It’s random blog pimping time again! This time, I’m going to suggest you go take a look at a post on Subtopia, which bills itself as ‘A Field Guide to Military Urbanism’. Don’t be put off - it’s not full of pictures of people who take Neighbourhood Watch too seriously. Instead, it’s about the incursion of military thinking and architecture into urban spaces.

The post you should go and see is all about bunker touring in Berlin, complete with photos from exploratory trips into the old Nazi bunkers under the German capital:

[Image copied from Subtopia post, in turn borrowed from Berlin Underworlds Assn. Please contact if you require take-down.]

“I wonder, how much volumetric space is taken up in underground bunkers, how much air capacity exists trapped in these concrete structures? I’ve asked this before, but could we estimate exactly how much real estate, or in this case, air space, is devoted around the world to the underground?”

There’s plenty more like that, too, plus lots of other fascinating material, all wrapped up speculative musings and philosophy that has a similar flavour to BLDGBLOG.

And talking of BLDGBLOG, I may as well give it another plug, because there’s a new post about the solar observatories of ancient cultures - a subject I’m a real sucker for, much like BLDGBLOG’s author:

“Meanwhile, I’m a genuine sucker for solar-alignment theories involving landscapes and architecture; in fact, I was just talking to someone about this the other day. Yet I’m even more of a sucker for unintentional examples of such things – like houses with pitched gable roofs that accidentally line-up with the sun every summer solstice…”

Good stuff. Take a break from the writer blogs for five minutes; you’ll not regret it.

I figure most of you have read Accelerando by Charles Stross*. Remember Spring-Heeled Jack and his rocket boots? Stross didn’t just make them up out of thin air, you know - they were a genuine invention, a product of Cold War Russia’s military technology industry that never made it into large-scale production. Pity, that - I’d quite like a pair.

*If you’ve not read Accelerando yet, what the hell are you waiting for? It’s not like you can’t download it for free with the author’s blessing or anything …

If you wanted to play a first-person-shooter in VR, you’d need a damn big room and some lengthy cables, right? Well, not any more, thanks to a new device called the VirtuSphere.

Continue reading “Real movement in virtual realities”

Players of Doom will know well what the letters ‘B.F.G.’ stand for… Continue reading “Life imitating computer games (again)…BFG”

I’m no fan of war in general, especially not the ongoing ‘liberation’ going on in the Middle East. But I *am* a real sucker for futuristic technology, even for military applications. Continue reading “Bring on the super-weapons!”

The BBC reports on a Pentagon document detailing the US military’s approach to ‘information warfare’ (PDF format). A little quote:

From influencing public opinion through new media to designing “computer network attack” weapons, the US military is learning to fight an electronic war.

Continue reading “Don’t believe everything that you read/watch/hear…”

From the website of Witham Specialist Vehicles:

A high proportion of surplus MoD vehicles are exported by ourselves, fully supported by a vast inventory of spare parts and service items.
Vehicles and plant can be purchased from us ‘as is’ or fully reconditioned and prepared to customers requirements. Our fully trained staff are able to undertake all aspects of work on all types of vehicles and plant we sell, in our modern fully equipped workshops.
Whatever your requirement for MoD vehicles is, Witham SV can provide you with a cost effective, dependable solution, on time and on budget.

And here’s where I can get some vehicles for my post-apocalypse fantasy scenarios, to go with my bunker colony. (Mental note…stop reading military SF late at night.) No bloody hovercraft, though. I want a hovercraft.

This link courtesy of my good mate Crusty Paul…he makes musical instruments out of old electronic kids toys and sells them to musicians with more money than sense, check his website here: Circuitbenders

For sale: Britain’s underground city - Sunday Times - Times Online:

WELCOME to Cold War City (population: 4). It covers 240 acres and has 60 miles of roads and its own railway station. It even includes a pub called the Rose and Crown.
The most underpopulated town in Britain is being put on the market. But there will be no estate agent?s blurb extolling the marvellous views of the town for sale: true, it has a Wiltshire address, but it is 120ft underground.

Woot! Okay, let’s get a consortium together, folks; given the world political climate and the fact that I like my peace and quiet, this could be the ideal enclave for anyone who’s had enough of the world. I will be king of the mole-people…join me!