(flashback, in situ)

In case you may have missed this selection of eminently quotable profundities, bon mots, maxims, aphorisms, and engaging witticisms by the sage rhetoricist Marshall McLuhan when first posted here—well, here we go again…

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Whereas convictions depend on speed-ups, justice requires delay.

Money is the poor man’s credit card.

We look at the present through a rear-view mirror.

We march backwards into the future.

Invention is the mother of necessities.

You mean my whole fallacy’s wrong?

Mud sometimes gives the illusion of depth.

The trouble with a cheap, specialized education
is that you never stop paying for it.

People don’t actually read newspapers.

They step into them every morning like a hot bath.

Today each of us lives several hundred years in a decade.

The price of eternal vigilance is indifference.

News, far more than art, is artifact.

When you are on the phone or on the air, you have no body.

Tomorrow is our permanent address.

All advertising advertises advertising.

The answers are always inside the problem, not outside.

Politics offers yesterday’s answers to today’s questions.

The missing link created far more interest
than all the chains and explanations of being.

When a thing is current, it creates currency.

Food for the mind is like food for the body:
the inputs are never the same as the outputs.

The future of the book is the blurb.

The ignorance of how to use new knowledge stockpiles exponentially.

A road is a flattened-out wheel, rolled up in the belly of an airplane.

I may be wrong, but I’m never in doubt.

This information is top security.
When you have read it, destroy yourself.

(Image: detail of rear-view McLuhan photograph taken by the late great Canadian photographer Yousuf Karsh on 21 January, 1967)

Winnipeg, Canada

I’ve been asked to present at GDC Manitoba’s PechaKucha Night two weeks from now (Wednesday, 17 February 2010). PechaKucha is an event/format devised in Tokyo in 2003 for designers and creatives to meet, network, and show their work in public (drawing its name from the Japanese term for the sound of “chit chat,” PechaKucha is a presentation format based on a simple idea: 20 images x 20 seconds each x inspiring, motivated creative speakers). In recent years PechaKucha has ballooned in popularity, with events happening around the world. Learn more about the upcoming gig (free admission, cash bar) at the lovely old Park Theatre in Winnipeg here.

Wednesday, 17 February 2010
The Park Theatre, 698 Osborne Street
Winnipeg, Manitoba

Doors open at 19:30, first presenter at 20:20 (of course).

Porto, Portugal

Soiled your favourite shirt? No need to fire up that wasteful washing machine… with this lovely molded wash-tub (and a bit of elbow-grease) you can return to the age-old practice of hand-washing in style. Read more about it here—just one of many excellent designs by the talented Emanuel Barbosa, a designer and teacher at Escola Superior de Artes e Design (ESAD) in Matosinhos, Portugal.

Any questions? (source: unknown Fabio Gioia)

Tapachula, Mexico

My older brother Jim (recently retired from a lifetime teaching career) is on an extended road-trip south to Panama (and back, we’re hoping!) with his brother-in-law Bob Banman. I’ve just received the first travel update by email and am re-posting it here, in Jim’s words, for the benefit of extended family and friends…

“We got stopped by the Mexican army today. They searched through all our stuff, then tried to convince us to sell them Bob’s big GPS. The soldiers sure wanted it, but we managed to leave without selling them the GPS or giving them any money, so that was good.

Tomorrow morning we try to cross the border into Guatemala; then we have only a short drive (140km) to Quetzaltenango.

We’re in Tapachula, Mexico right now. It was 97F here today (36C) and humid. We spent the evening sitting in the city plaza, eating supper and watching the people. They all come to the city plaza for the evening, all dressed up and ready to socialize. Bob and I stand out of the crowd because we’re gringos and so much bigger than everybody else.

Did lots of mountain driving today; good roads in Mexico! Will be in touch again soon…”

Pic is of “Diego and Pako, two little street merchants I paid 5 pesos each to let me take their pictures.”

Midway Atoll (middle of the North Pacific)

Chris Jordan is a remarkable Seattle-based photographer/activist who uses his skills effectively to address challenging social issues and redress problems arising from our modern lifestyles. (I’ve often shown his thoughtful and impeccably crafted photographic interventions in talks I’ve given). Midway: Message from the Gyre is a stunning photographic essay that delivers an important message (about avoiding, reducing, or effectively recycling plastics) with uncommon punch—view the entire image collection here. Following is the accompanying text by Chris…

These photographs of albatross chicks were made in September, 2009, on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world’s most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles (3200 kilometers) from the nearest continent.

Keep up the great work, Chris! (thanks to friend Gregor Brandt for the link)

Heartfelt expressions regarding peace and hope and change are powerful—no matter what corner of the earth or in which back alley you may find them.

Thanks to Belgian statistician, philosopher, writer, and human rights blogger extraordinaire Filip Spagnoli for these images/links.

Auschwitz, Poland

It’s 65 years ago today since Soviet troops liberated the last of the living at the Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp… at which an estimated 1.1 million human beings perished at the hands of the Nazis. This particular day (27 January) is now remembered worldwide as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Image: Starving Romani (aka Gypsy) children at Auschwitz

Milan, Italy

Internationally-known graphic designer Bob Noorda, who helped introduce a Modernist look to advertising and corporate logos in the 1960s (as well as the entire New York City subway system) died on January 11 at the age of 82 due to complications of head trauma suffered in a fall. For his contributions to the city of Milan, he has been given a sepulcher in the city’s historic cemetery, the Famedio del Cimitero Monumentale, where some of Milan’s most famous citizens are buried.

A master of spare, elegant, and logical designs that “caught the eye,” Dutch-born Noorda helped found Unimark International in 1965, teaming up with a group of American and European designers (including Massimo Vignelli), with initial offices in Chicago and Milan. An early proponent of unified branding—the consistent use of distinctive type and imagery to identify a company—Unimark has been credited with awakening the corporate world to Modernist design thinking.

The influence of Bob Noorda carries on…

Read the full Obit by Steven Heller in The New York Times, here.

(thanks for the link, Ronald)

Cleveland, Ohio (99 years ago)

“The Pyramid of Capitalist System is a provocative illustration of the hierarchical system of capitalist rule in America. In this beautifully colored portrait, the artist depicts the multiple tiers of working class oppression. At the top of the pyramid sits the state, which serves the interests of the ruling class and functions under capitalism as the protector of private wealth and property. Below the state stand the religious leaders, clergymen, and preachers of false consciousness who encourage obedience to and acceptance of the status quo, entreating the working masses to accept their ordained fate and seek their just rewards not on earth but in that glorious hereafter.

If obedience cannot be encouraged it will surely be enforced by the members of the next tier… beneath the military sit the parasite class, the bourgeoisie, who exploit the toilers of the world and profit by their labor power.

Beneath it all, bearing the weight of the entire system, are the workers who produce all things fundamental to the perpetuation of life and the continuation of this system. Thus, in addition to illustrating the multi-layered oppression and exploitation of workers, this image also begs the question, “what would happen to capitalism if the workers simply withdrew their support?”

Poster image: Pyramid of Capitalist System, issued by Nedeljkovich, Brashick and Kuharich, Cleveland: The International Publishing Co., 1911.