Earlier I wrote of the contrast between the old synagogue in Stommeln and the in-your-face fuck you of the cathedral in Köln.  While in Avignon I visited the PayPal place and came away disgusted and angry. This place is just as empty and devoid of spirit as Stommeln,  but in contrast because it was quickly constructed for political reasons (the schism of the Catholics and the relocation of the papacy to Avignon demanded an appropriate building) and subsequently used as both barracks and prison (!). In particular, the army tore out all the PayPal show-off shit for utility, which seems really appropriate.

On entering the ticket booth to be relieved of my tourist money, there was a mighty crash of thunder as the weather turned and the rain that had threatened all morning began. Seemed appropriate.

Worth noting: the"special" chapel off the PayPal reception area devoted to St Marcial, a made up saint whose function was to connect the French Pope's line with early Christian tradition to legitimate him. Since there wasn't any existing visual story about this guy, the artist got to just make stuff up when painting the walls and ceiling. Of course now the paintings are solemnly celebrated in the public tour.

Also of note: the balcony over the open area within the palace from whence the Pope would dispense mass indulgences for all the assembled who had paid.  Gotta keep that monopoly business going.

I’m pretty done with Catholic displays of power.  Altogether, the solemnity seems as ridiculous as a historical guided tour of a Disneyland exhibit. Btw: Google kept rewriting “papal” as “PayPal”, so I kept it 🙂

“The Venture Capital Populist”, George Packer, The Atlantic (June 2026) spends a bunch of ink arguing that David Sacks, a professed free-market “libertarian capitalist”, is in fact the architect and beneficiary of White House initiatives that leave him substantially richer. But from all the reading I’ve been doing over the last few months, this is the normal way of capitalism. The mythology of small businesses eagerly competing with one another free of interference and winner-picking by government is historically just a myth, especially with empires. The state power of empire is traditionally used to secure and enforce the profitability of favored companies, often through state-mandated violence.

I remember Douglas showing me an illustrated book about a small baker and how what he did was the exemplar of capitalism. But historically speaking, I rather think it’s more that slavery is the exemplar. Crony capitalism, monopoly, corruption seem more the rule than the exception, in history and around the world.

From https://www.liberalism.org/p/enshittification-despotification-and-the-open-internet:

"Any decentralized successor that requires users to become their own sysadmins will lose the same way the last generation of open protocols lost."

I think my son is discovering this.

Doing some art installation work in Stommeln, near Cologne. The installation is associated with the old synagogue there, a modest now-empty building hidden off the main square behind shops. Went into Cologne today on the train. The cathedral there is completely in your face, dominating the area for a square mile. Bit of a different vibe …

https://www.terrygodier.com/the-boring-internet/ascii

https://transparentelection.org

Clyde Shavers is getting something together for WA.

https://www.digitalistpapers.com/vol2/autorthompson

The basic idea is the Expertise framework.  Jobs are composed of tasks, tasks have more or less expertise associated with them.  If the less-expert tasks are automated, expertise is valued, there are fewer but more highly paid workers (experienced software architects).  If the more-expert tasks are automated, the remaining work is lower-paid, and more broadly available (Amazon warehouse workers).  The way out is the creation of new expertise, through the creation of new tasks, most of which we can’t yet conceive of.

Douglas was arguing this years ago when I expressed my fears regarding automation and paid work.  This is a nuanced guide to the argument, with supporting research and examples.  Along the way, lots of good ideas and observations.

We all shop at Trader Joe’s.  https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/tell-trader-joes-to-commit-to-keeping-ice-out

This one is for my son, Ian. Years ago before the Internet, when social media was dial-up and I had an account on the Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link, I read a post speculating about a new theory, that ocean warming could cause a state change in the oceanic currents that keep Europe warmer than other places with similar latitudes (for example, northern Canada). Not a gradual temperature shift, but more like flipping a switch.  If such a thing happened, the average temperature in Europe would quickly plummet, making traditional agriculture as it’s currently practiced in traditional locations difficult or impossible.  This in turn would significantly affect Europe’s ability to feed itself.

The theory has become well-accepted. This week I read that the consensus is now that there’s a 50% chance that the state change will happen this century, and a substantial chance that it happens by 2050.