Walter Benjamin puts activists to shame

This evening I hopped on the bus to Marylebone Road to hear Pier Vittorio Aureli’s keynote lecture at Westminster University’s conference on Scarcity. The theme of the conference is, it goes without saying, timely. As PV pointed out, if the paradigm of the 20th century was growth, then its corollary in the 21st is scarcity. And yet it has only been patchily theorised. Having said that, PV’s approach to the topic was tangential and, I’m about to argue, provocative for the sake of it.

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Edge City published on iTunes

Edge City, along with all the other Strelka Press essays, are now available on iTunes. Which is good news for lots of reasons, not least that the images look much, much better on an iPad. See my earlier post for more on this ebook and the rest of the series.

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Edge City published by Strelka Press

I’ve been meaning to say something here about a piece of writing I’ve just published. It’s a piece of long-form journalism about São Paulo, and one of a new series of ebooks recently released by Strelka Press. I should confess that I’m also the editor behind Strelka Press, so this was partly a case of my wanting to live this particular experiment to the fullest, as both author and publisher.

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Drains of Helsinki

Starting a blog was a terrible idea. As the months roll on since my first and only post, now I just have another thing to feel guilty about. I got 99 problems but paid writing work ain’t one. So with the deadlines piling up this week (and given my inability to finish anything without a deadline), there’s no chance of a proper post. On the other hand, I’ve got these pictures of drains in Helsinki burning a hole in my phone.

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Beneath the street, the wilderness: Occupy and Bear Grylls

What interests me about the Occupy LSX encampment is not that it is outside St Paul’s Cathedral – in reach of sanctuary, as it were – but that it is outside a Blacks adventure store. This branch of Blacks was presumably established to sell adventure gear to City boys and girls off on their thrill-seeking holidays. It struck me that the Occupy camp completely subverts the purpose and meaning of this store, and many others like it.

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