Iain Anderson’s animated film, Aiport, shows even the most pedestrian of designs come to life with a bit of creativity.

Elsewhere, a post at Copyfight, suggests that the availability of those symbols — their freedom from copyright and trademark restrictions — was a key factor in spurring their broad adoption, creating both the culture and the free imagery for artists like Anderson to use in their cultural commentary.

aiga, airport, airport symbols, culture, Iain Anderson, icons, symbols, travel

We can be forgiven for not noticing, but the world changed not long ago.

Sometime after the academics gave up complaining about the apparent commercialization of the internet, and while Wall Street was licking it’s wounds after the first internet boom went bust, the world changed.

Around the time we realized that over 200 million Americans have internet access, that 94 million Americans use the internet ?on an average day, and that 80% of them believe the internet is a reliable source of information, we looked around and found that along with doing their banking, their taxes, and booking tickets for travel and movies, those users were making about five billion web searches each month.

Now that over 62 million households (55%) have internet-connected computers at home, and 87% of youth 12-17 are active online, is it any surprise that children may learn to type before they write? Bloggers are changing the way we get news, but it’s Craigslist that’s killing newspapers’ old cash cow.

And perhaps most amazingly, the internet became not simply a market, a bazaar, it became a component of almost every facet of our lives. Facebook and MySpace were born of this simple desire to be human, with other humans, regardless of medium. A desire that drives, to greater or lesser extents, services like Flickr and 43things.

As Kevin Kelly noted in Wired:

“The accretion of tiny marvels can numb us to the arrival of the stupendous.”

It may seem as unlikely as Norman Bel Geddes realizing his Futurama, or Chesley Bonestell achieving interplanetary flight, but what was once science fiction has become a part of our daily lives. The internet age is here. It is now. We just don’t know what it means yet.

And here’s the library connection: We will all struggle with questions of relevancy in this new world. Inevitably, this will require us to examine our core values and change our services, but the results will be magical. As never before has the technology been available to so connect questions with answers, patrons with libraries.

library, libraries, future libraries, internet, internet usage, tiny marvels, stupendous, arrival, information age, science fiction, reality, social change, cultural effects, society, culture, networked information

Think now of the US interstate highway system. Like the internet that followed, the highway system was the subject of much hype and conjecture. Most notably, Norman Bel Geddes’ -designed General Motors Futurama exhibit at the 1939 New York Word’s Fair. In it we saw magical highways connecting our cities, and whisking motorists from New York to LA in 24 hours. He predicted cities would expand their commuting radius by 600% by 1960. The seven acres of exhibits dazzled. The attending crowds, who mostly took trains from hot, huddled apartments, fell in love with the dream.

The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, signed into law by President Eisenhower on June 29, codified Bel Geddes’ vision, and set in motion the enormous machinery necessary to build it.

And strangely, as it all began to take shape, it all looked pretty much as Bel Geddes had shown us in 1939 and earlier. Even so, it was the late 1960s before we started to understand the social change it brought with it. A 1970 study showed that home prices increased $65 for each minute closer (by highway) to the central business district they were, and that churches closest to highways grew far faster than those further from them. These were seen as positive trends, it was only later that we recognized urban flight, or the many other facts of a highway-enabled culture.

Change can be hard to see, to understand, and especially hard to judge, even in retrospect. More importantly, the lesson here is that by the time we see a change, it’s already happened.

(Highway history details from Tom Lewis’ Divided Highways.)

highway, highways, divided highways, change, social change, social effects, understanding change, interstate, interstate highways, mobility, cultural values, culture

CommonCensus Map Project:

The CommonCensus Map Project is redrawing the map of the United States based on your voting, to show how the country is organized culturally, as opposed to traditional political boundaries. It shows how the country is divided into ’spheres of influence’ between different cities at the national, regional, and local levels.

tags: common census, commoncensus, culture, cultural boundaries, cultural map, cultural regions, local, locale, map of the united states, map project, political boundaries, region, regions, spheres of influence, united states, us map

We’ve seen lists like this before. Beloit College in Beloit Wisconsin releases their “Mindeset List” for their incoming class every year around now. The point is to remind us how cultural touchstones change over time. It does that, but it also give us (me, anyway) a good chuckle.

It’s worth reading all the way down to number 49, at least, where libraries get a good mention.

tags: beloit, beloit college, beloit wisconsin, chuckle, cultural changes, culture, incoming class, mindset, touchstones, wisconsin, worth reading

Here’s the full list:

Most students entering college this fall were born in 1987.

1. Andy Warhol, Liberace, Jackie Gleason, and Lee Marvin have always been dead.

2. They don’t remember when “cut and paste” involved scissors.

3. Heart-lung transplants have always been possible.

4. Wayne Gretzky never played for Edmonton.

5. Boston has been working on “The Big Dig” all their lives.

6. With little need to practice, most of them do not know how to tie a tie.

7. Pay-Per-View television has always been an option.

8. They never had the fun of being thrown into the back of a station wagon with six others.

9. Iran and Iraq have never been at war with each other.

10. They are more familiar with Greg Gumbel than with Bryant Gumbel.

11. Philip Morris has always owned Kraft Foods.

12. Al-Qaida has always existed with Osama bin Laden at its head.

13. They learned to count with Lotus 1-2-3.

14. Car stereos have always rivaled home component systems.

15. Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker have never preached on television.

16. Voice mail has always been available.

17. “Whatever” is not part of a question but an expression of sullen rebuke.

18. The federal budget has always been more than a trillion dollars.

19. Condoms have always been advertised on television.

20. They may have fallen asleep playing with their Gameboys in the crib.

21. They have always had the right to burn the flag.

22. For daily caffeine emergencies, Starbucks has always been around the corner.

23. Ferdinand Marcos has never been in charge of the Philippines.

24. Money put in their savings account the year they were born earned almost 7% interest.

25. Bill Gates has always been worth at least a billion dollars.

26. Dirty dancing has always been acceptable.

27. Southern fried chicken, prepared with a blend of 11 herbs and spices, has always been available in China.

28. Michael Jackson has always been bad, and greed has always been good.

29. The Starship Enterprise has always looked dated.

30. Pixar has always existed.

31. There has never been a “fairness doctrine” at the FCC.

32. Judicial appointments routinely have been “Borked.”

33. Aretha Franklin has always been in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

34. There have always been zebra mussels in the Great Lakes.

35. Police have always been able to search garbage without a search warrant.

36. It has always been possible to walk from England to mainland Europe on dry land.

37. They have grown up in a single superpower world.

38. They missed the oat bran diet craze.

39. American Motors has never existed.

40. Scientists have always been able to see supernovas.

41. Les Miserables has always been on stage.

42. Halogen lights have always been available at home, with a warning.

43. “Baby M” may be a classmate, and contracts with surrogate mothers have always been legal.

44. RU486, the “morning after pill,” has always been on the market.

45. There has always been a pyramid in front of the Louvre in Paris.

46. British Airways has always been privately owned.

47. Irradiated food has always been available but controversial.

48. Snowboarding has always been a popular winter pastime.

49. Libraries have always been the best centers for computer technology and access to good software.

50. Biosphere 2 has always been trying to create a revolution in the life sciences.

51. The Hubble Telescope has always been focused on new frontiers.

52. Researchers have always been looking for stem cells.

53. They do not remember “a kinder and gentler nation.”

54. They never saw the shuttle Challenger fly.

55. The TV networks have always had cable partners.

56. Airports have always had upscale shops and restaurants.

57. Black Americans have always been known as African-Americans.

58. They never saw Pat Sajak or Arsenio Hall host a late night television show.

59. Matt Groening has always had a Life in Hell.

60. Salman Rushdie has always been watching over his shoulder.

61. Digital cameras have always existed.

62. Tom Landry never coached the Cowboys.

63. Time Life and Warner Communications have always been joined.

64. CNBC has always been on the air.

65. The Field of Dreams has always been drawing people to Iowa.

66. They never saw a Howard Johnson’s with 28 ice cream flavors.

67. Reindeer at Christmas have always distinguished between secular and religious decorations.

68. Entertainment Weekly has always been on the newsstand.

69. Lyme Disease has always been a ticking concern in the woods.

70. Jimmy Carter has always been an elder statesman.

71. Miss Piggy and Kermit have always dwelt in Disneyland.

72. America’s Funniest Home Videos has always been on television.

73. Their nervous new parents heard C. Everett Koop proclaim nicotine as addictive as heroin.

74. Lever has always been looking for 2000 parts to clean.

75. They have always been challenged to distinguish between news and entertainment on cable TV.

I get a kick out of these 1948 and 1950 Life magazine covers. Take a look and I think you’ll agree that no magazine puts photos like this on their covers today.

tags: 1948, 1950, culture, life, life magazine, magazine covers, magazines, retro