A Year in Illustration

Creating visuals for abstract ideas with the public domain, fair use, Creative Commons and zero artistic talent.

A vintage illustration depicting Ida Tarbell chopping down a tree from which an irate John D Rockefeller shouts at her.

Back when we were inventing blogging, most posts did not have illustration, which was good for me, since I can’t draw so much as a stick figure, and there was precious little in the way of public domain or otherwise freely reusable stock art.

Continue reading "A Year in Illustration"

Pluralistic: An end-of-year retrospective (24 Dec 2022)


Today's links

  • An end-of-year retrospective: 2002, 2003, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2013, 2017, 2018, 2021, 2022.
  • Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading

Continue reading "Pluralistic: An end-of-year retrospective (24 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: What the fediverse (does/n't) solve (23 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: What the fediverse (does/n't) solve (23 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: Here are just two of the corporate giveaways hidden in the rushed, must-pass, end-of-year budget bill (22 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: Here are just two of the corporate giveaways hidden in the rushed, must-pass, end-of-year budget bill (22 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: How Apple could open its App Store without really opening its App Store (21 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: How Apple could open its App Store without really opening its App Store (21 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: 2023's public domain is a banger (20 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: 2023's public domain is a banger (20 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: Better failure for social media (19 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: Better failure for social media (19 Dec 2022)"

“Metaverse” means “pivot to video”

Fool me twice, we don’t get fooled again.

“Oh come, now, you don’t mean to let on that you like it?”

The brush continued to move.

“Like it? Well, I don’t see why I oughtn’t to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?”

That put the thing in a new light. Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forth — stepped back to note the effect — added a touch here and there — criticised the effect again — Ben watching every move and getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said:

“Say, Tom, let me whitewash a little.”

– Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

In 2003, a 19-year-old Harvard undergrad named Mark Zuckerberg had an idea: he’d create a website for Harvard students to nonconsensually rate the fuckability of their classmates. He called it Facemash.

Later that year, Zuckerberg changed the name of the site to The Facebook, and, in 2005, the site was renamed, simply, “Facebook.”

Continue reading "“Metaverse” means “pivot to video”"

Pluralistic: The antitrust Twilight Zone (16 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: The antitrust Twilight Zone (16 Dec 2022)"

Pluralistic: How cable monopolists tricked conservatives into shooting themselves in the face (15 Dec 2022)


Today's links

Continue reading "Pluralistic: How cable monopolists tricked conservatives into shooting themselves in the face (15 Dec 2022)"