Archive for December, 2008

The Beatles’ Norwegian Wood was actually Swedish

Miscellaneous: December 16th, 2008 by DL

Observer design and architecture critic Stephen Bayley ruminated last Sunday about the roots and inspiration behind modern Swedish design, concluding succinctly that it all gets back to two things: climate and demography.

Harsh winters meant Swedes were traditionally forced to enjoy the indoors: furniture, rugs, glassware and ceramics become exceptionally important when it is 30 degrees below outside.

He continues:

Demographically, Sweden is more nearly all one social class than, say, Britain or France. This meant that when the first design movements began in the early last century, their appeals could be addressed to the whole population, not just a special interest group. This made Sweden modern while we were still Victorian.

Fair enough. But Bayley’s theory about the outgrowth of the early forces behind the Swedish design movement is likely to ruffle the feathers of more than a few Norwegians.

Thus was social democracy given its material credentials: a century of great design followed, satirised by The Beatles as Norwegian Wood, but really it was Swedish. The wood was pale and mated to natural canvas. Chairs and objects came in polite shapes. Crocks were colourful and fish platters were made in stainless steel.

Who knew that British pop music could contain such insights about how and why Scandinavians choose to decorate their homes as they do?

Sweden currys favour with Indian cooks

Miscellaneous: December 16th, 2008 by DL

Sweden’s recent decision to liberalize its policies governming immigrant labour have caught the attention of the Wall Street Journal. The paper explains how the move ‘bucks the trend’ of other European countries which have adopted measures that only target highly-skilled workers.

The WSJ expects international employment and immigration experts to watch developments in Sweden closely to see how the new rules, which went into effect on December 15th, play out.

“People are going to be watching the Brits, who are putting everything into a point system, and the Swedes, who are doing something entirely different,” said Demetrios Papademetriou, president of the Washington-based Migration Policy Institute, a nonprofit think tank. People “will be watching to see which system gives better labor market outcomes, both for the employer but also for the immigrants themselves.”

According to the article, early advocates of the new legislation include reps from Sweden’s Indiska chain of retail outlets and restaurants, who are hoping the new rules will make it easier for them to hire chefs for their restaurants directly from India.

Curry anyone?

My city’s greener than yours

Miscellaneous: December 16th, 2008 by DL

The Treehugger environmental news website reported recently on a brewing battle between Stockholm and Olso as to which town can lay claim to having the best infrastructure for electric cars in the Nordic region.

Stockholm’s bid charged ahead last week with the unveiling of a couple of odd looking poles sticking out of the pavement along Norr Mälarstrand, not too far from City Hall.

Finnish utility Fortum is promising to install 100 electric charging stations in the city of Stockholm in the coming year. Even though that probably won’t put Stockholm or Sweden at the absolute head of the electric pack (Oslo will likely have well over 100 stations by the end of next year), Stockholm’s move is a good one.

So while Sweden may not yet be ahead of their Norwegian brethren when it comes to catering to electric cars, efforts by both cities will surely add a spark to the friendly rivalry between the two countries.

Viva las reindeers!!!

Miscellaneous: December 3rd, 2008 by DL

A UK-based animal rights group thinks Ikea deserves a lump of coal in its stocking for selling products containing reindeer meat.

The Daily Telegraph reports that Viva! (Vegetarians International Voice for Animals) has launched a campaign urging the Swedish furniture retailer to remove the items from its shelves because of the cruelty associated with modern reindeer hunting.

Viva! campaigns manager, Justin Kerswell, said: “We are very concerned about the exploitation of wild animals for meat.

“As well as being chased from the land and air, once they are caught, their misery doesn’t end there. In Sweden, some reindeer face a gruelling journey of up to 1,000km to the slaughterhouse where they face anything but a humane end.

“More than 70 per cent of reindeer slaughtered for meat are calves that have grazed during the summer, which means they never even get to see snow.”

The group cites a 2005 study by neuroscience researchers at Uppsala University which concluded that reindeer hunting caused the animals “considerable physical and mental stress”.

Ikea responded in a statement in which it explained that using modern equipment helps keep the large reindeer herds safe from predators, and that the animals are taken to slaughter according to rules which apply to other animals in Sweden.

Missing from the story is any comment from Sweden’s reindeer herders themselves, the indigenous Sami, whose way of life — not to mention livelihood — depends to a large extent on tending to the animals known to the rest of the world as Santa’s little helpers.

Swedish ‘rapper’ facing murder charges in LA

Miscellaneous: December 3rd, 2008 by DL

Aftonbladet is reporting that Swedish hip-hop artist and song writer David Jassy, who goes by the stage name Dave Monopoly, is set to be charged with murder on Wednesday in Los Angeles for running down a well-known jazz pianist.

According to reports in the Los Angeles Times, the incident occurred on the morning of November 24th when Jassy’s SUV edged into a pedestrian crosswalk, at which point 55-year-old John Osnes, a respected jazz pianist and advocate for pedestrians’ rights, struck the hood of the vehicle in frustration.

Jassy got out of his vehicle, punched Osnes and then kicked him in the head when he bent over to retrieve his glasses, authorities allege.

Bystanders, including an off-duty Anaheim police officer, attempted to detain Jassy, but he got back in the SUV and drove over Osnes’ body, according to authorities. He fled the scene and was arrested Monday after investigators traced the license plate of his rented car, police said.

Osnes, who was on his way home after visiting a local watering hole, died later in hospital from “blunt force trauma“.

Jassy was initially charged with assault, battery and leaving the scene of an accident, but prosecutors have now added murder to the indictment as well.

In Sweden, coverage of the tragic case of road rage gone awry has been covered primarily by the tabloids which, in accordance with Swedish press ethics standards, refuse to publish Jassy’s name, even though he is named in several LA Times articles.

Alternately referred to in the Swedish press as “the Swedish hip-hop artist” and “the Swedish song writer”, Jassy is by no means a big name in the music world, according to the LA Times

Although he identifies himself as the “CEO of Jassy World Entertainment” on his MySpace page, Jassy is a minor music industry player whose biggest accomplishment to date is rapping on an album track for “High School Musical” actress Ashley Tisdale.

Virtual reality, Swedish style

Miscellaneous: December 3rd, 2008 by DL

Media outlets across the world were fascinated on Wednesday with an experiment from the Karolinska Institutet on Wednesday which reads like something out of a science fiction movie.

As Reuters puts it:

Researchers using closed-circuit televisions to create an illusion have made volunteers virtually swap bodies, even making women believe they were in a man’s body and vice-versa.

The experiment … shows it is possible to manipulate the human mind to create the perception of having another body …

Or, as the researchers put it in their article, published on Tuesday in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS ONE:

Manipulation of the visual perspective, in combination with the receipt of correlated multisensory information from the body was sufficient to trigger the illusion that another person’s body or an artificial body was one’s own. This effect was so strong that people could experience being in another person’s body when facing their own body and shaking hands with it.

All philosophizing aside, the experiment also showed that there were limits to the extent which the subjects sensed that they were outside their own bodies.

The illusion only goes so far. The researchers said they could not fool their volunteers into thinking they were a box, for example.

Virtual reality indeed. One can only imagine where this sort of technology may lead in the future.

BBC launches four new channels in Sweden

Miscellaneous: December 2nd, 2008 by PO

Starting this week, TV viewers in Sweden will be able to access four new BBC channels: BBC Entertainment, BBC Knowledge, BBC Lifestyle, as well as a HD channel.

The British broadcaster has signed deals with Swedish operators Canal Digital, Com Hem, Telia and Tele2, Dagens Media reports.

BBC Entertainment will replace BBC Prime, a channel described by the broadcaster as “too non-specific. BBC Entertainment will do what it says on the tin.”

But are the new channels any good? Discuss.

Thrillseeker parachutes onto Turning Torso

Offbeat: December 2nd, 2008 by PO

In this two year old video, Austrian basejumper Felix Baumgartner, 40, aptly nicknamed ‘Fearless Felix’, parachutes from a moving helicopter, lands on top of the famous Turning Torso in Malmö, then basejumps to the ground.

Why? Erm, good question…