Hoffman also gives an account of what he calls the “dark underside of the arms race”: the secret decision by the Soviet government to turn biological germs and toxins into weapons, despite signing a treaty banning these weapons at the same time. The book reveals some details and lesser known facts now available after documents have come to light and personnel working on these projects started to give information.

Insightful are also accounts of encounters on the political stage (like the 1985 Geneva Summit) and military blunders (like the shooting down of Korean Airlines Flight 007). The reader gets the impression of how decisions that could have wiped out millions of people depended on beliefs, suspicions and gut feelings about the other side or superiors rather than reasoning. It is revealed that often enough even the facts that would support such reasoning were wrong or missing entirely.

Having lived in this period as a child and teenager Hofmann’s book brings back memories — mostly from TV. News items and films like War Games, The Day After and Z For Zachariah come to mind. It reminds me of a time when these stories were the ordinary background of an upbringing (not only mine). Recalling from today I feel a strange longing. There is regret of having missed the (what seemed then) very real chance of fulfilling every boys dream of never having to grow up. The eerie sense one gets when walking on the edge of an abyss and the cynical cold one has after having done so for a long time.

David E. Hoffman, The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy, 2009, ISBN 978-0385524377

12.10.2011

Construction work at the new headquarters of the European Central Bank (ECB) is currently making good progress. It is located on the grounds of the former central wholesale market (Großmarkt) of Frankfurt. Part of the historical building known as the Großmarkthalle will be preserved and included in the new complex.

14.10.2011

Work on the building site had begun as early as Spring 2008 but was stopped after no general contractor could be found. After this the tendering procedure was redrafted allowing bidders to make offers for individual lots rather than the whole project. Also different market conditions brought about by the global financial crisis may have helped the ECB to get companies aboard which previously were not interested. Projects in the Middle East and further abroad that offered better profitability were by then charged with higher risks or business opportunities had evaporated entirely.

25.10.2011

In February 2010 construction work was resumed and the former Großmarkthalle was partially torn down to make room for the new structure that is to cut through the original landmark building, but will preserve some of the historical structure. Some of the torn down parts had already suffered damages in the Second World War and were rebuilt thereafter.

27.10.2011

The photos on this page we conveniently taken by me on trips to work on the nearby Hanauer Landstraße.

I first created a subdomain using the “web” directory of Symfony 2 as document root for the vhost.

However, I seemed to could not get rid of the errors calling config.php telling me, that app/cache and app/logs were not writeable by the server. After searching the web top to bottom and having a look at the output of php_info() I identified the culprit. PLESK sets open_basedir (the topmost directory that is accessible by your web server) to the document root:

open_basedir var/www/vhosts/<YOURDOMAIN>/ <SUBDOMAINHTTPDOCS>/Symfony/web/:/tmp/

To remedy this place a file called “vhost.conf” under /var/www/vhost/<YOURDOMAIN>/subdomains/ <SUBDOMAIN>/conf containing directives overriding PLESK’s settings, e.g.:

Now to get the settings into the system run as root:

/usr/local/psa/admin/bin/httpdmng --reconfigure-all

Then restart Apache:

apache2ctl restart

Which OS are You?

Deeply rooted in the working class the Angelic Upstarts never held back with their opinion. Their origin in the Oi! scene made them popular with both punks and skinheads. Like The Clash and other bands with punk origin their music was influenced by Reggae music (“I understand”).

The Angelic Upstarts also acquired an unwanted following of racist skinheads. When the National Front and others of their ilk tried to adopt their music for their purposes they were tought a lesson in violence. The Upstarts did not only speak out against racism, join the popular “Rock against Racism” campaign or write songs. They quickly found that holding “I hate Nazis” signs and talking about it were not very effective. Instead they took up the fight on the discourse level of their oponents. Attacked by racist skins at their concerts they choose to retaliate — with their fists. Most of the time the racists kept their opinion, but lost their teeth.

The lyrics of their songs and public statements — especially by vocalist “Mensi” (Thomas Mensforth) — were often controversial. Using the vocabulary and symbols of racist and right wing politics they challenged their audience to deconstruct the semiotics of hatespeak. Often misunderstood and seen by many as contradictory, their display of patriotism, adoration the Union Jack or even pride in their skin colour (“I’ve got nothing against niggers but I’m proud to be white.”) was challenging, provocative or even offensive — depending on where you stand. Mensi and the Angelic Upstarts played with the ambiguous nature of signs. A dangerous game in a linguistic environment that is quick with labels and prefers naïve correspondence of signifier and signified to careful textual analysis and close reading.

Find out more by reading these interesting interviews:

• http://www.punkglobe.com/angelicupstartsinterview.html
• http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/1196/upstarts.html

Also drawing (cartoons) and manga play a major role in Megatokyo. Cases in point are the self-referential discourses about the four panel format (in later episodes mostly abandoned), and the discussion of a previous episode reviewed by characters during a visit to the cinema.

A major attraction for fans is the humour based upon the circumstances Piro and Largo find themselves in after stranding in Japan. They are gamers in their early twenties, preferring the world of cartoons and computer games to their desolate and frustrating life. Their inability to act appropriately in social contexts, paired with their escapist approach when it comes to problems of the everyday life, makes it easy for many geeks to relate to their experiences. Both Piro and Largo are intelligent enough and capable of getting a job, earning money and performing the social rituals of mating, but they prefer dating sims (a game genre popular in Japan). They know that there was a Sim game about this kind of middle-class, suburban utopia and it sucked — ’nuff said.

Well, it isn’t entirely bad. In much the same way that a boring car isn’t bad if you just want to get from A to B. The book is quick and entertaining to read, likely to apeal to a wide yet undemanding audience, and inoffensive even where its creator sauced things up. So the whole thing is an epistulary novel in email, but it wasn’t avantgarde — even when it was new.

Still like to grab the book? Do so by all means, I’m sure it’ll entertain, but I also think it’s likely to be forgotten in much the same way as a ride to the supermarket.

Matt Beaumont: e. Plume Books. October 2000. ISBN 0452281881.

The person called peculiar is Dick Shoup who grabed and manipulated video footage when the people around him were trying to invent an office suite. Xerox PARC must have been one of the most creative places in space and time ever. Every time I sit on a bean bag I try to imagine what it must have been like there back then.