Mediacology

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As the joke goes, denial ain’t a river in Egypt. With the global economy and polar icecaps in meltdown, Dubai has become a World System inferno that continues to draws moths to its flame. In what could have been scripted in a JG Ballard [...]

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If this is the kind of reality they are promoting, I think I’d rather spend my afternoon in Baghdad.

No doubt, Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi wasn’t the final word on cinematography’s powerful capacity to depict the environmental consequences of our modern world. With Manufactured Landscapes comes Jennifer Baichwal’s depiction of photographer Edward Burtynsky’s stunning images of industry in China. If it’s true that what is not mediated doesn’t exist, we can say now that at [...]

Is the War on Terror really an advertising conspiracy? From Security Point Media:
Alternative Media for a Captive Audience: Guaranteed message delivery in an environment of heightened awareness.

Visit the Website for more surreal euphemisms.
Media Life Magazine – Your client’s face up at airport security:
“This is about the novelty of the space. It allows us to get [...]

Like all things Dubai, this architecture is need of some serious deconstruction.

Technorati Tags: Dubai

They’re calling it the Bagdad Disneyland, but, frankly, the Gulf already has its Las Vegas, dubbed Dubai. So now maybe all Iraq needs is Frank Gehry. Argh. Democracy stripped down to a militarized Times Square.

Architecture and Design · Inversion Tunnel House | Looking Back:
Dan Havel and Dean Ruck called this tunnel “Inversion” and saw it as a celebration of the old space that had once housed art classes. Just before these houses were demolished to clear the site for a coffee house, they peeled off the exterior wood and [...]

In the Information Age, the flow of IP (Internet Protocol) data between locations is nearly ubiquitous. Globe Encounters visualizes in real time the volumes of Internet data flowing between New York and cities around the world. The size of the glow on a particular city location corresponds to the amount of IP traffic flowing between [...]

192021 is an In incredibly provocative and beautiful assemblage of info graphics about the future of urban growth.
And if you want to monitor the stats that get us there, you can check out the awesome World Clock.

Technorati Tags: 122021

An interesting sign that resistance to control remains a persistent trait of humans, even when all seems lost.
AlterNet: Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace: Can’t Pay Your Mortgage? Trash Your House and Leave.:
On the lookout for disturbing trends? Here’s one for your pile: According to a recent article in Fortune, there has been a noticeable increase in [...]

A fantastic article explores the real world parallels of Africa with the virtual world of Second Life. It concurs with my belief that cultures that developed outside of the Western world that are not conditioned by print literacy will be the future operators of the information economy because they are more flexible and capable of [...]

The Cool Hunter reports:
Atkin’s Architecture Group recently won the first prize award for an international design competition with this stunning entry. Set in a spectacular water filled quarry in Songjiang, China, the 400 bed resort hotel is uniquely constructed within the natural elements of the quarry. Underwater public areas and guest rooms add to [...]

During the ’80s and ’90s you really had to watch your back in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Alphabet City, the Bowery and LES were known more for their crack than hipster cafes and bars. But like the mucky swamp bottom that nourishes the lotus, the LES also became a haven for anarchists, punks and street [...]

Here’s an interesting vision of how future architecture transforms society into a chlorophyl-based system. My only complaint is that in the fictional narrative (it’s presented as a documentary from the future) a single architect takes credit for the transformative idea. To me this violates the principle of social change, which is more based on emergent, [...]

I was trying to figure out how to justify a thread featuring Urban Collectable from chinnychinchin when I realized that with the Internet it’s possible to market anything to anybody. The model car reminds me of my first night living in Brooklyn when the local car thieves torched a vehicle in the street, which sent [...]

The above clip (which I saw over at BoingBoing (via Africa Unchained)) is an intriguing portrait of Lagos, Nigeria. It demonstrates some of the trends of expanding megacities that characterize the so-called “global south.” My main objection to the segment is the recycled and uncritical use of the term “developing world.” African critics have long [...]

Air Force Academy chapel, Colorado Springs, CO

Cylon Resurrection Ship, somewhere in outer space
In case you haven’t seen Sci-Fi network’s Battlestar Galactica (I highly recommend that you do), the premise of the story is that a race of robots created by humans decides to destroy their creators. The cyborgs, called Cylons, have developed a theistic [...]

No wonder the US is losing the war in Iraq. Like Taco Bell, it thinks people want convenience over authenticity. The battle for hearts and minds goes on…
Taco Bell Looks to Sell Mexican to … Mexicans – Advertising Age – News:
“We’re not trying to be authentic Mexican food,” said Rob Poetsch, director-public relations at Taco [...]

OK NSA filters, here’s the innocuous headline translation: marking-up modernist architecture. Strange how artistic expression could be interpreted as terrorism. Imagine how in the post-9/11 world a band like Einstürzende Neubauten (“Collapsing New Buildings”) would be misconstrued. It wouldn’t surprising me if certain government elements in their enthusiasm to define everything under the murky rubric [...]

How do you turn mat art into a viral video? Sci-Fi’s Tin Man series has this wormhole site that draws you into its various worlds– one after another. It’s a compelling visual fantasy; you have to give the creators credit for having cajones to tackle the Oz story and contemporize it with darker themes. [...]