Forget Wall Street – Silicon Valley is the new political power in Washington by Olivia Solon & Sabrina Siddiqui (for The Guardian)
“Their theory is that democracy is an impedance to capitalism so they need as little regulation as possible”
During the 1990s, In the early days of the dotcom era, internet companies flourished in Silicon Valley by skirting the law, moving fast and breaking things. Such techno-libertarianism was founded on the belief that borderless cyberspace was separate from the physical realm and therefore not subject to the same rules.
[…] Silicon Valley’s tech leaders have a short memory: their companies were built on a foundation of government intervention and public monies.
Born Sexy Yesterday by Pop Culture Detective (Jonathan McIntosh) investigates naive-but-sexy female characters portrayed sci-fi movies and identifies them as fantasies for the colonial gaze. These characters are build on an older, racist narratives about indigenous women and white men. The interpretation feels legit.. In Finland similar characters have been written to illustrate the relationships between urban and rural communities. A male graduate from the city arrives to the countryside and meets with a farmworker girl. The graduate fights of her brutish suitors (often alcoholics) and marries the girl. These stories are not sci-fi movies but they are rooted on modernistic fantasies.
Performed at the Lauttasaari street-party over the weekend. Got on stage after a show by the Moomin characters! Our part in the event was a part of the Neighborizome project we are working on with Leena Kela and Heini Aho (recently announced on the Koneensäätiö website). We were introduced on stage by Anna Talasniemi. Some evidence on the event on Instagram. We found five potential condominium-collaborators to work with.
My Dude mixer arrived to day. I’m very happy with the quality of the sound. It amplifies mic level signals neatly and delivers a balanced stereo mix (almost makes a sm58 mic audible with out a preamp). The over-amplification/saturation sound mixing feature works with rhythmic material, it seems to follow beats (haven’t tested the feedback yet). I guess I’ll make a tutorial on how it works with different audio sources for Pietari. The only disappointment is that it doesn’t have a separate light to indicate when the device is on (Open lines are indicated with leds). There is a serious issue with channels 4&5 and I’m in contact with Bastl to have the unit replaced/fixed.
Here is a video showing issues with mics and here is a video showing issues with synths (ts & trs connectors). Leoš from Bastl-Help guided me to reheat the contacts in an effort to fix the problem. Unfortunately I couldn’t get it to work. As I was poking inside the mixer I noticed a lot of fast and dirty soldering work – Which was disappointing. Some connections didn’t seem to have any solder in them! I’m now waiting for news on how long it will take to be replaced (the delivery of this unit took two weeks). I need to have the mixer repaired and delivered by 15.9.