string can phone

The difficulties of learning the Japanese language are well-documented, and possibly no task is more daunting to the novice than learning its written form, kanji. The complications of their very language became a detriment to Japanese office managers, who pride themselves on utmost efficiency and productivity. A way to write faster was needed. They saw how the typewriter had increased the productivity of the American officeplace, but American typewriter design was obviously impossible to use with the massive Japanese character set, which can consist of as many as 50,000 characters. The quest to create a kanji typewriter led to a complete re-examination and streamlining of the Japanese language. We at SCP salute the editors of The Book and the Computer who have superbly documented the evolution of the Japanese writing machine as part of their series, Japanese in the Age of Technology.

Our Dear Friend*, Mr. Cockerham is divesting himself of some — no doubt — cherished possessions via the ebay electronic market. Mr. Cockerham’s hands-free ultra-lightweight Kyocera phone set is currently attractively priced at $2.25, made from angel-weight aluminum and comes with 24 feet of lightweight, tangle-resistant, polished cotton string helps ensure that at least one of the two phones are always nearby.

Alas, we cannot bid ourselves as our funds are currently being compiled for the eventual purchase of an Atari 2600 Webserver.

*by “Dear Friend” we do not wish to imply anything beyond Mr. Cockerham allowing us to visit his website on occasion, for which we are grateful.

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Once or twice daily, a young delivery lad knocks on our door with the latest bundle of post. We flip the endearing street urchin a shilling and retire to the smoking room to enjoy the correspondence from you, Dear Readers. Most often, we grammar- and punctuation-correct each, then slip them into the walls as insulation. However, every once in a while we receive a note which we feel compelled to share. Today’s correspondence is from M______ of Scranton, PA, who writes:

Dear Sirs,
Why haven’t you ever written about [the vintage and antique typewriter site] Machines of Loving Grace? It would seem to be a natural fit for inclusion in your publication.

Regards, & Etc. [sic]

Rest assured that Machines of Loving Grace has not eluded our detection. The fact that is has not yet been featured in these pages is simple: it is a site owned and maintained by one of our editors. To write about it could be construed as Shamless Self-Promotion, and that–as we were so often reminded by the hymnal-wielding women who raised us– is something one Does Not Do.

Another reason is that we prefer to features pages of Quality. And from what we have seen of Machines of Loving Grace, it is sorely lacking in typographic and design skills, is far too verbal where it oughtn’t be, and not verbal enough where it should be.

Therefore, kind sir, please understand why we shall refrain from posting about Machines of Loving Grace, or its companion ocean liner postcards site.

Kind regards,
The Management

While the Feng Shui of precise Obelisk placement may bedevil many a gentleman’s spare time in His Garden, there are those of us who are More Concerned with the transportation of said obelisks. Fortuantely, the the Design Observer (oddly enough, but they must be some sort of “Renaissance” chappies) shows us pictures of Moving the Axum Obelisk, cc. 1880.

Although we shamefacedly admit to owning not just one but several digital cameras, this cartoon from PVPonline captures out attitude towards the new-for-the-sake-of-newness perfectly.

The Flying Cars Tribe has parked us for an inordinate amount of time in the lot of Future Car, wherein there is lots to see and mourn for:

Motor cars are the symbol of the American dream and their design is a reflection of American society, which means that the 1970s had some serious problems. The Space Age had much more fun with the automobile. Then cars were Yank tanks with steel breasts and were built so solid that the difference between them and light armour was a point of view. Engines were ever more powerful and speed seemed certain to hit the asymptote of the curve any day. Fins were everywhere and fins were king.

Going up (in a hierarchical parlance) brings us to Tales of Future Past with even more stories and images from the bygone days that should be now.

In the modern bid to find ever new ways of delivering advertising, one company has looked back in time to the Phenakistoscope, Zoetrope, and related devices. This new device, like its inspirations, uses a successions of still images viewed in a small interval of time to create the illusion of movement. The new twist here comes from the images remaining still while the viewer is moved. Most often the audience is captive and did not come for the “show”. One company bringing us this “advance” in advertising is Sidetrack Technologies, an allusion to the placement and method of animation. These are to be placed in the tunnels of BART, and similar commuter trains. They are not alone in this wave of nostaglia. Sub-Media has already installed such advertisements in New York-New Jersey PATH trains (fifteen megabyte, two and a quarter minute motion picture experts group file).

The recent posting of a antique blue light bulb originally sold as a prostate warmer on BoingBoing has prompted us to write about the choice of blue. An excellent write up is to be found in Banvard’s Folly, a book by by Paul Collins (2001, ISBN 0-312-26886-6) which has thirteen chapters devoted to big ideas that failured in one way or another. A wholely satisfying book, we found, but one chapter is particularly relevant to this electrical health gadget.

In 1861, Mr Augustus J Pleasonton made a greenhouse with some clear glass and some blue glass. After ten years, during which time he took a leave of farming to be a Civil War general, Mr. Pleasonton decided that the blue light in his greenhouse was particularly healthy to plants and young animals. He patented his use of blue light in 1871, receiving US Patent #119,242.

Then he published a book extolling the virtues of blue light which created a storm of interest. Contrary evidence was published in the late 1870s which killed the idea for a while, but every few decades it has resurfaced again. Mr John Kellogg had a version (of Kellogg’s Cereal fame) around 1890. Mr Neils Finsen had a turn of the century version. Mr Dinshah P. Ghadali had a mid-1920s variant that designed to separated fools from their money. In 1940 Mr Roland Hunt had a book published entitled The Seven Keys to Colour Healing which extended the powers of the color blue to things besides light, such as colored water.

Even today fringe elements cling to the notion that blue light is particularly healthy, such as The Owner Build Home and Homestead by Mr Ken Kern at Mother Earth News and Hemp Husbandry by Mr Robert A. Nelson at Rex Research. Both of those go so far as to cite Mr Pleasonton, to give the notion historical credence.