jake makes slideshows's blog/

This is my first day on ipernity, and so far I am impressed by the site, and by the quality of the contacts I'm making already.

I am hoping that there will be more community, and less competition than at flickr.

I have just uploaded my first soundfile.

I hesitate to call it music, as I know nothing about music (In the same way that I know nothing about photography)

It is the first time I have gone public with my sounds, so please don't be too critical.

My music is a sound equivalent to my photos... the same concerns, and often the same subject, and is meant to be listened to while watching my slideshows.

Once I get some complete slideshows uploaded I will maybe add more soundfiles and link them to specific slideshows.

‘So then always that knowledge is worthiest … which considereth the simple forms or differences of things, which are few in number, and the degrees and co-ordinations whereof make all this variety.’

Francis Bacon

I don't pick up a camera very often, but when I do I take a lot of photographs.

The title of each photo is the name of the set/album/slideshow that it belongs to, and is usually a descriptor of where and duration.

The number is assigned by the camera, so you can see that I don't post every photo I take.

I work best in the early morning, due to the quality of light at that time.

I would not call myself a photographer..... I know little about the camera and pretty much just point and shoot.

I work best when I am exploring, when I am somewhere new, and I simply take pictures of what my eyes are attracted to.

My main interest is in the sequence of images, the continuity and discontinuity, the "space" between the images, so I always advise that you view my photos as a slideshow once they are fully uploaded.

I feel, though you may disagree, that my photos are improving, and this is due in part to your feedback, your comments and faving, and the encouragement it gives me, and also in part due to the incredible collection of diverse, creative photos I see here and the "other place"

Thanks for your visits, and I simply hope you can find something here to enjoy.

I have deleted the first soundfiles I uploaded.

They were unfinished and roughly mixed and I uploaded them just as a test.

Now I will begin uploading finished pieces.

My suggestion is to listen to them as accompaniment to my slideshows.

They are mixed for headphones, so sound better heard that way.

The Politics of Nanjing: An Impartial Investigation

Kitamura Minoru

Translated by Hal Gold.

University Press of America

173 pp

ISBN-13 978-0-7638-3579-0

More than 60 years after the fact, the events surrounding the fall of Nanjing to the Japanese Army in 1937 remain clouded in hyperbole and rhetoric. The continuing denial of the “massacre” by the Japanese government continues to fuel tensions between Japan and China, and so it was with some hope of discovering some new facts that I began to read Professor Kitamura’s “impartial” investigation.

By the second chapter however, it became blatantly clear that this book’s claim to impartiality is a joke.

Kitamura has gone through an enormous amount of materials and records with a fine toothcomb and collected together many discrepancies and facts that support his thesis that the massacre is a masterpiece of Chinese propaganda. To further his agenda he fills in gaps in the historical record with opinions that have no basis in fact, and he ascribes meanings to people’s actions that are unverifiable and often extremely tenuous. He presents evidence as a prosecutor, rather than as a judge and as the book progresses, any attempt to mask his bias is dropped so that by the end of the book we can read a simple explanation as to why the Chinese claim of  300,000 victims can be dismissed … “The Chinese are reputedly – and unquestionably – cultural exaggerators.”.!!

One wonders what the good professor makes of the reputed – and unquestionable – inability of the Japanese to admit to unpleasant truths!!

He ends on the subject of “the emotions of memory”, and it is worth quoting in full,

“…from these ethnocentric emotions, people can easily be lead to a simple choosing of one conclusion concerning history. Then, Sun Gee continues, that if the Chinese continue clinging to this tendency, it makes it impossible for Chinese thinkers to face complicated international political relations, and they cannot participate effectively in living history.”

This strikes me as the EXACT situation Japan currently finds itself in with the policies of the current regime in Tokyo..

However, if one reads the book with one’s critical faculties fully operational, there is some interesting information unearthed by Kitamura. For instance there seems to be a lot of circumstantial evidence linking the American journalist Timperley, who was instrumental in reporting on Nanjing to the world and whose reports were influential at the War Crimes Trials, with the Chinese propaganda Ministry, and an interesting section that suggests that some of the more bizarre atrocities claimed by Chinese may have their roots in Chinese cultural taboos, but unfortunately the book is unlikely to have any impact other than reinforcing the beliefs of the “illusionist” school.

Just uploaded the latest mix of a track I deleted earlier.

The title is self-explanatory.

It seems to fit with the short sequence of photos I just uploaded of the Selfridge's building.

I first saw this amazing building on flickr, and was amazed to learn that it was at the Bullring in Birmingham, a place of fond memories of my degenerate youth.

Then last March, we were on vacation in the UK and taking a bus to North Wales, and we had to change buses in Birmingham.

As we pulled in the bus station I caught a glimpse of the building.

We had 40 minutes till our bus left, and it was a ten minute walk through the pouring rain to the building, so I only had 20 minutes to photograph it

It turn out that the weather helped, because the diffuse light helped make my photos a little different from the usual photos of it, bright and contrasty.

Anyway, please enjoy both if you can.

A brief explanation on the series of photos I am currently posting.

Latest version of a soundfile I deleted earlier.

I've just added a set of photos of a walk around northern Kyoto, visiting shrines, starting at Kamigamo Jinja.

I recommend using the slideshow .

On recent uploads.

A short slideshow imported from f@@@@r

Recently uploaded album/set

Short slideshow of Thailand photos.

Your favorites.

Book review.

Slideshow of a walk around Miyoshi

Slideshow of a local matsuri

My first ipernity album.

Slideshow exploring the town of Hamada