Hint: Hawaiians use it for measurement.

Kelly Slater’s OuterKnown was unveiled to much fanfare nearly five years when the World’s Most Recognized Surfer ditched Quiksilver in its time of need in order to realize his fashion dream. Quiksilver, as you recall, was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, struggling with high overhead in the rapidly changing market etc. The brand had sponsored Kelly for two decades and I’m sure employee morale soared when the 11 time World Champ slammed the door on the way out.

So long, old friends and wish me luck!

OuterKnown. It was sleek, grown up, offered at a higher price point and best of all sustainable.

Sustainable.

Oh the word has lost a bit of its sheen through bald-faced marketing grabs and unabashed hypocrisy but back then it meant something. The mysterious name was “OuterKnown.”

What did it signify? What did it refer to? The furthest known point on the horizon? A seismic event?

I wondered until this very moment when I stumbled upon a story about OuterKnown’s collaboration with Swiss luxury watch maker Breitling. The watch, which comes with a sustainable band, was tested recently at Kelly Slater’s sustainable Surf Ranch. A wonderland where human ingenuity figured out how to recreate the ocean’s waves using a large machine. And let us turn to the luxury magazine Robb Report for more:

Breitling unveiled a new Superocean Automatic 44 Outerknown dive watch last week in its natural habitat. The watch was tested at the Wave Company Surf Ranch owned by surf champ Kelly Slater, a member of Breitling’s “surfer squad” of ambassadors. The ranch, located near Lemoor, California, just south of Fresno, offers perfect surfing conditions… 100 miles inland.

Outerknown is surfer slang for the other, unseen side of a wave. It is also the name a company owned by Slater that makes sustainable clothing—over 90 percent of Outerknown’s products are made from organic, recycled or regenerated materials.

And did you catch that? Outerknown is surfer slang for the other, unseen side of the wave. I honestly had no idea and that’s one of the true glorious about this surfing life. We’re all students, constantly learning.

"If he claimed to be a Nazi and hating blacks, maybe it was Dora putting on a fright mask and saying Boo! to the surfing world…"

Well Dora understood way back when, before Musk and before Trump and before WSL bought BeachGrit, the PT Barnumism that there is no such thing as bad publicity.

Dora would say outrageous things and as long as people were talking about him or putting him in Surfer Magazine and paying attention to him and maybe even paying him, Dora was winning.

Dora had a big, black hole of a soul and he thrived on negative energy, poor sap.

Tubesteak said Dora was the product of a dysfunctional childhood and probably had an Oedipus complex about his mom, who sounds like a femme fatale from a Raymond Chandler novel: Human fish, swimming at the bottom of the great ocean of atmosphere, develop psychic injuries as they collide with one another. Most mortal of all are those gotten from the parent fish.

Da Bull said Dora was very bright and that was part of his problem.

Dora cared about things and was hardly the only person to be spun out by the cynicism and hypocrisy and violence and divison of the 1960s.

Anyone who surfs Malibu now fantasizes about rolling up to Furst Point in 1956 driving a Bel Air or a ‘Vette or an F100 or a Woody or a Spyder rocking out to Girl Can’t Help It by Little Richard and surfing yourself to jelly on balsa chips on those big, green days with maybe 20 friends and no dingalings coming for another five years.

That’s how Dora had it and it was paradise, pretty much, but it all ended very very fast – Gidget to Ride the Wild Surf in 1962 and that was the end of that.

And that would be a heavy, heavy loss. Soul shattering. Turn a guy into a racist and a Nazi lover, or someone who pretended to be, just because the world made him spin.

In 1959, in the movie Gidget, the big to-do was that Kahuna didn’t have a real job.

Ten years later in 1969, Tarantino’s 1969, during the historic swell of December, in that same week the fan was killed at Altamont, the first Vietnam draft lottery was held and Manson was trotted out on the front page of the LA Times as the evil mind behind Tate/Labianca.

The world changes a lot in 10 years but rarely has it changed as much as between 1959 and 1969. Dora got swept up in all that. Some say he was at the Ambassador Hotel the night Robert Kennedy was shot.

Would a racist support Robert Kennedy or a Nazi support the Democratic Party?

Unlikely.

If he claimed to be a Nazi and hating blacks, maybe it was Dora putting on a fright mask and saying “Boo!” to the surfing world, to people he held in disdain because as we see from BeachGrit, there are a lot of dumbass proles in the surfing world.

Dora’s rascism could have been an act put on by an angry person who didn’t care about wrong or right.

He just wanted attention, maybe going back to the mom deal.

Dora was an act.

As is Trump, as is Musk, as is bitchgripe.com, all of it designed to generate controversy and, hopefully, money money money.

Or maybe Dora really did hate n**gers and Kikes. Who knows?

What was true about Weber and Velzy is true around here: Dora’s been dead for years, but people still want to kill him.

Strong parallels, respective strengths, bringing together marketing and distribution channels etc.

It’s been coming for a while so it ain’t a great surprise. Earlier today, the covers came off the sale of privately owned Rip Curl to camping retailer Kathmandu for $A350 million, a little over two hundred mill US.

The deal ends fifty years of continuous private ownership for a company founded in Torquay in 1969 by Doug Warbrick and Brian Singer, two wild gunslingers whose surf DNA allowed Rip Curl to thrive while Billabong and Quiksilver went public, soared, then sunk.

Kathmandu, if you’re wondering, sells outdoor gear, tents, chunky boots etc, and has stores in Australia, New Zealand and the UK.

In a statement, Doug and Brian said,

“We realise, Rip Curl, our baby has grown into an adult recognised all over the planet and we are proud that we have created one of the world’s great brands.”

According to Reuters, Rip Curl’s current CEO Michael Daly will stay in charge and report to Kathmandu CEO Xavier Simonet.

“There are strong parallels with both Rip Curl and Kathmandu. Bringing them together will build on our respective strengths across product, marketing and distribution channels,” said Daly. “It will be a new world for all of us after 50 years of private ownership, and our entire crew would like to thank the Rip Curl Founders for everything they have done for surfing over the years.”

In turn, Kathmandu’s CEO Xavier Simonet said “Rip Curl transforms Kathmandu into a highly complementary, seasonally balanced, global outdoor and action sports business. The combination will support the acceleration of our brands’ global expansion into new channels and markets. Sharing a focus on quality, innovation and sustainability, Kathmandu and Rip Curl make for a great cultural fit.”

The deal, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, works like this,

The transaction will be financed through a combination of a fully underwritten 1 for 4 pro-rata accelerated entitlement offer to raise NZ$145 million ($90.80 million) and a placement of about NZ$32 million of new Kathmandu shares to the founders and chief executive of Rip Curl, who will receive a part of the consideration in Kathmandu shares.

At eight am this morning, Torquay time, all Rip Curl employees were called into a meeting to discuss the implications etc. An hour later, they’re still in there.

More on that soon.

 

Shattered illusions.

For years and years now I have been so proud of our Hawaii, the center of the surfing universe, for also being the center of pop music’s. I didn’t know how it came to be, how the most isolated island chain in the world found itself name-checked in every impactful electronic-tinged pop song, many hip hop and rap songs too, for the past decade plus but there it was.

808.

And every time I heard Hawaii’s area code being sung by The Chainsmokers, Charli XCX, Lil Nas X, Lil Jon my heart beat gratified. I sometimes wondered what brought them to Hawaii and where they stayed. Honolulu? Princeville? Lahina? Where they recorded. Hilo? Kailua? Kahului? I wondered how the pop scene came to flourish and how it could own the spotlight for so long. Seattle had a great run that lasted under a decade. Austin shone for only five years.

But Hawaii, our 808, showed no signs of slowing down. More and more electronic-tinged pop, hip hop and rap songs. A bushel of them winning Grammys, Teen Choice and American Music Awards.

I gave up listening for ukulele in those 808 songs a few years ago, assuming that it was represented metaphorically, and just enjoyed them for what they were.

Powerful odes to aloha.

Then, two days ago, I was scrolling through the TV channels and caught a documentary on one of the most important electronic instruments ever created.

The Roland TR-808.

My heart broke in two. The pride drained away and was replaced by a horrific depression. The sort that children feel when they learn Santa Claus is a fraud. That college graduates when they learn they are indentured servants.

Did you know all along that Bruno Mars is Hawaii’s only contribution to popular music?

And when was the last time a shattered illusion broke your heart?

"Pure cruelty…risking best friend's life…etc"

It’s a slow news day so let’s scrape hell out of the barrel, shall we?

You’ll remember, six months ago, when Mavericks pioneer Jeff Clark ran over a VAL with his SUP foil out at Cowell’s in Santa Cruz. You’ll also recall the third party in the collision, Skyler the Surfing Dog (and her owner, nineties pro Homer Henard).

Read, Surfing Dog vs Kook vs SUP Foiler/Mavericks Legend Jeff Clarke, here, SUP Foiler Jeff Clark Responds to Anti-Foil Buzz, here and Watch Full Video (With Zoom) of Surfing Dog  vs VAL vs SUP Foil/Mavs Legend Jeff Clark, here.

In the Cowell’s incident some argued Skyler and Homer dropped in on Jeff, and was the cause of his SUP Foil colliding with the encroaching VAL. Similar to American justifications for bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam war, if you’re looking for a historical comparison.

This narrative was subsequently quashed by all parties involved.

Now, the Australian red heeler has been embroiled in another scandal. Earlier today, popular instagram account @kookoftheday posted a video of Skyler being sent over the falls in a shorebreak, briefly disappearing in the maelstrom that also knocks over a nearby photographer.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B3A1aIjAJq6/

Writes KOTD,

Alright, this dog surfing shit just went too far. It’s kool to see a dog surf a safe, slow mellow wave maybe once in eternity. But you gotta do what you gotta do for attention these days, like risking your best friend’s life!

The response was split, for and against.

@mamavava THIS IS SOOO HORRIBLE. FUCK ALL THESE PEOPLE INVOLVED. PURE CRUELTY. IDIOTS. THEY SHOULD BE ASHAMED

@colewalliser I think this is animal abuse. It’s infuriating to see.

And,

@jerbo741 these people need to fucking relax. I’m sure (Sklyer) is very loved and supported. Keep doing your thing and having fun out in the water!

@tenderplacements The dog can jump off at any point, if he really didnt wanna do this he wouldnt do it. You cant force a dog to do something like this.

Currently over 1900 comments, and counting.

It’s a fascinating exchange of ideas that recalls French social theorist Michel Foucault (who loved sexual torture) and American linguist Noam Chomsky’s famed 1971 debate, “Human Nature: justice versus power.”

Where do you sit? A bit of canine fun, or animal exploitation?