the runways, as not only practical, but an effort to “interpret the sensation of flying,” and “express the drama and specialness and excitement of travel,” according to Eero Saarinen: an Architecture of Multiplicity." https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/what-is-planespotting-la-flights

Un medico si è sottoposto sperimentalmente per un mese a una dieta basata su cibi ultra-processati. E si è ammalato. Da qui è partito uno studio ma anche un interessante articolo che spiega perché mangiamo male anche quando pensiamo di mangiare meglio o almeno meno peggio. Money quote: "If ultra-processed foods had the same effect on everyone, wouldn't we expect to see the whole population gaining weight and becoming unhealthy or do people respond differently? I think there are two groups of adults. Many people will be able to have a relationship with ultra-processed food that is somewhat like a relationship with alcohol. A lot of people can just enjoy two glasses of wine or a bottle of beer on a Friday night, and that's fine. They can have that relationship with it. But many people will recognize that actually their relationship with these food products is much more addicting in nature." https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/07/24/1189276187/an-ultra-processed-diet-made-this-doctor-sick-now-hes-studying-why

Il business dell'annotazione dei dataset per le AI. Una inchiesta con gli attributi, di qualche settimana fa. È uscita su Intelligencer e The Verge, pubblico entrambe le versioni per evitare che una vada "al buio" a un certo punto. Money quote: "Then, in 2019, an opportunity arose: Joe could make four times as much running an annotation boot camp for a new company that was hungry for labelers. Every two weeks, 50 new recruits would file into an office building in Nairobi to begin their apprenticeships. There seemed to be limitless demand for the work. They would be asked to categorize clothing seen in mirror selfies, look through the eyes of robot vacuum cleaners to determine which rooms they were in, and draw squares around lidar scans of motorcycles. Over half of Joe’s students usually dropped out before the boot camp was finished. “Some people don’t know how to stay in one place for long,” he explained with gracious understatement. Also, he acknowledged, “it is very boring.”" https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-humans-technology-business-factory.html https://www.theverge.com/features/23764584/ai-artificial-intelligence-data-notation-labor-scale-surge-remotasks-openai-chatbots

La guida per nerd che visitano New York. Di carta. Nel XXI secolo. Genio. Money quote: "I migliori negozi nerd di New York selezionati da ITOMI.studio tra i tantissimi presenti nella Grande Mela: una variegata selezione che passa dai costumi di Abracadabra ai videogiochi di VideoGamesNewYork, passando per i grandi marchi come Nintendo, LEGO e Disney e le piccole chicche come Tannen’s Magic o Hex & Company e le istituzioni nerd della città come Forbidden Planet, Kinokuniya o The Compleat Strategist." https://nerdvanaguides.com/newyork/

Sono tornato da poco da Tokyo e questa lista di mercatini dove comprare cose usate e usatissime me l'ero dimenticata. Viaggiando con il solo bagaglio a mano sarebbe stato anche una tortura farci un giro. Comunque, a futura memoria... Money quote: "Here, in no particular order, is our pick of top Tokyo flea markets to explore for mind-blowing bargains and good fun. Note: the smaller markets can be a bit hit and miss—buzzing one month, dead the next. Also, this post is peppered with cheapo tips — keep an eye out for them!" https://tokyocheapo.com/shopping-2/fashion/top-tokyo-flea-markets/

Alcuni forse li avete anche letti. Comunque, ogni tanto mi rispunta l'articolo di *The Verge* che fa la listona dei migliori libri di sempre in ambito tech, e quindi perché non segnalarla una volta per tutte anche qui? Money quote: "Technology craves a narrative but often has a short memory for history. As a publication that contributes to that — The Verge lives in the news cycle, after all — we wanted to praise the form of writing that lasts: the book. How else do we move forward if we can’t remember the past? So we set out with the audacious goal to define the best books about tech out there." https://www.theverge.com/c/23771068/best-tech-books-nonfiction-recommendations

Escono nuovi telefoni "pieghevoli" con cronometrica regolarità. Ogni tanto ne intravedo qualcuno e un paio li ho anche provati. A parte Android, sono anche comodi. Però non sono ancora pronti per la prima serata, come si dice. Money quote: "RIP to my Pixel Fold: Dead after four days" https://arstechnica.com/google/2023/06/rip-to-my-pixel-fold-dead-after-four-days/

Le notizie sulla imminente fine del nostro mondo sono fortemente esagerate. Money quote: "Despite the hype around today’s possible geomagnetic storms, there’s no reason to panic. Electrically-charged gas ejected from the surface of the Sun will collide with Earth’s magnetic field sometime today, sparking geomagnetic storms. NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center expects the storms and their effects to be minor. However, the weird solar phenomenon behind the storms, called a cannibal cloud, is terrifying and awesome." https://www.inverse.com/science/x-class-solar-flares-coming-this-week-unlikely-says-noaa

🎙 Un paio di bazzecole e qualche buon libro. Ovvero: Tokyo mon amour - Venedikt Erofeev - L'ultimo Miyazaki - Software aggressivo Ascoltate Tilde ~ 30, il finale di stagione! → tilde ~ su Spotify → tilde ~ su Apple Podcast → tilde ~ su Google Podcast Potete ascoltare il podcast da Spotify, Google Podcast o Apple Podcast, oppure dal sito: tilde.show. Buon ascolto, buon martedì e grazie per il supporto di questi mesi. Torneremo a settembre, forse!

Ta-da!

Avete presente la tragica fine del generale Custer e del Settimo cavalleggeri, massacrato dagli indiani? Beh, la narrativa è molto, molto viziata. E adesso c'è finalmente una riscrittura di quella storia che spiega anche i motivi per cui il racconto è diventato quel che è diventato. Money quote: "Marshall is writing a book on how distorted narratives about the “Indian wars” after the Civil War made their way into schools. The answer reveals a potent mix of the powerful who engage in history making: soldiers burnishing their own reputations, loved ones honoring family members, lawmakers lobbying for federal dollars, and textbook writers mythologizing American Manifest Destiny." https://time.com/6288437/custer-last-stand-history-education/

Mostly Weekly, la mia newsletter gratuita, continua anche d'estate. Si parla di vestiti alla marinara in Giappone e lingue perdute in Cina, fra le altre cose. La trovate qui: https://antoniodini.com/weekly/230/

Recensione fotocamera digitale Leica Q3, forse la migliore compatta di sempre: il mio articolo (e ci sono anche un po' di foto del Giappone! Ma poco perché nonostante la macchina bestiale non sono bravo) https://www.macitynet.it/recensione-leica-q3/

È uscito il secondo numero dell'annuario "The html Review" (che già il titolo è geniale). Tanta tanta roba da leggere. Money quote: "Our 2023 issue is made up of 17 contributions that span modes of digital literature and experiment. We have poetic instruments, interactive fictions, illustrated essays, movable lyrics, linguistic gardens, and pixelated memories. I like to think each piece we publish is a specific illumination of how literature can exist in digital spaces. They are each reflective of a World Wide Web built with fingerprints visible, inviting all to participate and take ownership. After all, this issue comes at a time when both our reading and digital lives are perilous." https://thehtml.review/02/ Qui invece il primo numero https://thehtml.review/01/

Dovremmo cominciare a parlare di più dei libri per ragazzi e bambini. E dovremmo anche cominciare a pensarli in maniera diversa, lasciando più spazio ad autori che sono percepiti come meno convenzionali dalla cultura mainstream. Money quote: "I get it—trees are a thing that kids and adults have in common (also: benches). Kids climb them and adults like to … look at them, I guess. We adults can’t stop writing and publishing books like this. And since there is no real critique of children’s books (since any children’s book author or illustrator is assumed to be trying to do something nice for kids, and don’t knock it), we keep making more of them—the kids haven’t told us otherwise. As The Gruffalo author Julia Donaldson put it in a radio interview, “When you read an adult novel there’s always about three pages of reviews.” For kids’ books, there are none." https://lithub.com/let-the-kids-get-weird-the-adult-problem-with-childrens-books/

Storia orale della serie animata di Batman che nel 1992 aprì una nuova prospettiva sul cavaliere oscuro. Money quote: "BT: Neither of us had ever produced a series before, so that was a big gamble on her part. There was a period in the early couple months of production where, literally, Eric and I didn’t know if we were gonna show up and find the locks changed on our offices. I mean, this had never really been done before for TV. What we wanted to do was quite a bit more adult than, say, shows like G.I. Joe or Transformers or He-Man. Those shows were deliberately designed for young kids, and nobody else. If you were 13, that was pretty much the cutoff point for a show like He-Man or G.I. Joe. But we wanted to do a show that would appeal to kids and also to adults, as well. Basically, we were making the show for ourselves." https://www.vulture.com/article/oral-history-batman-the-animated-series.html

Stranissimo articolo su una artista che conoscevo solo superficialmente. Ma la foto di apertura vale tutto. Money quote: "Joanna Sternberg’s relationship with visual art has been a lifelong pursuit. They recall developing a childhood interest that wasn’t always encouraged in school. “When I was home drawing, it was so much fun, and I would just get lost in it. In middle school, I started really wanting to draw all the time and was always drawing something else during class,” they explain. " https://thevinylfactory.com/features/joanna-sternberg-interview/