Link About It: This Week’s Picks
A call for climate change protest posters and NYC merchandise, and a great reason to watch porn
A New Database of Climate Change Protest Posters
Creative events producer Glug plans to accrue the world’s largest database of climate change protest posters for a 20 September rally held in advance of the UN Climate Summit. The project, entitled Protest by Design, calls for submissions of A3-sized posters with varied messaging and imagery. You can contribute to the database by posting concepts with the hashtags #protestbydesign and #climatestrike, or by tagging UKSCN and Glug. The subsequent posters will become accessible to millions for use at protests on the 20th and beyond. Read more at It’s Nice That.
BMW’s One-Off Vantablack X6
On display at this year’s Frankfurt Motor Show, BMW‘s VBX6 is the “first and only vehicle in the world” to receive a Vantablack VBx2 coating—a sprayable form of the blackest black pigment. BMW partnered with Vantablack inventor Surrey NanoSystems on the disorienting project, wherein the automaker’s third-generation X6 SUV appears almost two-dimensional. It’s spell-binding but there’s just enough reflection for our brain to process some dimension. See photos and a video over at The Verge.
The Stream Queens Provide Safe Spaces for Queer Gamers
Contrary to the stereotypical gamer profile (cisgender white men), the Stream Queens are drag artists. Elixa, a current member of the aforementioned troupe, experienced a fair share of internet trolling and cyber-attacks (online gaming and streaming have longstanding issues with misogyny, slur usage and harassment), but stepping back from platforms like Twitch was not an option. “I thought of my community and how much of an impact I’ve been making on some people. It took me so long to accept who I was that I will not allow someone to censor me,” she says. Along with Deere, who founded the Stream Queens, Elixa and the community provide drag queens and other LGBTQ+ gamers safety, fun and an audiences. Read more at i-D.
Randy Hage’s Miniature NYC Facades
Randy Hage’s NYC storefront project began by documenting them—he took 450+ photos over 14 years across the city. The majority of these shops (unsurprisingly) have been torn down. But from his images, Hage painstakingly reproduces each on to scale. While some are well-known (like CBGB’s or the still-standing Katz’s Deli), many have long been forgotten and lost to gentrification. Hage’s incredibly detailed work keeps the mom and pop stores of yesteryear alive, and serve as a reminder of the city’s rampant development that “displaces the storeowners and residents of these communities.” See more at Booooooom.
BBC’s Voice Assistant Will Understand Accents
Though the public broadcaster doesn’t plan to release a standalone device, BBC announced a forthcoming competitor to Amazon’s Alexa: Beeb. The assistant will be able to recognize regional accents (British ones first) with greater accuracy. The company plans to ask employees from offices across the UK to engage with the software this week in order to gauge its ability to understand identical languages delivered with slight variation. Once available to the public, Beeb will live on the BBC’s website, their iPlayer app on smart TVs, and as a standalone software for developers interested in employing it in their inventions. Read more at The Guardian.
A Call for Rare NYC-Centric Merch
Inspired by Jon Caramanica’s piece on Williamsburg’s Fantasy Explosion, Shirts for Lifelong New Yorkers and Those Who Would Like to Pass for One, The New York Times is calling for photos of your best NYC-centric merchandise. From sweatsuits adorned with New York Department of Sanitation branding to T-shirts from bygone diners and pizzerias, the Style desk seeks photos and stories about a variety of NYC garb. “What’s in your closet or your storage space? Do you have shirts from long-shuttered nightclubs? Old uniforms from city agencies? A dad hat from the beloved neighborhood restaurant that closed last year? Pieces of clothing from your elementary school, your summer camp, your crossword-solver club?” they ask. Read more and submit there.
Pornhub’s “Dirtiest Porn Ever” Funds Ocean Clean-up Projects
Pornhub’s “Dirtiest Porn Ever” features a pair of the site’s most popular actors doing what they do best, but the scene is tarnished by a polluted backdrop. A clean-up crew in Pornhub-branded uniforms attempt to restore the beauty and of course, it ruins the mood. Each time the video is played (the site is visited 92 million times a day) a donation is made to Ocean Polymers, a non-profit dedicated to deploying a vessel to clean up the existing pollution in our oceans. The donation is called out on the video’s page and also provides a link to a page dedicated to simplifying the task of eliminating our single-use plastic dependence. Read more at Quartz.
Winston Helps Users Protect Their Online Data
A filter for all WiFi-connected devices, the Winston plugs into a pre-existing router and blocks sites from employing price manipulations, targeting ads, spyware, malware, surveillance tools and retrieving typical data trails. It does so with “zero knowledge,” as not a single Winston employee will have access to this information either. The device, which is available for pre-order now, proves to be a simple alternative to software installations that scramble, encrypt and anonymize your data—particularly for the less tech-savvy and those with smart devices. Read more at Dezeen.
Link About It is our filtered look at the web, shared daily in Link and on social media, and rounded up every Saturday morning.
