Futel is half hacker project and half public good. At it's core, it's a literal payphone that anyone can use, for free, to make outgoing calls, as well as leverage free voicemail services. Beyond that, it's also a zine documenting its usage, an incoming number to hear all sorts of audio ephemera. In short, a fascinating series of phone interfaces that also provide services that may be critical for those in need.

You can read more about the project on their site and blog or spend a few minutes with this YouTube presentation that walks through all of it.

b-sides and rarities from the Sumday era of Grandaddy. a delight.

Bookmark worthy

a $60,000 turntable! $60,000!!

I’m told this is an excellent read. Adding it here so I remember to actually read it.

A true crime / comedy podcast involving two brides and one turd. AKA must listen!?

An insightful read and plenty of replies with thoughtful commentary. Funny to predict how a giant company like Meta is going to swim in open source waters but this provides some context.

good ole Sanborn Fire Insurance maps opening up a new, old, world. Pretty fascinating tbh. I would walk around in an old neighborhood with an awkward headset!

Truly, a quality theory worth knowing

A little over ten years ago, I got an email from a guy named Matt Smith. He said he liked what I was doing with yk Records and had an album he'd just finished recording at Battle Tapes but wasn't sure how to make all the pieces fit. I loved what I heard and we worked to release The World and Ourselves in 2013. It continues to be an album in the yk catalog of releases that I feel gets highly overlooked.

Cut to: ten years later and Matt has moved from New York to LA, had a family and been generally busy with life stuff. But a second album has been percolating the whole time. I'm happy to announce that percolation will yield a brand new record this summer in the form of New Public Domain; eleven tracks of infectiously melodic pop/rock songs.

We will be releasing the first single, "Talk Talk Talk," in a few weeks but you can actually get the first morsels of music in this announcement video.

We're going to release the album on exactly the same day as his first album because.. why not?

As classic as it gets in terms of internet content

NY Magazine runs through all the shows canceled this year. It is wild how many of these I’ve never even heard of. Worse; some sounds very entertaining!

look, I'm not interested in eating real meat again and there are lots of questions around this BUT I hope this means we're on a path where fewer animals have to be slaughtered to keep Chik-Fil-A consumers happy.

For super fans, I am sure this is very old news but I just recently stumbled on the "lost" Paul McCartney album Return to Pepperland. As the lore tells it, McCartney was dealing with a bit of a funk in his late 80's solo career and decided to work up some songs in tribute to the 20th anniversary of Sgt Peppers. He connected with producer Phil Ramone and recorded a bunch of tracks, including the titular "Return to Pepperland" and a mash-up of The Beatles "Love Me Do" and "PS I Love You" entitled "
Like a lot of lost albums, there's a lot of speculation and connecting dots. I've no idea what the motivation behind the album was or if the tracks associated with the record were actually ever intended to be some grand Sgt Peppers tribute. What I do know is that there are some very entertaining bootlegs on Youtube that compile a lot of these tracks into a possible album.

The title track is quite good and some of the deeper album cuts - like "I Love This House" - are not at all what you'd associate with the McCartney sound.

McCartney fandom requires a ton of research. I'm not sure I'm ready to take that deep dive myself but I am endorsing dipping your toes in on this one.

a blast from the 1996 past. Blinker the Star was probably best known for their Dreamworks album, August Everywhere, but this one should not be overlooked. Packs a bit more oomph, even tho the lyrics may feel a bit more naive. Hey, it was 1996!

sorta forgot about this band but now I'm quite pleased to see their first new record in seven years!

There's not much that needs to be said about Miniatua; the highly detailed, handcrafted, miniature scale models of classic computers.. but there is a lot to see. They are pretty tiny but the amount of detail in these things is really nuts. Each project on the site has a nice insightful breakdown of what all was constructed and it's worth spending time to pore over each one. You gotta watch the tiny lights, please.

There's also an Instagram with way more, of course.

Not a positive read but a cutting, worthwhile, one. I see a little silver lining tucked in here but I also just enjoy the vitriolic truth.

Look, I'm not going to suggest you sit down and watch a six hour long YouTube video but if you were prone to do such a thing, I would certainly suggest adding this Zelda 2 PC Enhanced Remake walkthrough to your list.

According to the author's insights, it's a full rebuild of the game using GameMaker that includes widescreen views, bug fixes and lots of quality of life enhancements. What the blog post doesn't say is that it's also got hours of new map areas, dungeons and other general "adventure" baked in that feels completely like the original game.

I recognize that there's a great deal of nostalgia at play here but I can't help but be impressed that someone rebuilt a (somewhat maligned) game from 1987, fixed it and added loads to it for the pure fan service. I recognize this happens a lot with ROM hacks but this one feels especially legitimate. Maybe even worth 6 hours of your time.

I love this pizza place in the lower east side but I can not comprehend why these shoes sold for this much. I’m not a shoe culture guy but this seems especially nuts!