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Jason Kottke's weblog, home of fine hypertext products since 1998

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Kodak and the Invention of Popular Photography

In 1888, the Eastman Kodak Company rolled out a new camera and a new slogan. “You press the button, we do the rest.” To say this moment revolutionized photography would be an understatement. But this story isn’t just about Kodak. It’s about what happens when a powerful technology, originally only understood by a select few, can suddenly fit in your hand.

And then, fast-forwarding to the 90s and 00s, Kodak gradually, then suddenly, missed a similar shift that further democratized photography: the move to digital.

Tags: Kodak · photography · video

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Fun little word game: Alphaguess. “Guess the word of the day. Each...

Fun little word game: Alphaguess. “Guess the word of the day. Each guess reveals where the word sits alphabetically.” (Today’s puzzle took me 16 guesses…is that good?)

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The Pudding has collected satellite imagery of all 59,507 outdoor basketball courts...

The Pudding has collected satellite imagery of all 59,507 outdoor basketball courts in the United States.

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The Williamsburg Bridge Riders

Adam DiCarlo takes photos of commuters (mostly bikers) as they exit the Williamsburg Bridge bike path on the Manhattan side and posts them to his Instagram account. (via @BAMstutz) Tags: Adam DiCarlo · cycling · NYC · photography 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

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Dark Matter Could Be Hiding Out as Atom-Sized Black Holes. “Black holes...

Dark Matter Could Be Hiding Out as Atom-Sized Black Holes. “Black holes the size of an atom that contain the mass of an asteroid may fly through the inner solar system about once a decade”…and we can theoretically detect them through planetary wobble.

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The Return of Ta-Nehisi Coates, a lengthy profile of the writer on...

The Return of Ta-Nehisi Coates, a lengthy profile of the writer on the eve of the publication of The Message, his book about “three resonant sites of conflict”, including Palestine.

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The Artists’ and Writers’ Cookbook

Published in 1961 with an introduction by Alice B Toklas, The Artists’ and Writers’ Cookbook features recipes and wisdom from dozens of writers and artists, including Harper Lee, Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Pearl Buck, Upton Sinclair, John Keats, and Burl Ives. Lee shared her...

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Frozen food delivery service Schwan’s will shutter in November. Founded in 1952...

Frozen food delivery service Schwan’s will shutter in November. Founded in 1952 (and now called Yelloh 🙄), the company cited “economic & market headwinds”. When I was a kid in rural WI, a visit from “the Schwan’s man” was an *event*, let me tell you.

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“Presidential polls are no more reliable than they were a century ago,”...

“Presidential polls are no more reliable than they were a century ago,” but polling is now the centerpiece of American politics, with “the media obsessing over each statistically insignificant blip”. Why do we pay so much attention to this bullshit?

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Listen to a Performance of Some New Mozart Music

Last week, I posted about the discovery of a “new” piece of music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. A previously unknown piece of music composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart when he was probably in his early teens has been uncovered at a library in Germany. The piece dates to the...

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“The state should not give itself the right to kill human beings...

“The state should not give itself the right to kill human beings — especially when it kills with premeditation and ceremony, in the name of the law or in the name of its people, and when it does so in an arbitrary and discriminatory fashion.”

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American Suburbs Are a Horror Movie and We’re the Protagonists. “American suburbs...

American Suburbs Are a Horror Movie and We’re the Protagonists. “American suburbs are full of ugly, empty, liminal spaces: spaces you are not meant to linger in or enjoy. They’re the creepy hallways of the built environment…”

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Ian Scott tracked down the full “What were the skies like when...

Ian Scott tracked down the full “What were the skies like when you were young?” sample from The Orb’s Little Fluffy Clouds. You can listen to it on the Internet Archive or on Soundcloud.

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Substack Still Sucks

From Casey Newton’s post looking back on Platformer’s fourth year, your periodic reminder that Substack still sucks: When we learned about the extent of far-right extremism, Hitler worship and Holocaust denial on Substack, you pressed us to investigate. And when we publish...

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The NY Times is beta testing a sports version of their popular...

The NY Times is beta testing a sports version of their popular Connections game.

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Ross Anderson on The Secret Code of Pickup Basketball. “It allows a...

Ross Anderson on The Secret Code of Pickup Basketball. “It allows a small group of perfect strangers with little in common besides basketball to experience a flow state — a brief, but intense, form of group transcendence.” Super interesting sociology.

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Tipping Point is a three-part podcast on The Limits to Growth, a...

Tipping Point is a three-part podcast on The Limits to Growth, a 1970s book that predicted the collapse of civilization by ~2050 (based on early systems dynamics modeling done at MIT) and how it was ignored & discredited.

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Foliage season is ramping up here in New England — here’s this...

Foliage season is ramping up here in New England — here’s this year’s foliage prediction map for the US.

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Radio Shack Catalog Archive (1939-2011)

Look, I’m not even going to explain this. Either 1) you’re the type of person who reads the words “Radio Shack Catalog Archive (1939-2011)”, completely flips their shit, clicks away immediately, and therefore isn’t even reading this, or 2) you don’t care. Have a good one! Tags: Radio Shack 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

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Don’t ever hand your phone to the cops. “Handing your phone to...

Don’t ever hand your phone to the cops. “Handing your phone to a police officer grants law enforcement a lot of power over some of your most intimate personal data.”

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“Google is serving AI-generated images of mushrooms when users search for some...

“Google is serving AI-generated images of mushrooms when users search for some species, a risky and potentially fatal error for foragers who are trying to figure out what mushrooms are safe to eat.” JFC.

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Out today: Sally Rooney’s new novel Intermezzo. I’m actually gonna grab this...

Out today: Sally Rooney’s new novel Intermezzo. I’m actually gonna grab this from the local bookstore today while I’m out and about.

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Astronomy Photographer of the Year for 2024

Royal Museums Greenwich has announced the winners of the Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2024 competition. You can also check out some of the shortlist entries and runners-up in each category (Moon, Sun, etc.) Photos above by (from top to bottom): Tom Williams, Peter Ward, Ryan Imperio, and Tom Rae. Tags: astronomy · best of · best of 2024 · photography 💬 Join the discussion on kottke.org →

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The International Space Station is scheduled to reach the end of its...

The International Space Station is scheduled to reach the end of its functional life by 2030 — and will then be destroyed. “After 30 years of dutiful service, our home among the stars will be ripped apart by the atmosphere.”

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Master Blacksmith Forges a Beautiful Knife

Watch as a Latvian master blacksmith forges a Damascus steel1 knife with 320 layers of steel. Then he uses the finished knife to make a leather holder for it. Pound it flat, fold it over. Pound it flat, fold it over. I love that twist he puts on the steel in the middle of...

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How to Decarbonize Your Life. “Trying to zero out your personal carbon...

How to Decarbonize Your Life. “Trying to zero out your personal carbon footprint…is a fool’s errand. What you can do, however, is maximize the degree to which you’re building a new, post-fossil-fuel world.”

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Wes Anderson Is Museum Bound

Wes Anderson pictured with a number of the models from Isle of Dogs

London’s Design Museum is hosting a big retrospective of Wes Anderson’s work beginning in late 2025.

This exhibition will be the first time museum visitors have the opportunity to delve into the art of his complete filmography, examining his inspirations, homages, and the meticulous craftsmanship that define his work.

Through a curated collection of original props, costumes, and behind-the-scenes insights, including from his personal collection, this exhibition offers an unprecedented look into the world of Wes Anderson, celebrating his enduring influence on contemporary cinema.

Might have to make my way to London for this. (via daniel benneworth–gray)

Tags: design · London Design Museum · movies · museums · Wes Anderson

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Reader survey: “Upon discovering that an item they want to buy is...

Reader survey: “Upon discovering that an item they want to buy is in a locked case, less than one in three shoppers (32%) get a store employee to unlock the case.” There is a 0% chance of me shopping at a store with these locked product cages.

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Gorgeous Lego animation of Caleb Holonko doing a 360 drop on a...

Gorgeous Lego animation of Caleb Holonko doing a 360 drop on a mountain bike.

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Departure Mono

some design samples using a typeface called Departure Mono

I am such a sucker for a pixel fonts and Departure Mono is no exception.

Departure Mono is a monospaced pixel font inspired by the constraints of early command-line and graphical user interfaces, the tiny pixel fonts of the late 90s/early 00s, and sci-fi concepts from film and television.

Oh and there’s a playable Breakout game at the bottom of the page if you scroll all the way down.

Tags: design · typography

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