The Daily Render

A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future

YouTube Video of Teabaggers Having A Rally On Astroturf
|| 9/16/2009 || 6:43 pm || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

[Watch on YouTube]

Last Friday, on the evening before the Taxpayer March On Washington, a large group of teabaggers, patriots, small-government conservatives, and libertarians staged a rally at CityCenterDC, the site of the old Washington, DC Convention center. Little did they know they were standing on Astroturf.

Astroturfing is a word that describes political, advertising, or public relations campaigns which seek to create the impression of being spontaneous “grassroots” behavior. Being that the Taxpayer March on Washington was promoted heavily by Fox News and other conversation media organizations, it was far from being a grassroots mobilization. So when I realized the demonstrators were actually standing on astroturf, I decided to make this short video to highlight the irony of the spectacle.

The Mural Non-Controversy: From Edgewood to the Edge of the World Vs. ANC Commissioner Marshall Phillips
|| 8/28/2009 || 6:04 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

watch video on YouTube

Last Sunday there was a great article in the Washington Post about the just-completed mural in DC called From Edgewood to the Edge of the World. My good friend DECOY participated in the construction of the mural (and is shown in the video above), so when I originally saw the video clip on TV, I laughed out loud and decided to save the video. I originally attempted to embed the video about the story here on this blog, but was unable to do so properly, so I uploaded the video to YouTube. After I posted the video on Facebook, I decided to e-mail the popular street art blog Wooster Collective, who had posted a call to artists a couple weeks ago. The following day they posted the video under the headline “Stupidity in Washington, DC.”

The joke of this story is that there really is no controversy. Rather its one ANC commissioner, who doesn’t have much appreciation for art, trying to make a fuss about a unique cultural attraction in his neighborhood. I think it was the Redskins reference that really got me laughing. The team isn’t even located in Washington, DC! I sincerely hope someone makes a stencil of the Redskins logo and adds it to the mural. Not to comply with his request, per se, but to just make a point about the transient nature of street art. Since the artists approached him before the mural was even started, he had the opportunity to participate in the painting of the mural. So for him to complain about it lacking local relevance is in poor taste. But then again, he’s wearing a neon green jumpsuit, and from the looks of it(?), has his beard dyed grey. I’m curious about what he hangs on the walls of home.

As a side note— I really really really dislike the blatant racism exhibited by some YouTube users. The video has been viewed about 2,000 times since I uploaded it and I’ve already had to delete some racially charged comments. This is not the first time I’ve had to deal with this type of digital bigotry. The YouTube video of George Bush getting booed at Obama’s inauguration had quite a bit of hate speech. So what gives? I am debating if I should just turn off comments on all the videos I upload so I don’t have to be the intolerance nanny.

Charlie Chaplin’s speech in the The Great Dictator (1940)
|| 8/10/2009 || 4:15 pm || 8 Comments Rendered || ||

The Great Dictator is a comedy film directed by and starring Charlie Chaplin. First released in October 1940, it was Chaplin’s first true talking picture, and more importantly was the only major film of its period to bitterly satirize Nazism and Adolf Hitler. In the film Chaplin plays two characters who look strikingly similar- a jewish barber and a dictator who looks like Adolf Hitler. Near the end of the film, after a series of far-flung mishaps, the dictator gets replaced by his look-alike, the barber, and is taken to the capital where he is asked to give a speech. The text below (via) is the transcription of the video above. I am posting it because I feel that it’s as relevant today as it was 69 years ago.

Hope… I’m sorry but I don’t want to be an Emperor – that’s not my business – I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another, human beings are like that.

We all want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone and the earth is rich and can provide for everyone.

The way of life can be free and beautiful.

But we have lost the way.

Greed has poisoned men’s souls – has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.

We have developed speed but we have shut ourselves in: machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical, our cleverness hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little: More than machinery we need humanity; More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.

The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me I say “Do not despair”.

The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress: the hate of men will pass and dictators die and the power they took from the people, will return to the people and so long as men die [now] liberty will never perish…

Soldiers – don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you and enslave you – who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel, who drill you, diet you, treat you as cattle, as cannon fodder.

Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts. You are not machines. You are not cattle. You are men. You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t hate – only the unloved hate. Only the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers – don’t fight for slavery, fight for liberty.

In the seventeenth chapter of Saint Luke it is written ” the kingdom of God is within man ” – not one man, nor a group of men – but in all men – in you, the people.

You the people have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness. You the people have the power to make life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy let’s use that power – let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give you the future and old age and security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie. They do not fulfil their promise, they never will. Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfil that promise. Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness.

Soldiers – in the name of democracy, let us all unite!”

For a cartographic bonus, here is another clip from the film where Charlie Chaplin, playing the role of Adenoid Hynkel (Adolf Hitler), dances with a globe balloon. If you look closely, you can see how the world was mapped in 1939 when the movie was filmed.

Johnny Osbourne – Truths And Rights (1979)
|| 8/9/2009 || 4:00 pm || 4 Comments Rendered || ||

A tacky fan video featuring the song “Truths And Rights” by Johnny Osbourne

I think this song might qualify as the official song for this blog. With the opening phrase “Render your arms and not your garments,” it clearly has a home in the archives of this website which I’ve called The Daily Render for nearly five years now…..

Below are the lyrics of Truths And Rights by Johnny Osbourne:

Render your arms and not your garments
The truth is there for who have eyes to see
Partiality has no place in this judgment
Remember the words of prophecy

Chorus:
Children, run come the truths and rights
That’s what I’m about
You know the truths and rights
Teach it to the children
You know the truths and rights
Teach it to the children
Cause they should know
know know know know

Children say a little prayer
Every night before you go to sleep
Cause tomorrow is promised to no one
When you think it’s peace and safety, Lord
It could be, it could be sudden destruction
Cause we know, yes we know

Remember I say this few words to you
Remember the words I’m saying to you right now
And for tomorrow and hence for I say

Render your hearts and not your garments
The truth is there for who have eyes to see
Partiality has no place in this judgment
Remember the words of prophecy

Chorus:
Children, run come the truths and rights
That’s what I’m about
You know the truths and rights
Teach it to the children
You know the truths and rights
Teach it to the children
Cause they should know
know know know know

Johnny Osbourne – Truths And Rights (1979)

YouTube Video: Last Weekend in 25 Video Clips
|| 8/5/2009 || 12:39 pm || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

I made this YouTube video yesterday evening after I downloaded all the photos and video I took from last weekend’s excursion to the to the Shenandoah mountains. The 25 video clips are played in sequential order, starting with me getting into my friend’s vegetable oil-powered Mercedes Benz, driving out of Washington, DC, driving through the country, seeing a spider eat a moth, lights projected on trees, a spider with eggs crawling through the grass, chasing a butterfly among lilies (probably my favorite scene), insects devouring a large dragonfly, a few clips of the band Stripmall Ballads performing, caterpillar at night, lightrope on a rock, an American Goldfinch bathing in a creek in the middle of the road, and driving back home.

All in all, I had a great time. I just wish I still wasn’t tired from hiking up and down the length of the property!

Revisiting the Dupont Lenz Quilt Animation
|| 7/17/2009 || 7:16 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

Embedded from Facebook

In August of 2007 I posted the Quicktime Movie of Dupont Lenz Quilt Animation on this blog. I had not joined YouTube yet, nor had I released the contents of this website to search engines, so only recently have I begun to port some of my animations to other websites. Today I decided to upload the animation to Facebook and to YouTube.

The animation uses same layout from my map “Dupont Circle Quilt 2005.” The 30 second animation features two 15 second segments of the same imagery shown from two different perspectives. The modified aerial photography of Dupont Circle in Washington, DC is magnified using transparent glass spheres to create unique cartographic perspective.

Related Animations:

+ MORE

WETA’s Late-Night All-Access Programming Sponsored by the FBI
|| 7/15/2009 || 6:49 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

Back in April, I was home late on Saturday evening / Sunday morning and stumbled on to the Washington, DC PBS affiliate station WETA showing a Federal Bureau of Investigation recruitment video on their All-Access programming. It’s the first time and only I’ve seen this type of sponsored recruitment video on public television before.

Changing Channels – Al Jazeera English begins broadcasting in Washington, DC
|| 7/2/2009 || 11:52 pm || 2 Comments Rendered || ||

A couple weeks ago on June 25th, I attended the taping of Al Jazeera English’s town hall forum titled “Changing Channels” at the Newseum. The aim of the Q & A styled show was to give people in the Washington, DC area the opportunity to ask pointed questions to some of Al Jazeera’s main movers and shakers. Starting yesterday Al Jazeera English began broadcasting in the Washington, DC area on Comcast Channel 275, RCN Channel 34, Cox Channel 474, and Verizon FiOS Channel 457. Its too bad none of those channels show up on the basic cable at my house.

I was able to spot myself in the crowd:

Screen capture from Part Two where I can be seen in the background

For more videos visit Al Jazeera’s YouTube Channel. If you don’t have access to Al Jazeera in your city, contact your cable provider here.

YouTube video of the early years of Disco in the Washington / Baltimore area from 1976
|| 6/1/2009 || 2:41 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

This video was created by Tom D’Antoni in 1976 for Maryland Public Broadcasting‘s show “The Critic’s Place” on the Disco phenomenon when it was happening. It shows some of the nightclubs that existed in Washington, DC and Baltimore during the early years of Disco. I really enjoyed how Tom highlighted the social differences that existed between DC and Baltimore 30 years ago and how they, in some ways, still exist today. I am really curious about where the clubs that were featured in the video were located. At about 4 minutes in he mentions 20th & L streets and that area is now all office buildings. I gotta wonder if there are any nightclubs in the locations shown in the video that still exist today?

A big thanks goes to Dori Hadar, who posted this on Facebook, and is the person we can collectively thank for helping to discover Mingering Mike. You can purchase his insightful book about Mingering Mike on Amazon.

Note: while the YouTube video’s title says “Disco 1975 (74?),” upon a thorough reading of the comments posted on YouTube, audiophiles were able to accurately place the video at 1976.

UPDATE – 2/28/2011 – The Sagittarius, shown at the opening and again at around the 2 minute mark, was located inside of the Fraser Mansion and is currently the national affairs office of the Church of Scientology. -via DCist.

[Update] The Architectural Athan Drum & Bass Mashup via YouTube Doubler is now transcribed
|| 4/19/2009 || 10:36 am || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

Click image to view the mashup on YouTube Doubler

Just under one year ago I created an interesting mashup using Brian Kane’s YouTube Doubler. Dubbed “the Athan Drum & Bass Mashup” (and since then I’ve added “architectural” to the title), the mashup features a slideshow of Islamic architecture on the left side and a stationary camera focused on a Drum & Bass DJ’s turntables on the right. Last night I revisited the original entry and discovered that whomever had uploaded the slideshow decided to transcribe the Athan using YouTube’s annotation feature. Now you can actually read the English translation of the morning call to prayer sung in Arabic.

#update – This iteration also automatically rewinds!

Related Interactive Entries:

+ MORE

The Daily Render By

A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future.

::LAST 51 POSTS::

Fair Use

43 queries. 1.814 seconds.
Powered by WordPress

Nikolas Schiller is a second-class American citizen living in America's last colony, Washington, DC. This blog is my on-line repository of what I have created or found on-line since May of 2004. If you have any questions or comments, please contact: