This dark blue book is the penultimate volume in the printed series. That’s exciting. The book will be mailed to all “paid” subscribers in about a week.

And here’s that Big Beautiful [April] Deal in a nutshell:

For the A$80 annual subscription fee (equivalent to somewhere between A$6 and A$7 per month) you will become entitled to a 50% reduction in the price of all 5 current printed books. That’s a saving of A$100.

Watch me talk it through in this 4-minute video from 30 March.

So, become a paid subscriber now, either HERE on the REMO store website or by upgrading to PAID via the REMORANDOM.com substack platform HERE. The confirmation email will then send you the code for the full set discount.

Cheers,

Remo

PS: Set out below are some sample spreads from REMORANDOM 6

REMORANDOM 6: Sample Spreads

Dancing mania, also known as choreomania, St Vitus’ Dance or St John’s Dance, was a social phenomenon that occurred primarily in Europe from as early as the 7th century but mostly between the 14th and 17th centuries. It involved groups of people dancing erratically, sometimes thousands at a time, for hours, days or even weeks.

The most notable outbreaks happened in the years 1374 (Aachen, Germany) and 1518 (Strasbourg, France). Similar events were reported in other parts of Europe.

Men, women and children participated in these frenzied dance sessions. The dancers often seemed to be in a trance-like state, unable to stop dancing until they collapsed from exhaustion or, in some cases, died.

Participants would experience a sudden urge to dance uncontrollably. Other symptoms included hallucinations, hyperactivity and, sometimes, speaking in tongues. Many of the dancers would scream, laugh or cry during their episodes. The continuous dancing led to physical injuries, dehydration and, as already mentioned, even death.

For whatever reason, participants were reported to demonstrate extremely adverse reactions to both the colour red and (wait for it) pointed shoes. Curiouser and curiouser.

WTAF – we hear you cry. So, what was the cause?

Numerous hypotheses have been proposed for the causes of dancing mania, and it remains unclear whether it was a real illness or a social phenomenon.

One theory suggests that the mania was caused by ergot poisoning, a condition resulting from consuming rye bread contaminated with ergot fungus. Ergot contains chemicals similar to LSD, which can induce hallucinations and convulsions. However, the ergot fungus was not always present in the places where the dancing mania occurred.

Instead, most agree that dancing mania was one of the earliest-recorded forms of mass hysteria, and it has been suggested that the outbreaks may have been due to cultural contagion triggered, in times of particular hardship, by deeply rooted popular beliefs in the region regarding angry spirits capable of inflicting a “dancing curse” to punish their victims.

Thankfully, the phenomenon gradually disappeared by the 17th century, likely due to changes in social conditions and improved understanding of diseases and psychological disorders. Phew!

Story Idea: Melanie Giuffré

REMORANDOM Chapter

The moka pot, also known as the stovetop espresso maker, was invented in 1933 by Alfonso Bialetti, an Italian engineer who ran a small aluminium smelting foundry. It is an industrial object that has remained unchanged since its first appearance.

The design was actually inspired by an early 20th-century laundry system that used steam pressure to push soapy water through clothes. Bialetti applied this concept to coffee, creating a simple yet, at the time, revolutionary method for brewing rich, espresso-like coffee at home.

During World War II, Italy faced economic hardship, making espresso coffee an expensive luxury. The moka pot, manufactured by Bialetti, became a household staple, democratising espresso-style coffee. The selling proposition was this: in casa un espresso come al bar (“an espresso at home just like at a cafe”).

By the 1950s, with Alfonso’s ambitious son Renato driving the family business, the Moka Express had become an iconic product in Italian homes, and its popularity soon spread worldwide. Renato had a gift for showmanship. Using the medium of television, he popularised his product on the main RAI TV station and created a brand trademark around his distinctive handlebar moustache, as can be seen in the trademark icon, a caricature of a man with a finger raised in the air ordering another cup of coffee.

The moka pot works as a pressure-driven coffee brewer, consisting of three main chambers. The bottom chamber holds water, the middle funnel with a filter basket contains ground coffee, and the top chamber collects the brewed coffee. When placed on a heat source, the water in the bottom chamber heats up, creating steam pressure. This pressure forces hot water up through the coffee grounds and into the top chamber, resulting in a strong, concentrated coffee – similar to espresso but with a slightly lighter body and less crema.

While Bialetti is the most iconic and widely recognised brand, several other manufacturers – e.g. Alessi, Pezzetti and Ilsa – produce high-quality moka pots with unique designs and features. Despite the competition, Bialetti remains the industry leader, largely because of its historical legacy, quality craftsmanship and cultural significance.

Beyond its function, the moka pot has also become an industrial design icon. Its octagonal shape and Art Deco aesthetic have made it a permanent fixture in museums like the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. The original Bialetti Moka Express, with its mustachioed mascot, remains a best-seller and a symbol of Italian coffee culture.

Despite the rise of espresso machines, pod systems and pour-over methods, the moka pot remains popular due to its affordability, simplicity and sustainability. It requires no electricity, uses no disposable pods or filters, and delivers a bold, rich coffee experience.

Postscript
Alfonso Bialetti also happens to be the grandfather of famous Italian designer and manufacturer Alberto Alessi. Makes sense. See also Juicy Salif [RR1:43].

REMORANDOM Chapter

For years Hermann Rorschach had grappled with the theories of Freud and Jung while also absorbing the aesthetic of a new generation of modern artists. He had come to believe that who we are is less a matter of what we say, than what we see, and the process we use to see it.

The Rorschach test is a psychological test in which subjects’ perceptions of symmetrical inkblots are recorded and then analysed using psychological interpretation, complex algorithms, or both.

Some psychologists use this test to examine someone’s personality characteristics and emotional functioning. It has been employed to detect underlying thought disorders, especially in cases where patients are reluctant to describe their thinking processes openly.

The use of interpreting “ambiguous designs” to assess an individual’s personality is an idea that actually goes back to Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli. Interpretation of inkblots was central to a game called Gobolinks, from the late 19th century. The Rorschach test, however, was the first systematic approach of this kind.

In 1921, after studying 300 mental patients and 100 control subjects, Rorschach wrote his book Psychodiagnostik, which was to form the basis of the inkblot test. After experimenting with several hundred inkblots which he drew himself, he selected a set of ten for their diagnostic value. See them in order in our image gallery.

Rorschach suffered a ruptured appendix and died the following year, but his creation continued to grow and become part of the culture, documented with style in a 2017 book The Inkblots: Hermann Rorschach, His Iconic Test, and the Power of Seeing by Damion Searls.

The Rorschach test made its way to the United States, where it took on a life of its own, becoming used for purposes never envisioned by Rorschach. Co-opted by the military after Pearl Harbor, it was a fixture at the Nuremberg trials and in the jungles of Vietnam. It became an advertising staple, a clich. in Hollywood and journalism, and an inspiration to everyone from Andy Warhol to Jay-Z. The test was also given to millions of defendants, job applicants, parents in custody battles, workers applying for jobs, and people suffering from mental illness … or simply trying to understand themselves better. And it is still used today.

The Rorschach test has shaped our view of human personality and become a fixture in popular culture.

Curious to know more? Watch the TED-Ed video by Damion Searls that explains in some detail how the Rorschach test actually works.

Finally, Australian artist Ben Quilty has used the Rorschach technique in his paintings, by thickly applying oil paint onto a canvas and then pressing a second, unpainted, canvas onto the first, and proceeding to create an artwork from the shape created by this method.

Story Idea: Melanie Giuffré

Videos

REMORANDOM Chapter

Dr. Seuss was born Theodor Seuss Geisel in 1904. As an author and an artist, he is credited with the development of a distinct creative voice that fused nonsense, rhythm and bold illustration into storytelling that was simple on the surface but thematically complex, and also very durable. Across more than 60 books, he created a world of impossible creatures, joyful wordplay and moral clarity that has shaped childhood the world over for generations.

Geisel’s early career included advertising and political cartoons, both of which influenced his style. His rhythmic devices – especially something called “anapestic tetrameter” – proved ideal for early readers.

His big breakthrough came in 1957 with The Cat in the Hat, produced in response to concerns that US children’s literacy was stagnating. The challenge was to write an engaging book using a limited vocabulary list (just 220 different words were used), and the result was a disruptive, rule-breaking feline who injected controlled chaos into primer-style reading. It was a tour de force, and it killed off the likes of “Dick and Jane”. That book, along with Green Eggs and Ham (famously written using only 50 unique words, 49 of which had one syllable), helped redefine early childhood literature by making it fun rather than dutiful.

Dr. Seuss’s creative legacy extends beyond entertainment. Many of his works carried moral, philosophical or social messages delivered with a signature lightness of touch. Horton Hears a Who! offered an accessible reflection on empathy and the value of even the smallest voice. The Lorax, published in 1971, became an early environmental parable, capturing anxieties around industrialisation and ecological stewardship long before such narratives were mainstream. The Sneetches tackled discrimination with its simple metaphor of starbellied superiority.

These books were not lectures disguised as stories; they were stories that opened doors for discussion, offering parents and educators a shared language for big ideas. Geisel’s later notable books include the inspirational Oh, the Places You’ll Go! (1990), which became a popular graduation gift.

His visual style was equally influential. The wonky architecture, biomorphic machinery, long-limbed creatures and improbable landscapes all reflected an imagination with no regard for straight lines. His illustrations carried motion, personality and mischief. They also proved uniquely recognisable as a visual identity for childhood itself.

In the decades since his death in 1991, his legacy has continued to evolve. The books remain perennial bestsellers, translated into dozens of languages and adapted into films, plays, television specials and even a theme park. Subsequent to the death of his wife Audrey in 2018, Dr. Seuss Enterprises continues to maintain tight control over new interpretations, reinforcing the brand’s global reach.

His legacy also includes critical reassessment. In recent years, some of his early political cartoons and several lesser-known books have been scrutinised for racial caricatures of Asian, Arab and Black people. Six titles, including his very first children’s book And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street (1937), were withdrawn from publication in 2021. Despite these debates, Dr. Seuss remains a towering figure in children’s literature.

REMORANDOM Chapter

The term “looksmaxxing” originated on male “incel” (meaning: “involuntarily celibate”) message boards in the 2010s. Emerging from these online forums and migrating to platforms like TikTok and Reddit, it treats beauty as a system that can be hacked – measured, tweaked and improved through discipline, products, and, at times, obsession.

Within these communities, a dense, ever-evolving jargon has taken hold. Influential figures include users like Clavicular (real name: Braden Peters), known for breaking down facial aesthetics into highly specific components and rating systems.

Participants analyse everything from jaw projection to skin clarity, often with a level of scrutiny that resembles forensic science more than casual grooming advice. These ratings, together with one’s perceived status and wealth, are to be considered when calculating one’s “sexual market value” (also known as SMV). [Ed: It’s out there, that’s for sure.]

A key distinction is between “softmaxxing” and “hardmaxxing”. The former refers to relatively accessible improvements – skincare routines, better haircuts, fitness, posture and wardrobe upgrades. The latter ventures into more extreme territory: cosmetic procedures, orthodontics or experimental techniques aimed at permanently altering one’s appearance. The line between the two is fluid, but the underlying goal is the same – incremental gains toward an idealised standard – “ascending” from average to elite through a hierarchy of “logging” (dominating others in looks). By way of context, Clavicular rates the actor Matt Bomer (see below) as the closest thing we have to what he calls a “True Adam”.

Among the most widely discussed techniques is “mewing,” popularised by British orthodontist John Mew and his son Mike Mew. It involves pressing the tongue against the roof of the mouth to supposedly reshape the jawline over time. Scientific support is limited, but its viral spread suggests a strong appetite for low-cost, DIY transformation methods.

Other concepts drift further into controversial territory. “Hunter eyes”, for instance, describe a narrow, slightly downward-tilting eye shape associated – within these circles – with attractiveness and dominance. More extreme still is “bonesmashing”, a fringe practice in which individuals intentionally apply force to facial bones by tapping them with hammers (!) in the belief that micro-damage will remodel structure during healing. Medical experts strongly caution against such methods, citing risks of injury without proven benefit.

The movement has drawn cultural scrutiny. In The New Yorker, critic Becca Rothfeld argued that looksmaxxing reflects a broader shift toward treating the self as a project of relentless optimisation. Beauty becomes less about expression and more about compliance with perceived universal standards – symmetry, youthfulness and sexual dimorphism. Rothfeld suggests this mindset risks flattening individuality, replacing charm with calibration.

That tension is captured by the French phrase jolie laide – literally “pretty-ugly.” It celebrates faces that deviate from classical ideals yet possess a distinctive allure: a crooked nose, an asymmetrical smile, an unconventional gaze. Where looksmaxxing often seeks to eliminate irregularities, jolie laide embraces them, implying that memorability lies in difference rather than perfection.

Psychologically, looksmaxxing can cut both ways. For some, it offers agency – a structured path toward self-improvement through grooming and discipline. For others, it risks becoming a loop of comparison and dissatisfaction, where the mirror becomes a metric and identity a perpetual work-in-progress.

REMORANDOM Subscription

Looksmaxxing, along with 89 other topics, will feature in REMORANDOM 7, coming in October 2026. Meanwhile, subscribers will receive REMORANDOM 6 in May. Are you RR subscribed? If not you can do so HERE on the REMO website, or by upgrading your FREE Substack subscription to PAID. And NOW would be a good time to do that. All April subscribers are entitled to a A$100 saving on the cost of the full set of RR1 to RR5. (The promotional code is sent automatically to all new subscribers.)

Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley (1865–1931) was a Vermont farmer who became the first person to photograph individual snowflakes using a microscope. Fascinated by their beauty, Bentley spent his life capturing more than 5,000 snowflake images.

As a child he used a microscope given to him by his mother to study “drops of water, tiny fragments of stone, a feather dropped from a bird’s wing, a delicately veined petal from some flower”. From the very beginning it was the snowflakes that fascinated him the most.

Under his microscope, Bentley discovered that each snowflake had its own careful and fleeting geometry. “Every crystal was a masterpiece of design and no one design was ever repeated,” he wrote. “When a snowflake melted, that design was forever lost.”

To document this wonder, he first tried his hand at drawing the snowflakes, but found that they were too elaborate for him to reproduce with adequate fidelity. Eventually, he got the idea to capture them photographically instead, via the incorporation of his microscope.

So, how did he go about it?

Bentley perfected a process of catching flakes on black velvet in such a way that their images could be captured before they either melted or sublimated (converted from solid to gas without becoming liquid). When a snowstorm blew through Jericho, Vermont, he would head outside with a black slate to catch flakes as they fell and then examine them with a handheld magnifier. He would transfer the captured crystal to a microscope slide and press it to the glass with a feather. Then it was a race against the clock to focus the camera and make the lengthy exposure – a task that could take as long as two minutes – before the snowflake was no more. He later recalled the day he’d developed his first successful negative as “the greatest moment of my life”.

In collaboration with George Henry Perkins, professor of natural history at the University of Vermont, Bentley published an article in which he argued that no two snow crystals were alike. This concept caught the public imagination and he published other articles in magazines, including National Geographic, Nature, Popular Science and Scientific American.

His work laid the foundation for modern snowflake science, and he published a book in 1931, Snow Crystals, showcasing 2,453 of his photographs, that is still in print today.

Postscript
The idea that “no two snowflakes are alike” is technically true. At a molecular level, each snowflake forms under slightly different conditions of temperature, humidity and turbulence, which influence its growth. However, given the sheer number of snowflakes that have fallen in Earth’s history, some have likely been extremely similar.

Story Idea: Elly Bieszczad

REMORANDOM Chapter

The idea was as simple as it was absurd. The Pet Rock was just a smooth stone, marketed as a low-maintenance pet. The rocks were collected from Rosarito Beach in Mexico and sold to people in a small, cardboard box designed to look like a pet carrier, complete with air holes, straw for bedding and some clever copywriting.

The idea was born of a casual conversation Dahl had with friends in a bar. They were discussing the hassle of caring for pets, and Dahl jokingly remarked that a rock would be the perfect pet. It required no feeding, walking or grooming, and it wouldn’t die, make a mess or misbehave.

Maybe it was the alcohol, but his friends didn’t dismiss the idea out of hand.

So Dahl, recognising the potential for this absurd idea to catch on, decided to turn the joke into a reality. He was freelancing as a copywriter at the time [Ed: In my experience, that’s French for out of work] – so it came very naturally to him to create a whole story around said rock. Each rock came with an instruction manual titled “The Care and Training of Your Pet Rock”. The manual included instructions on how to care for your rock, such as teaching it to “sit” or “stay” (which, of course, it was very good at doing).

The Pet Rock was an instant and phenomenal hit, capturing the public’s imagination. It was released just before the Christmas season of 1975 and became a must-have gift. Dahl sold the rocks for US$3.95 each, and within six months, he had sold over 1.5 million units, making him an instant millionaire.

For a few frenzied months in 1975, many people became the proud if slightly embarrassed owners of Pet Rocks, a fad that Newsweek later called “one of the most ridiculously successful marketing schemes ever”.

While the Pet Rock fad faded quickly, it became an iconic example of the power of “clever” marketing and the absurdity of consumer culture in the 1970s. Although Dahl went on to have a decently successful career in advertising, e.g. he authored Advertising for Dummies in 2001, the Pet Rock is what he is remembered for – and no doubt why he rated a New York Times obituary when he died in 2015.

In the decades since its birth, the Pet Rock has been periodically re-released and celebrated as a piece of American cultural nostalgia, e.g. “The Official Everything Everywhere All At Once Pet Rock™ includes one googly eye rock with paper nest and a care and training pamphlet. Rock size may vary.”

The Pet Rock phenomenon has inspired others (individuals and corporations) to shoot for the same WTF rags-to-riches result with their kooky absurdist ideas, e.g. Canned Air, Invisible Pet, Pet Cloud, USB Pet Rock. Google them if interested.

Also, as you will discover in REMORANDOM 4 at [73], Tamagotchi たまごっち (virtual pets) released by Japanese company Bandai in 1996, became a global craze. Unlike a rock, Tamagotchis needed virtual care, echoing the simplicity of the Pet Rock but with added technological engagement.

The legacy of the Pet Rock isn’t just the humour or novelty, it’s the realisation that you can sometimes get lucky with the timing of a story and a narrative that resonates.

Story Idea: Nils Benson

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REMORANDOM Chapters

“Lorem ipsum” is the name given to placeholder text used in the printing and typesetting industry. It’s often used in the design and layout of printed materials, websites, and various other visual mediums to demonstrate the visual form of a document or presentation without the distraction of meaningful content.

Here is some sample Lorem ipsum text:

“Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat.”

Versions of the Lorem ipsum text have been used in typesetting at least since the 1960s, when it was popularised by ads for Letraset transfer sheets (old enough to remember those?); and Lorem ipsum was introduced to the digital world in the mid-1980s, when Aldus employed it in graphic and word-processing templates for its desktop publishing program PageMaker.

Until not so long ago it was thought to be random Latin gibberish thrown together by someone in the 1500s as a way to mock-up text.

But now we know that it both means something (sort of) … and comes from somewhere.

The first two words themselves are a truncation of dolorem ipsum (“pain itself”). The subsequent words are a corrupted version of De finibus bonorum et malorum, a 1st-century BCE text by the Roman statesman and philosopher Cicero, with words altered, added and removed to make it nonsensical and improper Latin.

The discovery of the text’s origin is attributed to Richard McClintock, a Latin scholar at Hampden–Sydney College. McClintock connected Lorem ipsum to Cicero’s writing sometime before 1982 while searching for instances of the Latin word consectetur, which was rarely used in classical literature. McClintock first published his discovery in a 1994 letter to the editor of Before & After magazine, contesting the editor’s claim that Lorem ipsum held no meaning.

The passage in a 1914 edition from the Loeb Classical Library that McClintock found reads as follows: “Neque porro quisquam est qui do- [page break] lorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit”.

The obvious conclusion is that whoever first created the sequence was sitting in front of this 1914 translated version of De Finibus, and took the text from the page beginning “lorem ipsum”. Meaning that, contrary to a long held belief, Lorem ipsum was not born in the world of printing in the 16th century, but rather appeared at the earliest after 1914 – and potentially not until the 1960s when some marketing executive at Letraset tasked with generating placeholder text for an ad reached for his or her 1914 Loeb facing translation of De Finibus, and then, quoting Jack Shephard in his fine article on this subject “settled down to the hard, thankless task of absolutely butchering it”.

Not into Latin? Never mind. Nowadays, there’s no shortage of Lorem Ipsum alternatives, including Nietzsche Ipsum, Delorean Ipsum, Pirate Ipsum, Cheese Ipsum, Cat Ipsum and DJ Khaled Ipsum. Check out some samples below, and fill those blank pages with gibberish of your choosing.

Story Idea: David Astle

Alternative Lorem Ipsum Samples

Nietzsche Ipsum

One must still have chaos in oneself to give birth to a dancing star; thus the abyss gazes also, quietly amused, as values dissolve and are reforged in the furnace of will. Morality trembles, truth flickers, and the overman strides not toward comfort, but toward becoming.

DeLorean Ipsum

Great Scott, the flux capacitor is humming as we punch it to 88 miles per hour, leaving twin trails of fire across the parking lot of history; the timeline bends, the past resists, and the future—well, the future is exactly where we’re going.

Pirate Ipsum

Avast, ye scurvy dog, hoist the mainsail and mind the kraken as we chart a course through treacherous waters, pockets jinglin’ with plunder and hearts set on rum, glory, and the next ill-gotten horizon.

Cheese Ipsum

A velvety brie melts languidly beside a sharp cheddar bite, while blue veins whisper of caves and time; crumble, slice, or spread—each wheel a quiet masterpiece of milk, patience, and indulgence.

Cat Ipsum

I fits, I sits, judging you silently from atop the warm laptop while plotting midnight zoomies; the curtain is mine, the box is mine, everything is mine—now feed me and pretend it was your idea.

DJ Khaled Ipsum

Another one—bless up, we the best, major key alert—stay focused, secure the bag, and don’t ever play yourself, because the journey is a celebration and the wins? They just keep coming.

REMORANDOM Chapter

When Google unveiled Google Glass in 2012, it felt to some that the future had arrived.

The project emerged from Google X, the company’s semi-secret “moonshot” lab for experimental technologies. The idea was to create a wearable computer in the form of lightweight eyeglasses, capable of projecting information into the user’s field of vision. Early prototypes featured a small, prism-shaped display above the right eye, a camera, voice control and a touchpad built into the temple of the frame. The ambition was nothing less than to redefine human-computer interaction by making it seamless, mobile and socially integrated.

The Glass project was introduced to the public by Google co-founder Sergey Brin, who demoed it with skydivers live-streaming their descent into a Google I/O conference. This bold theatrical launch generated enormous excitement, casting Glass as the next frontier in consumer technology.

In 2013, Google released the Explorer Edition for developers and early adopters at a cost of US$1,500. This pre-release strategy was designed to gather feedback and spark innovation around potential applications, from hands-free photography to real-time translation. Brin took to the stage at the annual TED [RR1:79] conference in 2013 [Ed: I was there.] to explain why he felt that the days of looking down at a phone rather than up and into the world were numbered. Watch that short talk HERE.

Despite the hype, real-world use quickly revealed challenges. Battery life was short, the display resolution limited and voice commands often unreliable. But the most pressing issue wasn’t technical – it was social. The built-in camera, always ready to record, raised immediate privacy concerns. Bars, cinemas and even casinos banned Glass, worried about covert filming. The term “Glasshole” entered popular vocabulary, describing wearers who seemed oblivious to social norms or etiquette. What was intended as a cool, futuristic accessory came to symbolise arrogance, surveillance and tech culture’s blind spots.

Market uptake never matched the initial promise. Only a few thousand units were sold, and Google ended the consumer Explorer program in 2015. The company quietly repositioned the technology for enterprise applications. Industries like healthcare, manufacturing and logistics found value in a hands-free display that allowed workers to consult instructions, livestream procedures or receive remote guidance without breaking focus. This shift turned Glass into a niche but functional tool, shedding its failed mass-consumer identity.

Culturally, Google Glass left a lasting imprint far beyond its limited sales. It became a touchstone in debates about surveillance, wearable tech and the uneasy merging of digital and physical life. And its high-profile failure also served as a cautionary tale in Silicon Valley: bold visions must grapple with human factors, not just engineering.

Google Glass also demonstrated the social risk of facial wearables. People are selfconscious, and wearing something unusual on your face is always going to be risky. [Ed: I have three words to add: Apple, Vision, Pro.]

For facial wearables to gain broad acceptance, companies need to shoot for a form factor that feels cool [RR2:03] and not daggy [RR4:25].

See also: Segway [RR3:72]

Video

REMORANDOM Chapters

Kowloon Walled City (Chinese: 九龍城寨) known colloquially as the “city of darkness” was an extremely densely populated enclave of China that existed within the boundaries of Kowloon City in Hong Kong.

It began life as a Chinese military fort during the Qing Dynasty, but its modern story really took shape in the late 19th century. When Hong Kong was temporarily ceded to Britain, the Walled City became a strange diplomatic loophole – technically Chinese territory, but enclosed by what was, at the time, British-controlled Hong Kong. Its population increased dramatically after the end of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong during World War II.

By the 1980s, roughly 50,000 people were living inside just 2.6 hectares – making it the most densely populated place on Earth. From the outside, it looked like a single, solid block of concrete, 12 to 14 storeys high, pierced only by a chaotic tangle of pipes, cables, balconies, makeshift stairwells and dangling laundry. From the inside, it was a dim maze of narrow corridors, barely lit by daylight, where electric wires and water pipes snaked along the ceilings. Sunlight reached only the top floors; lower levels lived in a perpetual twilight. It had no central planning, no building codes, and for decades, almost no police presence. People could come to Kowloon, and, in official terms, disappear.

The lower floors were notorious for illegal factories, unlicensed dentists, opium dens, gambling rooms and brothels, many linked to the five Triad gangs who all took up residence: King Yee, Sun Yee On, 14K, Wo Shing Wo and Tai Ho Choi.

But it was not simply a criminal slum. It was also a functioning, tightly knit community. Families lived there for generations. Children played in rooftop courtyards. Neighbours shared water lines, electricity and favours. There were small temples, noodle factories, schools and workshops that produced everything from fish balls to plastic goods.

Life was improvised but organised.

Because planes from the nearby Kai Tak Airport flew directly overhead [Ed: Remember that?], building height was capped by aircraft safety, creating a relatively flat, crowded rooftop skyline – like a concrete mesa. Photographers and journalists portrayed it as a vertical slum, a cyberpunk vision of overcrowding and decay. It inspired countless films, novels, video games and a cool 1993 book of photographs: City of Darkness by Ian Lambot and Greg Girard.

To outsiders, the Walled City became a symbol of urban dystopia. [Ed: Very Silo.] To residents, it was simply home – cheap, central and alive with opportunity. The science fiction writer, William Gibson, a Walled City fan, saw in the unregulated, organic chaos, an embodiment of his famous concept of “cyberspace” – or, as we would call it today, the internet.

By the late 1980s, both British and Chinese authorities had finally agreed that the place had to go. By 1993, the city had been fully evacuated, and demolition began. Residents were compensated and rehoused. Today, its footprint is a peaceful public park, with stone markers and a reconstructed gate marking where the chaos once stood.

Video

REMORANDOM Chapter

The expression “Rock of Eye” dates back to the late 18th century and literally means “to be guided by the eye”, to do by feel and intuition rather than by precise methods.

English tailors regard Rock of Eye as the ability to immediately see and understand tasteful proportion…

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The figurine depicts a cat holding a koban (oval gold coin) with a paw raised in a beckoning gesture. Despite how it might look to some Westerners, the cat is not waving. This is an interesting cultural difference. The Japanese beckoning gesture is made by holding up the hand, palm down, and repeatedly folding the fingers down and back, just …

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“Scissors paper rock” (the most common ordering of the words in Australia) is a game most often played between two people, in which each player simultaneously forms one of three shapes with an outstretched hand: “rock” (a closed fist), “paper” (a flat hand) and “scissors” (a fist with the index finger and…

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“Pale Blue Dot” is the name given to a photograph of planet Earth taken on 14 February 1990 by Voyager 1, a robotic explorer built by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In the photograph, taken from a record distance of about 6 billion kilometres, Earth’s apparent size is less than a pixel. The planet appears as a tiny dot against the vastness of space, among bands of sunlight reflected by the camera. The phrase Pale Blue Dot has come to represent a contemplative perspective on humanity’s relationship to the cosmos.

The spacecraft had flown past Jupiter and Saturn and sent beautiful close-ups and exciting scientific data back to Earth. After Saturn, the spacecraft was destined to spend its remaining years in deep space. There would be nothing but darkness, punctuated occasionally by the twinkle of distant stars. There was no reason to keep Voyager’s cameras on for that, and NASA wanted to conserve the spacecraft’s power. But, before turning the cameras off, NASA engineers directed Voyager to turn around and take one last look at home, at the request of astronomer and author Carl Sagan.

Sagan acknowledged that such a picture would not have had much scientific value, as the Earth would appear too small for Voyager’s cameras to make out any detail, but it would be meaningful as a perspective on humanity’s place in the universe.

The phrase “Pale Blue Dot” was coined by Sagan in his reflections on the photograph’s significance, documented in his 1994 book of the same name. In the book Carl Sagan comments on what he sees as the greater significance of the photograph, writing:

“From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Consider again that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”

Hear these words spoken by Sagan himself in the first video included below.

In 2020, for the image’s 30th anniversary, NASA published the above new version of the original Voyager photo: “Pale Blue Dot Revisited”, obtained using modern image processing techniques; and to celebrate the same occasion, the Carl Sagan Institute released a new video with several noted astronomers reciting Sagan’s Pale Blue Dot speech. Moving. Watch it online.

Videos

Pale Blue Dot read by Carl Sagan:

This one read by noted astronomers and other colleagues:

REMORANDOM Chapter

In the early days of the internet, he set new standards for the global online distribution of typefaces through FontShop, leaving a lasting mark on the infrastructure of digital type design. As well as being a type designer, Erik has created the visual identities of major corporations and public institutions through his companies MetaDesign and EdenSpiekermann. He has been committed to preserving the tradition of classic lead typesetting and promoting letterpress printing as a vital foundation of typography and the art of printing for many years (check out Hacking Gutenberg). His book Stop Stealing Sheep & Find out how type works (1993), now in its 4th edition, remains a go-to guide for typographic literacy.

Erik and Remo chat about: old times, new times – and everything in between.

hackinggutenberg.berlin

Support Erik’s workshop. Become a Friend (Freunde) HERE

Listen to or watch this episode on: YouTube, Spotify or Apple Podcasts

Gestalten Video, 2015

REMORANDOM Chapter | RR6 Coming Soon

PODCAST CREDITS

REMORANDOM is produced and published in Sydney by REMO Since 1988

Podcast co-hosts: Remo Giuffré and Claudia Chan Shaw

Contact us via email at hello@remorandom.com

Original Theme Music by Tom Thum … using only his voice. Watch his 2013 TEDxSydney talk HERE.

Copyright © EOLO Pty Limited. All rights reserved.

These were the Fugates of Troublesome Creek, better known today as the “Blue People of Kentucky”.

Though their unusual colour invited folklore and speculation, the truth behind their blueness is a result of genetics, isolation and the ways small communities can amplify rare traits over generations.

Martin Fug…

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Today is the first day of April: April Fools’ Day.

But where do we get the strange custom of playing pranks on 1 April? The short answer is that nobody knows for sure, and this ambiguity has in fact long been acknowledged.

“T…

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Tucker Viemeister (born 14 August 1948, and named after the car that his father Read was designing at the time) is an American industrial designer who helped found many important design businesses: Smart Design, frog design’s New York studio, Razorfish’s physical design …

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Greetings from REMORANDOM HQ here in North Bondi.

I’m the founder Remo Giuffré – and I come bearing news of the most generous REMORANDOM offer ever. More on that in a minute. I also wanted to take the opportunity to give you a bit of an update on where we are with the book series, and to tempt you free subscribers into upgrading your subscription to paid, and I’ll be explaining why it makes so much sense to be doing that right now.

Subscribe now

Firstly, to the update, I trust that you’re enjoying your daily doses of uncommon knowledge. It gives me a lot of pleasure to curate those for you, so I hope that some of them are making you smile … or think.

I’m soon to receive some advance copies of REMORANDOM 6 from our long time printer in Hong Kong. This dark blue book is the penultimate volume in the printed series. That’s exciting. It’s a cracker. The book will be mailed to all “paid” subscribers in early May.

Our printer is also sending me a sample of an embossed black slipcase that has been designed to house the complete set of seven printed books.

Check it out. It’s gorgeous.

That set will become available in October – and indeed on the 20th of October we are going to be hosting a launch party and shindig here in Bondi for our subscribers and VIP friends – in real life, face to face; just like in the old days.

Those of you who are subscribed to the printed book series, either via the REMO store website or by having a paid subscription on Substack, will have already received your early bird invitation via email.

Over 100 people are already registered. It’s going to be a great night.

For the rest of you, I’m here to announce a big time incentive to upgrade to an Annual Paid subscription, and moreover, as mentioned, to do that NOW.

Here’s that deal in a nutshell:

For the A$80 annual subscription fee (equivalent to somewhere between A$6 and A$7 per month) you will become entitled to a 50% reduction in the price of all 5 current printed books. That’s a saving of A$100.

Note that this deal must end on the 30th of April, which is just before we’ll be sending the next volume out to our paid subscribers – maybe you.

Subscribe now

This will get you right up to date with the printed book series – which is the originating source of all of the posts that many of you are currently receiving via email.

This April Bonus is on top of all of the regular benefits. And, what are they?

As a paying subscriber you get to receive all of our printed output – collectible souvenirs of our culture and shared experience as humans. In 100 years who knows where we will be digitally. However your books will still exist somewhere in the world – ready and able to inform and inspire the curious.

So, as a paying annual subscriber, you would also be entitled to FREE copies of both REMORANDOM 6 (May 2026) and REMORANDOM 7 (October 2026). There’s another A$80 in value.

Come October you’ll also enjoy FREE access to our famous Tempus Fugit wallplanner PDF – A$20 value.

Psst: So far we’re up a A$200 return for your A$80 investment :)

Subscribers also enjoy a discount applied to everything on sale at online REMO – not just the books. We’ve been serving customers with unique t shirt designs and thoughtful gifts for almost 40 years now.

Nearer the end of the year that discount can work well for you.

As a paid subscriber you also get unlimited access to the full archive of posts and the interactive PDFs for all of our books.

Subscribe now

Finally, and this is relevant, your paid subscription will help me continue my work and enable me to be publishing the printed books. Keeping the home fires burning.

REMORANDOM is a truly tiny solopreneurial endeavour – and it is only subscriber support that makes it sustainable. I’m super grateful to those of you who decide to come along for the ride.

Become a paid subscriber NOW, either HERE on the REMO store website or by upgrading to PAID via the REMORANDOM.com substack platform HERE.

Cheers, thanks for watching and I look forward to sending out book sets to all newbie paid subscribers.

Remo
North Bondi, 30 March 2026