Diffractions Collective Archives - Page 2 of 6

Standing Stone: Kinship

Memory-stones

seldom stand by the road

Save when kinsman honors his kin.

—Hávamál

Runic writing first appeared in the second century AD in the Germanic parts of continental Europe. It was initially used to adorn various status objects, such as brooches, helms, or spearheads, the oldest datable runic find being a comb with the legend harja (ᚺᚨᚱᛃᚨ) dating to 160 ADfound in the Vimose bog on the Danish island of Funen.[1]

The Non-Fungible Time That Remains

A Film by the Cosmo-Financial Study Group

Welcome to the Cosmo-Financial Report, a speculative forecast from the weather within and underground to update our community of distinguished stakeholders and metastable dividuals about the newest innovations and products in the finance industry.

Modifying the Means To The End

In the wake of efforts to create precipitation and combat the arid and drought-stricken landscape of the United Arab Emirates, legions of drones have been unleashed and tested this past July to usher in a novel deployment of cloud seeding. The drones distinguished from previous experiments that relied on dispersing silver iodine in the clouds are equipped with high-resolution sensors that measure temperature, humidity and release electrical charges that are designed to electrocute clouds in their effort to jolt droplets in the clouds which in effect trigger them to clump together and produce rain. 1

Derivative Capitalism & Cryptonomics w/Jonathan Beller

An interview with Jonathan Beller regarding the evolution of the Attention Economy, the role of Cinema as a critical site and catalyst for aspects of Computation, and the possible emergence of a ‘Cryptocommons’.

‘Social Derivatives & Convex Commons’ w/Economic Space Agency & Gerald Nestler

This is the video uploaded from the Diffractions Collective and their featured panel that hosted Economic Space Agency & Robin Hood ‘DAO’ to discuss the nature of Social Derivatives, DAOs, Gaming, and Convex Commons. Below is also accompanying notes from Gerald Nestler who unfortunately was not able to join us.

Goldmen and Dogefathers

image source: https://www.reddit.com/r/fakehistoryporn/comments/7op4em/first_dwarf_in_the_bitcoin_mines_in_toronto/

As I run through each verse of Tolkien’s Dwarven Song of Old Wealth, popularized in Peter Jackson’s more recent film The Hobbit (2012), my mind is torn between prototypical myths of kings and mountain men. On the one hand, the Dwarven Song tells a tale of a mysterious King under the mountain who returns unto his hall. On the other, it’s the tale of an old powerful dwarf taken by madness after losing his mountain and his fathomless horde of gold. For me, the tale confounds and twists two popular mythical archetypes from very polar, yet both proto-Indo European cultures: the Old Man of the Mountain (or the Wildman, wodewose), and the King asleep in the Mountain who returns.