1 minutes estimated reading time
Fujitsu runs probably the world’s oldest working computer. I hear a lot of techies I respect like Grace Quek complain about the use of old languages like COBOL. Not even COBOL would run on the world’s oldest working computer. Lord only knows what they’d make of this electromechanical computer operated and maintained by Fujitsu. I love it, it reminds me of the community of tinkerers and engineers that have kept vintage trucks, tractors, trains and steam pumps alive. More over at the Asahi Shimbun here on the technician responsible for running the world’s oldest working computer.
Large format high resolution displays are changing our environment and effects that would even astonish Blade Runner’s Rick Deckard. The COEX atrium in Seoul has a stunning installation by d’strict. A wave rolls around the screen. It offers an idea of the future potential of digital experiences in the real world.
Godspeed You Black Emperor is a 1976 16mm film following the adventures of a Japanese motorcycle gang, the Black Emperors. Groups like the Black Emperors went on to inspire Japanese streetwear designers like Neighborhood and WTAPS.
Gilbert Shelton’s stoner comic series, The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers is being adapted for television. Shelton satirised the establishment, drug culture and counterculture. Franklin, Freddy and Phineas are transported by the power of really far out weed from San Francisco in 1969, to the San Francisco of the present day.
The San Francisco of Google and Facebook is unrecognisable as the former world centre of counterculture. Cannabis is now legal, feminism has evolved so much as to become bewildering. Extreme gentrification has destroyed the San Francisco that they know and loved.
This pilot mini-episode has had a negative reaction, the wit isn’t as sharp as the books. But I am excited the brothers will be introduced to a new generation and hopefully inspire them to read the original books.