Sign in

georgegoodall.bsky.social

@georgegoodall.bsky.social
20 followers 34 following 88 posts
PostsRepliesMedia
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Many years ago, I met a well-dressed Dutchman on the Inca trail: Rockports, corduroys, button down shirt, fine wool v-neck, sports coat. His business meetings were cancelled, so he did the trail. That afternoon, a porter passed me with a huge Samsonite strapped to his back!
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
The world needs a "Best in Show"/"Do Androids Dream" mashup, of an event sponsored by DOGE, because of course it would be.
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
I was told we'd cruise the web for ransomware gold, We'd fire no guns —shed no tears, Now I'm a burnt-out dev at a server rack, The last of Barrett's Cyberteers!
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Oh, the year was twenty-twenty-six, (How I wish I was offline now!) A letter of marque came down from D.C., To the buggiest setup you ever did see, God damn them all! www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIwz...
youtube.com
Stan Rogers - Barrett's Privateers
YouTube video by bytor21122112
110
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
There were no easy catalogues full of task chairs, no Architectural Graphic Standards, no Neuferts. The first edition of Sweets Catalog was 1906. Architects like Wright had to design a lot of things!
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
To be fair, dedicated office furniture was barely a thing in 1904. The first explosion of Information Technology -- filing cabinets and index cards -- was just getting started.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 25/05/2026
A few dashes of Youppi! and Bonhomme in there, just for good measure. Definitely very Québécois!
110
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
I so loved the spinner rack of mmpb at my local library. So many SFF oddities! In retrospect, a collections librarian had a tiny budget and big genre ambitions. I was the beneficiary!
020
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 06/05/2026
Umberto Eco, Jorge Borges, and PK Dick walk into a bar. They're collaborating on a novel. They take out their phones and ask their favorite LLMs to clarify a few things...
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 06/05/2026
I have a few of those series on my shelf: 1, 3, 4, 5 in beautiful trade reissues with slick book design and cover art; 2 as battered hardcover, no dust jacket. Most annoyingly -- different heights. Feels like an intentional strategy to irritate me...
040
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 25/04/2026
"no mention of Quebec or McMahon" -- I clicked through expecting a UK green paper concerning professional wrestling in Montreal. It was... not that.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 21/04/2026
My mind went to Torquay -- a festival of music and technology organized by Basil Fawlty. Now *that* could be interesting.
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
On story, I've found Jonathan Gottschall's work interesting (including his journey into MMA fighting... seriously).
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
I've found it valuable to consider how we interact with story, rather than reading. AI can create stories, particularly if they conform to a formula like the Hero's Journey, but those stories somehow miss. I've been thinking about the relationship between Dumas and Maquet, and the creation of story.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 09/04/2026
I think the hallucinations are a feature, not a bug. I love how LLMs will engage my wackiness, and take it further. Of course, this means the feature most people expect -- truth and veracity -- is actually a bug. These things are cool, but they're not what's on the label.
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 09/04/2026
Yes! That was Julian Orr's research (_Talking About Machines_).
020
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
Boney M -- Nightflight to Venus
030
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
Michael Lewis introduced a related concept in _The Premonition_ -- the L6: "someone six levels down, and no one knows they exist... If you’re a gifted manager, the first thing you do is try to find that L6." (He borrowed the idea from Todd Park)
2112
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
I appreciate this recent insight from Bruce Sterling: "we've accidentally invented Galileo's telescope and we're using it as a kaleidoscope for lolcats that helps kids cheat on their homework." [pulled from my very analog commonplace because, you know <gestures towards screen>]
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
All good. I recently revisited this *ancient* (2.5 years ago) collection of mini-essays on novels and AI. A few familiar names in there! Most of the insights still hold up, despite AI's recent glamour tour. www.theguardian.com/books/2023/n...
theguardian.com
‘It is a beast that needs to be tamed’: leading novelists on how AI could rewrite the future
Novelists and poets, Bernardine Evaristo, Jeanette Winterson, Stephen Marche and others, consider the threats and thrilling possibilities of artificial intelligence
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Hmmm... I don't always agree with @stephenmarche.bsky.social, but I've learned to always take his (many) perspectives seriously. He has a talent for uncovering the first glimmerings of truths against which others have drawn the shades. And he's Canadian, you know. So he'll just keep givin' er.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
Flea's autobiography is very interesting. He talks about his step-dad -- an aspiring jazz musician -- and various antics. Puts some of his aspirations into context. Recommended if you're a fan. Recommended even if you're not a fan!
140
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
Atkins's work on cyanotypes was very important for the emergence of blueprints and the low-cost reproduction of engineering and building drawings, paving the way from a bespoke world to one of mass production and reproduction ("Paging Walter Benjamin. Please come to the service desk.")
001
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 11/03/2026
This whole incident is so weird, from both a product and a risk perspective. Where was the whimsical (and public domain) soft launch? "Karl Marx, Sun Tzu, and Arthur Conan Doyle will review your work!" That would get headlines in The Guardian and Gizmodo. But this...
media.tenor.com
a man in a white shirt is sitting on the floor and says not like this .
Alt: Person in a white shirt is sitting on the floor and says not like this, from Matrix
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 11/03/2026
*George MacDonald Fraser*. Stupid Scottish spellings... Arturo Pérez-Reverte would also write a fine Ramelli novel, methinks.
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 11/03/2026
He deserves his own novel, written by George McDonald Frasier. Guillermo del Toro directs the movie. Ramelli is played by Oliver Reed or Richard Burton.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 11/03/2026
To be fair, Ramelli was a century ahead of Newton, three centuries ahead of Carnot, Joule, and thermodynamics. Imagine him as a neurodiverse D'Artagnan; a 16th-c Ogre in Lambda, Lambda, Lambda; captain of both the early modern high school rugby team, and the robotics team; a Baroque Flashman.
121
Reposted by @georgegoodall.bsky.social
Brittlestar @brittlestar.com · 11/03/2026
This crappy hotel is home. www.brittlestar.com/p/this-crapp...
brittlestar.com
This Crappy Hotel Is Home
Sometimes you step down to someone else's step up
1216927
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
What did Arundell think of Ramelli's book wheel? Nothing apparently. He left no notes. We love that thing. Anthony Grafton had a replica in his office. Contemporaries just shrugged.
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
If you were to dedicate yourself to reading Arundell's notes, you would be... disappointed. He was product of his time, largely lacking mathematics and kinematics. His understanding of the depicted machines is cursory at best.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Arundell apparently loved his copy of Ramelli's work, leaving extensive marginalia and notes, in his own hand and in that of his amanuensis. Elizabethan secretary hand isn't an easy thing to interpret. www.christies.com/img/LotImage...
christies.com
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Arundell was a favorite of Elizabeth I but, as a Catholic, not infrequently found himself off-side in Fleet Prison and was implicated in the Gunpowder Plot.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Ramelli's book is a beautiful thing. It shows up in the libraries of a wide variety of rich old white dudes. Yale's Elizabethan Club has perhaps the most interesting copy. It was owned by Thomas Arundell, 1st Baron Arundell of Wardour.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
The book is more typical, including lessons in geometry, perspective, and fortification. Some of his contraptions greatly resemble Ramelli's, although the kinematics are somewhat suspicious. Interestingly, he includes a few designs for scientific instruments (a la Galileo).
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
In the forward, Ramelli alludes to betrayal by an associate, likely Ambroise Bachot. It seems that Bachot served as both assistant and engraver. He rushed some of his own designs to print ahead of Ramelli (gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/b...).
gallica.bnf.fr
Le gouvernail d'Ambroise Bachot,... : lequel conduira le curieux de géométrie en perspective dedans l'architecture des fortifications, machine de guerre et plusieurs autres particularitez y contenues
Le gouvernail d'Ambroise Bachot,... : lequel conduira le curieux de géométrie en perspective dedans l'architecture des fortifications, machine de guerre et plusieurs autres particularitez y contenues ...
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
His work continues a tradition of engineering sketch books, most famously Leonardo's various codices. Some of his original drawings are at the Smithsonian (library.si.edu/digital-libr...).
library.si.edu
Ramelli's Machines: Original drawings of 16th century machines
Original drawings and superb engravings from Ramelli's book of ingenious inventions that had a great influence on the development of mechanical engineering. The military engineer Agostino Ramelli
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Ramelli's book is a weird thing. It served as a calling card and a resume, describing the fantastical things Ramelli could do for his patrons. In an era of weak IP controls, patronage was crucial.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Ramelli borrowed from earlier works. His designs, in turn, were copied by a wide range of authors like Bockler, de Caus, Leupold, etc. They even appear in the "numbered books of machines" like "507 Mechanical Movements" by Henry T. Brown, a benchtop staple of Second Industrial Revolution.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Ramelli was an engineer and soldier, from Lugano. He was at the Siege of La Rochelle, fighting the Huguenots. But not Besson.
100
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/03/2026
Ramelli was a fascinating guy. His work is perhaps the most famous of the Baroque theatrum machinarum ("theatres of machines" -- I wrote a dissertation on them). The earliest was that of Jacques Besson (1578), Huguenot minister, distiller of scents and oils, etc. www.loc.gov/item/2021666...
loc.gov
Theater of Instruments and Machines.
A new type of book appeared in Europe in the late 16th century, representing a genre of literature known as the "theater of machines." The first of the theaters was produced by Jacques Besson (circa 1...
181
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 06/03/2026
But, you could be your own press secretary! I say hold on for the provincial leadership nomination.
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 05/03/2026
White Castle brought systematic management to the lunch counter. The company is still called "White Castle System." With a bit of search+replace, this is the type of thing White Castle could have written in 1921. "Hey Copilot -- replace 'sandwhich' with 'legacy code.'"
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
So... Will the chairlifts always run for an extra hour?
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 28/02/2026
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 16/12/2025
SiriusXM has a station called "Dad Rock." Not surprisingly, it plays dad rock, mixed in with dad jokes. The concept is a bit saccharine... but it's the compromise choice for my kids and me on long car trips!
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
And also Desk Set. Because Katherine Hepburn. And libraries. And early computers. And debauched office parties. thestalkingmoon.weebly.com/uploads/1/1/...
010
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
The best zombie Christmas high school musical of all time! [I'm not sure I had those adjectives in the right order...] m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5...
240
Reposted by @georgegoodall.bsky.social
Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 08/12/2025
Inverted Catenaries xkcd.com/3176/
Comic. [Two people walking together as inverted catenary curves fall around them.] PERSON: Oh wow, the first inverted catenary fall of the year! Time to swap out my all-season tires for square ones.
202065170
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 04/12/2025
Damn you, Grammarly! You had *one* job...
000
georgegoodall.bsky.social @georgegoodall.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Elaine Svenonious called this phenomenon "guided by the invisible hand of the classification system" -- getting you close so serendipity can occur. Dopamine hit engaged. Instantly getting exactly what (the system thinks) I want just isn't the same. Endowment effect, maybe.
010