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How Hitler Dismantled a Democracy in 53 Days

Roger Lancefield — Fri, 10 Jan 2025 12:28:20 +0000

Filing this one under "warnings from history", although the warning has clearly had little effect on some.

How Hitler Dismantled a Democracy in 53 Days

Luigi Mangione and Media Double Standards

Roger Lancefield — Tue, 31 Dec 2024 10:10:36 +0000

Ricky Hale on the US media's response to the Brian Thompson murder. His critique of course applies equally to sections of the UK media as well.

"The correct moral position is that violence is wrong, but if you’re pushing the message that violence is fine when its against people …

The Seikilos Epitaph

Roger Lancefield — Sun, 30 Jun 2024 22:25:43 +0100

The Seikilos epitaph is a haunting and IMO beautiful piece music that dates from the second century CE. It is the oldest surviving complete musical composition that includes musical notation (source).

It's commonly assumed to be a lament to the composer's dead wife, although there's a less romantic hypothesis, namely …

Katharine Hayhoe's Challenge to Sceptics

Roger Lancefield — Fri, 03 May 2024 12:08:00 +0100

Re-upping this 2018 tweet by climate scientist, Katharine Hayhoe.

The original tweet can be seen here. Nearly six years later the thread in which it occurs is still well worth a bookmark. It's packed with resources, both in the main thread and dispensed during the course of answering the questions …

It's not dirt

Roger Lancefield — Fri, 26 Apr 2024 00:44:15 +0100

A delightful post in the North East Bylines from teacher and smallholder, Melody Bird.

As the digging went on, we made cross curricular links to the Battle of the Somme and sang ‘mud, mud glorious mud’. The clart was all encompassing. Accident prone Pupil H looked like the creature from …

Ed Zitron on Elon Musk

Roger Lancefield — Thu, 25 Apr 2024 12:43:46 +0100

While hatchet jobs on the rich and famous are a penny a dozen, this Ed Zitron piece resonated with me, not least because it reinforces many of the observations I've made about Musk in recent years.

The Descent of Elon Musk

You'll need to watch Don Lemon's interview with Musk …

The Earthrise Story

Roger Lancefield — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 15:24:55 +0100

I stumbled across the official story behind the famous "Earthrise" photograph taken during the Apollo 8 mission in 1968. Not only was it humanity’s first view of Earth from another planetary body, but it also played an important role in the growing environmental awareness in the late 1960s and …

Surveillance as a Service

Roger Lancefield — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 10:46:14 +0100

Technologies and tools that further erode citizens' privacy and ability to organise, protest, dissent and to engage in civil disobedience.

Surveillance as a Service: The Global Impact of Israeli “Defense” Technologies on Privacy and Human Rights

A Última Árvore (The Last Tree)

Roger Lancefield — Mon, 08 Apr 2024 17:12:20 +0100

A Última Árvore (The Last Tree)
Mixed-media sculpture, Will Ferreira, 2013

Markarian's Chain

Roger Lancefield — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 15:52:11 +0100

I've changed the image in my page-top banner to a shot of Markarian's Chain. This group of galaxies is one of the most awe-inspiring sights I've had yet through an amateur telescope. I first viewed the chain in our back garden using my 150mm f8 refractor under the Bortle 4 …

The Anthropocene: an event not an epoch

Roger Lancefield — Tue, 02 Apr 2024 23:58:05 +0100

Following last month's decision by the International Union of Geological Sciences to reject the proposal to declare an Anthropocene epoch, I saw one or two comments on social media by environmental campaigners who seemed to regard the decision as a setback, even a defeat.

In the light of this, I …

ICYMI: The Web turned 35 this month

Roger Lancefield — Wed, 27 Mar 2024 22:36:27 +0000

The World Wide Web turned 35 earlier this month. Tim Berners-Lee marked the day by posting an open letter:

Marking the Web’s 35th Birthday: An Open Letter

In it he urges users to work to protect the web from corporate control and to support projects that give users the …

Colour Schemes for Linux

Roger Lancefield — Sun, 24 Mar 2024 00:42:08 +0000

Colour schemes for the Linux desktop and applications. The author highlights some really nice work.

My Top 3 Linux Color Schemes

The author also gives an honourable mention to Ethan Schoonover's venerable Solarized scheme. Solarized doesn't make it in to his top three, but only because he couldn't make …

Dark Skies and Bibliophilic Design

Roger Lancefield — Tue, 19 Mar 2024 15:56:00 +0000

A fascinating and alarming interview in the Journal of Bibliophilic Design with Steve Tonkin, dark sky advisor to the Cranborne Chase National Landscape. Topics covered include the effects of light pollution on human health, on wildlife and biodiversity, and on the night sky and astronomy.

Right Light, Right Place, Right …

Vim Learning Stages

Roger Lancefield — Mon, 18 Mar 2024 19:14:00 +0000

Mine went something like this.

0. Morbid curiosity

"Seriously? This is a joke, right?"

1. Initial fascination

"Hmm, in fact this appears to deliver the kind of text editing power I've always dreamed of possessing. I must explore this further."

2. Down the rabbit hole

"Wow, there's so much here …

Sea Level Rise

Roger Lancefield — Sun, 17 Mar 2024 21:46:00 +0000

Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist at the University of Reading (and the creator of the warming stripes) has posted on twitter this animation of sea level rise between 1900 and 2023. It's a crucial range of data, but personally I find this complementary graph posted in the replies to be …

Shell Abandons 2035 Emissions Target and Weakens 2030 Goal

Roger Lancefield — Sun, 17 Mar 2024 21:46:00 +0000

Filing under "Quelle surprise". CarbonBrief has the story

The longest tunnel specifically built for biking and walking

Roger Lancefield — Wed, 13 Mar 2024 21:01:00 +0000

Now this is cycling and walking infrastructure!

The longest tunnel specifically built for biking and walking

Apparently it's the Fyllingsdalstunnelen in Norway.

Automakers Are Sharing Consumers’ Driving Behavior With Insurance Companies

Roger Lancefield — Mon, 11 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This is a pretty jaw-dropping exposé of the extent to which automakers are tracking their customers driving behaviour and sharing that telemetry data with insurance companies.

Anyone buying a new car needs to read this.

Automakers are Sharing Consumers' Driving Behaviour with Insurance Companies

(Tip of the hat to Dan …

AI and Surveillance Capitalism

Roger Lancefield — Fri, 08 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

There's a lot to unpack here. Meredith Whittaker & Camille Francois discuss the recent AI hype, the nature of AI, who controls it, whose interests it serves, to what uses it's being put, what its impacts will be on politics and society, and more.

The AI series: AI and Surveillance Capitalism …