December 10, 2012
Hailed as one of the best inventions of 2012 by America’s Time Magazine, Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde is able to create a perfect white cloud in a room by meticulously regulating the air’s temperature, humidity, and light.
“When the conditions have been made just right, Smilde brings the cloud into existence using a fog machine. The cloud lasts only minutes, but the blending of art and nature is beautifully moving.”
(Link: enpundit.com, Photo of Cloud by Mollivan Jon, some rights reserved)
Tags: clouds, fog, inventions
December 9, 2012
Why would you want to ask a court whether an Apple iPad is a phone or a general computer? Well, if computers given as a Christmas bonus are considered income and phones are not, you might have an incentive, especially if the back taxes amount to 323,687 euro.
Broadcaster RTL Nederland gave 664 of its employees an iPad in 2010, including a Vodafone 3G subscription. The law says that something supplied by one’s employer does not count as income if this something is intended “to prevent costs, expenses or depreciations needed for a correct execution of one’s employment”, Arnoud Engelfriet reports.
The law also prescribes categories of devices that are applicable, including “phones, Internet and such communication devices, but not computers, nor similar devices or peripherals”.
RTL Nederland sued the Dutch tax office and the question before the court became whether these iPads were mainly computers or mainly communication devices. The court ruled on 30 November that “considering the format of the iPad (the version the claimants provided has a 9.7 inch screen diagonal) verbal communication should not be seen as the central function of the iPad.”
RTL Nederland will appeal the decision. “We are a media company,” a spokesperson told Webwereld. “We work with those iPads, they are part of our daily business.”
Tags: communication, companies, employees, employers, income tax, iPad, law, RTL, RTL Nederland, tax service, taxes, telephony
December 8, 2012
On 27 July 1668 lawyer, doctor and libertarian wunderkind Adriaan Koerbagh was convicted for heresy. His crime? Writing and publishing a dictionary* two years earlier.
Koerbagh was a religious man, but he held no truck with (too much) superstition. A thing that irritated him was the use of foreign (Greek or Latin) words in the Bible to obfuscate their often simple meanings. In his dictionary he pointed out that ‘angel’ merely meant ‘messenger’, that ‘devil’ meant ‘slanderer’ (“the devil was invented by theologians**”) and that Jesus Christ ought to be called Jesus the Anointed. He felt that theologians, lawyers and doctors used foreign words on purpose to keep the common man from seeing through their dogmas.
According to Pim den Boer, Koerbagh was the first Dutchman to publicly denounce miracles: “Theologians claim that a miracle is something that stands above nature or goes against it, but that is not true, because nothing can be above nature or go against it.”
In 1993 lexicographer Ewout Sanders published an anthology of Koerbagh’s dictionary, but now DBNL.org has published the whole thing. It is not clear to me if the book is still forbidden.
About the Bible Koerbagh wrote: “If the word would no longer be protected by fire and sword, it would deteriorate in no time.” The author would feel the force of that fire and sword. Two years after his conviction he died in prison at the age of 37.
*) Titled A Flower Garden Full of Loveliness Without Sadness.
**) I should point out that the common Dutch word for theologian, theoloog, is also derived from Greek. Koerbagh of course uses the Germanic form godsgeleerde.
(Link: Marc van Oostendorp)
Tags: Adriaan Koerbagh, dictionaries, lexicographers, lexicography
December 7, 2012
When snow starts falling in the Netherlands, the Dutch often continue to use their bikes to commute even when there’s ice on the ground. It’s dangerous and there are accidents. It can be done more safely, although this blogger lives in a small town that cannot compare to an Utrecht or Amsterdam as far as bike traffic is concerned, but it’s definitely a good primer.
Cesar van Rongen may have found a quick, easy and cheap solution for stubborn Dutch cyclists.
With Cesar van Rongen’s Bike Spikes wintry slips and slides are a thing of the past, without having to change tyres. A rubber casing with iron spikes to cover the bicycle tyre gives you grip on icy stretches, and on ordinary asphalt they will still be comfortable. The special winter bike tyre can easily be fixed to any city bike with the little key that comes with it. And when it thaws, the Bike Spikes can be taken off in an instant and folded into a compact little package.
Bike Spikes By Cesar van Rongen from Design Academy Eindhoven on Vimeo.
(Links: www.cesarvanrongen.nl, www.blessthisstuff.com, Photo: Cesar van Rongen)
December 6, 2012
Dutch postal company PostNL surveyed 18 European countries and it’s the Dutch that apparently send the most Christmas cards, at an average of 40 a household. The Brits, Danes, Fins and French also send a lot of Christmas wishes through the mail, at an average of 17 to 30 cards, while Southern Europeans send the least amount of cards.
Almost all European countries have special Christmas stamps at a reduced rate. In the Netherlands they’re called ‘decemberzegels’ (‘December stamps’, more generic) and ‘kerstzegels’ (‘Christmas stamps’).
Interestingly, Germany actually has Christmas stamps that are more expensive, costing 55 euro cent with 25 euro cent extra going to a good cause.
The photo above are Environmentally incorrect Santa Claus cards I scored at the cheap Asian import store down the street two years ago. However, while researching this piece, these blonde Caucasian German angels jumped out at me.
(Link: www.telegraaf.nl)
Tags: angels, Christmas, Germany, Netherlands, postage stamps, Santa
December 5, 2012
Put aside what the media is saying, forget what people think, good or bad, about the group of mainly Somalian rejected asylum seekers who cannot go back to their country, and ignore Sinterklaas, your gift giving urges, your ‘aah how sad, those cold asylum seekers’ and let me tell you what it’s like. This national drama is playing out 5 minutes from my warm office, so I gathered some food and beauty products for the women (more fearful of going out than the men) and took a walk.
There’s some snow falling from the sky on a dark and dreary Amsterdam day in December. A neighbourhood church abandoned for a long time is currently housing a group of about 30 asylum seekers who have exhausted their right to appeal. The church is just a cement block and it’s cold. There are tents being set up inside for the men and the women have separate quarters with beds. There are no children. The mood is neutral and grey, much like the inside of the church. Some Dutch women are serving hot soup, there’s a café bouncer at the door of the church to make sure the ‘wrong people’ don’t come in. There’s a Dutch girl bundled up in a chair next to him who I suspect is doing the Twittering. I run into an acquaintance bringing food.
I had a few laughs with one of the men heading out to the supermarket with a young Dutch woman and said he should tell her what he wants for dinner so they could get more rice and less macaroni. I wished him good luck and thought about coming by again, hopefully with more useful supplies.
Follow what’s going on in De Vluchtkerk on Twitter as well, especially to find out what they need.
(Link: De Vluchtkerk)
Tags: asylum seekers, church, Somalia
December 4, 2012
More than 40 civil rights organisations and security experts from around the world are said to be ‘gravely concerned’ about a Dutch proposal to break into foreign computers and search and delete data. “The proposal would grant powers to the Dutch police to break into computers, including those located in other countries, in order to search and delete data and install spyware. The Dutch government argues that the new powers are required to effectively combat cybercrime in the Netherlands.”
Breaking into computers in other countries is a breach of that country’s sovereignty, not to mention crappy diplomacy. Dutch digital rights organisation Bits of Freedom is urgently calling upon the Minister of Security and Justice to withdraw his proposal, to be debated in Dutch parliament this week. Problem is, many countries are likely to follow suit. Imagine countries hacking each other back and you’ve got a subplot for an entire season of American hit TV series Homeland.
Anyone involved in politics, as well as journalists, dissidents and the likes run the risk of being hacked purely for reasons of blasphemy, homosexuality or alledged copyright infringement.
(Link: www.bof.nl)
December 3, 2012
In 2005 designer Sander Mulder created 200 copies of his Pong Clock based on the classic arcade game. The entire run was sold out in a day!
The clock plays a continuous game of Pong, the left hand player scoring once every minute and the right hand player only once every hour.
There is a video of how the clock works here, and some circuit board porn here.
For those who don’t know Pong, it was one of the earliest video games and the first video arcade game that gained mass success. It was written in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and released by his company Atari on 29 November of that year, making it 40 years old. Pong is a fairly boring ping-pong simulation, though the Power Pong game by Dutch artist Mathilde Mupe that I played at Hackers At Large in 2001 was much more entertaining. That version was hooked up to two exercise bikes and if you pedalled faster the game would speed up too.
(Photo: Sander Mulder)
Tags: clocks, Mathilde Mupe, Pong, Sander Mulder, video games
December 2, 2012
Gemonde is a small, cosy village in Noord-Brabant, just South of Maaskantje*, and bordered by the Dommel river**, which is where landscape photographer Robert-Paul Jansen takes his pictures.
Landscape photographers often want to bring along the biggest cameras they can find just to capture all that detail, but Jansen likes to use his Apple iPhone 4. Last week he told DPReview: “Smartphones typically have the largest viewfinders of all cameras, and this is ideal for taking landscape photos. Composition is key in landscape photography and a large viewfinder helps me to compose the shot easily. There are some limitations, like a lack of a true wide angle lens and zoom, but these things can be compensated for by using the right apps [for stitching photos together].”
I guess that the weight and size of the iPhone are also a consideration.
Besides an iPhone Jansen also uses more ‘serious’ cameras, as you can see on his blog.
*) Of the TV series.
**) Of the beer.
(Photo: Robert-Paul Jansen)
Tags: Apple, Dommel, Dommelsch, iPhones, landscape photography, landscapes, Maaskantje, Robert-Paul Jansen
December 1, 2012
Researchers at the University of Twente have developed a way of trapping cells in microscopic pyramids.
According to the university, these pyramids allow the study of cells in a three dimensional environment. “Compounds and protein-like deposits were soon seen forming between cells in nearby pyramids. Changes in cell phenotype can therefore be studied better than in a flat plane, as this is the right way to grow cells. This yields a promising tool for research into such things as tissue regeneration.”
Building microscopic silicone pyramids was accidentally discovered. The technology can also be used to make microscopic writing utensils.
(Link: New Scientist. Photo of a macroscopic pyramid by Wilhelm Joys Andersen, some rights reserved.)
Tags: cells, microscopes, pyramids, University of Twente
