[ recap ]

Last we looked at one of my current favourite websites is Antikythera, "What is Intelligence?" by Blaise Agüera y Arcas, Aldous Huxley's "The Doors of Perception."

[ thoughts ]

"Look to the past: some of the best ways to spark creativity and innovation come from revisiting old ideas."

Walter Benjamin wrote "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" in 1935. His argument: mechanical reproduction strips away the "aura" of original art - the unique presence, the physical encounter, the thing you had to be in the same room with to experience.

In 1935, he was writing about photography and film. Cameras could reproduce paintings. Film could capture performances. The question he asked: what happens to art when copies become effortless?

In 2026, mechanical reproduction is AI generating infinite variations at zero marginal cost. Text, images, video, music - all reproducible instantly. Benjamin's 1935 essay is more relevant now than when he wrote it.

The response to infinite reproduction isn't rejecting technology. It's choosing deliberately. Last month saw the release of The Pro-Human AI Declaration: "AI should serve humanity, not the reverse."

Benjamin's question from 1935 still stands: what happens when reproduction becomes effortless? The answer emerging in 2026: people choose the thing that can't be reproduced.

[ creativity ]

The most digital generation is going aggressively analog.

US vinyl sales hit $1.04 billion in 2025 - first time since 1983. Nineteenth consecutive year of growth. Nearly 47 million records sold.

Kodak reports film demand doubled in the last five years. They've had to upgrade manufacturing capacity twice. The company reopened production lines they'd shut down. New film photography labs opened at a rate of 312 locations globally in 2025.

Michaels declared 2026 "the Year of Creative Living in the analog era."

Needlepoint searches up 251% year-over-year. Sewing patterns up 152%. Visible mending up 144%.

46% of Gen Z refuse to use AI tools at work. The generation most comfortable with technology is opting out.

The global print magazine market is worth $60 billion. Print still accounts for 55% of total magazine circulation globally and 75% of publisher revenue.

Women's lifestyle magazines saw readership increase 23.6% between 2024 and 2025.

Independent print magazines are launching while mass-market titles fold.

Five of my current favourite magazines: Arena, Plethora, Palladium, Heavy Traffic, Works in Progress.

The pattern isn't strictly anti-technology. I think it's constraints. Vinyl gives you 24 minutes per side. Film gives you 24 or 36 exposures.

Benjamin called it "aura" - the presence an original has that a reproduction doesn't. The record forces you to flip it. The film forces you to think before clicking.

The constraint changes what you see and how you see it.

[ making ]

Try the cut-up method this week.

Brion Gysin and William S. Burroughs developed it in the 1950s. Take existing text - newspapers, books, your own writing - cut it into pieces, rearrange randomly.

How to do it:

• Find a page of text (printed)
• Cut it into individual words or phrases
• Rearrange without planning
• Write down what emerges

The randomness isn't the point. The point is breaking your pattern. You can't write the same sentence twice if you're pulling from pieces.

This is in The Contemporary Blueprint. The cut-up method is one of several techniques for disrupting your default thinking.

The method is 70 years old. It works because your brain is still the same brain. Old tools on new problems.

[ sign off ]

This week I watched "AI is making CEOs delusional" - 7½ minutes of analysing the current state of AI. Worth your time.

See you next Sunday, anonymous reader.