In ‘Fictional Nature,’ Fabian Knecht Encloses Live Trees and Craggy Stones in a White Cube Gallery

Walk into one of Fabian Knecht’s installations, and you’ll likely smell the dewy, herbal scent of moss and the sweet musk of wood, fragrant evidence of life growing amidst clinical, fluorescent lights and stark walls. Branches, grass, and water features appear as if they’ve been cut to fit the exact dimensions of the gallery and transported from their native habitats into the classic white cube.

A person stands in a stark white gallery space, observing a large installation that resembles a mossy forest floor with tree trunks emerging from rocks, creating a striking contrast between nature and the sterile indoor environment.

Spent most of the morning digging through Robert Birming’s Blog Inspiration page. So many good posts and resources! birming.com/blog-insp…


What We Learned In Our First Year of 404 Media

A year ago today, we published a blog post called “Welcome to 404 Media.” In that post, we explained that the four of us quit our jobs to start something new, and set some goals for ourselves.

They grow up so fast 🥲🎂


I’m finally starting to get over this covid stuff. Still not back to 100% and I can’t really taste much but I’m feeling a lot better. In a couple days I’ll be back at work. Feels like post vacation depression honestly. I’m not ready to reintegrate with society yet!


No sick days

I’m on day four of COVID. Started feeling a little weird at work Friday and I woke up Saturday feeling like I got thrown down a flight of stairs. I told my boss I should be good just taking the weekend off and I’ll be back Monday.

Yeah, that didn’t take. I woke up feeling even worse Monday. I was so hoarse I could barely talk. Whatever I did manage to get out sounded like Darth Vader on his death bed.


Authors sue Anthropic for copyright infringement over AI training

The complaint, filed on Monday, opens new tab by writers and journalists Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson, said that Anthropic used pirated versions of their works and others to teach Claude to respond to human prompts.

It’s one thing to debate on whether or not it’s okay to train on publicly available data, or the ethics of ignoring Robots.txt but this is a company with billions of dollars in funding, literally pirating books to train AI


CSS is like Tetris through text commands


One of my favorite pics from that Blink 182 show. Idk why really, I’ve just never been that close to the cameraman lol

Cameraman and crew recording concert in a full stadium.

You can't say that on Youtube!

George Carlin had that list of dirty words you couldn’t say on TV back in the 70’s. Record labels release edited versions of hit songs to clean them up for radio. Movies are always censored to remove nudity and profanity for TV.


Those weren't the best years of your life

Steve Buscemi as the Fellow Kids guy, holding a skateboard and wearing a backwards ball cap with his MUSIC BAND t-shirt

My generation is pretty bad about not wanting to grow up. We talk about how we “just can’t adult today,” or how our parents seemed so grown up when they were in their 30s but we still feel like kids.


Your TV set has become a digital billboard. And it’s only getting worse.

Representatives for LG and Samsung declined to comment to Ars Technica about how much of their respective company’s business is ad sales. But the deals they’ve made with data-collection firms signal big interest in turning their products into lucrative smart TVs. In this case, “smart” isn’t about Internet connectivity but rather how well the TV understands its viewer.

We’re literally turning into an Idiocracy

Screenshot from Idiocracy where Dax Shepard is sitting in the chair watching OW! MY BALLS! and the actual viewing area is a tiny square in the middle of a giant screen, surrounded by a bunch of dumb ad banners

Late night hangs

I can’t think of anything I love more than the dead of night. I don’t know what it is, specifically. I used to think it was because that’s when all the parties happen, but the older I get the more I realize I didn’t even like raging with big groups of people in the first place.


Mozilla’s New Logo Brings Back the Dinosaur Mascot (Kinda)

It could be viewed as a flag on a pole. Sort of like Mozilla planting its values in the ground to say “we’re here, come join”.

But it’s more likely a nod to the original Mozilla mascot (inherited from its Netscape beginnings), which was a red dinosaur (an interesting logo of itself as it was designed by Shepard Fairey who created other seminal design works, and the skate brand OBEY).

I’m a sucker for throwback design language and ASCII doodles. Wonder if this will stick?

Old Mozilla logo on the top left, with an arrow pointing to the new typography and logo on the right. The background is an iridescent rainbow pattern. Source: omgubuntu.co.uk

Trump Once Compared Avoiding STDs to His ‘Personal Vietnam’

“You know, if you’re young, and in this era, and if you have any guilt about not having gone to Vietnam. We have our own Vietnam. It’s called the dating game,” he said during a discussion of Trump’s well-publicized germaphobia and the ongoing AIDS epidemic.

“It’s pretty dangerous out there…It’s like Vietnam,” Trump said earlier in the interview.

I don’t envy the people working at Snopes since Trump entered politics. It must feel like writing for the Onion


I don't really like Fridays

I’m sick at home with covid and, coincidentally, this is the first weekend I’ve had off in as long as I can remember. Usually Fridays are my Monday and Wednesday and Thursday is my weekend.

I like it that way. If I have to go get a haircut, I’m in and out within 20 minutes at 2pm on a Wednesday. There’s never a crowd at the grocery store, or traffic even. Not that I’m really running errands today, all things considered.

I always hated having weekends off. There’s nothing good on TV, all the news sites I read are radio silence. Nothing ever happens on weekends.

Related: NOFX - Thank God it’s Monday


Imported all my posts from Bear Blog 👀 I’m all in on Micro.blog now. It was too much having an entirely separate website just for longer posts.


The Scent Of UX: The Unrealized Potential Of Olfactory Design

Odors may not replace textbooks and lectures, but their addition will make remembering and recalling things significantly easier. In fact, researchers from MIT built and tested a wearable scent-emitting device that can be used for targeted memory reactivation.

This makes me uncomfortable o_O


Let this tiny bean bag chair for your lap hold your heavy handhelds

Doomscrolling isn’t going away any time soon, but there’s no reason you can’t be comfortable while doing it. Mechanism’s $59 Gaming Pillow is designed to shift the weight of gadgets like handheld consoles, tablets, XL smartphones, and e-readers from your arms to your lap

Honestly this looks useful but I’m too proud to own something called a “gaming pillow” lol


Friday is my Monday 😩 but I don’t work until noon tomorrow so it’s also kind of my Friday