h. Play

So I’m all over incandescent, long-lasting bulbs and candle lights like

A few dimmers and I’ll be set.

It is a wonderful article about why LED lights suck and are slowly making us lose it.

I’m probably pretty light-sensitive, always have been. When I get headlights the strength of high-security prison floodlights in my face, I get stabby. It infuriates my retina to the point of wanting to immediately shut down this light now and forever.

All those cheap LED bulbs on porches, desks, in bedroom strips, in every single piece of electronic even when it’s completely unnecessary (I have a guitar pedal with a blue LED light more powerful than a thousand suns), are messing with me.

The article provides the answer as to why: that blue, 450-480nm light. It totally makes sense now. I knew it. I knew something was off with those LED lights, even when broadcasting 2700K warm light.

The answer to why LED lights invaded our lives the way they did is not so much their efficiency, it’s the fact that every single business out there in the world was like “we need to replace [item] for better lighting” which probably created an insane amount of transactions.

We already know that LED lights die rather quickly. All the supposed gains from having low power lights are offset by the costs of replacing all the bulbs, transformers and replacing all the LED lights that will die. It’s fake efficiency.

Once again, they disguise technological advance as a Quality of Life improvement when it’s essentially only a business agreement probably detrimental to said Quality of Life.

In 2023, now that we’ve put LEDs in everything, the answer, once the sun goes down, seems a blindingly clear “No!” Throughout the studies I’ve been digging into, there’s a lot of hemming and hawing about “Well, yes, blue light from LEDs is nasty to humans, but we can’t question the 24/7 productivity that lighting offers, so… I suppose we might file off some edges with future research…” – without ever asking the questions about “Is 24/7 productivity actually good for humans?” 

It is not in any way.

Do you know why we have cities? Because people created neighborhoods with and for their families, also creating businesses to sustain said folks.

Then cities competed against each other, involving businesses and government. Who would get the city hall build next to them, who would get the pretty church, the general store, etc.

Then cities competed with high-rises. Who is going to get the tallest building, expressing how progressive those cities were by building structures that offered everything in them. Hotels, restaurants, stores, apartments. Living in houses meant chores, maintenance, the old world. Bigger buildings (steel and concrete making them fireproof, a giant technological advance at that time), services, meant progress.

Los Angeles built up skyscrapers in downtown almost exclusively to say “hey, we’re not New York or Chicago big, but we’re trying!”.

It’s 2023. For a decade now the zeitgeist is remote work, delivery for everything, internet shopping. How many downtown buildings in America are still needed-needed? Probably less than half of them. They never really recovered from the move to the malls and suburbs since the 60s, anyway.

The way we live today completely destroys the need for the classical city.

No need for high density that was needed to get multiple stores on one block, once. That is pointless today because people order from their couches. We just need lockers, storage and stores that are a few blocks away because otherwise we wouldn’t walk ever (and we need to).

I keep thinking about the wild inertia between the ways we live and how we shape our worlds. Crazy, 50-year lag.

The counter-argument to UBI is always “and how do you finance such a big expenditure, misterr?”

Oh, you just do. Just like we do when we save banks.

See the Silicon Valley Bank thing? You are in the red? Minus $15B?

*changes number in database*

No you’re not! That’s how it’s done. Money is a number in databases. It’s always hard to comprehend considering how we’re all doing, I know.

We change the number for the bank and the credit runs up to 2095 or whatever, when it’s supposedly due. When the date will be changed again. There’s no accountability.

Ask SV, it’s all bullshit

(the best way to make the government change the number of $ in your bank account database instead of the bank account database, is to ask and vote for UBI, please do so thank you)

• France passed its reform to push the age of retirement by a few years. The French government has been trying to do that for decades.
• It won’t fix anything because the system is this: younger generations pay older generations’ retirement funds, right? It’s been known that we’re not matching retirement’s demand since at least the early 90s.
• A majority of people I know who did/do have great retirement benefits are BORED to DEATH. They also die rather quickly.
• My mom just retired. Her pension sucks. She knew this thirty years ago. She has retired, but still works. Like tons of other people. she’s 67.
• Same with my dad.
• They are the last slice of boomers who did get some retirement money. Everyone born in the 60s and up, it’s a WRAP.
• For it not to be a wrap, we would need everyone born in the 60s and up to immediately make $200K a year and make two babies each who would also work for us at well paid full-time jobs.
• Like I said, that’s a WRAP.

So I’m confused why one would protest a retirement reform that reforms a system that is known to be dead in the water for at least 35 years, which is a wildly known fact (I almost based my careers on the fact that I would never have retirement money), while we simultaneously witness that retirement is not all that either. We need purpose in life (my ENT in France is 90 years old and I saw him this year; he has not retired, and looks good).

So I don’t know what the fuck is going on for us to pretend like that. It’s maddening to me.

I don’t understand either why would you think that working your heart out at the start of your life would allow you to enjoy said life later, when your body fails more, and that that’s a great plan.

Y’all? Anyway, one more reason for UBI. Retirement is dead.

Yes, I’m using its version 3 via Bing.

Yes, I see the debates.

Yes, getting an answer like “sorry for your issue with this, here’s what you can do” that makes sense and is pretty much accurate, is a lot more natural and enjoyable than parsing a page of SEO’d blue links.

Yes, it is freaking me out, when I see that version 4 is a lot better than 3 and that the very first LLM only came out in 2018. And that it does almost as well in any language than it does in English.

At that pace, it’s not hard to see what’s going to happen. One example.

ChatGPT is an insanely good coding assistant. Remember how we told kids, “learn to code and you’ll be fine!”. Well now we know that we probably need ten times less programmers, compared to what we thought in 2010. That means ten times less money being saved for retirement of folks born in the 80s/90s, but I digress.

The implications of LLMs are hard to comprehend but it’s about to wash our worlds. I’m afraid of a few things:

• Bots are now going to be so impossible to detect that coupled with folks not being cautious or tech savvy, it is going to fuel a level of scams that we can’t possibly imagine.
• 
• It’s going to create an absurd, default, strong distrust between all of us in digital worlds. Is it Auntie in the group chat? No way to know for sure. Who’s writing those posts? Me here but otherwise, not sure.
• It’s just frightening how many jobs can be automated or semi-automated with LLMs. Six-figure jobs doing nothing but writing stuff are gone. If they’re not gone now, they are on their way out.
• It’s impossible to see at what pace or how those jobs will be gone, but it’s already happening. We’ll realize it when it’s done. Scary shit.
• Over the past 20 years, we have outsourced like crazy to developing countries. That’s over. Support work is going back home to data centers now. The impact on emerging economies is going to be felt for the next decades. Which means more emigration.
• Remote work exploded with the pandemic but with AI? That’s going to be forever now. There’s a huge brand new Warner Bros office on Venice Blvd. It’s for TV folks, who work from home on their laptops and Zoom constantly. The building is constantly empty. It will stay empty now and that was pretty much impossible to foresee when the building was built, years ago. Repeat that times a million across the country.

Two things that make me happy though: LLMs scan the internet for information and reasoning logic. My 15+ years blog is feeding them too! Second, I hope that this technological progress really makes people understand how we need UBI now and forever.

What a time to be alive has become really accurate to me.

The frame is wood and steel with reinforced concrete walls defining and punctuating the rectilinear geometry. The house is clad in stucco, redwood and glass.

Me:

The structure aspires to sustain a dialogue about the relationship between the natural and the human-made and the joys and wonders of both.

Me:

(I must have a built-in BS repellant in my mind)

I see Waymo cars twice a day now. I’m not sure that we’re ready for the massive upcoming societal changes but also:

• People straight up can’t drive anymore. They’re all distracted by giant dashboards and phones, excellent sound insulation and AC. Attention to the road and surroundings are a third priority now.
• Young people don’t want to drive anymore. Plus, all the 2000-born folks don’t have the analog feel, it’s all Ridge Racer-y and not good for traffic.
• Older people, more numerous than ever before can’t drive anymore, as we all know. 15mph on the left lane, no peripheral vision whatsoever, a mess.

I am left alone focused and sailing through a sea of moronic behavior and I’m tired of it.

Enters Waymo.

I remember the DARPA challenge and how about 20 years ago those robot cars prototypes were getting lost and failing in the desert around a rock and tumbleweeds. Now they’re in traffic driving better than 95% of folks around.

I know, this is purely American-built progress due to the grid infrastructure that I enjoy so much. European small and convoluted streets are not so great for this in-progress disruption of our lives. I mean:

• Codependency almost all based on access to a vehicle? Gone.
• Any emergency 24/7 needing you to move from A to B? Covered.
• Adultery and car sex? Revolutionized.
• Work, commuting and remote work? Reshaped.
• My 103 years old ass wanting to go to the 4D movies, but unable to drive his good old 2CV? Taken care of!
• Suddenly the titanic road system in California becomes a wonderfully automated transportation vessel where one can rest, do stuff, dream.

Now the data collection implications with Google’s vertical integration? Yes. Horrifying.

Architectural observations, I guess.

Single family house is/was the best

It is the best. It provides space, privacy. Indoor, outdoor. Growing up in such environment is fantastic, for that it brings so many layers of understanding about the world, and so many needed skills. I’ll take the recent example of J Dilla’s life. He and his siblings grew up in many apartments and houses, and they preferred apartments because they’re less work and chores. But it’s in a single house, in the basement that the beat producer became the beat producer. Space. Privacy. Growth.

Families are so different now

Tons of divorced couples. Most families don’t have many kids anymore. Tons of recomposed families. What that means is that we don’t need big family homes rather, we need 3-folks structures that can be maintained by said three folks. We’re in a post-servant world. It is also smarter to build multiple small dwellings than a giant house. Not only that allows for more flexibility (living with your partner and their mom or your partner and a kid is very different) but building small units makes them super easy to insulate and orientate perfectly. Climate change, energy prices, etc.

The giant impact of technology

We can comfortably sit somewhere with a laptop sporting 8 hours of battery, and do SOOO many things just like that. Architecturally speaking, this is freeing: no more specific rooms for specific usage. The needs for a game room or an entertainment room or a den or a study are gone. All the questions about how to integrate those rooms in a house, gone. All that matters is creating cozy nooks where we can go on with our digital lives.

We need to build smaller

The most consistent feeling when I analyze homes in books or in real life is how much we always build too much. For instance, dining rooms. Everyone tries to have one, but most of the eating and gathering will take place in the kitchen! Every. Single. Time. It’s like we create spaces “just in case” but that is extremely expensive and an awful waste. Due to climate change and optimizing cooling/heating, we need smaller homes than before. That’s the perfect justification to get rid of the past’s conservativeness.

Less squareness

We build using 90° angles because that made sense and it is easy to create and recreate with material we use to make houses and buildings with. But I’m telling you because I’ve experienced it: walls angled further away from the mighty ninety make the room a completely different experience. Your brain simply feels less imprisoned in a non-square space. The fabulous opportunity here is that we have those great little tools called computers, attached to those great 3D printers and that we are FREE from the 90° tyranny. Use Revit, send your 120° angular or curvy data to firms and machines, done.

Don’t forget: we shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us.

Reading a ton about Japanese architecture. Completely blown away at their ability to not follow anything but to just be in the now.

Japanese folks build somewhere and for a purpose. Maybe they want a view, maybe they want to mostly live in a big room, maybe they need to alleviate a noisy road. Maybe the lot is 4 meters (13 ft) large.

It’s never about “I need 4 bedrooms, a garage for my F250 and my house needs to look like a 1543 Italian Renaissance retreat”. That’s… Not it.

It’s about building ways for you to enjoy life, and it depends heavily on the site, its surroundings and the owner’s intention.

That means a whole lot of brainstorming.

Feelings first, looks later. Check those out:

Anti Dwelling House, 1972

Built for the architect’s mom. So yeah, a single-person home with a great skylight. Who wouldn’t like that?

Miyamajima Residence, 1973

Built around a 45cm grid, in and out. Conceptual AF.

Mini House, 1998

Tokyo. Ultra-dense and compact lots. Yet this house offers a lot of room, even a roof terrace and a parking space.

House N, 2008

Apertures arranged randomly to preserve privacy, windows designed in accordance with the golden ratio. CRAZY (so, so bold)

Nasu Tepee, 2013

Owners wanted to preserve trees around, so they designed rooms to fit between trunks. Since the interior would be dark when trees are thick with leaves, windows were placed at the top to provide natural light. Simple, yet amazing.

Necklace House, 2006

Built in a region with a lot of snow, most houses there have few openings. This one was completely optimized to provide natural light in every room and situation.

Optical Glass House, 2012

This one faces a 8-lane boulevard so they created a glass wall made of 6,000 glass bricks neatly tied together by stainless steel rods. Right behind the glass wall is a small garden with trees. The effect is that the noise is vastly reduced if not completely taken care of, while traffic and light blur together through the bricks. GE-NIUS

House NA, 2011

Take a tour. Isn’t it amazing? To live in a house like this has to change you deeply. You have to love stairs for sure though.

Just a few examples. There are so many incredible homes out there.

We are so boring with our shoeboxes that leak everything.