A 1Mhz Z80 clone, in 1984?!?!? The Z80 shipped in 1976 and the basic unit was 4Mhz. It was almost completely out of production by about 1985. For a more direct comparison, consider that the original Macintosh shipped about the same time as this single-board computer.

I recall seeing apocalyptic diagrams like this before. So I did a little web searching and there are several diagrams predating this one, that are so similar, they had to be the source. Here's one dated 1919. http://www.blueletterbible.org/study/larkin/lark07.cfm

That Perret illustration reminds me a lot of Rachel Whiteread's sculpture "House," where she filled an old house with concrete and then stripped away all the house structure from around the hardened concrete. http://acrosstheuniverse.forummotion.com/t1322-rachel-whiteread-s-house

You might be interested in similar artworks and detailed analysis at the MIT website "Black Ships & Samurai." http://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/21f/21f.027/black_ships_and_samurai/index.html It was created by Pulitzer Prize winning historian John Dower for his class "Visualizing Culture." It caused some considerable controversy when it was released, Dower's wikipedia bio goes into some of the details.

Wow, that second image is strikingly similar to Le Corbusier's "Modulor Man." http://www.lenombredor.free.fr/modulor.htm I checked the dates, it appears that Kiesler's publications pre-date Corbu's. They are so similar, I suspect that Kiesler was the direct inspiration for The Modulor.

Nice collection of images. Of course you know that "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I" (there is a version II) is a well-storied painting. It was confiscated by the Nazis and was at the center of one of the greatest legal battles ever attempted at repatriation of stolen art. The case even went before the US Supreme Court. The heirs won and they sold the portrait for $135 million, a record price for any painting. Now it's the centerpiece of the Neue Gallerie in New York City.

It is always fascinating to see your presentations of the microscopic details of engravings, as they reveal the finer aspects of creating a visual illusion. But your illustrations, especially the first one of the eye, and the astronomical diagrams, show an interesting intersection of the arts and sciences through linear perspective and projective geometry. I spent many hours studying and practicing this in art school. One of the basic theories of linear perspective is that the drawing is a projection of a 3D scene onto a plane, and that projection implies a specific viewpoint. This was widely shown in early perspective instructional diagrams like this one: http://tinyurl.com/7pq6b25 This quickly became the scientific metaphor for vision, as in this diagram by Descartes: http://tinyurl.com/76a5gqc These diagrams look quite similar to the astronomy diagrams that trace the rays projected from the sun. But more interestingly (to me at least) the diagrams are viewed from "God's Eye" which looks down at the astronomical objects from above. The illustrators and engravers would have been aware of what they were doing, it is clearly demonstrated in the final illustration in your post. This is such a powerful metaphor for vision, in both science and art, that it is still common today. These diagrams constructed how we think about vision.

Ha, I worked on a similar project in 1977. This idea of mobile computing with a big truck had surprising longevity, even into the microcomputer era. Many a career has foundered in pursuit of this great white whale. http://tinyurl.com/7clfyy9

Ooh, I used to have one of those. I remember the swirly plastic, I thought it distracted your eyes away from the image.

This type of site shots always reminds me of new work by Michael Weseley. He has a new take on architectural site photography: point the camera at a construction site and open the shutter for 3 years. http://itchyi.squarespace.com/thelatest/2010/7/20/the-longest-photographic-exposures-in-history.html It seems to get at the essentials of the object being constructed, while all the activity of the construction itself is invisible.

That is kind of awesome, and the handshake makes it work even better than the original PT reader I used on an old IMSAI 8080A microcomputer. I remember you had to continuously pull the tape. If you stopped, it would corrupt the data. You were supposed to pull the tape evenly using a hand-cranked spool, but we didn't have one so we'd just grab the end of the tape and walk out the door and down the hall. The faster you walked (or ran) the smoother the data was read. But if you stopped or paused, the data would fail the checksum.

It may be worth noting that Apple is the world's largest Open Source software company. They drive development of some of the most essential Unix software like WebKit and CUPS. Darwin, the Unix foundation of MacOS X is Open Source.

You might be interested in the use of clouds in classical Japanese art. Many of the cloud forms were linear with specific curves that had a known meaning. Other times, the clouds were used as framing devices to separate sections of a story, as in the top image of these two byoubu (folding screens). http://www.concatenate.net.au/golden/files/BIGbattle.jpg.jpg

You are correct, the Wireless Walkman was never released in the US. The FCC considers them illegal transmitters, they operate on a reserved frequency. I remember seeing Sony's Wireless Discman players in Akihabara in 1996, none of those models have ever been released in the US either. Now if you want to see a really amazing portable cassette player, check out the Toshiba KT-AS10. It is actually SMALLER than a cassette, it clips onto the cassette. It also came with a AM/FM tuner pack that you could use instead of a cassette. I had one of these, it was incredible. But it burned batteries rapidly, and was very fragile. I dropped it one day and it was ruined. http://pocketcalculatorshow.com/walkman/toshiba/graphics/kt-as10.jpg

My grandfather told me stories of using a portable Hollerith Type 001 keypunch during the 1940s. He was a cattle inspector for the USDA, he'd ride the ranges throughout Wyoming and Montana on horseback, collecting statistics on cattle herds. He carried cards and the punch in his saddlebag, punched his data on to cards while in the field, and mailed them in to the office for processing. So that's always been my image of a cowboy: packin' a Hollerith instead of a Winchester.

I would quibble with your description of the Large Glass, of Duchamp's "finishing it after many years of labor." He abandoned work on the Large Glass for years at a time, and finally declared it had "reached a definitive state of incompletion." I think I finally understood the Large Glass (insofar as that is possible) when I read an interview with Duchamp, accompanied by a photo of him looking through a New York bookstore's shop window. He talked about how a window was a "transaction" between the viewer and the shop display.

I've seen Wiltshire's work, that is a phenomenon all of its own. I personally don't think Corot was at that level of photographic memory, but it's the sort of legend that develops when you draw every leaf with such certitude. That cliche verre is just stunning, it has a whole different type of certitude, I didn't expect that from Corot. Alas, I can't really show my own cliche verre work (btw, is that plural cliches verre or cliche verres?) because they are irreproducible in any other media. I use transparent metallic inks that have a strange reflective sheen, you can't really see the effect except firsthand. I can't scan them or photograph them. Well, I could scan them, but they would be lifeless. But in person.. I had one viewer tell me the prints shined so brightly, they gave her a migraine! You know, the funny thing is, I didn't even know that my prints were cliche verre until I met up with my old art school photo professor, several decades after I studied with him. He said I should see his cliche verre, and I was surprised that it was the same technique I used. I swear I didn't learn it from him, I developed it (oops pun unintended) all on my own. BTW, that was a hell of a collection of paintings, with my favorite Futurists, and I didn't think anyone had ever heard of Rayonism.

Thanks for that Corot. I use the cliche verre process myself, it's my primary work process. I read that Corot had a photographic memory and could look at a landscape once and then draw it from memory so accurately, he could remember every leaf. Of course they say a lot of crazy things about artists.

Your article reminded me of even more ancient calculating methods that were precursors to the abacus. I saw some extensive web documentation of these calculators made from rope, but alas I could not find that page. So I'll give this link as a tantalizing glimpse of what is out there. http://incas.homestead.com/quipu/quipu_video_elearning.html

Based on your recommendation, I just watched a recently released 1080p version of the "restored" cut. You might be surprised at the increase in tonality in a really good BluRay HiDef transfer, the film is much less contrasty black and white than other Noir films. But I was a bit surprised, it is obvious the recut film had some editing problems, it just isn't immaculately tight like a Welles film should be. Still, it's a pretty great Noir classic. But it just makes me wonder what it COULD have been.

Universal? Retrocomputing? Bah, you noobs. This doesn't emulate common CP/M disk formats like North Star. I would buy one if it did, I need a drive for my SOL-20.

If you want to see the real thing, there is an exhibit at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry, I don't know the official name but I call it "The Human Section." A real cadaver was sliced vertically into thin pieces and mounted in formaldehyde between panels of plexiglass. The last time I saw it, about 10 years ago, it was in an appalling state of conservation. But I suspect the museum really wants this grisly exhibit to go away, it was moved to a distant stairwell and is hard to find, even if you know where it is.

Woodblocks wear out quickly, especially when it's a popular print and many impressions are taken from the block. Areas of fine detail (usually in the face) tend to wear out first, and nobody wants to buy a portrait with badly printed face. So It was fairly common for woodblock artists to cut out the worn area around the face and insert a new piece of wood, and recarve it.

I recall a historian who asserted the Industrial Revolution came from the screw-cutter you show here. He said that cutting one screw allowed you to use that as a guide screw to cut better screws. This started the continuous development of more advanced mechanical technology, and in particular, timepieces and watches.

The crater garden makes sense. Explosives are full of potassium, nitrogen, and carbon, so the blast would have tilled and fertilized the soil.