OT ~ Welcome to Saturday!

open thread.jpg

Sit-a-while
on swinging porch
where tin-dippers and
sweet water
in cool touches
meet lips
from hand dug wells.

Star Designer Dieter Rams Thinks We're Buying Too Much Stuff

Good morning good people,

"Rams designed objects with an architect’s mentality. He believed objects should respect the space they existed within, and oftentimes that meant letting them fade into the background." https://www.wired.com/story/dieter-rams-documentary-gary-hustwit/


For over fifty years, Dieter Rams has left an indelible mark on the field of product design and the world at large with his iconic work at Braun and Vitsoe. The objects Dieter has designed have touched the lives of millions of people––so many of us have had a Braun coffeemaker, shaver, stereo, calculator, speakers, or alarm clock. Or an Oral-B toothbrush. Or a Vitsoe 606 shelving system. Or any of the hundreds of other products Dieter has designed or overseen the design of.

His work has influenced the way most of today's consumer products look and function. The computer or phone you're reading this on looks the way it does because of Dieter Rams. Dieter's influence also extends to his "Ten Principles of Good Design," a list of edicts that champions simplicity, honesty, and restraint, and still applies to design theory and practice today.

In 2008, Gary interviewed Dieter for his documentary Objectified, but was only able to share a small piece of his story in that film. Dieter, who is now 86, is a very private person; however Gary has been granted unprecedented access to create the first feature-length documentary about his life and work. The documentary is simply titled Rams.https://www.hustwit.com/rams/



.....

All night rooting, Hamlet squeezed loose,
a secret pinkness under the wall,
your pet piglet
feeling himself round and free in the city.
He’d made it.
Streetlights reddened his tiny eyes.
White clouds hooted from his nostrils.
He sprinted up and down the sweet garbage rows.

You weren’t worried. You said
pigs are among the cleverest creatures we know:
whales descend from pigs.
I imagined Hamlet bobbing on the ocean,
in the sunshine growing huge and thoughtful.
We searched all morning in the park,
shattering the frosted shadows of trees.
Now he seems like part of our love getting away.

We found the women hurling their groceries
over their heads, on Main Street, Hamlet
squirting out from under parked cars,
his tail curled tightly behind.
Children shrieked happily.
Policemen toddled on their knees, pleading,
plunking their nightsticks.
A store window had broken, blanketing
the sidewalk. A firetruck came
and backed over a streetsign.

Everyone pointed, Hamlet skidding
down Pearl Street by the river.
I don’t believe he swam for it,
smoothly cutting through the slushy Kennebec
and across Casco Bay into the open Atlantic.
I think he went to the dump
with its enormous seagulls turning overhead
and waited for the town dogs.

Chasing Hamlet ~ John Witte

Wherever you are, hoping you've a wonderful day.

The porch is yours ...

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The Aspie Corner's picture

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

smiley7's picture

@The Aspie Corner

Thank you for posting; been a long time since i thought of Marxism in a serious way, this fellow raises interesting points, but i don't know the answers to his questions, "why don't the elites?" is asked of many across the globe from differing perspectives.

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lotlizard's picture

O Lord, help us change, that our ways may no longer
degrade and denature the earth . . .

https://typesetinthefuture.com/2018/12/04/walle/

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mimi's picture

@lotlizard
I gave him such a piece of million German Marks bill. I remember he was confused. Call me dumb to confuse Joe is something I pat myself on the shoulder these days, but way back when that meet-up was happening, I felt embarrassed of having given the 'the wrong gift'.

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smiley7's picture

@lotlizard

Perfect and clever, lotizard, and a good morning to you.

From your link

The movie begins with an insight into WALL·E’s typical workday, which is spent building gigantic piles of trash by compacting waste into neat, stackable cubes. After a hard day’s crushing, we follow him on his journey home, learning some useful exposition along the way. This includes a bank of electronic ads for BnL, promoting everything from liquid air to quadruple-patty burgers. Common throughout these ads is an insistence on immediate consumption—“DRINK NOW,” “HUNGRY NOW,” “RUN NOW,” “CONSUME.” And if consuming a product once isn’t enough, you can repeat the experience a second time—the signage seen below includes ads for both “100% Reused Food” and “Regurgi-Shake: Twice the Flavor.”

Thank you for Wall E (don't know how to type 'a vertically centered dot') and for being here,

Hoping you've a marvelous day.

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magiamma's picture

@smiley7
Option 8

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Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation

Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook

lotlizard's picture

@smiley7

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magiamma's picture

@lotlizard
Thx. Long and covers a lot of different things well.

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Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation

Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook

smiley and all. I'm listening to your musical selections and started with the last one which I had never heard and is beautiful. I'm making my way through the rest as it is cold and rainy here and the dog is not interested in a long run outside right now. So I will indulge in a quiet morning, but with music. Thanks smiley.

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smiley7's picture

@randtntx
Thank you for the Casal! Rain for you becomes the biggest storm for maybe 30 years, yeah for we ski industry folks and the community as motels and restaurants depend upon the economic engine of the local ski mountains. Hope i'm ready.

Got to run, off to the mountain. Have a great one, good man.

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@smiley7 Have a great day in the snow.

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lotlizard's picture

Tucker Carlson interview in establishment Swiss weekly Die Weltwoche.

https://www.weltwoche.ch/ausgaben/2018-49/artikel/trump-is-not-capable-d...

Well, that’s the remarkable thing. For 100 years the Democratic Party represented wage earners, working people, normal people, middle class people, then somewhere around — I’d precisely peg it to Clinton’s second term in the tech boom in the Bay Area in Francisco and Silicon Valley — the Democratic Party reoriented and became the party of technology, of large corporations, and of the rich. You’ve really seen that change in the last 20 years where in the top 10 richest zip codes in the United States, 9 of them in the last election just went for Democrats. Out of the top 50, 42 went for Democrats. The Democratic Party, which for 100 years was the party of average people is now the party of the rich.

Donald Trump, who is often seen as this world-changing figure, is actually a symptom of something that precedes him that I sometimes wonder if he even understands, which is this realignment. He served the purpose of bringing the middle class into the Republican Party, which had zero interest, no interest in representing them at all. Trump intuited, he felt, he could smell that there was this large group of voters who had no one representing them and he brought them to the Republican side, but the realignment is still ongoing.

In other words, the Democratic Party used to represent the middle class; it no longer does, it now hates the middle class. The Republican Party which has never represented the middle class doesn’t want to. That is the source of really all the confusion and the tension that you’re seeing now.

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on my mind and am preparing to shop for the holidays. This site has some ideas regarding good food, nutrition, and sustainability.
http://eatwild.com/

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enhydra lutris's picture

and a great day there. Be safe.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

the Kennebeck River Comes out ten miles up the coast from the north end of Casco Bay.
Masshole!
fuck

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Ya got to be a Spirit, cain't be no Ghost. . .

Explain Bldg #7. . . still waiting. . .

If you’ve ever wondered whether you would have complied in 1930’s Germany,
Now you know. . .
sign at protest march

magiamma's picture

and have a good one...

[video:https://youtu.be/GnyAgOWhMnk]

Enjoy the mountain smiley

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Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation

Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook

Certainly seems possible to me:
Bannon's far right movement in Europe

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Beware the bullshit factories.

mimi's picture

[video:https://youtu.be/lq_-mxHx1UA]
boy, which mommy can keep up with those details?

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hope you had as much snow on the slopes as you could have wanted.

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divineorder's picture

We met Kennedy last year at a fundraiser for the new River Protectors program at WildEarth Guardians. Sad to see his tweet, since the place is writing about is such a treasure:

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A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.

Unabashed Liberal's picture

for today's lovely OT. You know how much I enjoy all your music--especially, cello and piano. Clapping

Hope the process of selecting you and your Mom's Part D plans went well. We were a bit unsettled at the diminished formulary offerings, but managed to enroll in a pretty hefty RX plan, without "sacrificing an arm and a leg."

Wink

One thing that was particularly disturbing, was the inclusion of quite a few totally astronomically priced RX's (Tier 5), even though it's obvious that very few folks could afford them. At the same time, numerous life-saving, and considerably more affordable Tier 5 drugs were dropped from the 2019 formularies. This includes the RX called Keytruda/Pembrolizumab--which was widely credited with saving former President Carter's life after his liver/brain cancer diagnosis. (more on that later)

Hey, gotta run, and make a couple of phone payments. Hope you and everyone is able to avoid severe and/or dangerous weather this weekend.

Take care, and stay warm!

Pleasantry

Blue Onyx

"Dogs have given us their absolute all. We are the center of their universe. We are the focus of their love and faith and trust.

They serve us in return for scraps. It is without a doubt the best deal man has ever made."

~~Roger Caras, Author, "A Celebration Of Dogs"

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Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.

WindDancer13's picture

at the state level. Maybe a challenge in court in those states that make it illegal to go off grid or to collect rainwater.

Almost makes me wish I was young again. Although, then I would have to quit saying "Well, at least I won't be around for that (whatever that is)." Plus, I am not sure how I could integrate my complete addiction to my computer.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass