Busting Open an iPod Touch

...worry and exasperation is real. Apple’s minimalist design aesthetic, while making devices that are visually appealing, gets in the way of their use and function. This iPod is so sleek and slim that it just wants to slide out of your hand and break, which is how I came to this repair, of course. The funny thing is that in order to keep the thing from getting broken you have to buy a third party case. From a design perspective (not a capitalist one,...

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My New Thoughtstyling Throne

...he BarcaLounger which shows you how far this American Empire has declined. Making Stickley’s #336 involved an nerve racking steam bending process. The wood went in a makeshift box fed with steam from a wallpaper steamer. After an hour in the steamer the wood was quickly rushed to a form made with plywood. I had to actually sit on the arm to get it to bend. On the first attempt the arm broke and I had to do it all over again. When I was done with t...

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I made shoes!

As regular Root Simple readers know, I’ve been obsessing on making shoes for some time now, but was not able to wrap my mind around the process without help. Help arrived this weekend in the form of the wonderful–and wonderfully patient– Randy Fritz, who taught me and four other intrepid souls how to make turnshoes over the course of the last 4 days. Lesson 1: As we have all suspected, shoes are not easy to make. Seriously not easy. Four full day...

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Saturday Tweets: Don’t Fear the Green Reaper

...Root Simple (@rootsimple) January 28, 2019 The Right to Repair movement is making strides around the world https://t.co/PKffl3RWYJ — Root Simple (@rootsimple) January 28, 2019 I’m going to have to start eating actual mice, aren’t I?https://t.co/0cbDh6ipn4 — Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) January 28, 2019 Progress! https://t.co/7wPV20taEb — Michael Pollan (@michaelpollan) January 28, 2019 Play is beginning to look more and more like work. The Complic...

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Saturday Linkages: We Are All Liars

...f producing effects on users that keep us hooked. It is for the purpose of making users the conduits of the machine’s power, keeping its effects in circulation. Faked celebrity deaths, trolling, porn clickbait, advertisements, flurries of food and animal pictures, thirst traps, the endless ticker tape of messages mean less than they perform. The increase of information corresponds to a decrease in meaning . . . The result could be the most elabora...

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