We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.

Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Why I adore the United States

· How very odd!

Yesterday… I saw a homemade butane-powered cannon shoot a saboted blueberry muffin across my lawn.

– Tamara K

July 6th, 2006 | 24 comments - (Comments are closed)

I have always wanted one

· How very odd!

benign1.jpg

From Mo’s better living through art via Boingboing

July 3rd, 2006 | 9 comments - (Comments are closed)

Something in the mail

· How very odd! · UK affairs

Like many folk, I get my fair share of free newspapers pushed through the letterbox. These publications live on advertising and in some cases are quite useful, full of details about local plumbers, plasterers, doctors, new restaurants and the like. In my central London neighbourhood of Pimlico, there are a few of these things floating around. I normally give them a cursory glance and either jot down any handy numbers or put the rag into the trash.

The Pimlico and Belgravia Eye has this interesting ad which definitely caught my eye (not available online):

The latest craze hits Pimlico, Victoria!. Experience the ultimate sense of self expression. Not only is it an alternative form of fitness, but it is an overall empowerment source for women. Whether you want to learn new moves for personal enjoyment or for professional career development, we have just the class for you… Students are from all walks of life, ages, shapes and sizes. The school is designed for all levels of experience – total beginners, professional dancers and even aspiring pole dancing performers.

Pole dancing – now associated with ’empowerment’ and ‘professional career development’. Say what you like about we stuffy Brits – there is none of that stuffyiness in deepest Pimlico.

Here is their, ahem, website.

July 2nd, 2006 | 8 comments - (Comments are closed)

Window shopping near Wembley

· How very odd!

One of my hobbies is photographing landmarks, but in the course of doing this, I spot other less landmarky things, and snap them too. That was the origin of this photo:

ShopWindowS.jpg

It was taken in Harrow, which I visited not long ago, to photograph the new and I think magnificent Wembley football stadium.

Click to see more clothing graphics. Very Samizdata, I hope you agree. Apart, maybe, from where it says John Lennon.

June 18th, 2006 | 5 comments - (Comments are closed)

Holy stealth wings, Batman!

· Aerospace & Astronautics · How very odd! · Military affairs

Ok, now this is both cool and a bit wierd.

June 7th, 2006 | 14 comments - (Comments are closed)

Persuasive advertising, 1950s style

· How very odd! · Media & Journalism

Jim Henson banged out these rather bizarre commercials – featuring a murdering psychopathic Kermit The Frog lookalike and a Cookie Monsteresque grump – before sharpening his act up and creating The Muppets.

See (a lot) more of the series here, and ponder why Wilkins Coffee is not a household name.

(Hat tip – Larvatus Prodeo)

June 4th, 2006 | 5 comments - (Comments are closed)

Taiwan legislators star again

· Asian affairs · How very odd!

Chinese Taipai, or Taiwan, or the Republic of China; whatever you call it, you have to admit that the small electronic island has some of the best legislators in the world.

Not because they are particularly wise or sensible, but rather, they are perhaps the best exponents of the ‘scrummage’ school of legislative thought. The proceedings of the Parliament there are frequently punctuated by brawls, biffs, and other exciting interruptions.

And they have been at it again:

Pandemonium broke out in Taiwan’s parliament when deputies attacked a woman colleague for snatching and trying to eat a proposal on opening direct transport links with China in a bid to stop a vote on the issue. Lawmakers of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party charged towards the podium and protested noisily to prevent the review of an opposition proposal seeking an end to decades-old curbs on direct air and shipping links with China.

Amid the chaos, DPP deputy Wang Shu-hui snatched the written proposal from an opposition legislator and shoved it into her mouth, television news footage showed. Wang later spat out the document and tore it up after opposition lawmakers failed to get her to cough it up by pulling her hair. During the melee, another DPP woman legislator, Chuang Ho-tzu, spat at an opposition colleague.

“She spat saliva,” yelled Hung Hsiu-chu of the main opposition Nationalist Party.

In Australia, although there is plenty of legislation going about, I fear it has almost zero nutritional value. However, I applaud Ms Wang Shu-Hui’s novel approach to legislation and I think it should be adopted in legislatures throughout the world.

May 31st, 2006 | 10 comments - (Comments are closed)

And now for something completely different…

· How very odd!

A combination of perfect timing and extremely strong arms. Repect!

May 29th, 2006 | 5 comments - (Comments are closed)

How much?

· How very odd!

The FT’s The Way We Live Now column reports that David Blanchflower is to appear before the Treasury select committee, as he has been appointed to the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England. I imagine he is up for it as an economist representative of the currently modish disguise of egalitarianism as a collectively-skewed hedonics.

So does Maggi Urry, one suspects. She writes:

Blanchflower’s most frequently quoted claim to fame is his co-authorship in 2004 of a paper entitled “Money, Sex and Happiness”. […] He calculated that increasing the frequency of sex from once a month to once a week would generate as much happiness as would a $50,000 a year pay rise. Depends, I would have thought on who the sex was with – the pay rise might be preferable.

I am a little more cynical. At British tax rates, I note that is approximately $750 a time. If you cannot get really good sex for less than $750 without a series discount then your grasp of the market is quite questionable.

May 24th, 2006 | 9 comments - (Comments are closed)

The corporate state, McKinsey-style

· Economics, Business & Globalization · How very odd! · Latin American Affairs

How else? You might ask. But this abstract in McKinsey Quarterly caught my attention with its astounding wrong-headedness:

How Brazil can Grow –

The most important obstacle is Brazil’s huge informal economy which, distorts competition by putting efficient, law-abiding companies at a disadvantage. Macroeconomic instability­reflected in the high cost of capital­is the second-most-important hurdle, followed by regulations (such as rigid labor laws) that limit productivity.

Could it possibly be that it’s the top-heavy regulatory state and shocking tax rates on officially recognised activities that are keep the poor poor, small companies small, and the poltically unconnected outside the system hoping not to be noticed? It couldn’t be state favouritism and that same capricious regulatory apparatus that keep the risks high and capital proportionately expensive? It would also be interesting to know in what sense ‘efficient’ and ‘law-abiding’ go hand in hand in such circumstances. It is implied that unlawful, invisible, enterprises are inefficient ones (in whatever sense that is). How do they know?

May 4th, 2006 | 5 comments - (Comments are closed)

Minitru USA

· How very odd! · North American affairs

Nothing, absolutely nothing, is immune from state interference. Not even in the Land of the Free. Not even the past.

The original story here seems to be the tip of a bureaucratic iceberg. Last weeks further comment from the New York Times (which I can not find online, sorry):

[A]t the [US] National Archives, documents have been disappearing since 1999 because intelligence officials have wanted them to. And under the terms of two disturbing agreements – with the C.I.A. and the Air Force – the National Archives has been allowing officials to reclassify declassified documents, which means removing them from the public eye. So far 55,000 pages, some of them from the 1950’s [sic], have vanished. […]

What makes all this seem preposterous is that the agreements themselves prohibit the National Archives from revealing why the documents were removed. They are aparently secret enough that no-one can be told why they are secret – so secret, in fact, that the arrangement to reclassify them is also secret. According to the agreement with the C.I.A., employees are also prohibited from telling anyone that the C.I.A. was responsible for removing reclassified documents.

Next time you hear that saw about the price of freedom being eternal vigilance, remember eternity is outside time. You do not just have to keep watch on this moment.

May 1st, 2006 | 5 comments - (Comments are closed)

Self-parody

· How very odd!

Just when I thought e-government couldn’t get any sillier, I happened upon this site.

“Anti-social behaviour practitioner” is a particularly glorious piece of tin-eared bureaucratic jargon. “Tackling alcohol disorder” is alternative to “Taking a Stand Awards”, suggests to me that many of those approaching this site are expected to be unable to stand.

But apart from being stupid and unintentionally funny, it is another scary glimpse into how unlimited is the appetite to regulate and manage social life in Britain.

April 16th, 2006 | 24 comments - (Comments are closed)
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