"the first steel-framed skyscraper"

Links Watched Citizen Kane again tonight.  It is still the greatest film ever made.  The Sight & Sound vote is an aberration and hopefully it'll be back at the top where it belongs in 2022.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has a tumblr exposing images from its photography archive, along with explanatory commentary.
"This unusual spiral staircase served the Carnegie Building, the headquarters of the Carnegie Steel Co. When completed in 1895, the Carnegie Building was the tallest office building in Pittsburgh, standing at 13 stories or about 200 feet. It was the first steel-framed skyscraper constructed in the city. The building, which had been located at 428 Fifth Ave., was demolished in 1952 — the year this photograph was taken — to allow for the expansion of what today is the Downtown Macy’s store."

Robin Brown on the day he abseiled down Liverpool Cathedral.
"As I wait to go out onto the roof I peer over the side at what is the top side of the West Doors’ vaulted arch that houses the western entrance. It’s maybe 20 foot form the gantry I’m standing on to the floor, but in my heightened sensitivity to the perceived dangers all around me this relatively short height is worrying. I’m also pondering whether I would go through the top and continue my freefall in a rather less elegant way, should the gantry give way."

To celebrate Robert Moog's birthday earlier in the year, Google created this interactive doodle.
"When people hear the word “synthesizer” they often think “synthetic”—fake, manufactured, unnatural. In contrast, Bob Moog’s synthesizers produce beautiful, organic and rich sounds that are, nearly 50 years later, regarded by many professional musicians as the epitome of an electronic instrument. “Synthesizer,” it turns out, refers to the synthesis embedded in Moog’s instruments: a network of electronic components working together to create a whole greater than the sum of the parts."

The Guardian interviews Alanis Morissette.  She has a new album out soon.
"When someone says that I'm angry it's actually a compliment. I have not always been direct with my anger in my relationships, which is part of why I'd write about it in my songs because I had such fear around expressing anger as a woman. I thought I would be retaliated against or physically hit or vilified. Anger has been a really big deal for women: how can we express it without feeling that, as the physically weaker sex, we won't get killed. The alpha-woman was burned at the stake and had her head chopped off in days of old."