It's all about power. Where the Dublin Gastronomy Symposium leads, the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cooking and the Agricultural History Society follow.
That study of how people from rice- and wheat-growing areas of China differ in social situations is interesting, and part of a long history of trying to make use of the collectivism needed to grow rice well to explain other things. I'm not totally convinced.
"Who We Are: #8 India"
The Aryan-Invasion-Theory sure looks to be basically correct. As for the archaeologists saying that there’s not enough evidence of devastation, Reich points out that they can’t really detect the fall of the western Roman Empire, which hardly means it didn’t happen. War and migration are well-known important factors in written history – why not in prehistory? Because many contemporary archaeologist and historians think that wishing can make it so. They should be paid accordingly.
PESOS from https://www.reading.am/p/4XXy/https://westhunt.wordpress.com/2018/04/22/who-we-are-8-india/.
Atlantic City
Atlantic City came up in iTunes shuffle today, reminding of this absolute masterpiece (best enjoyed while listening along; also, if the images seem like ancient history, note they’re from just 3 months ago)
So very fine; I had never seen this before. I hope it never vanishes.
Lifetime achievement award for the man who invented the webcam
So interesting to see this, not only as a piece of history but also as a personal reminder.
Back when the web was young and shiny, an otherwise extremely intelligent BBC television producer, a friend at the time, asked my help in understanding the promise of the new shinyness, especially in visual terms. I told him about the famous coffee pot web cam (and maybe, also, about the link to the Coke machine).
"Isn't that great," I said, "that you can see whether there's coffee in the pot without having to leave your computer."
"But you could just get up and look."
"Well yes, but the coffee pot could be anywhere in the world."
"What's the point of that? You can't go and get a cup of coffee there."
"True. But it doesn't have to be a coffee pot. It could be, oh, anything."
"I just don't see the point."
Of couse he went on to produce a highly acclaimed series, and much else besides.
Virgin Cola: Richard Branson's Greatest Failure
As proven by his stunts, Richard Branson knew how to drive a tank. Unfortunately for Virgin Cola, Coke knew how to control an army.
@pazzobooks Thanks Tom. Not all history. Today, the future of wheat @meanlouise @/besslovejoy
NOFOMO I
1 min read
Finally reached a key milestone in the deliverables of a big work-for-money, so was able to treat myself to an excellent video from the [IndieWebSummit 2017](https://2017.indieweb.org).
First up, for me, [Lillian Karabaic](http://anomalily.net) offering [A brief history of my website](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VGX8iBWrTE&index=4&list=PLk3TtIJ31hqrLIPqz55TczawWu-30cnXM). I noted a few things.
First, the video, audio and editing were top notch. Huge kudos to everyone who made this happen. They say content trumps technical quality, and it does, but when you're not fighting quality, the value of the content is so much more obvious.
Second, and much more important, Lillian's trajectory mirrors my own and, not surprisingly, I can relate strongly to everything she said -- good and bad -- about the #indieweb. The help available is stellar, the documentation isn't great (I hope to work on that) and it is hard to evangelise.
So much left to do ...
A podcast about the Indieweb
2 min read
Further to my note about a new #podcast about #indieweb things, I listened to Marty McGuire's rendering of This Week in the Indieweb. I really enjoyed it, even though I had read the text version. Production and audio were top notch, and it was very clear. My only quibbles concern the pace and the audience.
Even as a native English speaker, and despite Marty's very clear diction, it seemed a bit speedy to me. I wonder whether less fluent listeners manage to get it all.
A second, similar point, about the audience. In my estimate, as a newcomer to indieweb and a less than expert person, some of the stuff whizzed right by me. But if I were familiar with it all, I'd probably be keeping up with the IRC channels and the indieweb.org pages and so I'm not too sure why I'd need an audio version. But that's just a matter of choice.
The slightly bigger question is, would there be an audience for a more discursive podcast about the indieweb? Marty would be in favour. So would Chris Aldrich, who started this ball rolling for me. There's a fair bit of audio tagged indieweb at huff duffer, but nothing, apparently, dedicated to the topic.
We certainly have the technology to produce something that captures the history, what's happening now and how things might develop. There's no way I could do that on my own -- not least because I don't know enough to ask intelligent questions -- but with a co-host or two it would be a really interesting project.