During summer heat, the intake of sufficient amounts of salt is important.

NSFW

This week’s song is from Hotel Rimini.

Their roots are in Leipzig and their style is - as this critique says - Indie pop, chamber music like German-language singer-songwriter art. I have, as always, no clue whether this categorizations is correct, but what I know for sure is that I like their music and even more their lyrics. They’re on tour in autum and will play in Vienna on November 6th. Tickets are available.

On of the very first songs I heard from them is

which is a - very good - reference to Wolfgang Herrndorf (more about him in “Look and Feel” below). Deutschlandfunk wrote about the relation between the song and the book.

Retrospect

Graz

Triggered by a text from Fabian Schmid in Der Standard, I spent some time on Saturday on Reddit and was, again, fascinated about what you can find there. Think about whatever you can think of - and you will find somethiong for you on Reddit.

Within a few minutes, I was in several subreddits dealing in all details one can imagine with the attack in Graz, the attacker, similar school shootings and so on. One of the things I saw within minutes was an X-profile, presumably from the attacker, with one single post: a picture, presumably taken in the Graz school-toilets, presumably moments before the attacker (whose full name is everywhere as well) began the rampage - showing the floor and his feet in some kind of combat boots - clearly in some kind of “Columbine aesthetics”.

Many of these posts made it - in simplified, shortened and sometimes glorifying forms - into mainstream media. Christian Nusser wrote an excellent text on what this implies.

It took me a little more time from there then to learn that since the Columbine attack a whole subculture with rules and codes on “how to do a school shootings” has emerged and how likely it is that the attacker in Graz is one in a long row of people being inspired by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold - the Columbine attackers and other school shooters. I would recommend to read

and then

and then, in particular

and that will lead to a new picture on how such violence can grow.

Coming from there I was then again even more astonished about the naivity (some) Austrian (legacy) media (still) whow when dealing with the internet and its subcultures. I was, in particular, fascinated by this post of Anna Thalhammer trying to justify why profil had brought an early article about the appartment the attacker lived in - and his family and neighbourhood.

The most interesting part here (for me) is that she really seems to believe that people might still need “profil” if they want to say something - as if the internet, social media and their (sub)cultures didn’t exist, as if “saying something; talking to someone” is equivalent with “being part in a profil-story” and as if this were an ethical justification for whatsoever.

There’s a very interesting Dunkelkammer-Podcast episode on some aspects of this debate with Alexander Warzilek, the head auf Austria’s self regulatory body in (print-)media “Presserat”.

Messenger Surveillance

We learned on Wednesday that the government found a consensus on how to introduce messenger surveillance in Austrias legal system.

One of the (small) changes one can see quickly is that the internal watchdog (“Rechtsschutzbeauftragter”) will have 3 months now - not, as originally suggested, 2 weeks - to assess the infiltration programme.

On Tuesday - before the new draft was presented - I finished an editorial on the matter that is going to be published in the next edition of MMR.

Here’s a sneak preview.

This will continue to keep us busy in the next months to come. Here’s one of the more interesting government policy statements in context.

#arsboni

We streamed the 5th episode of “Recht neugierig” with Prof. Dr. Konrad Lachmayer on the European Convention on Human Rights.

Prospect

I will be quite a lot on the road next week.

AI Day

Wednesday June 24 will bring a keynote at the “KI-Tag” auf Austria’s lawyers association.

Registration still possible, paid event.

Kölner Tage Datenschutzrecht

This is an all stars meeting in Köln on June 25 and June 26. Being the very first speaker there, I will ask a fundamental question: What is the purpose of Article 9 GDPR? Spoiler: My answer will be: 42. But I will need some time to explain this.

Registration is still possible, (paid) online participation as well.

Science Get Together 2025 (SGT25)

Friday will bring a gig in Salzburg at Paracelsus Medizinische Universität at their Science Get Together.

(Free) registration is still possible.

#arsboni

Two more laundry sessions will happen nex week as well, I will inform about their content as soon as the videos are out.

Look and Feel

I - finally - found the confidence to read Wolfgang Herrndorf’s “Arbeit und Struktur”. He would have become 60 on June 12th.

I had bought the book long time ago but had never dared to read it - and I was somehow right with my respect: I haven’t read such a touching and moving and truthful text for long, long time. It hurts almost physically to read it, but it opens windows into worlds of openness and beauty and despair. Fuck cancer.

It’s the first of his books that I read. That’s strange as I must have read a lot from him 30 years ago on “Wir höflichen Paparazzi” that I liked a lot then (Helmut Berger!). “Tschick” seems to be part of the obligatory litterature canon in school today. Next book I will read therefore is a novel for young adults.

Due to his birthday, some texts were published recently, for example from NDR, Rolling Stone - amd there’s an exhibition with some of his paintings in his place of redisdence Norderstedt.

Felix Krull

Thanks to a dear friend’s generosity, I was able to watch Felix Krull in Kammerspiele. It’s a dramatisation of the novel, with not less than six people playing Felix Krull - simultaneously. Die Presse calls this “aktuelle Theatermarotte” (current theater fad) wheras Der Standard qualifies it as “smart and profitable”. I liked it.

I was sitting next to the Alois Mock” chair and enjoyed it significantly - despite (or: in ignorance of) the negative critiques one could read (in Presse, Standard and Falter, for example; Salzburger Nachrichten and Die Krone are more positive).

The theater has a trailer on YouTube that summarizes the approach taken quite well.

Performances are scheduled at least until September so that there are opportunities to watch it.

Daisy

© Birgit Forgó-Feldner

enjoys summer but doesn’t like the heat.

Have a wonderful week!

Kind regards

Nikolaus (Forgó)