Tiny Museums
16 exhibits in on 6 foot box brings museums to the masses
Interactive art adventure
Adventures through some interactive art pieces.
Ryoji Ikeda exhibit at 180 Strand (another video here and review here)
Notional waves Cuppetelli/Mendoza
Behaviors in Light by JNZNBRK (I wonder if it could be even cooler if the pieces moved and formed different patterns and shadows…)
Plane White by Carina Ow (parts list):
Glass portals
Basic financial literacy and the bitcoin collapse
Crypto currencies have been collapsing as markets turn south. No matter which side of the argument you fall (Crypto currencies are the future or it is all just a pyramid scheme), I have been surprised by the responses on the crypto currency forums. There seems to be a large population of the crypto currency owners that lack very basic financial literacy – and that is somewhat frightening considering people were being encouraged (and have) mortgaged homes, put life savings, and highly leverage debt to go all in on crypto purchases. Purchases that have dropped anywhere from 60% for Bitcoin to 100% for various stable coins that have gone to zero.
An example of a real lack of literacy was reading forums about the collapse of the Celsius Network that halted all withdrawals, sale of coins, and is now in debt restructuring. Most users have now lost everything. Very few people on the site realized they had signed their digital coins over to the platform and that their deposits were being used to secure highly speculative financial loans from Celsius. This despite the fact these policies were clearly stated on the site.
Even more telling is that a twitter and crypto advocate otteroooo had been sounding the alarm of growing insolvency issues at Celsius for weeks before the freeze and collapse – but was almost universally attacked and yelled down by crypto supporters calling it lies, FUD, and much worse. This thread was describing exactly what was going on and yet users were in complete denial and universally attacked him. Even after Celcius froze their assets and went into debt restructuring, most respondents on the Celsius reddit forum denied it was happening, didn’t understand the implications, and were still in complete denial and attacking people that were sounding the alarm. Even when one of the pinned posts on the front page was a 1-800 suicide prevention hotline.
Sadly, this was all very preventable and it’s not like this is new. I believe crypto is now having their very own 1929 market crash – a crash that is demonstrating the same brutal consequences as that original crash. These kind of bank runs are exactly why the FDIC was set up to both guarantee customer’s funds but also ensure the bank was not over-leveraged.
One can only hope the crypto world has learned a valuable lesson about the real dangers of unregulated markets and that many promises of stablecoins and crypto being stores of value independent of the market have been conclusively proven false. It’s just sad that now many of these forums are posting suicide prevention hotlines for real people losing everything.
Laundry Jet
What is old is new again. Old buildings used to all have laundry chutes. Even in the 80’s movie Home Alone featured them. There have also been central vacuuming systems for over 100 years as well. Now enter Laundry Jet that sucks dirty clothes into a central area.
The video is a bit misleading. You have to wave your hand over the portal to open it, then the suction starts. It works great with light items, but is a good bit slower on jeans, towels, and heavier items. There seems to be some discussion on how loud it is, so you’d probably want to suction unit in an isolated/sound deadened location. Probably would be amazing for family with kids as they have `smaller/lighter clothes.
Area 15 in Vegas
Besides Omega Mart and Lost Spirits distillery, Area 15 also has some other great displays. Here’s one of the best reviews I’ve found online and helped me figure out which things I’d like to see when I go.
We all have a natural call
I found this quote by Sister Natalia to be a very powerful and spot on understanding of religious life.
“We all have a natural call to marriage, but some of us have a calling to celibacy. That calling doesn’t come instead of a desire for marriage – it transcends it. My desire for a spouse helps me lean into Christ as my bridegroom.”
Today’s society is full of confusing and contradictory stances on sexuality that seem to be constantly and often radically changing directions every few years. One has to stop and ask themselves what is the truth of our sexuality if there is no agreement that lasts more than a few years? This isn’t just academic, it has far-reaching impacts on how we form families, pair bond, and how we define the happiness of the most meaningful long-term relationships of our lives.
That’s why I love Sister Natalia’s quote. She understand rightly that we all have a natural desire and calling to find a deep, fulfilling relationship in which we can express ourselves fully (including our sexual energy). That expression, however, is above all else relationship. Deep, fulfilling, open, vulnerable, wild, crazy, and sometimes frightening relationship that fully expresses our being in all dimensions.
As a person that explored religious life for 4 years at a monastery, I can firmly say that kind of fulfilling relationships is what all of us really seek. To reduce religious life, or ourselves, to our sexuality is to really miss the mark. As sister Natalia says, it is all about relationship – the relationship you have with God and bringing our COMPLETE selves to that relationship.
Have you found your complete fulfillment in your relationship with God above all others? Does it appear you have the gift of finding that expression of your love with God and being with him every day through what you are called to do and be for Him? Do you find that every day, you ‘lean into’ Christ as the most important person in your life more and more? Hopefully all Christians can say that, but for a person with a religious vocation, they find that ‘leaning in’ day by day with Christ to be the most important relationship. To the point that to do otherwise would be to deny who they are. And isn’t that the kind of self-fulfillment and self-expression we all seek?
- Sister Natalia’s article: https://www.kofc.org/en/news-room/columbia/archives/042022.html
Papercraft animals
Wolfram Kampffmeyer crafts vibrant paper polygon sculptures and taxidermy-style busts that he then translates to DIY kits sold under the Paperwolf brand. Minimal and playfully colored, Kapffmeyerâs menagerie includes a seated koala, multiple birds in flight, and of course, the original wolf. In addition to patterning pieces for his Etsy shop, the designer also works on a variety of commissions and collaborations, which result in large-scale sculptures in steel and wood.
Using round displays
Penk Chen created a nifty little computer with a round display. Even more cool, he made the project completely open source – including the 3D printable parts . Just gather up the right parts and give it a go:
- Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
- Framework Mainboard https://frame.work/products/mainboard
- OLKB Preonic keyboard https://drop.com/buy/preonic-mechanical-keyboard
- 5″ round LCDÂ https://m.tb.cn/h.fr5pE3w
- 3D printed components
I was always a big fan of Manny Calavera’s computer in Grim Fandango. Maybe this is an opportunity for me to make one.
Dinner Party VR experience
Dinner Party is a VR movie experience that tells the story of Barney and Betty Hill, an American couple who claimed they were abducted by extraterrestrials in a rural portion of the state of New Hampshire from September 19 to 20, 1961. It was the first widely publicized report of an alien abduction in the United States. Their story was adapted into a best-selling 1966 book The Interrupted Journey and a 1975 television film The UFO Incident.
Now, it’s been turned into a VR movie experience. You start by going into a real world 1960’s era dining room set, sit at the table, don your VR goggles, and watch the experience in 360 around you.
Trailer:
Information about how they created the experience:
Crank your art up
Neil Mendoza created âmechanical masterpiecesâ – an art installation that lets you poke, inflate, add water, or even a disco ball to 5 classic paintings. The interactive work was created for the childrenâs museum of Pittsburgh as part of itâs âtough artâ residency.