Monthly Archives for August 2010

DIY PERSONAL SATELLITES

from : http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2010/08/05/diy-personal-satellites/

$8K Personal Satellite Kit
http://news.discovery.com/space/personal-satellite-kit.html
“Bringing the do-it-yourself market to a whole new level, a California firm is selling kits to build a personal satellite — and get it into space — for $8,000. The program, called TubeSat, is the brainchild of Randa and Roderick Milliron, a Mojave, Calif.-based couple who’ve been developing a bare-bones, low-cost rocket system for the past 14 years. Selling flights as a package deal with satellite-building kits is proving to be a winning combination, with more than a dozen customers signed up to fly on the debut launch early next year. The first of four suborbital test flights is scheduled for August and there are customers for those as well. The kit contains the shell components for a satellite including a printed circuit board, solar cells, batteries, a combination transmitter-receiver, microcomputer, electronic components, blueprints and a structural shell that’s about the size of a one-liter bottle. Most TubeSat customers, so far, are universities. “There’s been a massive number of shelved experiments,” Milliron said, caused by a dearth of low-cost launch systems. “This is an opportunity for the academic community to fly affordably.” Interorbital’s rocket, called the Neptune, will place up to 32 TubeSats and 10 slightly larger off-the-shelf spacecraft called CubeSats into orbit about 192 miles above Earth. At that altitude, the spacecraft will orbit for about six weeks, then burn up in the atmosphere. Launches will take place from the island of ‘Eua, located in the Kingdom of Tonga, in the South Pacific.”

Includes Free Launch (32 at a Time)
http://interorbital.com/Company%20Page_1.htm
http://interorbital.com/TubeSat_1.htm
“A TubeSat is designed to function as a Basic Satellite Bus or as a simple stand-alone satellite. Each TubeSat kit includes the satellite’s structural components, safety hardware, solar panels, batteries, power management hardware and software, transceiver, antennas, microcomputer, and the required programming tools. With these components alone, the builder can construct a satellite that puts out enough power to be picked up on the ground by a hand-held HAM radio receiver. The TubeSat also allows the builder to add his or her own experiment or function to the basic TubeSat kit. As long as the experiment or function satisfies the volume and mass restrictions, it can be integrated into the TubeSat. These restrictions provide a unique intellectual challenge for the experiment or function designer. TubeSats are also available as Double TubeSats, Triple TubeSats, or Quadruple TubeSats. Prior to launch, each TubeSat is inserted into one of the rocket’s 32 Satellite Ejection Cylinders. They never come into contact with the other TubeSats. Once on-orbit, the satellites are released according to a pre-programmed timing sequence. The timing sequence is designed to prevent satellite clustering. Interorbital expects to launch a set of 32 TubeSats per month. If the buyer pays the full cost of the TubeSat kit upfront, he or she is immediately placed on a launch manifest according to the order in which the payment was received. TubeSat buyers also have the option of paying half of the cost upfront, then paying the other half of the cost at a later date or when the TubeSat is completed and ready for integration into the launch vehicle. With this option, the builder will be placed on a launch manifest according to the time when full payment is received.”

See Also: CubeSats
http://cubesatkit.com/content/overview.html
http://cubesat.calpoly.edu/index.php/collaborate/suppliers
http://space.com/businesstechnology/cube_sats_040908.html
“A standard CubeSat is a motherboard of invention: About a 4-inch (10-centimeter) block of equipment that tips the scale at roughly 2 pounds (1 kilogram). A handful are already in space and with other launches planned for later this year. Peep inside a CubeSat and you’ll spot off-the-shelf circuitry in the familiar form of microprocessors and modem ports, and other microchip devices typically used in cell phones, digital cameras and hand-held Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite navigation units. A CubeSat can be built for under $25,000, although they typically come in at the $30,000 to $40,000 price range – still a bargain. The “going-rate” per CubeSat launch is in the $40,000 range. Universities have an inherent advantage in developing “disruptive” space systems, Swartwout contends, and that is the freedom to fail. In fact, he added, three of the six CubeSats placed in orbit in 2003 were either never contacted or failed very early. “Experimental failure is a basic element of university life, and from the university’s perspective, a failed spacecraft is not necessarily a failed mission,” Swartwout said. Swartwout explained that the tremendous reductions in the size and cost of electronics are making possible “disposable” probes that function for only weeks, but whose very low cost and short development cycle make their launch and operation affordable. There is talk about flying tethers on the spacecraft, as well as toting along inflatable packages – both techniques viewed as a way to hasten a CubeSat’s reentry and lessen worry about adding to already orbiting space clutter. CubeSat innovators also envision the small spacecraft deployed from the International Space Station – chucked out of an airlock. Then there is the prospect of CubeSats toting biological or hardware experiments that reenter and parachute to Earth. “I hope the CubeSat is like the personal computer…you don’t know what the heck you’re going to do with this little box when you build it or what markets will be enabled. But it’s so cool, you’ve got to do it,” Twiggs concluded.”

Open Source Arduino Sats
http://opensat.cc/download/DIYSatellite_en.pdf
http://books.google.com/books?id=YAIHa97G4icC

Cellphone + Toy Parts
http://wired.com/wiredscience/2010/07/cell-phone-satellite/
“Instead of investing in their own computer research and development, engineers at the NASA Ames Research Center are looking to cellphones and off-the-shelf toys to power the future of low-cost satellite technology. The smartphone in your pocket has about 120 times more computing power than the average satellite, which has the equivalent of a 1984-era computer inside. “You can go to Walmart and buy toys that work better than satellites did 20 years ago,” said NASA physicist Chris Boshuizen. The biggest challenge of sending cellphones and toys into space is whether the parts can get up there without shaking apart and work in a vacuum at extreme high and low temperatures. To do some preliminary testing, two Nexus One cellphones caught rides on two rockets on July 24 that launched 30,000 feet into the atmosphere at a maximum speed of mach 2.4 (about 1,800 miles per hour). One of the rockets crashed into the ground after its parachute failed, but the other made it back with the cellphone unscathed. Both cellphones were able to record the acceleration of the rocket using their built-in accelerometers, and the undamaged phone captured 2.5 hours of video of the event through a hole in the side of the rocket. “Everything that didn’t break is a piece of data,” said volunteer engineer Ben Howard. “We know that the batteries didn’t break and that the computer worked the whole time.” If the cellphones ultimately get used to power satellites, they will probably be sent up without a screen and with a different battery to make them lighter. Next, the team will build a stabilizing mechanism for the satellite using the cellphone, $100 toy gyroscopes and parts similar to those of the Mindstorms Lego, so the satellite can orient itself in space. By installing three spinning gyroscopes and getting them to spin at different velocities, a satellite can move in any direction. The same technique is currently used on many satellites, but requires multimillion dollar technology. The whole goal of the project is to make satellites cheap and affordable, so that anyone with bit of time and a couple of thousand dollars can send their own satellite into space. Upgrading the computing power of satellites using cellphones would mean increased satellite capabilities, possibly including artificial intelligence. “We’re not sure yet exactly what people will want to do with their satellites, and that’s the point,” said NASA education specialist Matt Reyes. “What can you imagine doing with your phone in space?””


Retrieving the Nexus One cell phone from the rocket post-launch

Previously on Spectre : Sat Hacks
http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2009/10/02/sat-hacks/
Consumer Satellite Use
http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2008/07/16/consumer-satellite-use/
Russians Launching Satellites From Subs
http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2007/07/10/russians-launching-satellites-from-subs/
Brazilian Satellite Squatters
http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2009/04/24/brazilian-satellite-squatters/
Earth Will Have Rings
http://spectregroup.wordpress.com/2008/03/24/earth-will-have-rings/

Tuli Has Left the Planet

Paul Krassner, Tuli Kupferberg, and unidentified woman. Photo by Paskal / The Rag Blog.

Tuli Has Left the Planet
by Paul Krassner for High Times

Prologue: Ah, the songs . . . “Boobs a Lot” . . . “Nothing” . . . “Morning, Morning” . . ..

I first met Tuli Kupferberg in the early ’60s at the Paperback Gallery in Greenwich Village. I was delivering my magazine, The Realist, and he was delivering his booklet, Birth. Sharing a concept that tragedy and absurdity were two sides of the same coin, we bonded immediately.

In 1966, I published an article by John Wilcock, “Who the Fugs Think They Are.” Tuli talked about the importance of sexual liberation. “Americans like to kill or be killed,” he said. “Aggression is reaction to frustration. Sexual frustration is still the major problem to be solved and in my opinion the appearance of sexual humor is a healthy sign. And if we can put some joy, some real sexy warmth into the revolution, we’ll have really achieved something.”

When Norman Mailer wrote his first novel, The Naked and the Dead, he used the euphemism “fug” for “fuck,” which was then a literary taboo. At our first encounter, I asked him if it was true that when he met actress Tallulah Bankhead she said, “So you’re the young man who doesn’t know how to spell fuck.” With a twinkle in his eye, he told me that he replied, “Yes, and you’re the young woman who doesn’t know how to.” Anyway, that’s where the Fugs got their name. In “Doin’ All Right,” they sang, “I’m not ever goin’ to Vietnam/ I’d rather stay right here and screw your mom.” Tuli told me, “That was enough to get us beaten up if we did it in the right place.”

In 1968, at the counter-convention in Chicago, hash oil in honey was the drug of choice. The Fugs co-founders, Ed Sanders and Tuli, sampled it. This was strong stuff, and they got completely fugged up. Sanders described the grass he was walking on as “a giant frothing trough of mutant spinach egg noodles.” Tuli’s friends had to carry him by the armpits back to the apartment where he was staying. “They’re delivering me,” he explained.

There was a rumor that Philip Roth had lifted the masturbatory obsessed theme of his novel, Portnoy’s Complaint, from a Fugs song, but that notion was disavowed by Sanders, who assured me, “Philip Roth did not plagiarize a Fugs song. He came to a Fugs show in 1966, and I think he was inspired by Tuli, in top hat and cane, singing ‘Jack-Off Blues.’ Many times in reunion concerts, introducing Tuli singing that song, I have suggested that Roth got some of the impetus for Portnoy’s Complaint from that time he was inspired by the Tuli tune.”

Another rumor was triggered by Allen Ginsberg’s famous poem, Howl. Tuli acknowledged that he had been the inspiration for this passage: “…jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge this actually happened and walked away unknown and forgotten into the ghostly daze of Chinatown soup alley ways & firetrucks, not even one free beer…” Actually, it was the Manhattan Bridge. Tuli was just out of college and in the throes of the break-up of his first major love relationship, which contributed to a nervous breakdown that precipitated his suicide attempt. He was rescued by a passing tugboat and taken to Governor’s Island Hospital with a broken transverse process that put him in a body cast.

“Throughout the years,” Tuli complained, “I have been annoyed many times by, ‘Oh, did you really jump off the Brooklyn Bridge?’—as if it was a great accomplishment.” At first he had refused to talk about it, but as Ginsberg’s myth spread that he had simply “walked away” after jumping off a bridge, Tuli became concerned about wrongly influencing young people. He didn’t want anyone else to take a similar chance of being severely injured if they survived.

Tuli was the first Poet-in-Residence at the Bowery Poetry Club. Proprietor Bob Holman sent an e-mail two days before Tuli’s death on a gloomy Sunday: “I am in Medellin at the amazing International Poets Festival here—100 poets! Ten days of it!—and Tuli’s spirit is everywhere. Tell that bum to get up and out and over here.” Norman Savitt, producer of Tuli’s TV show, Revolting News, reported from the hospital bedside that Tuli reminded him “what a shame it was that I had my son circumcised, how I should be putting lyrics to all my instrumental music, and the importance of raw garlic in my diet.” And Larkworthy Antfarm adapted a Fugs song, applying the original lyrics to the BP catastrophe, singing about “a river of shit.”

Epilogue: Ah, the condolences: “Tuli, may you see Boobs a Lot in Heaven” . . . “This Monday will be just a little more Nothing” . . . “Mourning, Mourning” . . .

Check out paulkrassner.com to see the digitally colored edition of the infamous Disneyland Memorial Orgy poster.

NEW AEON MASTERS OF REALITY

New Masters of Reality album out in North America in October, with tour (!). Info: mastersofreality.com

Chris Goss: beloved Masters of Reality mainman for twenty-plus years—a storied New York band whose debut album was produced by Rick Rubin and released on American Records, which was followed by a move to California and some time on the record label that brought us Tone-Loc. For two years, three tours and a studio album, Masters of Reality’s drummer was legendary fiercehead Ginger Baker of Cream. Pine/Cross Dover is the band’s first studio effort in five years, and finds longtime drummer John Leamy once again on skins, joined by Brian O’Connor on bass, and Dave Catching (Eagles of Death Metal, Earthlings, QOTSA, etc) and Mark Christian on guitars.

Here’s the two covers for the new album, and the opening salvo…

263_BRH9905-Animated_300

Download: “King Richard TLH” — Masters of Reality (mp3)

Stream: [audio:http://www.arthurmag.com/magpie/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/King-Richard-TLH-128.mp3%5D

Goss is also known as: Kyuss producer, occasional Queens of the Stone Age/Desert Sessions member/collaborator, UNKLE contributor, and, with Twiggy Ramirez and Zach Hill, one-third of Goon Moon. As one-half of the pictured-below The 5:15ers (QOTSAer Josh Homme was the other half), he headlined the second night of ArthurBall in Los Angeles in spring 2006.

LARecordBall

Let’s have some classic Masters from the past. Here’s a couple from the Ginger Baker era, first up is a live rendition of “John Brown” off Masters’ first album…

“Mister Who?”: A video by Casey Niccoli from the Ginger Baker era…

A live one from the Queens era…

And an unbelievably majestic 1999 live take on another classic from Masters’ first album…

Also….

“Sound Methods and Weird Channels: How producer and Masters of Reality main man Chris Goss got his groove” (2004 profile I did for the LAWeekly)

Goss is the author of arguably the best piece of neighborhood/cooking writing to appear so far in the pages of Arthur: check out his super-porkout Immigrant’s Sauce recipe/reminisence from the Brian Eno cover ish (No. 17, July 2005—still available, collectors!).

Let’s wrap it up with a message/manifesto to artists from Goss…

TONIGHT, Sept 2: Arthur presents MEN (feat JD from Le Tigre) at Pappy and Harriet's in Pioneertown near Joshua Tree – ALL AGES, $10

Poster by Xavier Schipani

Who are MEN?: “MEN is JD Samson, Michael O’Neill and Ginger Brooks Takahashi—with contributions from Johanna Fateman and Emily Roysdon—a Brooklyn-based band and art/performance collective that focuses on the energy of live performance and radical potential of dance music… ”

MEN on Facebook and myspace

Pappy and Harriet’s is a big all-ages honkytonk located in Pioneertown, two and a half hours’ drive from Los Angeles, next to the town of Yucca Valley. The beautiful Joshua Tree National Park is 20 minutes’ drive away. There is almost zero cel phone reception at Pappy and Harriet’s, which helps you to enjoy where you are. On most nights, you can see the Milky Way.

Tickets are $10: Ticketweb

For inexpensive lodging options—both of these are a short walk from Pappy’s—check out

Motel: Pioneertown Inn

and

Camping: Pioneertown Camp Corrals

Previously in Arthur Magazine: JD was in Le Tigre, who were interviewed at length by Oliver Hall in Arthur No. 13 (2004), available from The Arthur Store for $6

A Poem from Henry Real Bird


HOOLA HAND
by Henry Real Bird

Today as I let go, a hoola hand into the dawn
Among silhouetted horse heads, held by a rope corral
But then, that day was many winters ago
To good horses you are drawn
I have asked that you ride the best
Of beautiful words to create images
Of life’s reflections filled with feelings of reality
Winters many may you ride the best.

As sunlight moved in the wind
Among the shadow of an ash tree
I gave the sweat lodge a drink
In the absence of memory
An ole’ feeling sprouts
In the charred remains of life
It is customary
That I have no doubts
Wishful thoughts and prayers through dreams strive
For peace in our souls
May you ride the best
Through the four different grounds
Upon our sacred mother earth.

Henry Real Bird is the current poet laureate of Montana. Right now he is riding a horse across the state of Montana handing out books of poetry. Read the story here.

"Silence Country" by Conor Stechschulte

Conor Stechschulte graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 2008 and embarked on a cross-country bicycle trip from the east coast in Virginia to the west coast in Oregon.  In each state, he photographed a “woods walk” where he would find a patch of woods usually somewhere close off the side of the road, walk in a straight line (going from east to west), and take a photograph every 3 to 5 steps.  Since coming home, he edited the photos down to one walk (consisting of anywhere from 10 to 16 images) per state and has begun to translate them into drawings.

Conor adds, “The drawings are done side by side, two at a time on pieces of 24 x 19″ bristol board.  Each drawing is about 9 x 6.5″.  There are 134 images to draw for the final Silence Country book, so going at the pace I am right now, it’ll probably be done somewhere around 2018.  Haw haw.”

This particular set is from Kentucky, outside of Bardstown. It was photographed right near an anonymous graveyard dating back to the civil war.

Conor underwent a similar walking/photographing/drawing process for a zine he did in 2008 titled “The Spirit World.”

Conor is a member of Closed Caption Comics, he plays in the band Witch Hat, and he lives in and helps run “Open Space” gallery in Baltimore.

¡ACTIVISTA! by Sonny Smith: "Do not turn your back away from the people of Arizona!"

¡Activista!
by Sonny Smith

I just came back from tour through the beauteous state of Arizona. My camper broke down in Tucson. Myself and the Sunsets stranded on the side of the road trying to figure out what to do. Radiator fluid dripping down the highway. The John Wesley Coleman boys from Austin traveling in peril with us. There was gonna be too many people to fit in a tow truck we were told, so we had to split up. The boys began walking to the nearest town. Impressive. It was 113 degrees. I didn’t know if I was gonna see those guys again. They didn’t take anything with them. Not even water. Moments later a trucker pulled over and gave us his remaining four jugs of water. As it turned out the boys made it to the Phoenix gig because the trucker had stopped and given them a lift.

Let it be heard: Arizona is lousy with arch maniacs, archfiends and arch fleas!

Phoenix Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s sojourn on earth reveals a basic lack of love and understanding for humanity. Yes this crooked cracker nut cake sheriff clown hails right out of some throwback 1950s deep south paperback: white, pale, bloated, mean and hell bent on criminalizing the inevitable other. Is it possible to surmise he is not an old soul, but a newer soul, perpetrating crimes in order to experience retribution? A de facto style for the soul to learn and grow. Fear not seekers of justice, it may take a hundred lifetimes to learn his lesson. Why, his retribution may possibly last millennia!

Let it be known! Arizona is plump and fat with honest fair folks!

The fellow that towed my camper to the Tucson garage was the nicest tow truck driver I’ve ever met. He said he wouldn’t take advantage of my situation and it turned out he didn’t. He gave me the most amicable deal I’ve ever gotten from a tow company.

Let it be known! Arizona is rank and foul with wicked xenophobes!

I passed six motels with signs stating “American owned and operated.” To be clear, “American owned…” signs hanging from motels are a not so subtle message declaring they aren’t owned by Indians. It’s racist code. A lady told me years ago: “They’re ruining the motel business.” Sheriff Joe dressed in drag.

Let it be known! Arizona is busting at the seams with righteous and reasonable folks!

The Trunk Space club owner in Phoenix was an understanding man when I told him I couldn’t make the gig. Clubs don’t typically forgive bands when they don’t show up. He didn’t have to be so understanding, but he was.

Protesters are attempting various strategies. Some shall win some shall fail!

Under a campaign entitled Soundstrike, bands such as Nine Inch Nails, Kanye West, Conor Oberst, and Sonic Youth have signed onto protest Arizona’s immigration laws by refusing to play in the state. This is a sincere yet most unfortunate choice of protest. Bands! Musicians! Artists! Do not turn your back away from the people of Arizona! Play underground. Play in houses. Play in day labor camps.

Let it be known! Arizona’s flowing over with good and bad news!

The proto-fascist Senate Bill 1070 was blocked on four key parts. But guess what, it’s going to be against the law to stand on the sidewalk and be available for work!

Let it be known!

When my band passed through the quasi-military immigration checkpoint I briefly quaked in my boots. Little fear however for my blanche white profile. Not so for the Latino angel trucker who gave my band water and brought the Wes Coleman boys one hundred and thirty miles to their gig. The checkpoint guard gave me a sideways look. “You in some kind of band or something?” “Yes” said I. She looked at my rig and sized us up. Had she decided we were “American owned and operated”?

Sonny Smith
Fri July 30, 2010