Make Mag's EduVideos

Make Magazine brings you weekend projects of stuff you can make at home.

I found this too late for the holidays, but this video demonstrates three techniques for creating small holiday cards: aluminum foil, woodblock prints and writing with light!

[via Blip.tv]

Rushkoff's Reality Tunnel

This winter, Doug Rushkoff experienced a series of changes, confrontations and revelations that refocused his understanding of "value".

As a media critic and author, he has been writing books for 15 years and has been hosting an online community of one sort or another for nearly as long.

In a short period of time, Rushkoff was challenged to a duel by a member of the “psychedelic elite” and was shaken to learn that one of his heroes of the 60s, Robert Anton Wilson, author of Cosmic Trigger and Prometheus Rising, was near death and near bankruptcy.

In his article, The Light at the End of the Reality Tunnel, in Arthur Magazine, you can read Doug's reflections on the free market ecology based on reputation, the danger of reality tunnels, the power of thoughts, and the value of communities over heroes.

Good News from Kabul!

(From our friend, world-record holder and former Alphachimp intern, the Jolly Juggler himself: Zach Warren)

The children in Kabul want to wish you Merry Christmas themselves (see video).

A special thanks goes to Jay Cole and the West Virginia Dept. of Education, and to all the individuals whose donations have helped build a new juggling gym for children at the circus in Kabul. The plexiglass structure allows children to play in the light, even during the darkest times of the year.

If you are planning your charitable giving for 2007, please consider a gift to help the MMCC children. I'm making a donation too. Tax-deductible contributions can be made online.

Remembering the blessings of 2006, and wishing you the best for 2007!!

(Click here to listen to a podcast an interview with Zach on his experiences working with the Mini Mobile Children's Circus in Afghanistan.)

Pantone Pen Print

[submitted by Jim Nuttle in DC]
Daniel Eatock sets his latest pen print experiment in the second ALSO* commission of The Aram Gallery.

Curator Daniel Charny describes the work:

Eatock’s predictive construct removes the artist’s hand from the pen, reverses the role of the paper, and allows its characteristics and positioning to become the most influential aspect of the work. Balanced on their nibs each of a set of 288 felt tip pens releases ink that expands into the layers of a ream of paper, making each layer of this multi-print different. This predicted variety is translated into a gambling tension for the consumer that chooses to purchase an unknown result on an unseen layer.

Dimensions: SRA1 640 x 900mm
Edition Size: 73 original prints

– One complete set of Letraset TRIA Pantone markers
– arranged in the colour spectrum
– left for one month
– resting on their nibs
– on a stack of 500 SRA1 sheets
– 70gsm uncoated white paper

The edition number was determined by the number of sheets the ink bled through from the possible 500.

The numbering of each sheet corresponds to the position it was within the stack and also determined its value.

The final sheet the ink reached, (furthest from the top) was numbered 1 / 73 and valued at £1, the one above numbered 2 / 73 and valued at £2 etc. The top sheet (the sheet the pens rested on) was numbered 73 / 73 and valued at £73 [SOLD OUT!]

Pantone Pen Print

Kevin Kelly's True Films 2.0

As a contributor to The Whole Earth Catalog in the early seventies, and as founding editor of WIRED Magazine, Kevin Kelly has been a collector of the cool and the esoteric. We continue to glean precious nuggets from his current on-line catalog, Cool Tools.

True Films 2.0 is the second version of Kevin's reviews of the best documentaries and "factuals" available. This time he reviews 150 of the best true films and list two dozen others which he deems only "good."

For each film Kevin presents 4 or 5 screen shots, and captions, snagged from the film to give you some idea of their texture.

Kevin designed the book in color, but you can buy a black and white softcover version from Lulu.com, where it is the cheapest, or for a bit more from Amazon, where it is the easiest to order. Or you can buy a luxurious 156-page full color softcover version from Lulu. Or you can buy a dirt cheap color version as a PDF download, and get it instantly. In a few weeks you'll be able to get versions for e-book readers and PDAs.

• PDF Download [ $2 via PayPal | $1.88 via Lulu ]
• Black and white softcover book: $10 [ via Lulu ]
• Color softcover book: $30 [ via Lulu ]
  

Visit the official True Films website to see all of Kevin Kelly's reviews at www.truefilms.com.

From Kevin Kelly:

Now here is the thing. In each mode, I make exactly the same profit: $1.50 per book. In an experiment in new publishing I have priced each version $1.50 above my costs. So the different prices merely reflect the different costs of that venue. This means I don't care which edition you choose! Whether you buy the $2 PDF version, or the $30 color Lulu print version, or order from Amazon, I make exactly the same $1.50 per book. As I add other options for purchase the same process will apply: my total markup will be $1.50 above my costs.
Do I need to mention there is the free website version? Not as handy as a book, but updated with my latest additional reviews. However, I'm partial to the book version. It is a great browse, very concentrated and accessible and as it says on the cover "Perfect for Netflix."

-- KK

Best Small Art Gallery: moxie DaDA

Pittsburgh - Best Small Art Gallery: moxie DaDA - Main Feature - Main Feature Extra - Pittsburgh City Paper

BY BILL O'DRISCOLL

Conventional wisdom says the blank canvas is every artist's nightmare. For an art-gallery owner, though, it might be another story.

Christine Whispell, at least, seems right at home in the tabula rasa space where she and her colleagues are preparing to transplant moxie DaDA, their 2-year-old gallery.

The new venue is located in The Firehouse Ceramics Studios, an actual old North Side firehouse. And on the gallery's half of the first floor, beneath the high ceilings and fluorescent lights, three big wooden frames -- painted white and hung by chains on the bare brick wall -- suggest naked canvas.

The Arch Street gallery's grand re-opening, on Jan. 6, will be the latest chapter in a story that began when Whispell, a native of upstate New York, moved here in 1994 to attend The Art Institute of Pittsburgh. In 2004, after seven years as a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review news artist, Whispell left to combine her love of art with a long-held desire to run a community space.

No Gift Baskets, Please.

Last year, the NYC office of Z Plus Partners in DUMBO (located down under the Brooklyn Bridge) was inundated with holiday gift baskets.

While they definitely enjoyed the treats, it got them thinking-- there is a lot of cost associated with sending these items -- money that could be more meaningfully spent.

So they came up with a website for the holiday season that offers up some gift alternatives: NoBasketsPlease.com.

The site includes items chosen to promote sustainability and social responsibility:

For your literary friends... Worldchanging: a Users Guide for the 21st Century
For the chocoholic in your life... greenandblacks.com
For those who want to green the earth... self.org
For communities across the globe... heifer.org
And if you must send a gift basket, why not send one to support our troops in Iraq... ecarepackage.com

Z Plus also commisioned a song for the season, specially written by official Pop!Tech bard, Ethan Lipton, aptly titled "Gift Basket". You can download it for free from the Z+ Blog.

Z + Partners > Weblog > Some Gifts That Keep On Giving