Talking To Strangers

explore-blog: This is lovely – Diego Stocco makes music from...

Sat, 18 May 2013 15:50:24 -0400

This is lovely – Diego Stocco makes music from leaves and a turntable.

I love when nature and technology collide creatively.

"We are a species driven by narrative and art is storytelling. We need to tell stories. We need to..."

Fri, 17 May 2013 21:26:09 -0400

“We are a species driven by narrative and art is storytelling. We need to tell stories. We need to tell stories to pass along ideas and information and to try and make sense out of all this chaos. And sometimes, when you get a really good artist and a compelling story, you can almost achieve that thing that’s almost impossible which is entering the consciousness of another human being…so the experience is transformative.”

- Steven Soderbergh on storytelling (via heidisaman)

(via Securing Press Freedom for All | Free Press) I’m glad to...

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:22:42 -0400

(via Securing Press Freedom for All | Free Press)

I’m glad to see journalist security getting the attention it is, but we shouldn’t just accept and adapt to this new world of surveillance and eroding rights. We need the press to fight back on these encroachments, but we can’t leave it up to journalists alone. We all have a stake in this issue — as media makers, news consumers and members of the public — and we need to begin building a broad-based movement for media rights.

"What is it we want our maps to be now, if no longer a single authoritative view or the world?"

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:18:04 -0400

“What is it we want our maps to be now, if no longer a single authoritative view or the world?”

- Making Maps, the Google Way Transcript - On The Media

Relevant as we think about Google Maps and personalization.

New Post: Google Maps, Sense of Place and the Algorithms of Our...

Fri, 17 May 2013 09:20:50 -0400

New Post: Google Maps, Sense of Place and the Algorithms of Our Heart

View Post

"Insofar as there’s a “scandal” here, it’s more about what is legal than what isn’t. The DoJ simply..."

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:04:42 -0400

“Insofar as there’s a “scandal” here, it’s more about what is legal than what isn’t. The DoJ simply has extraordinary power, under existing law, to spy on ordinary citizens — members of the media included. The White House is trying to change existing law by encouraging Sen. Chuck Schumer to reintroduce the Media Shield Act. The Post’s Rachel Weiner has a good rundown of what the bill would do. It’s likely that the measure’s national security exemption would make it relatively toothless in this particular case, but if Congress is worried, they always can — and probably should — take that language out. Still, that legislation has been killed by Republicans before, and it’s likely to be killed by them again.”

- The scandals are falling apart

"Now it’s time now for U.S. media companies and individual bloggers alike to recognize that..."

Thu, 16 May 2013 11:52:53 -0400

“Now it’s time now for U.S. media companies and individual bloggers alike to recognize that they live in an environment in which their own government—not to mention criminal or corporate hackers—may well be using all of the tools at its considerable disposal, legal or not, to spy on them. They will increasingly need to practice their craft here at home as if they were independent journalists or dissidents living under an authoritarian regime.”

- Strongbox and other tools for journalists to protect themselves from the U.S. government.

And as more and more citizens are taking up the tools of media making and journalism, this can’t just be a fight that exists amongst the press. The tools and training needed to report and create media safely need to be part of our civic life broadly, and the fight to defend our rights must engage people broadly as well.

Everything You Wanted to Know About the DoJ/AP Controversy | Free Press

Wed, 15 May 2013 15:27:02 -0400

Everything You Wanted to Know About the DoJ/AP Controversy | Free Press:

Everything You Wanted to Know About the DoJ/AP Controversy - an explainer with copious links.

erinpolgreen: Every day. Just watching this is fun.

Wed, 15 May 2013 14:30:46 -0400

erinpolgreen:

Every day.

Just watching this is fun.

(via Holder Isn’t Sure How Often Reporters’ Records...

Wed, 15 May 2013 11:34:57 -0400

(via Holder Isn’t Sure How Often Reporters’ Records Are Seized : The Two-Way : NPR)

New Yorker Launches New Whistleblower Submission System, With...

Wed, 15 May 2013 10:44:50 -0400

New Yorker Launches New Whistleblower Submission System, With Code Written by the Late Aaron Swartz

(via Introducing Strongbox, a Tool for Anonymous Document-Sharing : The New Yorker)

Free Press Joins Major News Organizations in Pushing the Government to Explain Itself | Free Press

Tue, 14 May 2013 17:40:20 -0400

Free Press Joins Major News Organizations in Pushing the Government to Explain Itself | Free Press

Tell the Justice Department You Won’t Stand for Attacks on...

Tue, 14 May 2013 16:09:45 -0400

Tell the Justice Department You Won’t Stand for Attacks on Press Freedom

It was just revealed that the Justice Department secretly obtained the phone records of political reporters from the Associated Press in a “massive and unprecedented” violation of journalists’ constitutional right to gather and report the news. The government reportedly seized call logs and records from more than 20 AP phone lines in three sites, including the agency’s main phone inside the House of Representatives press gallery. This kind of behavior could have a chilling effect on journalists and whistleblowers everywhere.

This unprecedented abuse will continue unless we speak out. We’ll deliver your signatures to the DoJ and Congress — and will push Congress to launch an investigation.

Americans must not stand for this attack on press freedom.

(via FreePress.net | Tell the Justice Department You Won’t Stand for Attacks on Press Freedom)

http://www.worldpressphoto.org/news/digital-photography-experts-confirm-integrity-paul-hansen’s-image-files

Tue, 14 May 2013 15:02:08 -0400

http://www.worldpressphoto.org/news/digital-photography-experts-confirm-integrity-paul-hansen’s-image-files:

DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY EXPERTS CONFIRM THE INTEGRITY OF PAUL HANSEN’S IMAGE FILES

Tue, 05/14/2013 - 19:33

Following recent discussion and speculation in the media about the photograph by Paul Hansen, selected as World Press Photo of the Year 2012 by the contest jury, World Press Photo has submitted the image files for a forensic analysis. The purpose of the investigation into the authenticity and editing history of the picture is to curtail any further speculation about the integrity of the image and to establish that it is not a composite.

"While this incident has brought the Justice Department’s crackdown on leakers to a new..."

Tue, 14 May 2013 12:48:52 -0400

“While this incident has brought the Justice Department’s crackdown on leakers to a new extreme, it’s important to remember, this storm has been brewing for a while now. In five years, the Obama administration has prosecuted more leakers under the Espionage Act than all other administrations combined, and virtually all these prosecutions have engulfed journalists one way or another.”

- Justice Department Investigation of AP Part of Larger Pattern to Intimidate Sources and Reporters | Freedom of the Press Foundation

(via Gov’t obtains wide AP phone records in probe) This is...

Tue, 14 May 2013 12:48:28 -0400

(via Gov’t obtains wide AP phone records in probe)

This is huge and troubling.

(via How the 2013 World Press Photo of the Year was faked with...

Tue, 14 May 2013 12:47:49 -0400

(via How the 2013 World Press Photo of the Year was faked with Photoshop | ExtremeTech)

Fake is likely way too strong a word here… but whether or not the World Press Photo of the Year was manipulated, this post is a good lesson in how to analyze fakes.

A good follow up to LEGO-gate.

Sat, 11 May 2013 20:20:21 -0400

A good follow up to LEGO-gate.

Waiting for a breeze.

Sat, 11 May 2013 19:21:08 -0400

Waiting for a breeze.

climateadaptation: From Michael Marten’s series, Sea Change,...

Sat, 11 May 2013 15:54:51 -0400

climateadaptation:

From Michael Marten’s series, Sea Change, which explores rising sea levels from regular tides and also climate change. His statement:

‘Sea Change’ is a study of the tides round the coast of Britain. The views in each diptych are taken from identical positions at low tide and high tide, usually 6 or 18 hours apart.

I am interested in showing how landscape changes over time through natural processes and cycles. The camera that observes low and high tide side by side enables us to observe simultaneously two moments in time, two states of nature.

Recent landscape photography often focuses on human shaping (and reshaping) of the environment - urbanisation, globalisation, pollution. Even when critical and committed, this approach can emphasise, even glamorise, humankind’s power over nature. I’m interested in rediscovering nature’s own powers: the elemental forces and processes that underlie and shape the planet.

The tides are one of these great natural cycles. I hope these photographs will stimulate people’s awareness of natural change, of landscape as dynamic process rather than static image. Attending to earth’s rhythms can help us to reconnect with the fundamentals of our planet, which we ignore at our peril.

‘Sea Change’ also comments on climate change. The tide floods in and quickly recedes again, but rising sea levels will flood our shores and not recede for thousands or millions of years. Many of the views in these pictures may have disappeared in 100 years’ time.

— Michael Marten

Lens Culture

Great use of Gifs