Image by Za Rodinu via Flickr

Stuff I thought was interesting from April 14th through April 19th:

• Tea Party Financiers Owe Their Fortune to Josef Stalin – The Tea Party movement’s dirty little secret is that its chief financial backers owe their family fortune to the granddaddy of all their hatred: Stalin’s godless empire of the USSR.
• Cultivated Play: Farmville | MediaCommons – The most important thing to recognize here is that, whether we like it or not, seventy-three million people are playing Farmville: a boring, repetitive, and potentially dangerous activity that barely qualifies as a game. Seventy-three million people are obligated to a company that holds no reciprocal ethical obligation toward those people.
• Daily Kos: State of the Nation – When a President is all Heart – Yesterday, after ordering hospital visits rights to the partners of gay men and lesbians, president Obama called Janice Langbehn, a woman from Florida who in 2007 lost her partner for 18 years, Lisa Pond. Apparently, the president read the story last year. So last night he called Langbehn from Air Force One to tell her about the new policy.
• Internet Filter Not Needed, Says US Ambassador to Australia – The US ambassador to Australia Jeff Bleich has criticised the Rudd government’s plan to filter the internet, saying the same goals can be achieved without censorship.
• House season finale shot with Canon 5D Mk II – For those doubters of having a “sub-standard” video mode in DSLRs, you might want to wait for the season finale of House (featuring the superbly sarcastic Hugh Laurie) to see what can be done with a video-capable DSLR

Inspired a little by the post processing used in David De Groot’s Dead Trees.

CP, and monochrome conversion in post.

Sitting as a stark reminder to what might have been, the ruins of “Archer’s Folly” is listed in the Tasmanian Heritage Register because of its association with prominent local businessman John Kinder Archer.

Not to be mistaken as a descendant of the Archer dynasty, John Kinder Archer was the son of John Archer, a miller from Ware in England.

Following the death of his father, and his inheritance of 30 shares in a steamship, John Kinder Archer turned his hand to the shipping industry.

He was also an elected member of the House of Assembly for Norfolk Plains in 1859, a position he held until 1861.

At about this time, Archer began building a large mansion on the high ground adjacent to Bishopsbourne Road in Carrick.

An interesting feature was the carriageway in the centre of house which took the form of a tunnel. Horse drawn vehicles could be driven right through the building from the front entrance to an inner court yard and out through the back entrance to the stables.

The front of the house was built, but at this stage Archer suffered a number of set backs.

Two of his ships collided in Bass Strait in a severe storm. They were carrying building materials for the house and were uninsured. Further building plans were cancelled and the house was never finished.

In 1867 it was sold to a miller, and ex-employee of his father, TW Monds who used the property for storage purposes.

Source: Heritage Tasmania