Russell Davies

moving house

Well, the Lyddle End project seems to be going nicely. James has speculated the first speculation - and it's a triumph. Awesome, well-researched and perfectly logical. About 15 buildings have found their way into the hands of builders, with more to come. I've found a supplier in Australia so they'll go out soon too. I've not found one in the US yet, so I might have to ship some from here. Which'll be a pain but do-able.

People have been asking for a deadline, so I'm going to say end of January. That should give everyone a decent amount of time. Then we'll work out how to get everything together. News and linkage is all being gathered automatically here. Just use the tag lyddleend2050 on flickr or delicious.

foggiest

dawdlr ticks over again

And there we are again. Dawdlr's just updated. Some lovely little moments in there. Next update May 21st.

lyddleend2050

Blimey. Well Lyddle End 2050 seems like a popular idea. How exciting. Loads of people have got in touch, all have promised not to be slack and I'm excited to find myself at the nexus where the world of futurism connects to the world of model railways. It's the kind of place you'd find a gigantic interdimensional shiftship.

The first lot of buildings are ready to go out to people, I shall be enveloping tomorrow. And I'm going to try and find local Hornby suppliers for all of you not in the UK. And, so we can all see work in progress, I've put a tumblr here. It should aggregate any flickr picture and any delicious bookmark tagged lyddleend2050.

More soon. And if you'd like to join in please email [email protected]

org

In a pathetic bid for zen-like clarity I've tried to rid m'blog of these kind of badgey things. But I'm rather proud of this one so I'll pop it here when it can live forever but quite quickly slip from view.

soho corners

copyphishing

It's sad, and possibly ironic, that we recognise this as phishing because it's more obviously written by a real, literate human than standard bank communications.

speculative modeling

A few things collided in my head a while ago:

* How much I like model railway lay-outs (a lot)

* A wondering about why model railway lay-outs always evoke the past - rarely the future

* A thought about the possible power of modeling and thinking with your hands

* Utter joy in the face of the splendidness of this.

* The discovery of the Lyddle End range of Hornby products.

And I had an idea. But I did nothing.

And then, Matt started his cattle-drive. Which proved the enormous value of the internet folly. And I saw this Pete Waterman quote in the paper at the weekend: "I don't mind people thinking we're daft. HG Wells was wrong. We do have a time machine, with models."

And all this culminated in an idea for another silly project; speculative modeling.

How about I get a load of Lyddle End properties and we try and build a version of what we think Lyddle End might be like in 2050? Everyone who wants one gets a little building and they have to alter it, mod it, change it, play with it, to reflect how they think the world will be in 42 years time. Then, we'll put them all together, either physically or through the magic of photography, and see what it might tell us about our visions of the future. I can't help thinking we might be able to build ourselves a rather intriguing speculative diorama.

Anyone up for that?

If you fancy it send me an email at [email protected] and I'll sort out getting some buildings. I'll pay for them, and the shipping, but you have to promise to have a go at the modeling and not be slack. Otherwise I'll feel a fool. (More of a fool.)

oooh aaah

strays

for Matt's cattle drive.