TIFI

Posted by Bruce Sterling to Beyond the Beyond.

June 14, 2007 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE EXXON PROPOSES BURNING HUMANITY FOR FUEL IF CLIMATE CALAMITY HITS GO-EXPO Conference organizer fails to have Yes Men arrested.

“We need something like whales, but infinitely more abundant,” said “NPC rep” “Shepard Wolff” (actually Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men), before describing the technology used to render human flesh into a new Exxon oil product called Vivoleum. 3-D animations of the process brought it to life.

Via Schneier on Security.

In a garden in Birchington, best friends Holly Prentice and Jojo Roberts, both aged eight, make daisy chains.

The picket fence marks the limit of their play area. They wouldn’t dare venture beyond it.

“You might get kidnapped or taken by a stranger,” says Jojo.

“In the park you might get raped,” agrees Holly.

Unfucking believable.

Posted by Bruce Sterling to Beyond the Beyond.

Something very strange is happening at University of Bologna… It seems that the University is organizing a “find the treasure” game of “Crediti Formativi Universitari” , “university credits”.

Via Warrenellis.com.

A Dutch TV station says it will go ahead with a programme in which a terminally ill woman selects one of three patients to receive her kidneys. Political parties have called for The Big Donor Show to be scrapped, but broadcaster BNN says it will highlight the country’s shortage of organ donors. The programme, from Big Brother creators Endemol, is due to be screened on Friday night.

Update: It was a hoax. Too bad.

Via ongoing.

In Toronto’s Globe and Mail, a William Gibson elegy (probably to vanish behind the paywall), lamenting cities crushing their history and our memories without even noticing.

The experience taught me something about the past, how it moves into and inhabits the future. Or rather, about how it should, ideally. Because it doesn’t, always. When I first saw London, and Paris, I understood that (though, they too would find their own regoodings, further along).