After watching the Oscars … this made me laugh.

Running in tandem with Kerouac’s displeasure and disappointment was the aptly named ‘Erector’ … what confusing times they were! Older brothers getting a hard on for being ‘hip’ and younger siblings on the prowl for an ‘Erector’ and their local mall. Way out!

Jack Kerouac must have felt pretty miffed when the term ‘Beatnik’ became a media stereotype of the 1950s and early 1960s. Bongos, berets, goatee beards, coffee houses, turtlenecks, dark glasses, smoking Gitanes and partner swaps in the suburbs! The actual word was coined by Herb Caen in a 1958 article in the San Fransisco Chronicle. He added the Russian suffix ‘nik’ to the term Beat Generation.  In the vernacular of the period, “Beat” indicated the culture, the attitude and the literature, while the common usage of “beatnik” was that of a stereotype that Madison Avenue advertising agencies could sell what was ‘cool’. Baby Boomers have destroyed our planet’s environment as much as humanly possible, they’ve made investment properties and vulgar consumerism necessities, then they had a good go at destroying banking systems worldwide and ruined a whole generation’s chances at obtaining anything like the standard of living they’ve enjoyed. A very talented generation indeed and so totally removed from Kerouac’s original vision and belief in beatitude.

Kerouac explained what he meant by “beat” at a Brandeis Forum, “Is There A Beat Generation?”, on November 8, 1958, at New York’s Hunter College Playhouse. Seminar panelists were Kerouac, James A. Wechsler, Princeton anthropologist Ashley Montague, and author Kingsley Amis.

I went one afternoon to the church of my childhood and had a vision of what I must have really meant with “Beat”… the vision of the word Beat as being to mean beatific. People began to call themselves beatniks, beats, jazzniks, bopniks, bugniks and finally I was called the “avatar” of all this. “The Origins of the Beat Generation” (Playboy, June 1959)

Here are some great moments in Beatnik popular culture.

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Yesterday I went to a talk given by Richard Dawkins. He gave a summation, along with some funny anecdotes, of his latest book, The Greatest Show on Earth. I love Richard Dawkins. I’m a massive fan of his passionate belief in humanity and how the most difficult concepts of enzymes, cell creation, DNA and the importance of proteins and bacteria have become comprehensible to me through his books. The special place Australian marsupials have in the argument of evolution over creationism as a rational, compelling and scientifically based theory should have those who accept the Bible is literally true (40% of the American population) rethinking their book of rules.

Unhappy Hipsters is one of my new favorite spots to hangout. Maybe I want what they apparently have, could be design envy, or just snark factor. I don’t know. I love the tag ‘It’s lonely in the modern world’.

Nick Gentry is an artist from the UK whose focus is on how society is affected by technological advancement. The movement away from the physical objects that stored our songs, books, photos and important documents to the immaterial world of cyberspace. The formats that once stored all our personal data that now lives in the world wide web were obsolete until now. Using mixed paint and used computer disks on wood, these floppies now have a wonderfully beautiful renewed purpose. Via

More of his work here

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Has anything really changed in the last 50 years? I mean really. Where do you go to meet women and how do you use your skills to get laid!

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Not being a fan of either of these two refreshments (I think they taste how I imagine rust would taste) each of these 2 competing campaigns coming from a different era literally communicate one concept (two at best) and are directed squarely at one class of people (2 stereotypes at best).  Pepsi’s being exclusively ’sociable’ with other fair skinned, middle class friends and Coke’s being ‘refreshed’ in the company of fair skinned elders and relaxing in a wholesome fashion! Coke was a little more sophisticated with the inclusion of ‘all age groups’. Seemingly simplistic and naive and completely foreign in today’s heavily market researched, must appeal to a wide range of age groups, social groups and breach the gender divide era of advertising. They must have worked because beverage giants Coca-Cola Co, Pepsi Co Inc and Dr Pepper Snapple Group Inc control 89 percent of the U.S. carbonated soft drink market.

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Got to hand it to Lifebuoy Handwash for this old print spot from 2008, it’s an oldie but such a goodie. Introducing the sanitized, fear motivated lifestyle that has made everyday activities a pathogen, microbe, bacteria, virus, microorganism, microscopic organism, fungi, protozoa (and many others) obstacle course.  Meh, I say … as a cat kisser, dog patter and someone who has eaten from the dirtiest food hawkers Asia can muster, I’m not impressed! Makes me want to grab my kittehs and just kiss them harder because visually I’m not that threatened by what I’m seeing.  Yes, I want to eat my cats, lick the local dogs and eat whatever garbage my hands get a hold of, because it’s not going to kill me. Post modern germophobia is good for business. Via

Once upon a time there was a mystical machine called a ‘reel to reel’ that used magnetic tape … magically analogue! Here you have before your eyes, evidence of the call to arms, a set of visual cues, openly instructing people to use this machine to record different sources available to the public. Only back in these golden olden days there wasn’t this magical place called cyberspace, where the internet (or interweb for hipsters) lived and would one day play host to whatever was recorded, photographed, scanned, or videoed and eat up valuable hours of our lives!