Keeping it Clean Online in Southeast Asia

MICA Minster Lui Tuck Yew. (Image: Straits Times)

The Minister of Information, Communications and the Arts in Singapore said today that the internet is too expansive for the Singaporean government to block viewers from accessing all undesirable content online.  However, internet service providers (ISPs) in Singapore are required by the MICA to exclude users from 100 websites as "a symbolic statement of our community's stand on harmful and undesirable content on the Internet."  The ministry uses censorship in pursuit of its rather milquetoast stated goals "to nurture, amongst Singaporeans, a deep passion for the country, and to inspire Singaporeans to explore, take pride in, and celebrate our identity."  Of course, these measures don't come close to censorship practices in China, where the government recently boasted that in 2010  they blocked 60,000 websites filled with obscenity and pornography, a category that includes political satire.

Men in Jakarta, Indonesia, checking their smartphones. (Image: Yahoo! News file photo)

In similar news, the majority Muslim nation of Indonesia announced today that it has won concessions from with the makers of Blackberry smartphones to keep pornography off the popular handheld devices.  The Communication and Information Technology Minister in that country has given Blackberry manufacturer Research in Motion two weeks to placate the ministry.   The Minster baldly stated, "If in the next two weeks, RIM fails to comply with the order by January 21, we will revoke its permit." The encrypted and unfettered connectivity provided by RIM's addictive business gadget drew scrutiny in 2010 from Indonesia and the governments of Saudi Arabia, India, and the UAE.

Existential Evening Plans

Screen grab from an online reservation form for a Tokyo ryokan.

The Passengers are planning a trip to Japan next month, and I am doing my best to hunt down a traditional Japanese bed-and-breakfast, or ryokan, for our stay.  These places sometimes also serve dinner to visitors so when I entered our meal preferences on the enquiry form above I was faced with a startling choice: large, medium, small, existential.  Click the image for a detailed view.

Down on the Corner, Out in the Street

José Rafael Moneo standing within the Columbia campus in front of his first New York project. Photo from the New York Times.

Early reviews are trickling in about a new landmark taking shape in upper Manhattan, Columbia University's new interdisciplinary science building. The tower balances on pillars above a very active gym and fitness center at the corner of Broadway and 120th Street. The design by José Rafael Moneo places a largely glass facade toward the campus interior, but the architect reduced the transparency of the street-facing glass by cladding the tower with a grid of panels striated with diagonal slits on either side of the outer trusses. The textural effect recalls the landscaped hedges that top the group entrance hall of Rafael Moneo's expansion at the Museo Prado. The lowest story remains incomplete and unformed, but it is supposed to hold an inviting public cafe. For a multimedia tour of the construction site visit the campus newspaper's website.

An architect's rendering of the building from 2007 showing the corner of Broadway & 120th Street.

The corner marks the convergence between Columbia, Teachers' College, Barnard, and Union Theological Seminary, and the architectural expression of self-importance for each institution means that no doors presently face onto this space. The presence of a public entrance or convenience on this spot would be a welcome, humanizing addition to the neighborhood. The more troubling relationship for the new structure is one of form and scale.

Columbia's main campus, stretching from 114th Street to 120th Street, largely conforms to McKim, Mead & White's fin de siécle plan for an enclosure of classical learning within classical, brick-faced architecture. The university has largely upheld these two tenets, with the exception of a Renzo Piano-designed student union and a handful of non-Western courses appended to the undergraduate core curriculum. However, the science building has no red brick materials or references to classical architecture. This is the disjunction that prompts former Columbia professor Barry Bergdoll to declare the building "provocative." Bergdoll is also right to acknowledging that the project creates a new focus on the north end of campus. Perhaps the visual role of this building will become clear with the construction of Columbia's new, and somewhat controversial, science-heavy campus in Harlem.

West 130th Street as envisioned by Columbia University's Manhattanville in West Harlem redevelopment project.

National Railway Museum, York

The Great Hall of the National Railway Museum holds train engines from Britain, Japan, and China. Some of the rolling stock hails from the nineteenth century.

During previous visits to York, I have always been too busy with research to stop in to the National Railway Museum, despite all the good press it receives. Fortunately, one of my stays here finally included a Sunday, which forces me to take a break from church visits (I was raised much too properly to wander the aisles staring upwards and scrutinizing the profiles of vault ribs as a vicar delivers his homily). I decided instead to apply my medieval mind to something much more modern.

Despite the obvious hypocrisy, this art historian find train enthusiasts to be very boring creatures overly concerned about defunct institutions and outdated technology. However, the museum takes care to tell how the history of train travel in Britain, and worldwide, changed leisure, trade, politics, and industry. Railroads opened up all sorts of opportunities and their historical course includes sites for everyone's interests. That and the place is full of huge locomotives that are big, heavy, expensive, powerful, and go faster and faster and faster. I admit I handed control of my afternoon over to childish enthusiasms, but I condoned my glee by reminding myself that I was tech-gawking at rolling stock, not high-powered war machines. Below are some photos. It's a little heavy on boy material (locomotives), but I assure everyone that I did take the time to see the beautifully appointed Royal carriages dating back to Queen Victoria.

The National Railway museum sits behind York's passenger terminal in what used to be the York Freight Depot Goods Warehouse for the Northeastern Railway Company.

The Duchess of Holland was built in 1938 and streamlined with ultra-sleek cladding, but all of its style was removed during World War II. Its shape and colors were only restored this year.

The NRM collection continues to expand. Here in "The Workshop" conservators labor to return the famous Flying Scotsman steam engine to working order.

The Mallard set the current world speed record for a steam-powered train in 1938: 126 mph.

The electric turntable at the center of the Great Hall helped trains at York station turn around from 1954 until the end of steam service in 1968. The museum holds daily demonstrations.

The Latest in Flight

Singapore Airlines has made available loads of photos to trumpet their deployment of the A380.

My flight today from Singapore to London took place on one of the new Airbus A380 superplanes. I wasn’t fortunate enough to sit on the upper deck, where business and first class resides, along with a few rows of economy. My deck did feature the personal suites, but I had to make due with the lower tier’s sixty-some rows of economy arranged 3-4-3 across. Fortunately, the sheer size of the aircraft lets everyone stretch out, even with ten seats across the body of the jet. Even better, a new jet means all the fixtures are clean and shiny: fresh upholstery, the latest seat-back televisions, and grime-free paneling.

My seat overlooked the starboard wing. When the plane rests on the tarmac the stupendously long appendages bend down so dramatically under their own weight that the foil fins atop the wingtips almost disappear under a titanium horizon. Once in flight, the wings’ aerodynamics create the forces and the lift needed to produce an unbroken, rigid sight-line. It’s fabulous engineering, but a slightly unnerving spectacle.

Home counties for the rest of the week. Back to New York on Friday with H.