Henry Gale, or Benjamin Linus, or whoever he wants to call himself, is actually …

Jonathan Richman.

Though it looks like some unholy mashup of Mordor and Burning Man, this is a photograph of the brickworks at Hussain Khil, in Afghanistan. According to the photographer, Simon Norfolk, demand for bricks has soared in the country, given all the necessary rebuilding in Kabul.

Elsewhere on Norfolk’s site are photos from Iraq, Normandy, Palestine, Bosnia, Liberia, and other hot spots around the world, including the Bush/Kerry campaign. The images are extraordinarily potent, and the site is well worth a visit.

Thanks to the equally extraordinary wood s lot.

Here’s a Sunday game for you (assuming you’ve finished your six-word memoir, that is):

1. Write two sentences.
2. Create tension between them.
3. Define “tension” any way you want.

The task comes courtesy of Marcus Gould, who started the website two sentences (or 2entences) in September ‘06. It’s a resurrection of a creative writing project with which he achieved brief notoriety on a forum called Brainstorms way back in (gasp) 2001. “As a creative person,” writes Marcus,

“I am fascinated by structured improvisation. Completely free-form improv doesn’t interest me, because a game without rules leads to anarchy, and anarchy is usually ugly. On the other hand, a completely rigid game quickly becomes boring. Great rigidity stifles creative play.”

Word.

Warning: this game is not easy. It’s deceptively hard, and that’s what I love about it.

Extra bonus: the Digg-like internal rankings system. Bestow plus-ones on entries you like, and deep-six ones you don’t.

It’s Flickr Time.

Thanks to Waxy.

I’ve always found oral histories pretty interesting; it’s nice to hear from the people who really experienced history, rather than the people who sat in a University building somewhere and studied it. (If you’re like me, and want to read some great oral histories about America over the past 100 years or so, check out the irrepressible Studs Terkel.)

The drawback, of course, has always been that someone has to go out and collect the histories. Now, though, that’s not the case — because everyone can put their particular story up on YouTube. So this week’s viral video is the story of Les Loken, a 94-year-old veteran of World War II, who talks about his experiences in post-war Japan.

Proving once again that there’s nothing politicians trying to be hip can’t ruin, Presidential hopeful Tom Vilsack, the outgoing governor of Iowa, has a profile on MySpace.

If you need me, I’ll be off banging my head against a wall somewhere.

David Carr is the best. He takes big media and makes it personal.

On top of being a solid reporter, he gives damn good interview and often finds a way to work his own story into the larger subject. (See his great October column on the rise of the PC, which is really all about doting on his daughters.)

Today Carr brings back “Carpetbagger,” the awards season video feature he created last winter, with a report from the indie-centric IFP Gotham Awards. True to form, he takes what could have been either a spiritually draining celebrity gawk-fest or a stodgy dissertation on the nature of awards shows and makes it well, all about David Carr.