The video “Running with the Beast” for the band zZz is interesting in two ways.

First there is of course the music and then the project shown “…about two artist who have created the conditions to capture rage in a systematic way…” by letting two colored cocks print their fight on a sheet of paper.

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

video by: Conditional Design

One of W.H. Auden best known poems “Funeral Blues” in its second (shorter) and changed version. We are still searching for the original version with five stanzas which Auden wrote together with Christopher Isherwood in 1936.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

Wystan Hugh Auden, 1907 - 1973, Funeral Blues

More information:
W.H. Auden at Wikipedia

An outstanding time-lapsed video of the sky, the sun, moon and the stars.

“…Set the sky in motion! Not seen in real-time by naked eye, but a time lapse technique speeds up the motion of the celestial objects. About 7000 individual photographies were assembled showing the apparent motion of the sun, moon, and stars due to earths rotation…”

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

video by: Ansgar Rudolf and Till Credner

More information
More great time lapsed videos available at The Sky in Motion

A video with a little puzzle to start the new year.
The Yoshimoto Cube - a transformation of two stellated rhombic dodecahedrons from one cube.

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

More information
A discussion of the video and the topic at Reddit

Thanks to all our readers for another year of your support.
Best wishes and happy holidays!

Now you can finally find out what the meaning of life is, well maybe not.

Click on the image below for the link

via: fatheed at Flickr

A video to start your day smiling.

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

More information:
Download the song at Fatblueman web log.

Here’s one more way to reduce the amount of resources you use without need.

The Dutch group SPRANQ has developed MS Windows and Mac font replacements that have little holes within the normally printed areas of a font to reduce the amount of ink used. The fonts are based on Vera Sans an open source font similar to Verdana. Their tests resulted in about 20% less ink used.

Downloads are available for MS Windows XP, MS Vista and Mac OS X.

Click on the image below for the link.

To install the font on MS Windows XP, follow these steps:

• 1. Click Start, and then click Run.
• 2. Type the following command, and then click OK:
  %windir%\fonts
• 3. On the File menu, click Install New Font.
• 4. In the Drives box, click the drive that contains the font that you want to add.
• 5. In the Folders box, click the folder that contains the font that you want to add, and then click OK.
• 6. In the List of fonts box, click the font that you want to add. To select more than one font at a time, press and hold the CTRL key while you select each font.
• 7. Click to select the Copy Fonts To Fonts Folder check box. The new font is saved in the Windows\Fonts folder.
• 8. Click OK.

More installation instructions and Help for other OS on the Ecofont web site.

More information:
About Ecofont

This is one of Klaus Nomi’s greatest performances. In this video, Klaus Nomi sings Purcell’s aria “The Cold Song” from his 17th century baroque opera King Arthur.

The opera’s composer Henry Purcell died in 1695 from incurable T.B. aged 36, while in 1983 Klaus Nomi sadly died as one of the first prominent victims of AIDS, aged 39.

He died about a half year after this recording was taken in Munich, Germany.

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

From the libretto of Purcell’s aria Cold Song:
“…What power art thou, who from below
Hast made me rise unwillingly and slow
From beds of everlasting snow
See’st thou not ( how stiff )2) and wondrous old
Far unfit to bear the bitter cold,
I ( can scarcely move or draw my breath )2)
Let me, let me freeze again to death.3)

More information:
Klaus Nomi at Wikipedia.

The song Lux Aeterna (Requiem For A Dream) by Clint Mansell.

Click on the image below for the link (multimedia)

More information:
Another version / variation of this great song played on the piano.