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Architectural Lighting That Celebrates Wood as a Material

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Architectural Lighting That Celebrates Wood as a Material

A short walk in nature – just 20 minutes or less – has been shown to boost immunity and reduce stress. In an era where stress is increasingly pervasive, especially within work-driven cultures, safeguarding our minds and environments has never been more essential. This growing need is reflected in a renewed appreciation for natural materials, as both consumers and designers gravitate toward textures and colors that feel innately human. In response, Post Company has partnered with Idaho Wood to create the Ravine Collection of lighting to celebrate these materials in an honest way. “The collection’s simplicity of form mirrors its material expression, with indirect lighting sources accentuating the organic variations and unique character of each piece,” says Leigh Salem, Founding Partner at Post Company.

A small wooden structure with a square base and a large, slanted pyramid-shaped roof sits on a wooden surface against a wooden wall.

Bold, hefty blocks of wood showcase intricate growth patterns, while the collection’s Bauhaus influence adds a sense of structure and intention. Named after the last remaining forest in Brooklyn, the Ravine Collection of architectural wood lighting thoughtfully unites nature and nurture. The collection, which includes a table lamp and flush mount light, are offered in three distinct finishes: Douglas fir with heritage natural timber oil, western red cedar with natural timber oil, and yakisugi, a traditional Japanese wood-charring technique.

A wooden lamp from the Ravine Collection Post Company, featuring a square base and wide, flat shade, sits on a wooden surface against a wooden plank wall.

A wooden interior features a pyramid-shaped lamp, a glass of water on a table, and a window ledge with stacked books and a cup, overlooking trees outside.

A small, dark, house-shaped object with a ridged roof sits on a wooden pedestal against a background of dark wooden panels.

Two wooden pedestals stand against a dark wood-paneled wall; one holds a small black house-shaped object with a pyramid roof.

Showcasing ancient techniques of finishing, Douglas fir is finished with a natural timber oil, protecting the surface and offering a soft, satiny luster to the exterior. Next is a western red cedar, prized for its distinctive smell, oils, and natural antimicrobial properties. Frequently used in Native American rituals as a cleansing substance, its natural resistance to decay has associated it with anti-inflammatory and healing practices for centuries. Last but certainly not least, the ancient yakisugi technique is utilized to create an incredible charred finish on the wood. The outside is intentionally burned and sealed with oil to create a waterproof, weatherproof finish that highlights the distinctive growth patterns while also hardening the wood’s outer layer, a completely natural, protective yet distinctive finish.

A dark wooden birdhouse from the Ravine Collection Post Company, with a triangular roof, sits on a round wooden stool against a dark background.

Vertical wooden siding painted black with a modern rectangular wall light, next to a leafy green shrub and stone at the base.

In developing the Ravine Collection, Post Company and Idaho Wood were guided by a simple idea: creating sculptural armatures that not only illuminate a room, but also celebrate the raw character of the wood itself. Each piece in the collection, which is handcrafted in North Carolina, balances geometry and scale, offering a quiet interplay between form, function, and material honesty.

A rectangular wooden box mounted on a dark, weathered wooden wall with a chain hanging to the right, partially illuminated by sunlight.

The table lamp is an architectural composition of two elemental shapes: a pyramidal shade perched atop a rectangular base. Both components are carved from solid blocks of wood, a choice that demands both precision in craftsmanship and access to materials of uncommon scale. A wooden peg anchors the lamping within the base, an intentional nod to traditional joinery techniques like mortise and tenon – methods once used in early barns and timber-framed structures. This peg motif reappears as the lamp’s dimmer, a tactile detail that subtly connects past and present. At night, the shade’s sharp form disappears into the dark, casting a soft glow that accentuates the base’s grain and silhouette – each lamp a quiet heirloom in the making.

A close-up of a charred wooden structural beam with gold accent lines, set against a wall of dark, burnt wood panels.

A square wooden wall sconce with a visible light bulb is mounted on a dark, textured wooden wall.

The flush mounts continue this language of geometric restraint and material reverence. Designed for both indoor and outdoor settings, they consist of two stacked rectangular elements – echoing the table lamp’s proportions – with the lighting recessed to wash the inner wood surface in warm, ambient light. Available in three sizes (5″, 7.5″, and 10″), these ceiling and wall fixtures offer a subtle, grounded presence, bringing natural warmth to even the most minimal of spaces.

A wooden wall-mounted light fixture with a rectangular, slatted design exposes a white bulb, set against a wooden plank wall.

A wooden chair and small table with a black bowl are placed in the corner of a room with wood-paneled walls and a small modern wall light.

A small, square wooden light fixture is mounted on a wooden plank ceiling with a natural wood grain pattern.

A small wooden birdhouse with a triangular roof sits on top of a tree stump in a leaf-covered forest.

Beauty, elegance, and utility – all three coalesce neatly at the heart of Post Company’s ethos, providing a solid foundation on which to build. An award-winning design firm that launched in 2012, they work across hospitality, residential, and retail industries to provide a grounding, comprehensive approach to interiors. With exacting detail work that takes their projects to the next level, they work diligently within multiple disciplines to ensure an overall quality and solidity to their portfolio.

A small wooden structure with a triangular roof sits on a tree stump surrounded by fallen leaves and trees in a forest.

What began as a modest garage workshop in Sandpoint, Idaho, in 1975 has grown into a quietly influential name in American woodcraft. Idaho Wood, originally focused on handcrafting custom fixtures from western red cedar, has since relocated to Oxford, North Carolina, where it continues to evolve under the leadership of entrepreneur JT Vaughn. Despite its growth, the company hasn’t strayed from its roots – remaining deeply committed to meticulous craftsmanship and thoughtful design. For its first official design collaboration, Idaho Wood turned to Post Company, drawn by the studio’s shared dedication to enduring aesthetics, careful artistry, and sustainable values.

A person wearing a blue jacket, camouflage pants, and a knit hat stands in a forest holding a wooden birdhouse.

To learn more about the Post Company and Idaho Wood’s Ravine Collection, please ravinecollection.com.

Photography by Chris Mottalini.

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mkalus
6 hours ago
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iPhone: 49.287476,-123.142136
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Bad brainwaves: ChatGPT makes you stupid

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In a new study, MIT Media Lab measured 55 people over four months on how well they could write an essay — either with ChatGPT, with a search engine, or just their unassisted brain. The researchers hooked them to an EEG to see which parts of their brains were active or not. [arXiv, PDF]

The ChatGPT group had less interconnected brain activity. Specifically, they didn’t use the parts of their brains that normally engage in language processing, working memory, or creative writing as much as the other groups.

ChatGPT users “consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels.” ChatGPT makes you stupid.

Only 20% of the chatbot group could remember a quote from their own essay. Shown their own essay afterwards, 16% of the chatbot group denied it was theirs.

That shouldn’t be surprising — if you’re not doing the work, you won’t remember the work.

But then the researchers switched the groups up. The search-engine and just-their-brain groups did just as well when they switched to using the chatbot. But the chatbot group didn’t get any better when they switched to search-engine or just their brains. They were still stuck thinking as badly as they did when they were trying to write with the chatbot.

This strongly suggests it’s imperative to keep students away from chatbots in the classroom — so they’ll actually learn.

This also explains people who insist you use the chatbot instead of thinking and will not shut up about it. They tried thinking once and they didn’t like it.

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mkalus
8 hours ago
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Album-Stream: Chillhop Essentials Summer 2025

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Da ich die letzten Tage in der brandenburgischen Pampa rumgehangen habe, ging die neue Chillhop Compilation bisher an mir vorbei. Aber aufgehoben ist ja bekanntlich nicht gleich aufgeschoben und so höre ich die halt jetzt. Neuer Sommer, neue Chillhop, neue LoFi/Dope- und Downbeats. Fürs Gemüt.

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mkalus
8 hours ago
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Montag

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mkalus
8 hours ago
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EchoLeak — send an email, extract secret info from Microsoft Office 365 Copilot AI

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You can’t put data into an LLM and then filter the output to block some of it. Once it’s in the model, it’s in the model.

If you put confidential business information into Microsoft 365 Copilot, an attacker can extract it by sending you an email and waiting for you to run a search. “EchoLeak” is a prompt injection by email. [Aim Security; CVE]

If you ask Copilot a question, it looks through everything in your available environment — including your email. So the attacker sends an email that looks like answers to basic corporate questions, but includes prompt injections asking for confidential information.

The attacker gets Copilot to load an image on the attacker’s website. You add parameters to the image address and the secret stuff is embedded in the parameters.

Copilot filters outgoing calls to the internet. So instead, the attacker tells Copilot to get Microsoft Teams to call the evil website for it — and it’ll just do it.

Aim Security calls this a zero-click attack. It’s not quite zero clicks — the user has to run a search. It’s pretty close, though.

Nothing in this system is separated from anything else. Your search engine should not be able to tell your Teams chat to do things.

But Microsoft forced a chatbot into enterprises as a search engine, then gave the chatbot the power to do things. And that’s why LLM-based AI agents are going to be a very stupid ongoing disaster even if they do ever work.

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mkalus
1 day ago
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Meta AI posts your personal chats to a public feed

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Meta’s got a new chatbot app, Meta AI. You can ask it questions in text or voice, much like ChatGPT or Gemini. [Meta]

There’s one difference — the other chatbots don’t reveal your conversations to the world. Some maniac at Meta put up a public feed of people chatting to the bot. [Twitter, thread]

There’s home addresses, there’s medical records, tax details, legal issues, going to a public feed. There’s “What should I do if I have a buunch of red bumps on my inner thigh?” [TechCrunch]

Gizmodo asked Meta what the hell they were thinking. Meta blamed the users: [Gizmodo]

a spokesperson stressed that posts are only shared when users tap the “share” button at the top-right corner of the Meta AI interface after asking the chatbot a question. There’s also a “post” button to send the exchange to Discover.

I can only think someone had a quarterly metric of chat posts to the public feed and applied some dark-pattern design. Meta’s desperate to show that anyone wants to engage with the AI slop machine.

Here’s how to switch it off:

  • Tap your profile icon at the top right.
  • Tap “Data & Privacy” under “App settings.”
  • Tap “Manage your information.”
  • Then, tap “Make all your prompts visible to only you.”
  • If you’ve already posted publicly and want to remove those posts, you can also tap “Delete all prompts.”

It’s unbelievable they let this happen. Except that Meta really are just like this. Warn your relatives still on Facebook.

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mkalus
1 day ago
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