Ben Rubin's San Jose Semaphore is a "multi-sensory kinetic artwork that illuminates the San Jose skyline with the transmission of a coded message""Each wheel of the Semaphore can assume four distinct positions: vertical, horizontal, and left and right-leaning diagonal; together, the four wheels have a vocabulary of 256 possible combinations. The San Jose Semaphore transmits its message at a steady rate; its four wheels turn to new positions every 7.2 seconds."The installation occupies the top floors of Adobe's headquarters in San Jose. The piece is based on the semaphore telegraphs of the 18th century.The challenge: To crack the code.It took...
The BookMan: Your Personal Bookshelf
Our friends at Any Amount of Books in London have come up with this beauty.It is designed by East Anglian artist Kazmierz Szmauz.The Bookman holds about 100 books it is 70" high by 45" wide and is made from Mahogany, although other woods can be used. Each bookcase is signed by the artist.Cost: $1700Here are the other two models that are available:Gotta love it.
Can We Heal?: A Book of Steel by Janet Goldner
Can We Heal?2000Steel4.5 x 10 x 5 feetA 5 -page hinged steel book born out of Goldner's trip to Poland and the Ukraine to visit her grandparent's birthplace. The work contains the phrase "Can we heal from the wounds of our tortured history? Lithuanians, Russians, Poles, Germans, Jews, Everyone." in both Lithuanian and English. The piece lives in Europas Parkas an amazing outdoor sculpture museum in Lithuania.She also has a series of small scale steel books that "have pages that are hinged together and movable; the pages read independently--but also as an overall image when the book is closed."Also of...
Abebooks Goes Live With Deceptive Bookseller Rating System
Leave it to Abebooks to come up with yet another way to alienate the core group of booksellers that their company was built on.I blogged about this rating system and it's utter disregard for the integrity of bookselling while it was in beta mode.Here is a snippet:AbeBooks is working on a rating system for booksellers based on the star rating systems that appear at other online marketplaces. Unfortunately, this bookseller rating system has nothing to do with bookselling and everything to do with order fulfillment. The amount of stars you earn is based exclusively on your order fulfillment percentage. Nothing...
Handless Reading Contraption
"The new Levo Book Holder takes the stress and strain out of having to hold your book, creating a more comfortable and relaxing reading time...now anyone can enjoy reading hands-free with perfect posture while sitting or reclining." Levo Book Holder Features: Straps: The book straps firmly to the bookboard in less than a minute. Tilt: The bookboard tilts 360 degrees and can hold a book overhead while you read in bed. Yaw: Move your book closer or further while keeping it perpendicular to your line of vision. Telescope Raise your book as high as 51 inches or lower it to...