Architect quits to spark revolution in building techniques with bold research: 'Our idea of progress is completely based on colonialist practices'
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Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience.
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Generate Key Takeaways
To build what's next, we may need to remember what's been forgotten. That philosophy is taking root on the rural outskirts of Tenjo, Colombia, where an Indigenous construction lab is redefining what "sustainable architecture" really means.
The Centro de Regeneración is a 30-acre open-air campus where ancient building techniques meet modern ecological thinking.
As featured in The Guardian, the land is dotted with experimental structures that resemble coiled pots, woven baskets, and even doughnuts. Each one is a workshop in progress, dedicated to earth construction, ecological restoration, biodynamic agriculture, and the medicinal power of native plants.
Much of the center's magic can be traced to its founder, Ana María Gutiérrez. Formerly an architect in New York, Gutiérrez left behind the corporate design world after a life-altering experience building with rammed earth back home in Colombia.
"The moment I was barefoot," she said, "working with the earth, I was like, 'What am I doing sitting at a desk, working on a computer all day, every day?'"
That turning point led her to transform inherited land into what is now the Centro de Regeneración, a living laboratory that centers learning through hands-on, sensory experiences. Alongside it, she launched Fundación Organizmo, a nonprofit that supports remote Indigenous communities in preserving and evolving ancestral construction knowledge.
Her mission: to "unlearn everything we have been taught" about progress. "Our idea of progress is completely based on colonialist, extractivist practices," she told The Guardian. "People talk about sustainability, but what exactly are we sustaining?"
Organizmo's work now stretches far beyond Tenjo. Backed by the Re:Arc Institute, which is supported by the Inter Ikea Foundation, the organization is partnering with communities such as Piaroa de la Urbana, where traditional palm-weaving techniques are at risk of disappearing.
In collaboration with elders, Gutiérrez and her team co-designed a classroom and curriculum to ensure that this intergenerational knowledge survives and thrives.
Elsewhere, Organizmo is empowering youth filmmakers from eight Indigenous groups in the Amazonian region of Vaupés to document land exploitation and cultural resilience. Their message is clear: Indigenous leadership isn't rooted in extraction; it's rooted in protection.
These low-tech, high-impact solutions are part of a broader movement funded by Re:Arc. Similar efforts include Oasis Urbano, a design collective working to revive overlooked neighborhoods in Medellín such as Moravia. All share a core belief that building a livable future means centering community wisdom, not corporate convenience.
In a landscape crowded with high-tech "sustainable" materials such as bioceramics and hempcrete, Organizmo's approach is refreshingly grounded. It makes life simpler, healthier, and more connected. The payoff? Cleaner air, stronger communities, and homes that don't cost the earth.
As Gutiérrez put it, "What if we saw ancestral knowledge not as a romantic past, but as a vivid present that could teach us resilience?"
Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
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Geek Vibes Nation
29-05-2025
- Geek Vibes Nation
'Consumed' Blu-Ray Review - Supernatural Creature Feature Impresses With Practical Effects
Trapped between a madman and a skin-stealing monster, a married couple must fight to make it out of the woods alive. For in-depth thoughts on Consumed, please see my colleague Cameron Ritter's review from its original theatrical release here. Video Quality Consumed makes its Blu-Ray debut with a sturdy 1080p video presentation that showcases the rural cinematography well. The remote shooting locations provide crystal clear and occasionally upsetting textural details. Some moments are intentionally hazy to capture the headspace of our protagonist as she has nightmares about her health and squares off against the creature. The presentation reveals a significant amount of depth while traversing the woods. The image has a somewhat cold quality about it, yet the rich colors of the forest nonetheless make a big impression. The film employs some complex hues in the expanses of nature which delivers a very stark image. Black levels exhibit discrete signs of banding in some of the darkest enclaves, but primarily they maintain their depth. The flesh tones are natural with a favorable amount of detail present in close-ups. This Blu-Ray is a grand representation of this movie that should more than please fans. Audio Quality Brainstorm Media gives this Blu-Ray a DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio track that effortlessly executes all of the creepy sonic elements. Environmental sounds of the world creep through the room in a very immersive manner. When the characters move through the woods, some distinct ambient details flesh out the setting to nice effect. Thrilling moments only come in sporadic bursts, but key developments deliver some exquisite texture to the proceedings. The nimble and effective sound design blooms with careful utilization of the surround speakers. Dialogue always comes through crisp and clear without being overpowered by any competing sounds. The score is capably balanced while maintaining its fidelity. The audio track provides a terrific experience that brings this narrative to life without issue. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided. Special Features Audio Commentary: Director Mitchell Altieri and writer David Calbert provide an informative commentary track in which they discuss the movie and production in depth. The pair discusses incorporating folklore into the narrative, the collaborative nature of the set, the performances, the shooting locations, and more. Interview with Creature Effects Supervisor Jim Ojala: A 17-minute interview is provided in which the creative discusses his involvement in the movie, crafting a memorable creature design, challenges faced along the way, and more. Behind The Scenes Footage: A nearly 38-minute selection of fly-on-the-wall footage captured during the production. Creating The Creature Effects: A nearly 32-minute piece that dives deeper into the creation of the special effects. Still Gallery (3:08) Original Trailer (1:45) Booklet: A multi-page booklet featuring an essay by film critic Don R. Lewis is provided here. This piece gives a well-rounded analysis of the creatives, themes, and plot developments, which strengthens your appreciation overall. Final Thoughts Consumed has a very promising premise that finds our protagonists battling creatures and internal struggles in equal measure. It has become less common to see practical effects used to conjure up a thrill, but director Mitchell Altieri and his team take the care to create tangible nightmares that stick in your memory more than most fully CGI sludge. This portion of the production is the best element in the end, as the script feels rather rote and repetitive. The performers bring what they can to the material, but it does not handle the mythical lore at the center of the narrative with enough creativity. The movie is fine for a fleeting distraction, but it does not hold up as a great film. Brainstorm Media has released a Blu-Ray featuring an excellent A/V presentation and a wonderful assortment of special features. Consumed is currently available to purchase on Standard Edition Blu-Ray or with a Limited Edition Slipcover exclusively through Vinegar Syndrome. Note: Images presented in this review are not reflective of the image quality of the Blu-Ray. Disclaimer: Brainstorm Media and OCN Distribution have supplied a copy of this disc free of charge for review purposes. All opinions in this review are the honest reactions of the author.
The Verge
28-05-2025
- The Verge
The plan for nationwide fiber internet might be upended for Starlink
For about 15 percent of US households as of 2023, the only internet options are crappy, especially in rural areas. But thanks to the US Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program, which aims to connect everyone in the US to high-quality, mostly fiber-based internet, that's close to changing. Or at least, it was. The plan's lead architect, Evan Feinman, says that before he was forced out by the Trump administration in March, three US states were just one 'minor administrative step' away from connecting their first residents under BEAD. In fact, he says, they could have started the process already — if not for US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, a recent Trump appointee. In March, Lutnick announced a 'rigorous review' of BEAD, which he claims is too 'woke' and filled with 'burdensome regulations.' Now the plan may change. Lutnick's changes to BEAD could hand a lot of the program's money over to private interests like Elon Musk's satellite internet provider, Starlink. And for every person whose home is served by a Starlink connection, their internet will likely be slower, less reliable, and more expensive than what BEAD might have gotten them with fiber. You can think of BEAD as a modern version of the nationwide US telephone network or electrification projects. It's been more than three years since the Biden administration established the $42.5 billion program, and so far, it hasn't actually connected anyone to the internet — a common criticism coming from the political right. But Feinman says that's by design. 'At every step of the game, states were screaming that we were going too fast,' he tells The Verge. 'When we made allocation, more than a dozen states sent us letters saying, 'Go slower, go slower, go slower.'' In fact, Feinman says, the first states would already have started construction if it wasn't for delays by the Trump administration, which has been encouraging states to redo finished phases of the program to make more space for satellite internet. That shift, Feinman said in April, could effectively mean 'millions of private capital is in the garbage.' Until now, BEAD has spent its time laying the groundwork to connect people. The states were given a year and a half to come up with proposals. According to the BEAD progress dashboard, 38 states have either begun or, in the case of West Virginia, finished picking service providers for the proposals. Nevada, Delaware, and Louisiana are just waiting for final approval from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration so they can sign contracts with companies, start laying fiber, and setting up infrastructure. 'More than a dozen states sent us letters saying, 'Go slower'' In his March statement about BEAD's review, Lutnick accused the Biden administration of 'woke mandates, favoritism towards certain technologies, and burdensome regulations.' The Commerce Department 'is revamping the BEAD program to take a tech-neutral approach that is rigorously driven by outcomes.' He didn't specify what he hoped the makeup of this 'tech-neutral' approach would look like. But Feinman told Financial Times in March that before he left, Lutnick had instructed BEAD's workers to give more priority to satellite connectivity and 'singled out Musk's provider, Starlink.' Musk, of course, has been a key player in the Trump administration as well as a vocal critic of BEAD. He's also been accused of trying to enrich himself using his unofficial, yet seemingly very powerful position within the US government. The Wall Street Journal reported Lutnick planned to overhaul the program in a way that could funnel as much as $20 billion, or close to half the program's overall funds, to Musk's Starlink. When I asked Feinman about this number, he said it's hard to know how much more money will go to satellite networks, but that the changes Lutnick is proposing 'will shift tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or millions of locations away from getting a fiber connection and on to the satellite networks.' As for Lutnick's 'tech-neutral' comment, Brian Mitchell, director of Nevada broadband office OSIT, says, 'I think that's what we did from the start.' Given Nevada's vast geography and sparse population, he says, 'it was never going to be realistic for us to do 100 percent fiber like you might see elsewhere.' Nevada's final proposal called for fiber internet in 80 percent of its locations, with satellite and fixed wireless internet making up what's left. As an example of what's on the line, Feinman says West Virginia's proposal included 'a fiber connection for every single West Virginia home and business' with $150 million to spare and ahead of its deadline. That sounds pretty good for a state that says it ranks 50th out of 52 (all the states plus DC and Puerto Rico) in broadband connectivity. Now, plans like West Virginia's could shift many of the proposed fiber connections to satellite instead. Currently, the BEAD program requires states to prioritize fiber over any other connection method for a given location, unless building it out would cost more than a certain cap — a cap each state was allowed to set. But one of Lutnick's ideas is apparently to issue a single nationwide cap. According to Feinman, if Lutnick's 'one-size-fits-all cap' is low enough, satellite internet companies will always win out. In Nevada, for instance, that could see the ratio of fiber-to-satellite flipping from around 80 percent fiber to about 70 percent satellite internet, according to Feinman. Not long after Lutnick announced his BEAD review, Feinman emailed his team to say he was leaving and warned that Lutnick's actions could mean 'stranding all or part of rural America with worse internet so that we can make the world's richest man even richer.' Feinman says that he had offered to continue running BEAD, but that the administration declined to renew his tenure. Although Lutnick hasn't detailed specific plans for BEAD, he's already at work changing the program. Near the end of March, West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey announced he'd met with Lutnick and got his state a 90-day extension that Feinman says West Virginia will use to reopen service provider bidding, endangering the state's pending fiber agreements. The Commerce Department has since issued a blanket invitation to all states to seek such extensions. That likely means at least some states will turn to slower, pricier internet for their citizens. There are states where Starlink makes sense. Mitchell says that his state 'knew that satellite was going to play a big part in connecting Nevadans, and that's the result that we delivered.' Satellite connections make up 10 percent of the state's final proposal. That's a 'great result for Nevadans,' he says, adding that providers are prepared to sign contracts and start building out connections 'as soon as the paperwork comes in from NIST,' or the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The first Nevadans could be connected as soon as this summer, according to Mitchell. (Neither NIST nor the NTIA responded when The Verge asked about the status of those approvals.) Continued delays could be costly. Garry Gomes, CEO of Sky Fiber in Nevada, urged Lutnick earlier this month to push Nevada's BEAD program forward in a letter to the NTIA forwarded to The Verge by OSIT. He said Sky Fiber — Nevada's biggest awardee under BEAD — has 'already invested over $360,000 in equipment, engineering, and staffing' and that its teams are ready to 'immediately' start construction on BEAD deployment. 'Yet the project remains stalled,' Gomes wrote. 'Delays not only risk higher costs and lost labor but also erode public confidence in what is arguably the most ambitious and promising broadband investment in our nation's history.' Would more Starlink involvement be such a bad thing? Sure, it doesn't come close to touching fiber, but a service only has to offer over 100Mbps down and 20Mbps up, with no less than 100 milliseconds of latency, to qualify as 'reliable broadband internet' under BEAD. Feinman says Starlink, while a 'really really good technology,' offers service that's 'barely nosing over' that requirement. This was something that Ookla echoed in December with its median findings from Starlink users in Maine, showing that median users saw 116.77Mbps down and 18.17Mbps up. But, hey, a D minus is still a passing grade, right? But while there's room in BEAD for satellite internet, it's not a replacement for hard-wired, ground-based connections. Even Musk himself has said that, having called satellite a 'nice complement' to tech like fiber and 5G back in 2021. Performance-wise, Starlink pales in comparison to fiber, which increasingly offers as much as 5 gigabits per second, down and up. That's more than 43 times faster than Ookla's reported median speed for Starlink. It's 20 times faster than 249Mbps, the best-case-scenario throughput the company shows for my midwestern address. And it's hardly worth comparing the upload speeds between the two options. Starlink service isn't just undeniably slower than fiber; it tends to be more expensive, too. Its fixed service is $80–$120 per month and comes with pricey upfront equipment fees. (Starlink's site advertises $30–$50 monthly, but when I tried to sign up for service while reporting this out, the price jumped to $120 a month with a $349 equipment fee, for a 'total due today' of $376.57.) In some areas, Starlink's website says its equipment is free if you sign a 12-month contract. Meanwhile, AT&T offers a gigabit fiber plan in my city of Milwaukee for $80 per month, with a $150 equipment fee. 'Nobody is campaigning on slower, more expensive internet for their constituents' Even if all things were equal, Feinman says the company can't scale to the needs of the program, as it 'doesn't have the capacity to serve that many locations.' What's more, it's costly to maintain Starlink's service, which requires rocket launches into space to replace dying or outmoded satellites. Subterranean fiber, on the other hand, can last decades before needing to be replaced. Before the Trump administration started futzing with BEAD, Feinman says the program enjoyed a great deal of bipartisan support. 'This is not what anybody outside of a very small circle of Trump administration folks wanted the program to become,' he says. 'This is not what Senate Republicans wanted it to become. It's not what any member of the Democratic coalition on Capitol Hill wanted. It's not what Republican governors wanted. It's not what the industry wanted.' Mitchell echoes that, saying that both Republicans and Democrats in his state have 'been very supportive' and adding that 'nobody is campaigning on slower, more expensive internet for their constituents.' He also says he doesn't think that has changed as the administration changed hands. 'All of our local officials and local governments are excited for who was awarded,' Mitchell says, 'and are ready to start working with them to issue the necessary permits so they can move forward with deployment.' Instead, they're waiting for Lutnick's review. A bipartisan group of 115 state legislators from 28 states signed a letter to Lutnick in April, stating that while they welcome some changes to BEAD, they urge him to make them optional. 'At this late stage, major changes would undermine our work and delay deployment by years,' they wrote. As for what's next, Feinman says he's working hard to make noise about what's being done with the program in an effort to preserve its core mission of connecting everyone to high-speed broadband internet. His departure letter in March said he thought the BEAD program would still mostly work even without so-called 'woke' requirements, which include things like fair and safe labor practices as well as outreach to historically underrepresented and marginalized groups. He also said 'shovels could already be in the ground … in half the country by summer' without Lutnick's proposed changes and that if the administration let the program move forward, 'it would be a huge political win for the Trump team.'
CNET
27-05-2025
- CNET
Memorial Day Deal: Last Chance to Get This Starlink Mini Kit on Sale for $299
We all need a stable internet connection at home, for everything from working to streaming entertainment. But if you live in a more rural area, getting a strong, dependable Wi-Fi connection isn't always easy. If this is something you struggle with, investing in a Starlink Mini kit can help. And right now it doesn't cost a fortune. We've spotted it for just $299 at Home Depot, reducing the price by $200, thanks to Memorial Day deals. But you'll have to act fast. Home Depot's Memorial Day sale is only expected to last through May 28. And although Best Buy had the same deal over the weekend, the item has already returned to the price of $500 on that site. The significant savings will allow you to snag a high-quality Wi-Fi system before tariffs begin to affect the cost of electronic goods. The Starlink Mini kit is a portable mesh Wi-Fi system that offers 2.4GHz and 5.0GHz band Wi-Fi. It runs on Wi-Fi 5 and can connect to satellites as long as it's placed in an area where it can face the sky without obstruction. The Starlink Mini was built to fit in a large purse or backpack and includes a DC power output. Using the device requires simply plugging it into a power source and ensuring it faces the sky. Once plugged in, you can surf the internet with speeds of up to 100 Mbps -- perfect for completing any task or communicating with loved ones. Mesh Wi-Fi coverage ensures you get a quality signal, no matter the corner of the world. Hey, did you know? CNET Deals texts are free, easy and save you money. Looking for a new Wi-Fi system but aren't sure if this product is for you? We have a list of the best mesh Wi-Fi systems, so you can compare before you shop. CNET's dedicated shopping team is also keeping tabs on all noteworthy Memorial Day deals so you can save during the tail end of these sales. Best Buy/CNET Why this deal matters The Starlink Mini kit typically costs $500, but this Home Depot deal knocks off $200, saving you 40%. For just $299, you can have reliable internet service when camping or living in a remote area with a spotty signal. When does this deal expire? Memorial Day sale by Home Depot lasts through May 28, which means you only have a day left to save. It is possible that the retailer might extend deals on some items, but there's no guarantee, so we recommend acting fast if you want to get this price.
