Category: Uncategorized
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It’s not the mechanism
More from the 1891 Inland Printer. Note the year. This is an editorial on the condition of the Government Printing Bureau. = = = = = START INLAND PRINTER: The bureau intended to gradually substitute steam presses for hand presses, but Congress failed to execute a contract. [SOUNDS FAMILIAR.] However, by working overtime the bureau…
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Phats?
Reading an 1891 Inland Printer, noticed an odd modern word in a report of conditions in KC: = = = = = START INLAND PRINTER: The past few months have witnessed the lowest depression in all branches of the printing business ever known in this city. Retrenchment has been the universal cry and practice among…
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Substack in 1830
In 1896 William Dean Howells, known today as one of Twain’s associates, wrote a brief remembrance of his father’s country newspaper in the 1840s and 1850s. This was in Ashtabula at the northeast edge of Ohio. He discussed the Patent Insides, which were dominant in 1896: = = = = = START HOWELLS: Twice or…
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The Stevens rule
Very old rule: Tight budgets cause smart plans and smart designs. Unlimited money causes stupid plans and stupid designs. The rule is clear with designs. My favorite example is Brooks Stevens. His 1947 design for the Willys wagon was TIGHTLY constrained by postwar restrictions. Willys was last on the priority list for bodymakers and machine…
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Learning requires stability.
In previous item about the history of stereotyping as it related to Kellogg’s Patent Insides, I was quoting a 1927 book by George Kubler. He understood how psychopathic chaos halts all learning and genuine innovation. = = = = = START QUOTE: Writing of books by hand continued to be the only method practiced throughout…
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The modern pattern
My rule about legacies and copyrights also applies to leaders. If you want your ideas to have a chance of lasting and spreading, don’t wall them off behind copyrights and patents and NDAs. Obviously not every idea is great enough or important enough to last, but when all ideas are walled, the good concepts won’t…
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An eye for an eye,
a decimal point for a decimal point. Via Protos: The founder of collapsed Turkish crypto exchange Thodex, Farouk Fatih Özer, has been sentenced to 11,196 years, 10 months, and 15 days in prison. Perfect. You want to create an autistic fraud and an autistic dystopia? We’ll give you an autistic punishment. A wildly unrealistic HUGE…
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Today is & day!
Time to reprint the genuine history of the symbol, which doesn’t match the standard etymology. = = = = = START REPRINT: I’ve always been bothered by the bizarre-sounding etymology of Ampersand. The symbol itself is no mystery: just a stylized version of et. But the usual etymology for the name doesn’t make a lick…
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Kellogg and Batya
A Reddit thread about ‘secrets of jobs’ delved into some interesting details about political staff. The fact that staffers run everything is NOT a secret. It’s well known and often discussed, but never mentioned in mainstream media or advertising. Successful politicians start as staffers, then move up to the “elected” role as manager of staff.…
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Writing and editing
Since I’m talking about writing and editing this week… Sohrab Ahmari is a wonderful writer and speaker. I always try to catch every interview and podcast because he always teaches me something new. Every interview has several Aha! So that’s why! moments. He publishes Compact Magazine, and I eagerly tried reading and subscribing for a…
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Loyalty is lethal
Good long interview with a striking actress and a striking writer for Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The Pittsburghers have put together their own Strike Paper where they can continue practicing their craft, but for some reason they haven’t DIVORCED themselves from the paper. They already have the new marriage with their CUSTOMERS, so they don’t need the…
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Two definitions
Controversial Conspiracy Theory: A belief shared by 80% of Americans. Mainstream Consensus: A belief shared by 100% of Jeff Bezos and Larry Fink.
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The other writers strike
Speaking of original spy plots, the plots developed by the “left” and “right” activists are getting dull. Both “sides” are drifting out into ever more complex theories about the EXACT SAME witchy invisible substances like nanoparticles and 5G. The “left” attributes the nanoparticles to Monsanto and Koch Brothers. The “right” attributes the nanoparticles to Pfizer…
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First plotted dream
This morning I had the first original plotted dream since the possible “end” of the NAZI TORTURE CAMP. All interesting dreams were on hold during the camp, as per Del Giudice’s hypothesis. Only an occasional ‘memory dump’, with a pile of unrelated details and unbridgeable gaps. This was a spy story, which was a fairly…
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It’s not hard
More silliness on UFOs. Everyone seems to be stuck on the mystery of instant acceleration, which is impossible for a massive body. Instant acceleration is NOT impossible for electrical charge, including a visible bundle of electrical charge. Nature uses fast-moving bundles of electrostatic charge all the time and everywhere, from nervous systems to earthquakes to…
Polistra's Mill 