David Lidsky's Blog, page 209

And the best movie posters of the year are . . .

The Oscars won’t recognize the visual art that brands cinema—but we will!

The Oscars don’t have a Best Poster category. (Or even a Best Title Sequence category, which they did sort of have for the very first Academy Awards in 1929 before—for shame—dropping it in 1930.) So this year, as in the past, we asked some of our favorite poster designers which Best Picture nominee should win Best Poster.

Germany celebrates 25th anniversary of Bernd das Brot

Bernd, a depressed loaf of bread, channels German stereotypes with his grumpy disposition, penchant for complaining, and dry sense of humor and irony.

Forget SpongeBob SquarePants, Sesame Street, and the sourdough starter craze: a depressed German loaf of bread named Bernd das Brot is celebrating his 25th anniversary as the reluctant star of a children’s television program that accidentally became equally popular with adults.

In Airstream’s new all-electric trailer, everything runs off a battery and rooftop solar

‘Theoretically, you could be out there indefinitely.’

A typical RV has to plug in at a campground to run the power inside. But Airstream’s newest Basecamp 20Xe trailer is designed to power itself in remote locations: If you want to spend a week in the wilderness, you can theoretically use an induction stove, keep your laptop charged, turn on the air-conditioning, and have hot water for the shower—even if you’re nowhere near any utilities.

Inside the design of Monopoly’s new board game that ditches the banker for an app

‘This is by far the most innovative version of Monopoly we’ve ever created.’

An accepted fact of childhood: Monopoly is a slow game that requires consecutive snow days to successfully finish. And, by god, no matter what you do, do not end up as the banker, the most tedious and thankless of jobs. 

Builder unsold inventory jumps to 2009 levels: Housing markets where buyers can find deals

“Some builders are facing pricing pressure—especially in key Florida and Texas markets,” writes Dillan Krieg at John Burns Research and Consulting.

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter.

A ‘Moby-Dick’-inspired opera opens at the Met

Gene Scheer whittled down the 600-plus-page novel to a 64-page libretto, often tweaking Herman Melville’s phrasing to make it more singable.

When Leonard Foglia was invited to direct an opera based on Herman Melville’s masterpiece about a white whale, his first reaction was: “Moby-Dick. That’s great!”

4 ways to protect your personal data from Musk’s DOGE

Elon Musk and his minions are trying to access your personally identifiable information at the Treasury Department and other government agencies. Here’s how to protect yourself.

Americans across all political stripes were understandably concerned when news broke that Elon Musk, the unelected head of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), had gained access to the U.S. Treasury Department’s payment systems. These payment systems are responsible for trillions of dollars in federal payments, including things like Social Security benefits and tax refunds.

How foreign workers helped spur Spain’s rapid economic growth

Spain’s ministry for social security and migration says 45% of all jobs created since 2022 have been filled by around half a million new foreign-born workers.

Inside a cavernous production plant in Spain, people from 62 nationalities work side by side to keep a food company humming as millions of legs of ham travel on hooks along conveyor belts.

People with secure attachment to their pets are less depressed, researchers find

Reflecting on both the joys and responsibilities of pet ownership can help strengthen the human-animal bond, supporting the well-being of both pets and owners.

For many people, pets provide unconditional love, companionship, and a sense of security. But not all human-pet relationships are beneficial, and some may contribute to stress and anxiety rather than relief.

Curious about DeepSeek but worried about privacy? These apps let you use an LLM without the internet

The desktop apps LM Studio and GPT4All allow users to run various LLM models directly on their computers.

Most of us are used to using internet chatbots like ChatGPT and DeepSeek in one of two ways: via a web browser or via their dedicated smartphone apps. There are two drawbacks to this. First, their use requires an internet connection. Second, everything you type into the chatbot is sent to the companies’ servers, where it is analyzed and retained. In other words: the more you use the chatbot the more the company knows about you. This is a particular worry surrounding DeepSeek that American lawmakers have expressed.