The Department of Information has been creating space for thought and giving meaningful ideas the bureaucracy they deserve since 2021.
Our Office of Public Awareness Japanese field operations crew recently dispatched a cache of field recordings from Japan. The first full collection documents a rural temporal landscape and includes locations such as the haunted nighttime cemetery on the sacred mountain of Koyasan, a tranquil island in the Seto Inland Sea, and numerous recordings from a [ ] The post New Audio Programs from the…
Our groundskeeper, fish tank cleaner, and seasonal poolboy, Sven, recently found a box of Flamingo Beach Postal Service pocket tees in the shed by the pool! They are for sale at the Tomato Lab Market while supplies last. Thank you. The post New in the Gift Shop: Flamingo Beach Postal Service Pocket Tees first appeared on Department of Information .
All offices, including the Main Campus, the gift shop, the taco truck in the parking lot, the Xerox Climate Lab, and the library are closed to officers, staff, and visitors until sometime in early May depending on when Pokey the Pigeon gets back from Florida—and if he stays out of jail. The post Spring Break Closure Notices first appeared on Department of Information .
During last year’s office holiday party, our information ambassador, Pokey the Pigeon, had one too many jungle birds at the tiki bar and ended up smoking a new street drug called hawk salt. He stole a city bus and crashed it into a pet store. As part of Pokey’s court-ordered community service, he now has [ ] The post Review: Drugs of Abuse Vol. 6 No. 2, Drug Enforcement Administration, 1979 first…
In honor of World Radio Day, we are republishing our deep dive on classic pirate radio station logos and releasing a new educational music single from our comms crew. Enjoy, and happy World Radio Day! Swan Island Beach Radio Tower, 1960 by The Department of Information This article was originally published on April 23rd, 2021. [ ] The post Yo-Ho-Ho and a Bottle of Wavelengths: Pirate Radio Logos…
The Department of Information is closed for winter break. All offices, including the Main Campus, the taco truck in the parking lot, the Xerox Climate Lab, and the library are closed to officers, staff, and visitors until January 5th, 2026. The pool is also closed. Stay away from the pool. Thank you. The post Winter Break first appeared on Department of Information .
Over the summer, we received a mysterious cache of documents from one of our Forest Service attachés (Kyle, known internally only as Field Officer K.). They were recovered from the basement of a remote ranger station outpost. Our unpaid interns have only just gotten around to processing the files—but since they date from the 1960s, [ ] The post Vintage Forest Service Pamphlets and Brochures from…
The Office of Public Awareness, Division of Film, Radio, Television Books, has recently begun issuing a series of limited-run silkscreen prints. These editions celebrate historic archival government and intergovernmental report cover designs from the 1960s through the 1980s. Often overlooked and forgotten, these modest and understated examples of Swiss and International Typographic Style—filtered…
Beach Sounds by The Department of Information Purchase Beach Sounds at the Tomato Lab Market. The Department Satellite Public Affairs Network (D-SPAN) and the Office of Public Awareness is pleased to release the latest installment in our Sounds series. Beach Sounds was recorded deep in the wilderness of South Florida and coastal New York State [ ] The post Beach Sounds first appeared on Department…
Our information ambassador, Pokey the Pigeon, was handing out anti-AI brochures at the local mall recently when a group of teenagers mistook him for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)’s sinister, owl-based weather mascot, Owlie Skywarn. It was weird—none of us had ever heard of Owlie before. Curious about this odd cousin of our [ ] The post Review: 1985 NOAA Weather Radio…
One of our fish tank cleaners at the Information Aquarium recently slid this pamphlet from 1966 under the door of our lead slime mold scientist after their graveyard shift. Apparently, they found the booklet in a plastic sleeve wedged between the aquarium wall and one of the pumps. Louella E. Cable wrote and produced Fishery [ ] The post Review: Plankton, United States Department of the Interior,…
We recently discovered a stash of loose vintage U.S. Forest Service pamphlets under the sofa mattress in the basement office of our Information Ambassador, Pokey the Pigeon. Apparently, he teamed up with Woodsy Owl—a lesser-known but equally strange Forest Service mascot who is now banned from several national parks for reasons we won’t get into—and [ ] The post Vintage Forest Service Pamphlets…
We recently found a copy of a 1944 Simple Sabotage Field Manual inside the unlocked desk drawer of one of our unpaid interns. It appears they were applying techniques from the pamphlet to their job at the Department. These included tactics such as bringing up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible, misfiling essential documents, and [ ] The post Review: Simple Sabotage Field Manual by the…
One of our unpaid interns found this pamphlet from 1978 underneath the office kitchen fridge while cleaning the drip pan after they spilled one of those paper trays of to-go coffees all over the floor. In exchange for class credit and office redemption we had them sterilize and photograph it for our consumer report and [ ] The post Review: Home Freezing of Fruits and Vegetables by the USDA Science…
The Department of Information is closed for winter break. All offices, including the Main Campus, the taco truck in the parking lot, the Xerox Climate Lab, and the library are closed to officers, staff, and visitors until January 1st, 2025. Thank you. The post Holiday Hours first appeared on Department of Information .
Have you seen strange lights in the night sky above New Jersey or the Tri-state area? Call our tip line to leave us a voice memo of what you saw. Our Information Scientists will use the anonymous data in future experiments and consumer products. Telephone and fax: 1-844-DOI-9003 E-mail: info@departmentofinformation.org Non-exclusive list of sightings we [ ] The post Seeing Strange Lights in the…
It’s that time of year again! We’ve enlisted our Head of Accounting and Budget, Officer Bill, to scrape together the absolute best public procurement notices, notices of intent, and/or requests for proposals from governmental, quasi-governmental, and non-governmental entities from 2024. Please enjoy our much-anticipated end of year roundup and let s all thank Bill for the [ ] The post The Absolute…
We told our unpaid interns that they would not be permitted to take off work on Election Day unless they created a civic-minded, positive, art-oriented post by the end of the week. This is what they came up with. Please take a look at some of the more visually interesting voting advocacy or voting advocacy-adjacent [ ] The post A Visual Exploration of Old Voting Advocacy Posters and Paraphernalia…
It s campfire season here at the Department, and whether you re burning barrels full of confidential documents or old office furniture full of asbestos, it s important to practice fire safety. We ve enlisted our newly minted Information Ambassador, Pokey the Pigeon, to dig through the U.S. Forest Service Smokey Bear Collection at the USDA National Agricultural Library [ ] The post Some Beautiful…
As our staff and officers trickle back to campus from their summer vacations we asked our outgoing unpaid summer interns to climb through the Carol M. Highsmith Archives one last time before heading back to Ohio and Nebraska, respectively. In the latest entry of our ongoing series Back to the Office, we examine the absolute [ ] The post The 13 Best Cubicles and Work Stations of the 80s and 90s…
Captured by Landsat 1, the first satellite of the US s Landsat program, in the early 1970s at a scale of 1:500,000 (1 cm equals 5 km), these satellite images of Florida were superimposed with a Mercator grid, printed onto oversized poster panels, and then—likely decades later—scanned and digitized in ultra high-resolution. The resulting images, showing [ ] The post The Psychedelic Nature of 1970s…
The Department of Information Office of Public Awareness, Division of Film, Radio, Television, and Books is proud to release the first publication in a series of unsanctioned but greatly improved reproductions of original USDA Fruit and Vegetable Market News Reports from the National Agricultural Library. These semi-faithful reproductions have been lovingly brought back to life [ ] The post New…
The United States Department of Agriculture began publishing reports on supplies, demand, and prices of “over 400 fresh fruit, vegetable, nut, ornamental, and other specialty crops” in 1915 according to a strange corner of the USDA National Agricultural Library website. These “Fruit and Vegetable Market News reports” were and are published under something called the Agricultural Marketing Service…
Garbology - noun - Garbology is the study of trash and modern waste, focusing on its origins and serving as a major source of information on nature and human society. The post Garbology first appeared on Department of Information .
Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) is a nonviolent movement promoting boycotts, divestments, and economic sanctions against Israel. Its objective is to pressure Israel to meet its obligations under international law. In the spirit of the current moment we have instructed one of our officers to compile a collection of some of the more interesting BDS [ ] The post BDS Posters and Graphics,…
On a recent Department field trip to a local bookstore (for our bi-monthly cultural enrichment outing and team-building activity), our visiting botanist-in-residence and eclectic zine expert, Bjorn, picked up an interesting book by Brooklyn-based artist, designer, and author, Nikki Scioscia. Sentient Sidewalk: Lessons from New York City s Wild Medicinal Plants is a striking risograph-printed and […
To kick off our new ongoing visual series, 'Back to the Office', we are taking a stroll down memory lane. Which specific memory, you might ask? The one where you drove your Oldsmobile to a sleek, carpeted 1980s corporate office building on the edge of town near the mall and the interstate. We are taking a look at the absolute best reception areas and common spaces from the 1980s commercial office…
Television test cards were elaborate, strange patterns and graphics used for visual calibration or for filling gaps and dead air in the early days of T.V. broadcasting. Often appearing for hours overnight when stations would "sign off", they would have entered the cultural imagination as hypnotic oddities—likely untrusted and alien—but would come to fill a nostalgic void made up of colorful, wild,…
Wow, what a year. With 2024 just around the corner we are looking back at some of the most exciting requests for proposals, goods, or services in government or quasi-government spaces in 2023. Here are eight procurement listings and notices that absolutely blew our socks off. The post 8 Public Procurement Notices That Totally Inspired Us in 2023 first appeared on Department of Information .
Governmentality - noun - The art of government; or the organized practices, mentalities, rationalities, and techniques through which subjects are governed by a positive means rather than a disciplinarian—as first introduced by French philosopher Michel Foucault. The post Governmentality first appeared on Department of Information .
We looted the basement of the Smithsonian Institution Archives by posing as doctoral researchers interested in the preservation techniques of really old flags. Our unpaid interns made us fake badges to gain entry to the cryogenic room—next to the Smithsonian staff sauna—where they keep the good stuff. They then helped us digitally smuggle out some [ ] The post Native American Tribes, Leagues, &…
While we here at the Department of Information have successfully stamped out many attempts over the decades at unionization from within our own ranks—sometimes through illegal, quasi-legal, and morally dubious methods—we still know how to appreciate good union branding when we see it. The post The Fraternal Order of Design: A Selection of U.S. Labor Union Logos, 1880s to Now first appeared on…
Sensorium - noun - The sensory apparatus as a whole through which someone or something experiences the environment around them—feeling, seeing, smelling, hearing, sensing, etc—and use of physical and remote faculties of the mind, phenomenal and psychological perception, cognition, intelligence, and intuition. The seat of sensation. The post Sensorium first appeared on Department of Information .
During a recent official Department research expedition that took place deep in the mountains of Colorado our team uncovered a peculiar artifact. The object appeared to be a self-published journal of observations from a respected and storied career medical professional. The subject of which focused on the personal treatment possibilities of legal (state-level in Colorado, [ ] The post Colorado…
In August 1950, the CIA secretly purchased the assets of Civil Air Transport (CAT), an airline that started in China. CAT would continue to fly commercial routes throughout Asia, acting as a privately owned commercial airline. Under the guise of CAT Incorporated, it provided airplanes and crews for secret intelligence operations. Naturally, with any substantial [ ] The post CIA Front Airline from…
Bi·o·de·grad·a·ble - adjective - A once-living substance or object that becomes capable of being decomposed by bacteria or other living organisms — often to live again through growth or repurpose The post Biodegradable first appeared on Department of Information .
While some of the objects in Extinct: A Compendium of Obsolete Objects are actually very much still around, it is true that all of them more fully belong to a now distant period of time that appreciated them more. Advertised by the University of Chicago Press as a “visual tour through futures past via the [ ] The post Extinct: A Compendium of Obsolete Objects first appeared on Department of…
in·ter·pass·iv·i·ty - noun - The delegation or outsourcing of enjoyment, consumption, action, or (inter)activity through passivity and inaction The post Interpassivity first appeared on Department of Information .
Ruben Pater and Amsterdam-based Valiz Publishers’ CAPS LOCK: How Capitalism Took Hold of Graphic Design, and How to Escape From It is an extensive (552 pages) but very engaging, accessible, and portable account of graphic design’s current and historical relationship with capitalism (and theories on how, as a designer, to potentially decouple the inextricably-linked duo). [ ] The post CAPS LOCK:…
haun·tol·o·gy - noun - First introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1993 book Specters of Marx, Hauntology is a portmanteau of haunting and ontology. It usually refers to the return, celebration, or persistence of elements from the past, as in the manner of a ghost and in anticipation of a future that never occurred. The post Hauntology first appeared on Department of…
The Miami-based Islandia Journal offers a refreshing and strange look at some of Florida’s more eccentric angles and anomalies through the hazy, sun-drenched, and mysterious lenses of local visual artists and writers. It is focused around the paranormal, weird, historical, and uniquely Floridian. The 8 ½’’ x 5 ½’’ limited-run journal’s first issue was published [ ] The post The Islandia Journal: A…
bio·re·gion·al·ism noun A kind of cultural and political localism with an ecological foundation, cited by environmentalist movements advocating political boundaries coincide with bioregions. via Google Ngram Similar to many indigenous cultures relationships to land, bioregionalism is first and foremost based on observation and recognition of what grows where, as well as an appreciation for the…
Mark Twain once said something along the lines of, “The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A government logo who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” And over the years since our countrymen first started drawing circles with eagles inside of them, many logos–along with their organizing bodies–did die. [ ] The post Government Logo Graveyard: Defunct US Federal Agency and…
Eindhoven, Netherlands Onomatopee Projects, with Nicolas Nova and Dislocation.org, use reflective silver ink on 255 pages of matte black paper to illustrate and explain to us what kinds of strange, wonderful, and terrifying things we might expect to encounter in the latest epoch of geological time. The A5 size publication, while quite thick, feels accessible [ ] The post A Bestiary of the…
en·to·moph·agy noun The practice of eating insects, especially by people. via Google Ngram Many countries already are entomophagous, feeding on bugs such as beetles, mealworms, and grasshoppers as a culinary delight: 36 African countries, 23 in the Americas, 29 in Asia, and 11 in Europe National Geographic Peripheral Resources Why Not Eat Insects by Vincent [ ] The post Entomophagy first…
James E. Lawrence would have been about 25 years old when he was assigned to survey the wild deer population outside of Brookhaven National Laboratory, a top-secret government research center full of particle physicists and experimental happenings, where said deer were running amok scaling the 12ft tall fence to eat radioactive plants. Was this the [ ] The post The Interminable Outdoor…
Extrapolation Factory Operator s Manual by Elliott P. Montgomery and Chris Woebken is a dual-language guide full of beautiful photos, thoughtful typesetting, curious illustrated diagrams, and words you have never seen before. The Factory itself is a design-based research studio in Brooklyn founded by the two authors. It is here they develop “experimental methods for collaboratively [ ] The post…
Hamilton Morris, chemist and indie zine hobbyist, took it upon himself to update and republish the cult classic “ethnoherpetological”* pamphlet, Bufo Alvarius: The Psychedelic Toad of the Sonoran Desert, from 1983. A notable addition to the new version includes Mr. Morris’ untold history of how the original author, Ken Nelson, who had published under a [ ] The post Bufo Alvarius: The Psychedelic…
MY BODY FEELS AMAZING is a meditation on space, the body, and form. Originally printed in 2019, this latest edition was recently re-printed via risograph with a thermographic cover and saddle stitch binding. The heat-printed method creates this raised, rubbery effect, making gliding your hands over the the cover and back page a pleasant tactile [ ] The post MY BODY FEELS AMAZING: A Zine by…
Mushrooms Friends 3 is an 8.5” x 11” staple-bound high-fidelity celebration of wild mushrooms, their friends, imagination, and the color spectrum. It is not necessary to know that Cantharellus cinnabarinus–commonly known as a chanterelle–is edible, or that it s Greek name refers to it s cup-like shape, to appreciate that the mushroom looks really cool and [ ] The post Mushrooms & Friends 3 by…