The Lomo is a cheap Russian camera that takes lovely pictures. My friend Giles bought one and it broke, like he thought it might. So the way to get Lomographs is to fake them not make them. I do it by using second curtain sync flash with long exposure times but that only gets the blurry bits right. It’s hard to explain; look at some Lomographs and then fake your own.
Monthly Archive for October, 2004
If you don’t subscribe to Prospect you won’t be able to read Timothy Snyder’s brilliant article about the similarities between America under Bush and Oceanea, the country depicted in George Orwell’s 1984. You will be able to see the article free once the current issue becomes the previous issue but until then here is a little précis, or rather a selective collection of quotations from the article.
The US of today is obviously not the totalitarian society that Orwell describes. Yet Orwell wrote the novel for citizens of democratic societies as a warning about possible futures, and some of his concerns seem rather timely. Take the three slogans of Oceania’s rulers: War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength. The current US president constantly defines the Americans as a peaceful people. Yet the only foreign policy innovation of his administration has been the doctrine of pre-emptive war. The president constantly speaks of freedom; it has become a kind of verbal tic. Yet his administration is the only one since the 1940s substantially to reduce the civil rights of Americans. The word “strong” appears incessantly in official pronouncements of all kinds. The president, it appears, maintains his own strength by purposefully ignoring the world around him. In so far as this makes him more likeable, it is indeed his political strength.
To live in such contradictions is to engage in what Orwell called “doublethink”: “the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind and accepting both of them.” Without some notion of this kind, it is impossible to follow the American debate on terrorism. For years now, high officials of the US government have accepted that there is no evidence of any connection between Saddam Hussein and the attacks of 11th September, while nevertheless arguing that there was such a connection. As we now know, the president demanded that his intelligence officers produce a report demonstrating such a link, even as he was informed that there was no factual basis for his claim. Administration officials praise the findings of the congressional inquiry that denies any such connection, and then claim that these reports actually support their own position. These opposing views are expressed by different members of the same administration; more interestingly, they are also expressed by the same person, at different moments. Evidence about the world is not entirely denied, but it seems to be held apart from some deeper truth, accessible only by faith. Some American leaders, the president and the vice-president in particular, may simply have a different conception of truth: it is what they feel to be true at the moment when they are asked. They really do feel it, when they say it, although at some level they know it to be false. This is the essence of doublethink, and it is also perhaps the secret of Bush’s popularity.
In Orwell’s novel, the state manages reality by altering public memory of the very recent past. In today’s US, Fox News and talk radio - both closely associated with the Republican party and the present administration - engage in practices redolent of those Orwell describes. One of these is the obliteration of the immediate past when it contradicts the message of the rulers of today. In Oceania, this is the task of the Ministry of Truth. In the US, it is the task of Fox News. When Al Gore recently gave an important speech criticising President Bush, Fox News presented its own “analysis” of the speech rather than the speech itself. Although Gore received more votes in the last presidential election than Bush, he has in effect no mass media voice in the US. The event was re-created, as it were, before it even reached the consciousness of the typical television viewer. It never “happened.” Only the criticism, which was in fact mockery, happened.
In Orwell’s Oceania, falsehood and war bring impoverishment. The state impoverishes society by devoting its resources to fighting a useless war. In the atmosphere of perpetual war, Orwell suggests, people will accept not only abridgements of their freedom, but also reductions in living standards. This appears at first to be a fundamental difference between the Oceania of the novel and the America of reality. Who could accuse President Bush of opposing consumption? Yet on a deeper level, the correspondence between calculated war, calculated falsehood and calculated impoverishment holds true. It appears that the leading figures of the Bush administration had two main preoccupations before September 2001: tax cuts for the rich, and war in Iraq. The attacks of 11th September allowed them to carry out both policies. Strange as it may seem, tax cuts for the rich were presented as necessary in a time of war, and criticism of them was presented as unpatriotic. As a result, the less privileged classes of American society pay for the war in Iraq in two ways: with their lives, because the US army is drawn mainly from the poor, but also in the long run with their livelihoods. The result of big tax cuts during an expensive war has been the creation of a truly frightening national debt. The national debt, about $7.4 trillion, is currently increasing by about $1.69bn a day. President Bush’s last budget included an annual deficit of more than $500bn - a record.
The fundamental similarity between Oceania and America is the disabling of political discussion by the rhetoric of war. As one realises by the end of 1984, Oceania’s continuous wars in Eurasia and Eastasia serve no particular purpose, aside from providing the stimuli that allow the population to be confused, manipulated and ruled. The struggle against international terrorism by military and other means need not have been defined as a perpetual war of good against evil. We are a country “at war,” as Bush likes to say, and he is a “war president.” This is not a description of a particular action or mood, but of a permanent existential state. The hero of 1984 “could not remember a time when his country had not been at war.” Should Bush win the presidential election in November, the youngest generation of Americans will soon be able to say the same. As a society, we are less peaceful, less free and less informed than we were a few years ago. War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength.
This is exactly what I want my iPod to do. Get the latest news from the BBC, say, and download it so that I can listen to it on the train. I wonder if the BBC is supporting this yet?
A few weeks ago the Guardian newspaper in Britain mounted an exercise in which they invited their readers to try and influence the outcome of the US presidential election by writing letters to voters in an important swing state. The paper has been “under an unprecedented email bombardment from the United States” ever since because, to paraphrase but not much, the free thinking voters of the US fought and won a war of independence in order to be free from the political meddlings of a bunch of yellow-toothed Limey motherf*****s. One point that quite a few of the foul-mouthed correspondents made in their emails was that interference of this nature was likely to make people vote against rather than for Kerry. I think it’s quite a good argument. It makes me wonder why so many Americans think that the people of Iraq are going to embrace democracy just because their invaders have told them to. Surely the same logic applies; trying to enforce democracy will just turn people against it.
Guardian Unlimited | Operation Clark County
Ian Katz on the US response Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | The last post
It’s not surprising to read that 100,000 civilians have been killed since the ‘coalition’ invaded Iraq, nor that most of those people killed violently were women or children. Iraq simply isn’t a safer place since the invasion, nor is the world. According to the study reported in this story, violence is now the main cause of death in Iraq. “The major causes of death before the war were heart attack, stroke and chronic illness.” So, the war increased terrorism in the region, made the weapons in Iraq available to terrorist all over the world and made Iraq a much more dangerous place for women and children. What are the positive aspects again?
BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Iraq deaths claim ‘to be studied’
People sometimes carry on as if software piracy were just a question of clicking a few buttons. OK, sometimes it is, but it’s often really hard work. I wanted to watch some mpeg-2 coded video on my Mac today and it turned out that I had to buy a small plug-in, called a component, for Quicktime to be able to do that. The price is $19, but it’s £19 if you live in the UK. Well, that’s just a rip-off. It ought to be about £10.50. It’s not as if Apple have to actually send it to me, it’s just a download. So I started up my p2p file sharing software and went looking for a copy I could download. Hours later and I know an awful lot more about the various versions of the component that Apple have released over the last year, with no documentation it’s been a hard slog, and I still haven’t got hold of the software I wanted. I’ve downloaded several versions but none of them worked, at one point I was convinced I’d downloaded a trojan instead so I had to scan my hard-drive for viruses. I’ve installed various other players and converters that claimed to be able to handle mpeg-2s, with no success. And I’ve got back-ache from sitting in this uncomfortable chair all day. So when you hear the suits complaining about people stealing software and getting a free ride don’t forget that it’s not all milk and honey out here in piracy land.
While we’re talking about the great things that the US is capable of, how about Apple? They are a cool company in several ways. I remember when a county in Texas refused to give tax breaks to them because their employee medical programme was available to same sex and unmarried partners as well as spouses; Apple promptly said they would site their office building elsewhere. When the iTunes store was launched most people thought that it was a great example of how the record industry should have dealt with the ‘problem’ of peer-to-peer music file sharing. However, some people think that the whole record industry is corrupt and unfair to musicians and that the iTunes store just perpetuates that unfairness.
“Despite huge new efficiencies created by internet distribution –no CDs to make, no distributors to store and ship them, no CD stores to build and run– artists receive the same pathetic cut [that they have in the past].”
The Downhill Battle site is well designed and very interesting. I’d say it’s worth a bookmark.
I think I’ll subscribe to Stay Free Magazine, despite trying to not buy American things if I can help it. This magazine is a real example of the great things that the US is capable of. They sponsored a showing of an alternative soundtrack to Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, and now they’re selling it. They host downloads of loads of short films that can’t be distributed because of copyright claims by big businesses. They’ve been giving away a CD of copyright infringing music. Their editorial critiques of the media are spot on. Go on, have a look - Stay Free Magazine
The Small Publishers Fair was as terrific as I expected, although I nearly didn’t make it through the door. In the entrance hall to the Conway Hall there was a sign showing all Saturday’s events: Main Hall – Small Publishers Fair, Bertrand Russell Room – Postal Mechanisation. For a moment I was torn, but the children dragged me forward and in to the main hall we went.
Cunning Les Coleman offered a postcard to my daughter Poppy and thus immediately got my attention. He’s not daft. It turns out that he was friends with Anthony Earnshaw who drew, with Eric Thacker, one of my favourite art-type books Musrum. He was selling some Earnshaw postcards called “Eight Wokker Postcards”. He said I should be sure to post them but of course I’m too selfish. I liked loads of Coleman’s books, but in the end bought just two. 180 grammes, (or maybe it’s called Kojak) is a sort of collection of aphorisms. -“IDENTIFICATION Cars crash; dogs bark; water evaporates; pylons fall over.” It is rather like some of the things in Musrum. “Meet the Art Students” is a book of cartoons of Art Student types. I love books of cartoons of types, who doesn’t? This picture isn’t in the book, but it’s in the same style.
Mark Pawson was over the aisle from Les Coleman. What can I say? Mark is such a really nice guy and everything he does is great. Order indiscriminately from his clunky site. I finally got around to buying his Pink Paper; it really is absorbing.
Coracle had millions of little books I wanted to buy. Collin Sacket’s book “by playback tape” has a beautiful tiny picture of a cassette tape on both covers and a sort of cut-up poem inside. It reminds me of a poem I recorded for Stan’s Café called Bleak Heart Driver.
The most money spent on one artist prize has to go to John Dilnot though. We bought four prints from him and I already wish I’d bought some of his books as well. It turns out that a few of my friends were already familiar with his work; my friend Isabel even claims that she knew that I’d like his stuff. Well, thanks for telling me Isabel. Anyway it’s OK now because the pictures I bought as Christmas presents are already up on the wall in my hall. This is my all-time favourite, “Little Museum”.
I love this blog, called “My NoT So DaiLY CraPS”. She randomly CapItAlisEs heR wordZ lIke An old skool HacKEr, but se describes herself as a “TyPiCaL FuLL timE MusLim GiRL.” KooL. And what is Unique about her? “I haV a LoOSE NecK REaLLY.” I suspect it may be written by William Gibson, or maybe Russel Hoban.
=smell sick-sweet. like old roses on a passing breeze=: “Todae I found out dat there are worst facis then Thomas Goh but I showed dat Paul!
Todae I found out that one can’t judge a book by it’s cover. Todae I found out that I should always trust my gut feeling. Todae I found out that the back of my mind is always the truthest place.
Todae someone tol me my trousers were nice. Todae someone confide in me on boy problems. Todae someone tol’ me a secret. Todae I wen hm wit my frens.
Todae I ran into Muslim. We got off the same MRT n didn’t realise we were walking side by side till we were a few feet away frm e control station. Too bad we cldn’t chat long ‘cos he had to meet a fren.
Todae I saw my new C; he stays in bedok his tall too. I’ve yet to noe his name 
Todae all of these were crushed down by a tragedy that wld happened if none tried to stop it. Still striving…
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