randomwalks/dj

I've been stepping through a lot of code in the Perl debugger recently. The debugger has a bit of a forbidding reputation but it's not too bad once your muscle memory has got the essential commands down. Once thing that would really help me though would be to have my text editor (TextMate) track the current debugger file and line. Then, when I wanted to see the code around the current location, I could just flip to my editor instead of hunting around with the debugger's code viewing commands.

Read more of this story at use Perl.

Originally posted by AndyArmstrong (posted by brian_d_foy) from use Perl, on January 19, 2008 8:36 AM

Examiner column for January 21.

    As an educator, I pride myself on my powers of observation. If you can’t see what’s going on around you, how will you be able to meet the needs of your 150 students? And yet there is so much I don’t notice.

 

    The clock is behind the desks in my classroom, and I don’t notice their furtive glances, especially during the last ten minutes of class. Nor do I notice that they don’t check the clock when there is a heated and animated class discussion going on.

    I don’t notice that a good book, like Kite Runner, is being read during a lesson nor that a student might be taking peeks at it while papers are passed out or a PowerPoint is being set up. If the class is shifting gears, I don’t notice when the hand beneath the desk completes a swift now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t as a cell phone is checked for text messages. Some battles are just not worth fighting.

    Teachers don’t notice when a student is absent for test days. Some students have a panic disorder, some simply can’t face the deadline. If they are excused and make up the work in a timely fashion, we don’t call attention to it.

    We also don’t notice educational fads imposed from above. When I first entered the public school system, it was TESA. We were supposed to touch children on the shoulder to indicate a personal connection. You can imagine how long that lasted. Then there was Pay-for-Performance. For a time I received several thousand dollars more per year than the salary scale. That time was brief!

    Now it’s Professional Learning Communities, which are fine and good when the learning community is productive and collegial, and not so good if it isn’t. Those learning communities need time to meet and that cuts into instructional time. With budget cuts and larger class sizes, we’ll see how long this lasts.

    Teachers don’t notice when other teachers fail to attend meetings of committees they are on. Everyone hates meetings, and we often wonder why the conscientious ones are not rewarded and the dilatory punished. Just like us, I guess administrators have to pick their battles.

    We don’t notice when students don’t love what we’re doing. That’s a hard one to ignore, but often we must. Shakespeare is hard, James Joyce is hard, but that doesn’t mean they’re not worth reading. I have lost count of the numbers of students who have returned from college to tell me how glad they are that they were held to a high standard in high school, even though they didn’t love it at the time.

    Teachers don’t notice a hundred different slights and insults to our egos throughout the day. If we required positive reactions to everything we do, we’d be showing films and playing games all day long, and our graduates would be asking, “Would you like fries with that?”

    We need to notice the achievements and ignore the distractions in order to keep the educational process upbeat. Rising above the petty, teachers don’t notice what we must not notice if we want to feel like returning the next day.

Originally posted by Erica Jacobs from TeacherTalk, on January 19, 2008 8:24 AM

Gothamist is turning 5 years old next month, and to celebrate, we're throwing a little party at Union Hall! We wanted to give you plenty of time to think of creative cakes you can bake us (pictured is one a reader whipped up for us on our 3rd birthday). Here are the details:

Movable Hype 12.0 and Gothamist Turns 5!
Friday, February 15th, 9pm
Union Hall (702 Union Street, Park Slope)
Featuring: The Forms, Pattern is Movement and Special Guests!

Both of these bands were amongst the many that were a part of our CMJ shows last year...but since we only got to see short acoustic sets there, we wanted them both back and plugged in! The third band will likely have to remain a secret 'til the very end. You can buy tickets here, and stay tuned for more details next week. Now...get baking! And give the below songs a listen:

Pattern is Movement, "Right Away"

The Forms, "Red Gun"

Originally posted by Jen Carlson from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 19, 2008 3:56 AM

    My Monday column gets written on Saturday mornings, the first time in five days I sleep later than 5 a.m. and therefore have a few brain cells to rub together. On Friday nights I am too tired to write, but I try to narrow down topics. Usually I start with a moment from my week at school, and begin to build from there. The subject always comes from my classroom, or an issue than directly affects me or my students. I don't ever write about abstractions because I don't think I have any special expertise about what I don't see personally.

    My week was filled with the following:

• college recommendations, through which I discovered remarkable things about seemingly unremarkable and quite "normal" students
• snow on Thursday, an event which proved, once again, that students and parents don't understand how difficult it is to let school out early or alter bus schedules in any way
• poetry, which led me to rediscover that the poetry my students like best is poetry about love. They don't like bitterness or irony--they like the sentimental stuff.
• reading a mystery where the chief sleuth is a book dealer. Mysteries are my vice, but I'm relatively picky about them, and Dunning's hero, Cliff Janeway, knows so much about books, the market for first editions and special editions, and the jockeying between book sellers--I almost think I'm reading something seriously intellectual instead of something purely escapist! Love it!
• as follow-up to my "Is Reading Dead?" column, I saw at least 10-15 students carrying around Kite Runner all week long, and even sneaking peeks during government class (and my own English class.) How mad could I get? I pretended I didn't notice. I do a lot of pretending not to notice in school--possibly a column topic all its own.

    So there it is, column-in-the-making. I have no idea whether one of these bullets will become the germ of what hits the pages of The Examiner on Monday, or whether some other topic will occur to me tomorrow. I'll write an update over the weekend to let you know.

Originally posted by Erica Jacobs from TeacherTalk, on January 18, 2008 4:36 PM

Director/animator Michel Gondry is curating the featured videos on YouTube’s home page during the Sundance film festival, where his Be Kind Rewind is premiering. The collection of videos feature the types of creative imagery that you’d expect from a Gondry playlist, including a fair share of stop motion and pixilation, as well as this demonstration of some MIT technology that allows computers to understand simple drawing and mechanics.

Originally posted by Johnny from Drawn! The Illustration and Cartooning Blog, on January 18, 2008 1:37 PM

These bok choy fish are like vegetables and a meat, in one convenient life form! [Thanks to Cathy for the heads up!]

Originally posted by Robyn Lee from Serious Eats: Main, on January 18, 2008 1:15 PM

Anthony Lappé is a writer, blogger, television producer and executive editor of GNN.tv, the web site for the Guerrilla News Network. He's written for mainstream press like the Times and was the National Affairs Editor for Black Book, and in 2003 he collaborated on the award-winning Showtime documentary about Iraq called BattleGround: 21 Days on the Empire’s Edge, which covered the front lines of the simmering guerrilla war in Iraq in 2003. Part of what he saw there influenced his new graphic novel, Shooting War, which started out as a serial on the Smith Magazine website. The lavish hardcover print edition, with illustrations by Dan Goldman, follows the gonzo adventures of a New York blogger who becomes a media darling in 2011 after his footage of a bombing at a Williamsburg Starbucks gets picked up by the mainstream media. Looking to keep coverage of the ongoing Iraq quagmire edgy, a global news network hires him to bring a youth angle to the guerrilla war. Part satire, part dystopian nightmare, Shooting War is unflinching in its depiction of the hellish future toward which the Bush administration is corralling us.

On Friday night Soft Skull Press founder Sander Hicks will join Lappé for a discussion about Shooting War at Vox Pop in Brooklyn. A stellar line-up of hip hop performances and organic beer to follow. Details here.

How much of yourself is in Shooting War’s protagonist, Jimmy Burns?I’d say a lot. I came up in the journalism world in sort of pre-internet days. But if I was 25 today I think I would share a lot similarities with him, though I never lived in Brooklyn and I never had an expensive haircut. I was once an angry young man with a lot of self-confidence. It kind of went over a lot of people’s heads that there’s a lot of mockery of the self-importance of the blogosphere in the character of Jimmy Burns.

Dan Rather plays a prominent role in Shooting War. What gave you the idea to make him a character in the book? I wrote him in as just a cameo role in the online serial version and the readers just flipped out. The Rather character quips his classic Dan Ratherisms, some of which are real Ratherisms and some I made up. You can go online and find lists of all these great phrases he actually uses. So it became so popular on the website I decided to write him as a real character in the book, kind of as an Obi-Wan Kenobi mentor to Jimmy Burns.

Have you heard from him? I was very apprehensive to know how he felt and I did ultimately receive a very, very sweet, endearing, two-page handwritten letter from Mr. Rather saying he was honored to be part of the project and that he appreciated it a lot. It felt good, especially because of the lawsuit and the New York Magazine cover story that shows how the executives at CBS turned on him in such a vicious and ungrateful way considering what he did for CBS News for so long. I don’t have any hero worship for the guy but I do respect him a lot. So it felt good to know he appreciated it and that he wasn’t going to sue me for using his image.

Shooting War presents a very dystopian vision of a world enflamed, with suicide bombings in Brooklyn, a nuclear attack in Bangalore, and the United States still mired in Iraq in 2011. Is this where you see things going? I don’t want to sound too pessimistic but it’s definitely a very possible future. I live very close to the World Trade Center and the plane actually woke me up that morning; it literally shook my windows. So I’m one of those people who wake up every day in New York City wondering why there hasn’t been a suicide bombing in New York or America since 9/11.

I do, too. Why do you think that is? I don’t know. I can speculate; I think the surveillance has pretty much every mosque in America under very tight electronic and visual surveillance. So I think there’s not a lot that’s going on that the authorities don’t know about. But at the same time I can’t imagine that there aren’t plots being hatched. It’s so easy to buy explosive materials or to put them together and get false identification. I always wonder because an Arab can look like a Hispanic. So you can get a Hispanic-sounding false I.D. and move around buying chemicals and things like that very easily with a Hispanic name, without raising red flags. Anyway, I don’t want to give anyone ideas but it is surprising. And then when it comes to suitcase nukes it is a very scary thing. I was just reading the real experts on nuclear proliferation who know how loose the nukes are and that one of the greatest ironies now is that the U.S. is complaining about Iran’s nuclear program when the biggest seller of nuclear materials and secrets are our allies we’ve been funding in Pakistan all these years.

And what’s really scary is the testimony of Sibel Edmonds, who was an FBI translator working on wiretaps; she claims she has information that high-ranking government officials were involved in the proliferation of nuclear technology around the world. So, yeah, I am surprised that things have not come back to the homefront. But in terms of the world getting worse I think there definitely is a real possibility. Of course, writing dystopian stuff is always more interesting and more fun than writing about smiley rainbows at the end of the street.

You were in Iraq, right? In 2003, about seven months after the invasion.

Is there anything you witnessed that specifically ended up in Shooting War? Not a specific incident but two characters came out of shooting BattleGround: 21 Days on the Empire’s Edge, which was why I was there. The character of Lieutenant Colonel John “Crash” Crowley was inspired by Lt. Col. Nate Sassaman, who we ended up getting some incredible footage of. He was a quarterback at West Point and he turned down an NFL career to go into the army and was kind of a legend for being a bad ass commander in the Sunni triangle area in the early part of the war.

Just after we left, he basically freaked out and encircled a whole town with barbed wire, issued Palestinian-type I.D. cards to everyone and created checkpoints ala the occupied territories. And he was quoted in an article the Times saying, “With a heavy dose of fear and violence, and enough money for projects, these people will come around to understand we’re here to help them.” And it was that sort of absurdity and unintended humor that kind of inspired me to create this character Crash.

A lot of people have said it’s over the top, the way he’s drawn with an iconographic Christian face plate and talking about praying all the time. And my response to that is that it’s not over the top enough; people don’t realize how embedded the Christian ideology is into the combat operations over there in Iraq. Sassaman himself went on the lecture circuit when he got back from Iraq; the lectures were titled “The Christian Warrior Ethic.” Now, of course his lecture circuit career ended when it was learned he helped cover up the incident in which two of his men threw two Iraqi teenagers off a bridge and laughed while one of them drowned. He was implicated in trying to cover that up and it kind of put the kibosh on his lecture circuit. Tom Cruise had actually optioned his story after he appeared on the cover of the New York Times Magazine for an article called “The Fall of the Warrior King.” I have a feeling it’ll be put on the backburner because all these Iraq movies have been tanking.

Having gone to Columbia University’s graduate school of journalism, you seem a bit atypical in that you’ve hewed toward what some in the establishment press dismiss as activist journalism. Are you sort of a black sheep of the Columbia alumni? I was a black sheep when I was there and I still am in some ways, so part of what this book is about is critiquing the mainstream media. But I also in a lot of ways owed it to my experience at Columbia; I do have a great respect for the history of journalism and the traditional standards of journalism. I was a freelance contributor for the New York Times for a while and other mainstream publications.

I also have a particular respect for war correspondents, especially in Iraq because this is the most dangerous war for journalists in the modern era. More journalists have been killed there than there were in Vietnam and WWII put together. There’s a lot of good reporting out there in newspapers that people don’t give enough credit to. And a lot of those guys risking their lives to report what’s going on are my friends. I also have a lot of critiques of the blogosphere, though I am a blogger and I run a website of bloggers and am an absolute proponent of citizen journalism and all the promise that has to change the industry for the better. I also have a lot of problems with internet culture and the navel gazing of the blogosphere and the lack of getting out and actually experiencing the world, thinking that you’ve got it all figured out sitting on your couch or, worse, in Starbucks.

Shooting War depicts the military using remote control robots for combat in Iraq. Where did that idea come from? That actually is not fiction. The U.S. has been using robots on the ground in bomb sniffing and reconnaissance roles extensively. Of course they use air based drones both for offensive and surveillance missions all over the world and extensively in Iraq. But they’ve been using these ground based robots for surveillance and bomb sniffing. And they’ve developed and beta-tested ground based offensive robots; they’re called TALONs.

Actually, what we use in the book are souped-up versions of actual models. I’m not sure if they’ve actually been deployed but they’ve been testing them and I’m sure there’ll be out there soon. The joke in the book is that instead of being controlled from a base in Iraq, they’re controlled by all these teenage kids in a hanger in Florida. The joke is that the military recruiting has kind of fallen off by 2011 but they have these legions of kids who have grown up playing Playstation who are just experts in first person shooter games. So the ultimate outsourcing of war happens and it starts to become remote controlled.

Shooting War started out online on Smithmag.net. Why produce a hard copy? The goal was always to do a book. The idea actually started out as a screenplay; it was all written out as a screenplay in Final Draft. It was essentially adapted week to week into comic book form. And this should give hope to all those people out there who have late night inebriated ideas that never come to fruition: This is one of those 3:30am ideas. I was sitting there with Jeff Newelt, a P.R. guy; he’s a real comic head and one night he said, “Dude, that would make a great comic!” I was never really a big comic book person. So I said, yeah, cool, but twenty minutes later I’m wondering how I’m going to get an artist. But he came up with the idea of starting it online and I just went for it. I found Dan Goldman through Craigslist. The original idea was to do something that would serve as the basis of a book and ultimately a film. I see the whole thing as a franchise idea, though I hate to use that term, that could live in any medium.

There will be a book release party tonight at Vox Pop in Brooklyn for Shooting War, featuring live hip hop performances and organic beer. Details here.

Originally posted by John Del Signore from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 18, 2008 12:17 PM

Photo of Crosby Connection space by Billy Chasen

Photo of the meatball hero and a smoked gouda and ham sandwich (with apples) by Tien Mao

On Crosby Street between Bleecker and Houston, there's a literally hole-in-the-wall sandwich shop called The Crosby Connection. Joey Cramarossa, an ex-cop from New Jersey, works out a tiny space to serve up unbelievably fresh, delicious, filling and reasonably priced sandwiches and salads at $5-6 each.

The meatball hero (with ricotta cheese) is hot and just what you want on a cold winter day, while the avocado, brie and fresh dill sandwich is decadently rich when served on soft foccacia (the breads are from Parisi!). On a fine day, the line can be over 8 people long waiting for an Italian Stallion - cappicola, provolone, salami, fresh tomatoes, sweet roasted peppers, romaine lettuce, basil, virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar.

Lately Cramarosa has been gearing up to move his operations because his lease is up. Billy Chasen, a fan of the Suzy Special, gives some back story about why it's so special:

Joey has done hundreds of mitzvahs throughout his reign as sandwich king. He lets people pay later and says you’re “never short” when buying a sandwich. He’s also consistently fed the homeless and 5 years ago, while walking to work saw a kid lying in a refrigerator box with a dog. Joey took the kid (Johnny) under his wing, gave him a job, and he’s worked at Crosby ever since.

Billy adds the building manager is the one trying to keep the sandwich joint out and "Joey believes that if the actual owner of the building, a Mr. Heller of Heller Realty was actually informed of the situation he wouldn’t be forced to shut it down."

So, here's how Billy suggests people get involved:

• Spread the word! The more people who know, the closer we could get to informing Mr. Heller.
  
• E-mail Robert Ross at RobMRoss@aol.com
  
• Mail the realty company (or tell them in person)
  BMH Realty Ltd d/b/a Heller Realty
  745 Fifth Ave Suite 1250
  New York, NY 10151
  
• Sign this online petition

If the Crosby Connection doesn't get a lease renewal, Cramarosa said that he's working on a space nearby on Elizabeth Street. We think the Crosby Connection should remain on Crosby.

Originally posted by Jen Chung from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 18, 2008 11:44 AM

Language Log: The Etiology and Elaboration of a Flagrant Mistranslation

People who see signs employing the f-word all over China, even in large stores and fancy restaurants, are not only aghast, they wonder how the dickens such a gross mistranslation could have originated and proliferated. Theories abound, to say the least.

Amazing, fascinating, hilarious, and educational — I cannot recommend this link highly enough.

Originally posted by Adam from randomWalks, on January 18, 2008 9:18 AM

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Fashionista, on January 18, 2008 8:02 AM

Posted by T.V. Raman, Research Scientist

From time to time, our own T.V. Raman shares his tips on how to use Google from his perspective as a technologist who cannot see -- tips that sighted people, among others, may also find useful. - Ed.

A little over a year ago, I blogged about our simple textual directions as an alternative to the popular graphical Google Maps interface. Those directions help me orient myself and learn my way around. But in the interest of safety -- my own and others! -- I choose not to drive and rely heavily on public transportation.

Now that Maps has textual directions in place, it's easy to build on top of that interface to introduce new innovations that become immediately useful to someone like me. Google Transit is a great example of this -- it helps me locate public transportation options and does so in the text format that I need. In addition, it offers several nice features to help me plan my trip:

• I can specify the desired departure or arrival time.
• It will show more than one trip choice, allowing some flexibility with respect to when I'd like to start.
• It estimates the amount of walking required to get to a transit stop/station.
• It identifies the length of waiting at each transit point.
• It estimates the comparable cost of transportation options, where available.

But these aren't the only benefits. Behind the scenes is the Google Transit Feed Specification (GTFS), an open data format used by public transit agencies to upload their data. Several agencies are already using these public feeds. Though GTFS is never seen by commuters directly, it opens up a wealth of possibilities with respect to accessibility and alternative access, such as building custom user interfaces and specialized route guidance applications that are optimized for people with special needs.

Though we added this alternative view to enhance the accessibility of Google Maps for blind and low-vision users, we hope that everyone finds it a useful addition to your commute arsenal. So next time you use the Maps graphical interface, give its cousin, the simple textual directions, a try -- there might be times when you find yourself using it even if you can see.

And here's to ever more open data feeds from the various public transport agencies!

Originally posted by A Googler from Official Google Blog, on January 18, 2008 7:40 AM

We're taking off for the East Coast again. This time it's to Charlottesville, Virginia, site of Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. We'll be away for a while (on family business) but will try to post from the road. Gosh, I sure wish someone like old T.J. was running for President this year. (Minus the slaves, of course.) Who comes even close? Obama? Hillary? Huckabee? Ron -- just who IS he -- Paul? I just hope I get my absentee ballot in the mail before Tsunami Tuesday!

Originally posted by (author unknown) from PAPERMAG: WORD UP!, on January 18, 2008 7:22 AM

Emma Goldman on Maxim Gorky, 1914:

We in America are conversant with tramp literature. A number of writers of considerable note have described what is commonly called the underworld, among them Josiah Flynt and Jack London, who have ably interpreted the life and psychology of the outcast. But with all due respect for their ability, it must be said that, after all, they wrote only as onlookers, as observers. They were not tramps themselves, in the real sense of the word. In "The Children of the Abyss" Jack London relates that when he stood in the breadline, he had money, a room in a good hotel, and a change of linen at hand. He was therefore not an integral part of the underworld, of the homeless and hopeless.

(link)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 18, 2008 4:13 AM

AnandTech: The MacBook Air CPU Mystery: More Details Revealed. It's a strange fate that we must suffer so much fear and doubt over so small a thing.

Originally posted by Wes Felter from Hack the Planet, on January 18, 2008 3:30 AM

· Laila, Park Slope Middle Eastern Joint Shuttered After 27 Years [TONY/The Feed]
· It's Been a Rough ’08 So Far For the MePA [ZagatBuzz]
· And Now We've Seen it All: Conveyor Belt Sushi [Midtown Lunch]
· Top Chef Mini-Reunion: Marcel and Hung in Vegas [Eater LA]
· Pizza Hut Introduces Text Ordering [Slice]
· Bourdain, et al on Kitchen Hazing [James Beard]

Originally posted by Kelly Dobkin from Eater, on January 18, 2008 3:05 AM

by Jenny Holzer.

Originally posted at kottke.org by Choire Sicha, whose week of guest blogging I’m thoroughly enjoying, even though I somehow never read his writing before.

+ Did you know you can get Jenny Holzer posts on Twitter? I love whenever one pops up in my feed.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from shey.net, on January 17, 2008 8:06 PM

Mike Lewinsky (EMV, Vice President of Creative Affairs), Lisa Truitt (National Geographic Cinema Ventures, President) , Ted Kenney (U2 3D, Supervising Producer), Sarah Carragher (mPRm Public Relations, Director), Jenny Sireci (U2 3D, Production Manager) and Steve Matthews (Principal Management Ltd., Director)

One of the pitfalls of flooding a city with tens of thousands of visitors in a week is that more often than not, cellular service is poor at best. So when a hot spot is found, people stop dead in their tracks to work, work, work, and work! We spent most of the morning and afternoon dealing with dinner and party location and transportation logistics with the A-Team.  A lot of progress was made by furiously tapping away.  Don't believe for a minute that the photo captured above is unique to our crew.  Everywhere you look at Sundance, this is what you'll see.

Originally posted by Souris from U2 3D Live, on January 17, 2008 3:09 PM

We had a call today with the Library of Congress team to catch up on what had happened overnight with The Commons pilot project. There was a lot of laughter as we shared stories about watching all the activity overnight, and frankly, none of us could quite fathom how fantastic the response to the pilot has been.

In the 24 hours after we launched, you added over 4,000 unique tags across the collection (about 19,000 tags were added in total, for example, “Rosie the Riveter” has been added to 10 different photos so far). You left just over 500 comments (most of which were remarkably informative and helpful), and the Library has made a ton of new friends (almost overwhelming the email account at the Library, thanks to all the “Someone has made you a contact” emails)!

I’ve never been one to count my chickens, but that’s brilliant!

 

1. About Eddie O’Keefe, indiamos tells us “The text to the right of his legs is
   
   SOMMER
   PHILA
   
   The Sommer Studio of Philadelphia took other boxers’ portraits, as well. See two more (of Tommy Glavin and Willie Moody) at www.antekprizering.com/photo.html.”
2. It’sGreg says “Ed Geers was purported to be the first man to win a sulky race using a sulky with pneumatic tires.”
3. Well-known baseball fanatic artolog knows that “[Bob Bescher] held the NL single-season stolen base record (81 in 1911) until Maury Wills broke it in 1962.”

Sincerely, thank you. This bodes well.

Originally posted by George Oates from Flickr Blog, on January 17, 2008 10:15 AM

Filed under: Accessories, Portables, MacBook Air

Well, this was inevitable. When Steve Jobs dramatically presented the MacBook Air by removing it from a manila envelope, two enterprising artists saw an opportunity, and the result is AirMail.

It's a vinyl laptop sleeve for the MacBook Air that looks just like -- you guessed it -- a standard issue manila envelope. They're lined with fleece and even feature a tie enclosure. Each hand made bag costs $29.95US, and they begin shipping two weeks from today.

It's not the most durable bag available, but among the most clever.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Originally posted by Dave Caolo from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), on January 17, 2008 9:45 AM

Over the last few days, I’ve taken part in (and facilitated parts of) an intense workshop meant to define the user experience of a new product. In the room we had representatives from pretty much the entire team — software engineers, hardware engineers, industrial designers, interaction designers, marketing, brand, and even the CEO.

At the end of the first day, we found ourselves a little unmoored — even though we had talked about our presumed users (this project is to launch a brand new product into the market, so there are no existing users), the discussion was nebulous. We needed an anchor.

So on the morning of the second day we dove into a discussion of personas — those archetypal users of the product. We had three personas (Casey, Jessica, and Eric), and we talked about (and occasionally argued about) them for quite a while, until we arrived at a shared understanding of who they are, and what they would get out of the product.

This discussion proved enormously valuable — it lead to soem coherence around who the product was for, and it helped focus our discussion of desired experiences, and, in turn, functional requirements. We referred to these personas for the remainder of the workshop, and they came in handy for resolving conversations that got stuck in “Well, I think…”

So, I was a bit surprised last night to read Steve Portigal’s article in the latest Interactions magazine, “Persona Non Grata.” (The first element of surprise was how it had the exact same title as Dan’s Adaptive Path essay from over two years ago). What most surprised me as the vitriol Steve cast at the practice of persona development — he essentially derides it as a waste of time, an exercise that purports to build empathy but in reality distances us from our users.

The thing is, when you read the article, it becomes clear that Steve is talking not about personas, but poorly conceived personas. Like any tool, personas can be wielded effectively or not. Steve is right in that the bulk of personas out there don’t serve their desired purpose, because they get too cutesy with alliterative names, or label people as types as opposed to individuals, or become cliched. But that’s not the fault of personas, that’s the fault of bad personas.

In our practice, we haven’t seen a tool for building empathy as effective as a well-constructed persona. We’ve used it numerous times to great success.

My frustration with the article is two-fold. First, because so many personas are bad doesn’t mean that we should throw out the practice. That’s like saying we should stop making movies because most movies suck. Steve commits Jakob’s Fallacy, perhaps most famous in his “Flash 99% bad“, wherein you dismiss a whole category of activity because the bulk of its practice is poor.

Second, no constructive alternative is presented. Steve could have taken two paths — either delineate what it takes to create a truly productive persona, or present other tools that successfully accomplish the objectives that personas fail to meet. However, he does neither, so at the end of the article, you’re simply left wondering, “Well, if personas suck, how do I make sense of my user research? How do I build empathy across a product team?”

Originally posted by peterme from peterme.com, on January 17, 2008 9:05 AM

Pricing could un-block the box for buses, and then some.

In an op-ed published yesterday in Metro, MTA chief Lee Sander emphasized the connection between congestion pricing and improved subway and bus service, which polls continue to suggest is the key to securing public support. Sander's piece joins reports that officials are working on plans to create a transit "lock box" for pricing revenue.

Making his case, Sander brought to the surface an idea that's been percolating among policy experts for some time: the "virtuous cycle."

[Congestion pricing] would speed trips for bus riders and make each bus less expensive to operate. Right now, when MTA buses are stuck idling in traffic, we must spend money on excess fuel and overtime for drivers. By decongesting the streets not just in Manhattan but throughout the city, as commuters from all the boroughs leave their cars at home congestion pricing would make travel times for bus riders faster. That leads to a virtuous cycle. As traffic is reduced, buses become faster. Faster buses attract more riders out of their cars, which reduces traffic further.

Transportation Alternatives director Paul Steely White introduced this concept to New Yorkers last May on the DMI Blog, noting that pricing will improve bus commutes right away:

In removing many of the cars that block buses, and by making it easier to reprogram car lanes into bus lanes (such as the new bus lanes proposed for the Queensboro and Williamsburg bridges), the bus boosting benefits of congestion pricing will be felt immediately. What's more, speedier buses, as in London [pdf], will set off a "virtuous cycle" of less driving and more bus ridership leading to decreased bus operation costs per rider and in turn encouraging more service, lower fares, more bus riders and fewer drivers getting in their way.

The paper White linked to -- Kenneth Small's "Unnoticed Lessons from London: Road Pricing and Public Transit" (download it) -- provides a rigorous academic explanation of the virtuous cycle effect. In a piece of tantalizing extrapolation, Small projects the effect of congestion pricing on bus ridership in a typical American city:

Ridership goes up 31 percent and average user cost falls more than 100 percent of the initial fare. Fares can be reduced 26 percent, despite a 21 percent increase in service whose fares cover less than average cost; these reduced fares are possible because of higher bus occupancy (due to patronage rising faster than vehicle-miles) and lower driver costs (due to faster trips). 

Photo: joeaverage/Flickr

Originally posted by Ben Fried from Streetsblog, on January 17, 2008 9:05 AM

Quick Post

Live-action recreations of Garfield strips followed by trippy "tributes" to Jim Davis. Words fail to explain how the awesomeness.

http://www.lasagnacat.com/

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Capn Design, on January 17, 2008 8:59 AM

Letter to the editor, New York Times, August 25, 1993:

The East Village is awash in criminal activity and antisocial behavior, which blatantly occurs all through the day and escalates as the sun goes down. At 7 A.M., when I walk my dog, the area looks like a war zone. Crack vials, human feces, used condoms and hypodermic needles litter the sidewalks, building entryways, halls and stoops. Junkies are roaming the streets uprooting flower beds to look for the drugs they hurriedly stashed the night before.

(Yes; today you are all being the victims of a project for which I'm urgently neck-deep in research.)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 17, 2008 8:45 AM

Lucky Victoria Beckham is the chosen model for Marc Jacobs' upcoming Spring/Summer 2008 campaign ads and my question is, "Whose concept was this?"

On another note, Posh has been hanging out with Tom Cruise way too much since moving to the states, because Mrs. B is looking more like an alien than ever. She should really not eat or drink anything when she's over at their house, hanging with Katie Holmes. I'm pretty sure there's something weird in the water.

Originally posted by Tracy Pepey from iVillage - Daily Blabber, on January 17, 2008 8:14 AM

JMT sez, "I can't remember the last time I diagrammed a sentence, but this breakdown of the Preamble to the US Constitution is almost beautiful in structure. Very awesome."

Indeed. Plus, I hear the Schoolhouse Rock version in my head whenever I see this. Link (Thanks, JMT!)

Originally posted by Cory Doctorow from Boing Boing, on January 17, 2008 8:11 AM

I always think of pots de crème, or little pots of crème, as the French answer to our puddings. Really a baked custard, the crème can be created in just about any flavor combo. That uber-chef Daniel Boulud created them to be coffee-cardamom was a nod to the way coffee is often drunk in the Middle East: through a cardamom pod held between one’s teeth.

Of course, Daniel being Daniel (and thank goodness he is), he ups the ante a bit: he caramelizes the coffee beans and cardamom pods before he pours in milk and cream and steeps everything for a few minutes. Even though this dessert is made with big flavors—you can hardly call coffee or cardamom wallflower flavors—the caramelizing step makes the flavors even bigger and more intense.

When these are baked in a professional kitchen, the custard cups, set in a roasting pan filled with water, are covered with a sheet of plastic wrap. The wrap doesn’t budge or burn because the temperature is low (of course, you’ve got to have an oven that keeps this low temperature). If the idea of baking with plastic wrap doesn’t make you comfortable, cover the set-up with foil.

Photograph taken by Gentl & Hyers

About the author: Dorie Greenspan is the author of several books on dessert, most recently Baking: From My Home to Yours. Dorie can also be found at DorieGreenspan.com and on the Bon Appétit website, where she is a special correspondent.

Coffee-Cardamom Pots de Crème

Adapted from The Café Boulud Cookbook

- makes 6 servings -

Ingredients

3 ounces (1 cup) coffee beans, preferably an espresso roast
2 tablespoons cardamom pods
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups (approximately) heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
7 large egg yolks

Procedure

1. Put the coffee beans and cardamom pods in the workbowl of a food processor and pulse on and off several times to roughly chop—not grind—the ingredients. Turn the chopped beans and pods into a medium saucepan and add 1/2 cup of the sugar. Put the pan over medium heat and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the sugar starts to melt. Patience—this will take a few minutes. Once the sugar has melted, continue to cook, still stirring without stop, until the sugar caramelizes—you want the color of the caramel to be deep amber. Now, standing away from the stove so you don’t get splattered, slowly pour in 1 cup of the cream and the milk. Don’t panic—the caramel will immediately seize and harden—it will all smooth out as the liquids warm and the sugar melts again. Bring the mixture to a boil and, when the sugar has melted and everything is smooth again, pull the pan from the heat. Cover the pan (we do this with plastic wrap at the Café to get a good seal) and allow the mixture to infuse 20 minutes.

2. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 300°F.

3. Working in a bowl that’s large enough to hold all the ingredients, whisk the yolks and remaining 1/4 cup sugar together until the mixture is pale and thick. Strain the coffee-cardamom liquid into a measuring cup (discard the beans and pods) and add enough heavy cream to bring the liquid measurement up to 2 cups. Very gradually and very gently—you don’t want to create air bubbles—whisk the liquid into the egg mixture; skim off the top foam, if there is any.

4. Arrange six 4-ounce espresso or custard cups in a small roasting pan, leaving an even amount of space between the cups, and fill each cup nearly to the top with the custard mixture. (If you liked, line the roasting pan with a double thickness of paper towel or a kitchen towel to steady the cups.) Carefully slide the pan into the oven; then, using a pitcher, fill the roasting pan with enough hot water to come halfway up the sides of the espresso cups. Cover the pan with plastic wrap (don’t worry—it can stand the heat) and poke two holes in two diagonally opposite corners. Bake the custards for about 40 minutes, or until the edges darken ever so slightly and the custards are set but still jiggle a little in the center when you shake them gently.

5. Remove the pan from the oven and let the custards sit in the water bath for 10 minutes. Peel off the plastic wrap, lift the cups out of the water and cool the custards in the refrigerator. (The pots de creme can be prepared a day ahead and, when cool, covered with plastic wrap and stored in the refrigerator.)

To serve: The pots de creme are at their best at room temperature, so remove them from the refrigerator and keep them on the counter for about 20 minutes before serving.

Originally posted by Dorie Greenspan from Serious Eats: Main, on January 17, 2008 8:00 AM

The other day, I'd been reminded about some of the most striking statistics I'd seen last year, which were from the NYPD crime stats for 9th Precinct, where I live. (That link is to a PDF with stats for last week.) Each precinct in the city files reports every week, and those reports also include comparisons of statistics for prior years.

But what's amazing is the trends in violent crime shown over the past 20 years. CompStat reports show the numbers from 1990 until 2006, and over that time, rapes are down 70% from 41 to 12. Burglaries are down 85%, from 1420 to 209. And murders? There weren't any. In my neighborhood, people don't kill each other. In 1990, they did, 23 times. Robberies over the same timeframe are down 81%, and felony assaults are down 69%. And all of this in a neighborhood where, just a year before they started tracking these stats, we had a police-incited riot that divided the entire neighborhood. Today, there's a dog run and a kids' playground just steps from where the riot began.

Now, of course, that's no consolation to the people who've still suffered from the crimes that do go on, and of course it doesn't account for other precincts where crime is worse. But the fundamental character of what it means to live here is so incredibly different from the perception that so many outsiders have of what it means to live in New York City. You will always have some violent crime -- an overwhelming majority of the personal violence that does happen could fall under the description of crimes of passion, people beating up their romantic rivals or things like that. But the day-to-day threat of random street violence is measurably, fundamentally reduced. Along with the massive improvements made to so many parks across all five boroughs, we are truly in a golden age for public space in New York. These numbers represent just one part of that, but it's an important part.

More from the New York Daily News, and detailed city-wide crime reports going back to 1960 are available here. Choire is also blogging about many of the same topics in his guest posts on kottke.org today.

Originally posted by Anil from Anil Dash, on January 17, 2008 7:57 AM

When using the volume control function keys on an Apple laptop, there's a limited amount of control over the volume -- each key press moves the volume by one entire unit in the onscreen bezel. However, by pressing Shift and Option along with the volume key you want to use, you can break up each large step in the volume control bezel into four parts, instead of having to use the menu bar item or System Preferences for fine-grained control.

[robg adds: I don't have 10.4 with me on the road this week, but a friend tested it for me and said it did not work. Hence, I've marked this hint as 10.5 only. If that turns out to be wrong, please let me know. Someone else with an external third-party keyboard said it didn't work for him in 10.5 -- so this hint may also require a laptop Mac and built-in keyboard. If someone can test using an Apple external on a desktop and/or laptop, plea...

Originally posted by (author unknown) from MacOSXHints.com, on January 17, 2008 5:30 AM

Diner, the self-explanatory concept around the corner from Peter Luger in Williamsburg, is now serving grass-fed meats supplied by their new resident butcher, Tom Mylan. He completed his apprenticeship at Fleisher’s Meats late last year. Basically, Diner is now serving and dry aging their own meat, and, nightly, while supplies last, you can get it in the form of porterhouse for two, four or six. Early review: "I tried one of these Porterhouses myself. It arrived on the medium side of medium rare — those who like it bloody, be clear — but it was still deliciously charred, tender, with a superior, clean taste..." [Brooklyn Based]

Originally posted by BL from Eater, on January 17, 2008 5:20 AM

There was a time, before he was running for President, when I was totally obsessed with Barack Obama. It was right before his historic speech at the National Democratic Convention. Because I worked on a film about the death penalty in Illinois, I spent several months in Chicago and the buzz about this guy was real. I knew for sure he would run for President... someday.

Now, here he is running for President and honestly I do not have to lot to say about it. I want him to win. I have volunteered for him and will continue to light a candle, say a prayer and help out when I can.

Some people ask me why Obama and not Clinton. I never really get into this discussion because I think my political choices are my own and I was raised, by my fairly politically active mother, that I do not have to justify why I vote for who I vote for. I just have to vote. However, I will give one simple from the heart answer. I believe that Barack Obama wants to change our country for all the right reasons. I am not sure I feel the same way about Clinton.

Do not get me wrong. These are the best options we've had since I've been voting and if Clinton gets the nomination, I will be behind her 100%. Sure, I think she is a political machine who lacks some nuance but she's fine. She leaps and bounds better than Romney or Huckabee!!!

I know I speak for black women everywhere when I say, it is hard to have to constantly justify why, in some people's eyes, you are choosing between being black and being a woman. It is pretty infuriating that my decision is looked upon that way but that is just the state of things. This is not the first time I have been asked to do this and I doubt it will be the last. For the record, I make the right decision for me and let the chips fall where they may.

Rebecca Walker wrote a great piece for The Huffington Post about why she is voting for Obama. It is in response to a piece that Gloria Steinem (her godmother!) wrote for The New York Times. Here is a great passage:

Racism and classism are as definitive as sexism. Did Steinem insinuate that Barack's gender, and not his talent, put him in the top spot? I thought black men were capable of performing at his level without an irrationally granted advantage. And the idea that black men always reach the Promised Land before white women? Forty per cent of black men don't finish high school in America, and one in four are incarcerated. Hillary, and her feminist supporters, are not going to win this election by glossing over the realities of African-American men.

Really, my absolute favorite take on all of this is Chris Rock's rant on SNL. His ability to get at the heart of all of this is incredible. He is truly one of our greatest minds. Turning this race into a suffering contest between black men and white women is pretty low but that seems to be where the race is going.

Originally posted by Angela Tucker from tuckergurl, on January 17, 2008 3:53 AM

If we are to believe DiscoPop, Discipline will take Janet back to her dance/pop roots. Could it be that she's finally finally gotten rid of that little carpet monkey JD that attempted to ghettoize her and completely ignored her significant gay fanbase? God I hope so. Whatever it does to you in bed and in life, let it do that, but keep its greasy fingers out of your music. Period.

Janet Jackson does not translate well to the 'hood aesthetic. Sorry. If ever Janet happens upon a hood hit, it's purely happenstance and that's the way it should be; you should never "sell" her to the ghetto. That's just STUPID STUPID STUPID. There's no amount of Norman Lear and John Singleton scripts that are going to change that. Mimi's better at operating in chickenhead mode anyway, keep giving her your ghetto beats. (SMH @ That Chick.)

20 Y.O. was a decent R&B album, but not having a dance track on there that didn't carry a BPM over 113 was the dumbest decision that's ever been made for her. "Throb", "Come On Get Up" and "Together Again" are career highlights and I was personally offended that JD intentionally decided he'd overlook the audience that forms the backbone of her fanbase.

How many Gays did Janet have to fire behind that last album? 20? 200? We had nothing to dance to!

Luckily, the Gays (L.A. Reid) were reinstated and gave you the sinister album title, fierce new look (above), the sickening beats and the questionable video (3/4 ain't bed). Their little sweet asses flocked about her, only allowing JD minimal and/or executive but distant involvement. The Gays have this. They know what they're doing. We just have to have faith in them and leave them be.

Go Gays!

Originally posted by (author unknown) from NOVASLIM.COM || Mmmm, posty., on January 17, 2008 3:11 AM

Filed under: Internet, Yahoo!, Social Software, Beta

The OpenID project got a huge shot in the arm today as Yahoo! announced their support for the OpenID 2.0 single sign-on framework. As of today, there are a total of about 120 million OpenID accounts spread across services such as myopenid, WordPress.com, AOL (covered here before), and others. Yahoo! triples that number today by becoming an OpenID provider and adding approximately 250 new OpenID enabled accounts. Yahoo! users can expect to be able to use the services in private beta on January 30.

This means users will be able to log into more than 9,000 OpenID enabled sites with their Yahoo! username and password. For those of you who are unfamiliar with OpenID, it is a single sign on system for the web. Meaning if you look to join and log-in to a new site, you can use one username and password across all these disperate websites. For more info about OpenID, see Wikipedia or the OpenID homepage.

This can be counted as a huge win for the OpenID project. We believe in the idea of OpenID, but it won't be successful until the major players in the web market hop on board. We hope to see the other big companies such as Google and MSN hop on board and start serving up some OpenID goodness.

[via TechCrunch]

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Originally posted by Jason Harris from Download Squad, on January 17, 2008 1:30 AM

Let’s be really unprecedented and say nice things about OS X twice in a single month. Well, and diss the Air a bit.

For those who aren’t Unix-command-line-enabled, the graphic above says that the combination of OS X “Leopard” 10.5.1 and an August-2007 MacBook is in at least one instance really fucking solid. And let me tell ya, I work this little sucker hard. The Web browser, its nakedness exposed to the Big Bad Internet, develops severe mental-health issues every few days and has has to be destroyed in order to be saved; other than that we just cruise along.

Those who (like me) have been through many computers over the years will tell you that there are certain hardware/software combos that hit a resonance frequency, work hard and get out of your way and are there when you need them. I cast my mind back and there’s one per decade, more or less: an Eighties NCD X Terminal hooked to a ton of big ol’ Unix boxes; a Toshiba Portegé running Win95 in that decade, and now I think Black Beauty is this decade’s It Computer.

MacBook Air? In its shaky first-ever release? At a time when the product sweet spot, namely the solid-state disk, is

1. overpriced,

2. undersized, and

3. a textbook example of the Product With Moore’s Law On Its Side?

Surely you jest.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from ongoing, on January 16, 2008 11:00 PM

Okay, these are just fun -- a series of custom-designed Mario levels that let the little plumber make his way through a whole level without the player ever having to touch a controller. A triumph of cleverly-placed blocks!

Find many, many more at this list of Automated Mario videos

Originally posted by Anil from Anil Dash, on January 16, 2008 1:43 PM

Josh MacPhee Now! $20 The housing market is insane, people making millions flipping homes while thousands don't have any roof over their head... 3 color silkscreen print 12.5"x19" signed/unnumbered

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Just Seeds, on January 16, 2008 12:05 PM

I had to go uptown to interview some people this afternoon and Laurie Anderson's "Live in New York" came on the headphones on the way, which made me think about "Cloverfield" and 9/11 and "too soon" again. "Live in New York" was recorded at Town Hall on September 19 and 20, 2001. Is it in my mind, or does she sound uncomfortable singing "I feel like I am in a burning building and I gotta go" on "Let X=X" (iTunes link)? Nexis doesn't deliver any useful accounts of the concert—just a review from Newsday which is appreciative but not very descriptive. (Also, though, now we know that the name "Laurie Anderson" has appeared in the New York Times an astonishing 799 times, and, yes, nearly all of them are her.) Also I'm not convinced she doesn't get choked up during (iTunes link ahoy) "Slip Away." ("What's this? A little dust in my eye.") Anyway, somehow that wasn't too soon.

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 16, 2008 10:59 AM

I'm glad because it's a cool press release. Apparently someone came out of nowhere and submitted a previously unknown T206 collection to be graded by Beckett. It's a collection with all Sweet Caporal backs. Guess which card is only found with a Sweet Caporal back. Read more about it on Beckett Behind the Scenes, which also has a brilliantly unhinged rant against all Beckett products in the

Originally posted by dayf from Cardboard Junkie, on January 16, 2008 10:42 AM

Flickr and the Library of Congress are teaming up to crowd-source the tagging of 1,500 photos in a test run of something called The Commons. Exciting stuff!

Originally posted by torrez from Andre's Notes, on January 16, 2008 10:37 AM

Originally posted by billycuts from Nerdshit, on January 16, 2008 9:24 AM

These altered book drawings by will ashford are incredible. I love the idea of using old books to create new art. There is a legacy and lineage being played with here. A trust that poetry can emerge from unexpected places. This art also proves in a beautiful way, that everything is open to the viewers interpretation, even something as "permanent" as the printed page.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Monoscope, on January 16, 2008 7:57 AM

Saw a screening of "Cloverfield" last night. New Yorkers say "too soon!" sarcastically a lot—but you know what? If we—me and another downtown Manhattan-residing friend—spent half an hour after the movie talking about what we did on 9/11, then it's not imaginary that the film actively, consciously, and ill-advisedly uses such imagery. What's weirder is that it was, like, the cast of "The O.C." doing 9/11. Debate on this is ongoing on various internets. But also the movie is totally rad, in an amusement park/horrorshow way. CONFUSING.

(link)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 16, 2008 7:30 AM

It’s freezing outside but we’re still feeling warm and fuzzy from all the recent rave reviews. Our team’s arrived in Park City, Utah for Sundance 2008 and we’re excited! Can’t stand the sub zero weather? No patience to wait hours in line for next year’s surprise box-office hit? Don’t worry. That’s what I’m here for — to report to you all the cool behind-the-scenes action that will happen at this indie cinema showcase. Watch everything unfold as we roll out the red carpet for U2 3D’s world premiere on Saturday, January 19, 2008. Sundance is going to rock!

Originally posted by Souris from U2 3D Live, on January 16, 2008 7:26 AM

This is pretty much the definition of a first world problem, but I know I'm not the only one who thinks the new Gmail UI for the iPhone isn't all its cracked up to be. They moved basic transactions like reading and archiving messages into asynchronous calls, and it creates this incredibly disjointed and sluggish user experience. Case in point, archiving a message.

• Steps to reproduce: view a message, touch the archive button.
• Expected result: user is returned to the message list, with that message removed from the list.
• Actual result: user is returned to the message list, with that message still in the message list. After several seconds a banner message appears stating that "The conversation has been marked as read." And then, after several more seconds (longer depending on the speed of your connection, on EDGE I've seen this take at least 10 seconds), another banner message apperas stating "The conversation has been archived."

Look, I'm a big fan of asynchronous JavaScript and XML. Just like I'm a big fan of HTML and CSS. And heck, HTTP for that matter. But the team made the technology they used the lede of the story, which leads me to believe that the requirement wasn't "make Gmail faster for iPhone users, especially on EDGE," but something like "port UI to AJAX."

On the plus side, IMAP setup is now much easier, so maybe I'll switch to that.

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 16, 2008 7:05 AM

Filed under: Gaming

The eagerly awaited game Spore from Will Wright (of Simcity and Sims fame) is coming to the Mac later this year. CNET broke the news earlier in the day, and EA confirmed it in a press release later. Like the releases promised (but not delivered) last year, the Mac version of Spore will rely on TransGaming's Cider technology and is set to be released simultaneously with the PC version. Nonetheless, they're hoping to do better this time and even Wright himself expressed confidence, saying: "We couldn't be happier to bring Spore to the Mac at the same time as the PC version. Spore is a highly creative game and I look forward to seeing what the players come up with to fill the universe they design."

Here's hoping that Wright's right, because Spore has been looking like the hotness itself for quite some time now.

Thanks David!

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Originally posted by Mat Lu from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), on January 16, 2008 7:00 AM

Harm reduction programs, in which health workers work to reduce dangerous behaviors with both education and materials as near in time and space as possible to those behaviors, still get opposition in health departments. But for years we've known that teenagers who join abstinence-only programs are actually less likely to use condoms when they do have sex, and that they have STD rates nearly equal to teens who do not. Just last month, needle exchange was legalized in D.C., ludicrously late.

Yesterday afternoon, I talked to Joshua Volle. For the past few years he's been the New York City Department of Health director of HIV community prevention programs; his last day at work was Friday. (We talked for a column I wrote for today's New York Observer about the ongoing rise in new H.I.V. cases among young gay men, and it probably isn't something most of you here want to read, as it is lewd, crude and sarcastic, so maybe don't!) Volle, 50, left DPH largely because he has become a minister, but also: "I wasn't in a place, in a position, where I could speak the truth that I know from my experience," he said. "I was basically a bureaucrat middle manager, and that's not my personality—nor is that why God sent me on this planet."

There are still, Volle indicated, policy camps in conflict in the Health Department over HIV prevention policies. New York State has something called the Sanitary Code; in the City, it is still used to shutter gay sex establishments from which reports of unsafe sex are received. But in the rest of the state, closure is used as a threat—and establishments are not closed if such places work in cooperation with community-based organizations that promote safe sex on-site.

The City is now assessing its current policy, and is in receipt of recommendations from "a local alliance of health professionals, activists and club owners."

"I don't know if I've ever seen an incidence where a government has been able to control people's behavior," Volle said. He used Prohibition and drug laws as an example of how government crackdowns push people to the margins, away from the reach of harm reduction workers. Now, in New York City, private sex parties have become ever more difficult for health workers to find and enter. (Volle stressed that he was a fan of his former boss, Department of Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden, and called him a smart man who obviously cared deeply about the health of New Yorkers.)

"We are still seeing an increase in HIV," he said, "so if the Sanitary Code was actually working, wouldn't we not be seeing that increase? If we try going in full force with our community partners, to do risk reduction, maybe we could get a handle on this epidemic. But we don't know, because we've never been given a chance. "

"What we'd like to see is sex venues be kind of certified by the Department of Health, if they have these partnerships set up by community-based organizations," he said. "And those that refuse? Guess what, you're still out on a limb, you could be shut down, because the law is still on the record."

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 16, 2008 6:40 AM

"Rent," the worst musical in the history of musicals, grossed more than $280 million dollars on Broadway since April, 1996—and grossed another $330 million in national tours. (The 2005 movie version of "Rent," by the way, only grossed $31 million worldwide.) Because I'm a terrible judge of everything, I was convinced at the time that it would close in workshops. Now, at last, "Rent" will close on Broadway this June. Too late!

(link)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 16, 2008 5:55 AM

After seeing these Banksy-style posters for Rambo all over hell and creation I wondered, what up? Well, Monday's L.A.Times revealed that, once again, the clever Mr. Tim Palen, marketing whiz at Lion's Gate, is responsible for the campaign. The image (done by Jason Lindeman from Ignition Print) was initially meant for a T-shirt, but Stallone was so taken with the image that the faux-Banksy ended up splattered all over town. Described by Palen as "Che Guevara meets Jesus," the poster, according to the Times article, "has spawned various street-art retorts, including a competing Rimbaud poster at a public transit stop in San Francisco." Now that's a movie I'd pay to see -- Stallone as Rimbaud! Granted he's a bit long in the tooth for the role but... maybe Banksy can be hired to do an animated version? Just like that a-ha video? Then again, Family Guy already did that. Brilliantly.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from PAPERMAG: WORD UP!, on January 16, 2008 5:52 AM

Pencils2MediaMoguls. “For the last couple of months, television fans have been buying pencils to send to the media moguls — the heads of six major companies that dominate the [Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers] — to demonstrate their support for the [striking] writers of their favorite TV series. On December 11, the first 500,000 pencils were delivered in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, another 200,000 will be delivered in New York.” Appropriately, the press conference will take place by the New York Stock Exchange.

(After the demo, the pencils are donated to the public school children.)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Social Design Notes, on January 16, 2008 5:34 AM

As you may know, BuzzFeed asks bloggers if they've written about trends that have been covered by BuzzFeed. In the case of the great Nick Denton's Balls trend - YOU MUST WATCH THE VIDEO IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY - here's the solicitation:

Originally posted by Andrea from Andrea Harner, on January 16, 2008 4:19 AM

Sun acquires MySQL AB

This isn’t good news to me.

(thanks, Johan)

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Marco.org Tumblelog, on January 16, 2008 3:44 AM

They’re joining the family. Surprise! Oh, yes. What a no-brainer.

[Disclosure]: MySQL was involved in the process of moving the text you are now reading from my screen to yours. Hey, I guess I can look forward to a discount on ongoing’s MySQL charges. [Um, isn’t that free? -Ed.]

MySQL, you know, in my experience, it, well, Just Works. Runs great on our hardware and OS. Well, OK, GNU/Linux too. What else is there? For databases, nothing that matters.

Stand by; this is going to be fun.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from ongoing, on January 15, 2008 11:00 PM

Below is a press release from the WGAE about the completion of the Pencils2MediaMoguls fan campaign today in New York. -JA

For the last couple of months, television fans have been buying pencils to send to the media moguls – the heads of six major companies that dominate the AMPTP – to demonstrate their support for the writers of their favorite TV series. On December 11, the first 500,000

Originally posted by John Aboud from United Hollywood, on January 15, 2008 10:28 PM

Whoooeeee. Don't you love that musty smell of bourgeois Asian American nationalism in the morning?

The knees are jerking over at the 80-20 Initiative, a group of crusty old Asian Am politicos trying to forge a Yellow Power voting bloc, over Obama's apparent refusal to answer a simple six-question. (For the history, go here.)

Now don't get me wrong. Heck, I'm certifiably pro-Yellow Power! I even wear Mao t-shirts sometimes (though mostly so people will think I'm Jeff Mao). And I think Obama's--overwhelmingly white, it must be said--top professional staff has been particularly dumb when dealing with Asian Americans.

Here's a particularly egregious screwup--one that btw didn't happen to affect Americans of East Asian descent, and so apparently passed completely unnoticed by the 80-20ers.

Folks, this incident was so bad that it led to the flight of notable amounts of money and support from Americans of South Asian descent to Hillary, and Obama himself had to apologize publicly and distance himself from his staff.

But 80-20...well, let's just reprint let Bob Wing's letter to 80-20. It says it all:

I applaud your efforts to press Mr. Obama and the other presidential candidates on issues related to Asian Americans. But I think your Defeat Obama campaign is divisive and not related to your stated mission of uniting Asian Americans. Worse, I think it plays to the racism that is unfortunately so prevalent in our society, including among some Asian Americans.

As Asian Americans we ought to know that one of the principal forms of racism is the often unfair claim, usually by some whites, that we and other people of color are not qualified to hold important positions. To say that Mr. Obama is not qualified to be president is not only incorrect, it also plays to that racism.

Moreover, it inflames the racial fires currently impacting upon the Democratic campaign in response to Mr. Obama's success in the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries.

I have no problem with criticizing Mr. Obama or any other candidate if they refuse to support legitimate Asian American rights. I also would have no problem with your deciding to throw your support behind a particular candidate and saying why. Those are positive actions.

But to mount a campaign claiming that Mr. Obama is unqualified to be president is harshly negative and divisive.

Whatever critique you may have of Mr. Obama, he is surely as qualified as many if not most of the people who have ever run for or even held the presidency. To decide that one candidate is more qualified than the others is what every voter must decide. To claim that a candidate with impressive credentials and massive backing such as Mr. Obama is not qualified at all is a harsh claim that smacks of partisan hype.

I hope you reconsider this ill conceived campaign and refocus on proactive efforts for Asian American equality and political unity.

Originally posted by Zentronix from zentronix: dubwise & hiphopcentric, on January 15, 2008 12:29 PM

otherthings @ flickr

"This is an extreme closeup scan (2400 dpi) of a paint chip retrieved from the ruins of Belmont Art Park by Amy McKenzie earlier this year. The fragment is about 1cm thick, and appears to consist of about 150-200 layers of paint."

Gorgeous. In Technoscience and Everyday Life, Michael writes about the "complex simplicities of the mundane" and I can't help but see some connections here.

Originally posted by Anne from Purse Lip Square Jaw, on January 15, 2008 12:25 PM

This is the dumbest, most myopic blog title I have seen in a long while: “Apple Stock Tanks During Stevenote.” I don’t mean to be snarky, but is it possible that someone could be so enthralled with the cult of Mac to completely miss the fact that Citigroup posted a $10B loss today? Of course Apple’s stock tanked. So did every other stock in the known universe. In the words of the Economist,

Originally posted by cameron from overstated, on January 15, 2008 12:09 PM

In their ongoing quest to be the world's greatest sports website—heck, the world's greatest anything website—The Wizznutzz "found" some "never-before-seen personal letters from Pres. Richard Nixon written to Kevin Loughery shortly after the Washington Bullets lost in the 1971 Finals to the Bucks." There's a long meditative section on watching crows in a field in winter that is particularly stellar.

(link)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 15, 2008 12:00 PM

Hey folks!
Check out my friend Jean Cozzens and the website she is working on! She makes gorgeous prints and also has done some rad collaborative work- like building cardboard cities in galleries and libraries with children large and small!!!! http://www.secretdoorprojects.org/

Originally posted by Meredith Stern from Just Seeds: Blog, on January 15, 2008 11:05 AM

Dave Chang—man of the year, Mayor of the East Village, keeper of the bo ssam, ice cream shoppe king (he could if he wanted to)—writes us today with news from his growing empire. He's made some personal changes at all three of his East Village restaurants, including the unopened Momofuku Ko (currently on a track for February/March), where Peter Serpico has been named a chef/partner. From here, we better to go directly to his note, which arrived on Chang brand letterhead, sealed with an orange peach embossed into melted orange wax.

Dear Friends,

We're growing. And as Ko gets closer to completion, it's clear some of us need to step aside and let the real talent shine. I am stepping off to work on new restaurant projects, Quino is working on his own concepts, and the guys who have been quietly running the show are now going to take ownership of the restaurants and command of the kitchens. It's something we've been planning for a long time (we are not leaving momofuku).

Tien "I love Paul Bocuse!" Ho will be chef-partner at Ssam Bar.

Kevin Pemoulie, chairman of the Larry Bird fan club, will be chef-partner at Noodle Bar with Scott Garfinkel, fifth line goalie of the New York Islanders.

Officer Peter Serpico will be chef-partner of the soon to be opened Ko.

You will still see us in the kitchen, but Tien, Kev, Scott and Serpico are really partners and are officially running the show. I think the changes are going to make the food better and keep our menus and ideas fresh.

Thanks for the support,
dc

Originally posted by BL from Eater, on January 15, 2008 10:38 AM

Compact fluorescents are the poster children for the energy efficiency movement. But in a not so far-away future, LEDs may give them a run for their money. We recently wrote about this in a recent, and surprisingly controversial, post.

LED bulbs are longer-lived and consume less energy than compact fluorescents, and they do not contain mercury. So why aren’t we using them already? There are two main complaints with LEDs: they are way too expensive, and they have an impractical spotlight type quality. But the University of Glasgow has a new process that they believe addresses both of these complaints.

Researchers have developed a more efficient (and thereby more economical) nano-imprint lithography process to pit the surface of the LED bulb with microscopic holes. These holes allow more light to escape from the bulb – for the same amount of energy. The light will also be more diffuse, and less spotlight like.

Before anyone sniffs at the triviality of light bulb research, it should be reported that the Department of Energy estimates that 22% of electricity generated in the United States is used for lighting (http://www.eere.energy.gov/buildings/tech/lighting/.)

Via U of Glasgow and Metaefficient

Originally posted by Heather McKee from EcoGeek.org, ReBlogged by Oscar G. Torres on Jan 15, 2008 at 03:32 PM

Originally posted by Heather McKee from Eyebeam reBlog, on January 15, 2008 10:32 AM

You have to see this movie. Preferably with a male companion. Saw it last night and it's pretty great. Not sure why my crotch feels vulnerable but...well you'll see. Congrats to Mitchell, who is a friend of friends, for a fantastic job! And thanks to Susan for the invite - was certainly a memorable date!

Originally posted by Andrea from Andrea Harner, on January 15, 2008 10:08 AM

Say you start playing a movie at 10 pm. Halfway though, you stop. Maybe you’re falling asleep. Maybe you’ve got a baby upstairs who wakes up crying. (When our son was born, I don’t think my wife and I finished a feature film in one night for an entire year.) You go to bed, and now you’re sort of stuck: you’ve got to finish the movie the next night before 10 pm or your carriage turns back into a pumpkin.

–John Gruber

Hi David–You know what this country needs? A good 27-hour on-demand viewing timeframe. Typically, you get 24 hours to watch your on-demand movie. Here’s what happens time and again to my wife and me. We get the kids down, and about 8, we click an on-demand movie to watch. I get sleepy by 9:30 (I work hard, okay?) and turn it off but I want to see the rest of the movie the next day. Next day, I get the kids down at 8 and—poof—the rest of the movie has disappeared. If it’s free, I have to fastforward through the movie (which is particularly slow and annoying). If I paid for it, then it’s particularly enraging. With a 27 hours to view the show, all problems solved.

–email to David Pogue

This EXACT scenario happened to my wife and me over the holidays–twice, in fact. We started a movie, got busy or tired, decided to finish it the next night–but found that it had been auto-deleted. We’d missed the option to see the rest of the movie by only an hour! What ever happened to the logic of the Blockbuster-style 2-day or 3-day rental period, anyway? A 24-hour period doesn’t really make any sense at all.

–David Pogue

I couldn’t agree more.

–Paul Kedrosky on David Pogue

The lesson here is that apparently, when you have children, you can never again watch a movie all the way through. And yet “Big Reproduction” continues to propagate the notion that the day you acquire one of these bundles of sadness may be the happiest day of your life. Nader, maybe you should stop wasting your time on seatbelts and get the TRUTH out about babies. Ancient Spartans, landed British gentry, and people who make up fake ‘African’ proverbs know that it takes a village to raise a child. What I didn’t realize is that the village is there to corral the children in one place while I find out what happens at the end.

Originally posted by jeb from Modcult, on January 15, 2008 9:00 AM

NBC News was planning on cutting tonight's Democratic debate in Nevada down to the top three candidates — but a judge's ruling may just force them to expand it to four.

Last night, Clark County District Court Judge Charles Thompson ordered that NBC include who Dennis Kucinich, who they had originally invited but then later excluded, or he would issue an injunction to stop the whole debate. NBC is appealing the order.

Originally posted by Eric Kleefeld from TPM Election Central, on January 15, 2008 4:01 AM

Quick Post

I'll take one of each.

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/multimedia/2008/01/modular_homes?slide=1&slideView=3

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Capn Design, on January 14, 2008 6:08 PM

Two years ago I got rather far in interviews to be the GM of Zagat.com. I had to write a vision statement which was basically about their dropping the paid wall. They had hopes to leverage user comments, user reviews for restaurants they didn't cover, and start a social network. It would have been timely perhaps a little ahead or possibly depending on your viewpoint a little behind. At any rate it became apparent that it was not negotiable at that time and I pulled back from pushing for the spot. Even with Yelp, chow.com, the NYT coming on and countless others, Zagat's could still be a big force in the space and I'm sure whoever buys it will open it up and try to realize the potential.

Originally posted by joshua mack from DefinitiveInk, on January 14, 2008 5:39 PM

Things got a little ugly since the Golden Globes fell victim to the writers' strike. Here are two quotes from both sides of the picket line:

“We [WGA] are grateful to our brothers and sisters in SAG for their continued solidarity and support. The entire awards show season is being put in jeopardy by the intransigence of a few big media corporations. We urge the conglomerates to return to the bargaining table they abandoned and negotiate a fair and reasonable deal with writers to put this town back to work.” - WGAW President Patrick M. Verrone in a statement we received.

"[NBC is] obviously trying to find a solution to satisfy fans of these great movies and all the incredible stars who have worked so hard all year and got this incredible opportunity. Sadly, it feels like the nerdiest, ugliest, meanest kids in the high school are trying to cancel the prom. But NBC wants to try to keep that prom alive." - NBC Entertainment co-chief Ben Silverman (pictured at right) to E! host Ryan Seacrest.

If the Golden Globes are equivalent to that guy's prom...we suddenly feel very satisfied with our own prom night.

Originally posted by Jen Carlson from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 14, 2008 2:13 PM

That's what Senator Hillary Clinton told Tim Russert on Meet the Press yesterday, but no matter what anyone says, race and gender are obviously factors in the hotly contested Democratic primary race.

After criticism over her remarks about Martin Luther King ("Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when President Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act...It took a president to get it done.”) and her husband's remarks about Barack Obama's fairy tale Iraq stance, Clinton came out swinging, saying that Obama's campaign had been distorting her remarks. She said, "This is an unfortunate story line the Obama campaign has pushed very successfully. I don't think this campaign is about gender, and I sure hope it's not about race."

In turn, Obama told reporters in a conference call, per the NY Post:

"I think what we saw this morning is why the American people are tired of Washington politicians and the games they play...Look, Senator Clinton made an unfortunate remark, an ill-advised remark, about Dr. King and Lyndon Johnson. I didn't make the statement. I haven't remarked on it, and she, I think, offended some folks who felt that it somehow diminished King's role in bringing about the Civil Rights Act...
She is free to explain that, but the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous."

Both Clinton and Obama are hoping to appeal to black voters; one third of South Carolina's population is black, and the South Carolina primary is on January 26. Both candidates have been emphasizing the historical firsts, that a woman and a black man are each mounting viable campaigns for presidency. The evolving race issue is making both campaigns uneasy, as the "black credentials" of each candidate are being discussed or criticized.

The Daily News' Errol Louis has a column about the nonstop "racially-tinged mud" Clinton's campaign is throwing at Obama: "Sadly, the victim is not just Obama himself, but the broader public, especially Obama's most important target constituency – people grown cynical or apathetic about politics who don't normally vote." And last week Maureen Dowd's Times column, Can Hillary Cry Her Way Back to the White House, (the day after Gloria Steinem had an op-ed, Women are Never Frontrunners) wondered about the gender card. Some tried to discredit Dowd because she filed the column from Jerusalem with a "Derry, N.H." dateline; Times editorial-page editor Andy Rosenthal says the nit-picking is "driving me out of my fucking mind."

Photograph of Hillary Clinton with church-goers after services at the Northminster Presbyterian Church in Columbia, SC yesterday by Elise Amendola/AP

Originally posted by Jen Chung from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 14, 2008 12:49 PM

In June of 2007, Mark Malkoff made news with his attempt, documented in a funny video, to patronize each of Manhattan’s 171 Starbucks in a single day. Now the Comedy Central staffer is back in the press with his latest quirky idea; he spent last week living in the Paramus, New Jersey IKEA to avoid his fumigated apartment. The strange experiment has been humorously documented on his website; we got him on the phone in IKEA before his stay ended Saturday night.

What are you doing right now? I was just in my living room hanging with a friend who came to visit me. Now I’m escorting her to the escalators; I’d walk out with her but I’m not leaving here for a week.

Have a lot of buddies come to visit? Yeah, a lot of friends and a lot of people who just heard about me and come bringing food items and living supplies. They’re concerned with my well-being. People brought me Starbucks because I did that other video and I guess they thought that was funny.

But aren’t you entitled to eat for free at IKEA? I am; I can eat whatever I want of the Swedish food they serve here. I’ve been vegetarian since I was a kid so they’re working on the first ever IKEA tofu meatball. I’m getting kind of tired of Swedish food and I may order Chinese or Dominos later today. I’ll have to give them the address of 100 IKEA Drive and hope they can find me in the bedroom set.

How have you been adapting to residing in a store and not going outside for a week? I had my personal trainer come in and we worked out all over the store so I could try and live a normal life. I played Lazer Tag with security guards at two in the morning. The fluorescent lighting is on 20 hours a day which is getting to me because I don’t have any sunlight. I wake up from naps and there are people staring at me and I feel like an animal in a zoo.

But I brought it on myself. The apartment I’ve set up is so much nicer than my own apartment; the only thing is none of the stuff works. The first night I got sick around 4:30am and I had to vomit. I had about 10 seconds to decide where I was going to go. I ran to the toilet and remembered, "Wait, this is a fake toilet!" So I ran to the kitchen and vomited in the sink, then I remembered the kitchen sink is fake as well. I went away for an hour and when I came back the puke was cleaned up. So whoever’s job that is in IKEA, I am really sorry.Have the IKEA managers tried to curb any of your antics? No, I get full creative control, which is insane to me. I met with them in mid-December and they’re letting me do this weeks later. I own the content with no restrictions on anything. The only thing they said I couldn’t do is paint my bedroom walls; I wanted to paint them green yesterday. But everything else goes. I can do whatever I want. If I want a clean towel I just go down to the towel department and get a clean towel. There’s a price tag on it when I dry myself but whatever. Yeah, this place is very livable except for the fluorescent lighting coming on at 4:15. And there’s construction right by where I live with hammering and drilling at about 5am. I absolutely feel like I’m back in the city.

What’s the construction about? The workers are always constructing bedroom sets. I’m living in what looks like a functional living room, bedroom, spare bedroom and bathroom with two sinks. This would go for at least $4,000 in Manhattan. I have a fake door but the living sets are all around me and they’re constantly working on them in the wee hours.

Do you think your experience is in any way a comment on the pervasiveness of American consumer culture? I’m a comedian and filmmaker and I just needed a place to live for a week. So I thought two things: If I can move in here I’ll have a place to stay and I can make videos.

How do you respond to people who think this is just some viral marketing thing? IKEA is not paying me anything. I have my friends working for free, including WGA workers who are not working but who wanted to participate in something fun here. I just thought it would be funny to live in the store. If you look at the videos, I don’t think IKEA looks good all the time. In the first episode there’s a joke about my IKEA furniture falling apart. They let me close the store every night over the P.A. and I say things like, “Get out! I want to go to sleep! This is the King of IKEA, the god of Swedish furniture!” Last night at closing I did Bon Jovi covers and addressed a man over the P.A. saying, “You, the man in the brown suit and the obvious toupee, William Shatner wants his rug back.”

So I’m saying these uncensored things and IKEA is obviously not paying me to do these things. I just thought it would be good video content. We have no budget and I think it’s remarkable we’re able to make well-produced, funny content with a turnover rate less than 24 hours.

What are some of the news outlets who have visited you? I’ve had everyone from Germany to Sweden to Israel; the AP and Reuters were here and that’s how we got worldwide coverage. But I’ve had every country you can imagine email me for a radio interview and I’ve been doing about 10 a day because that’s all I can manage. People are inviting me to other IKEAs to sleep. I don’t know if they’re official or not but I politely declined.

You don’t see yourself moving on to life in other department stores? I don’t. I’m sure Target’s going to call next week and offer me this but I don’t want to live in a Target. I just wanted to make funny videos and I didn’t realize how much stinking fun this would be.

You seem to have a knack for getting a lot of press with oddball ideas. Where do you see all this headed? I’ve been doing comedy videos since I was a kid. I do these comedy videos all the time; it’s just that the two I did involving corporate entities are the ones that got me the press. But most of the stuff I do does not involve corporations. I pick premises I think are funny and just do them.

What does your wife think of this? Christine thinks it’s funny but she doesn’t want to sleep over in a store. I’m not sure why. But she came to visit me and we had a date in the store Wednesday when the store closed and that was fun. Our apartment’s actually fine now; I got a call we could move back in on Wednesday night but I’m having too good of a time here. I have to leave Saturday at midnight because in Paramus no stores are open on Sundays.

Originally posted by John Del Signore from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 14, 2008 12:47 PM

The legal-size legal pad has been under attack since as early as 1982, when then Chief Justice Warren Burger banished legal-size documents from federal courts. One informal survey estimated Burger’s move saved almost $16 million through more efficient use of storage space. Several states followed the federal government’s lead; in Florida, a group appeared called “Eliminate Legal Files,” or ELF.

--This story about those yellow pads

Originally posted by jeb from Modcult, on January 14, 2008 12:27 PM

Rebecca Walker cuts to the heart of this past week's "It's gender, no it's race, no it's class" repeat of the 80s and 90s culture war debates. It's about all of the above, but it's really about generation.

Here's an excerpt, and check the original for the knockout punchline:

Hillary, no matter how symbolically potent, runs the risk of being seen as a Second Wave candidate. She's one of the first women to gain power and access, and may be one of the first with power and access to ignore the criticisms of women of color, progressive men, and many young women, all of whom have been sending clear messages to Second Wave feminist leadership for well over a decade.

Messages like:

Women are not only victims, but active participants in the shaping of their lives. It's not Hillary's gender that may keep her from winning this election, it's her lack of preparation. If she had an inter-generational, multi-racial, digitally savvy, globally inclined machine behind her, crafting electrifying rhetoric like The Audacity of Hope and The Power of Now, she'd be swept into the White House by a landslide. Hillary wasn't forced into the number two position in Iowa, she made decisions that put her there. New Hampshire is a case in point; she made different decisions and got different results.

Racism and classism are as definitive as sexism. Did Steinem insinuate that Barack's gender, and not his talent, put him in the top spot? I thought black men were capable of performing at his level without an irrationally granted advantage. And the idea that black men always reach the Promised Land before white women? Forty per cent of black men don't finish high school in America, and one in four are incarcerated. Hillary, and her feminist supporters, are not going to win this election by glossing over the realities of African-American men...

The rest is here.

BTW, I'm told that HuffPo's post-NH primary coverage brought record numbers to the site. That's a helluva lot of interest in the elections.

And all this discussion about identity issues this past week supports the idea that these elections will be about the ways that emerging post-Boomers want to redefine the national discourse.

Originally posted by Zentronix from zentronix: dubwise & hiphopcentric, on January 14, 2008 10:43 AM

Rumors are flying as the shadow of tomorrow's keynote looms over those in attendance at Macworld 2008. Some evidence of the MacBook Air has been dug up--let the conspiracy theories fly!

Read More...

Originally posted by clintecker@gmail.com (Clint Ecker) from Infinite Loop, on January 14, 2008 10:42 AM

READING: It's another First Tuesday event at McNally Robinson, and this time around author and activist Mark Crispin Miller invites Anthony Lappe to center stage. The executive editor of the Guerilla News Network also produced an award-winning documentary on the war in Iraq for Showtime. More recently, he's created a graphic novel called Shooting War with illustrator Dan Goldman, which is "a spoof of the network news, the war in Iraq, and the burgeoning 'citizen journalism' movement set in the near future." Expect a lively discussion about all of the above!

7pm // McNally Robinson [52 Prince St] // Free

EVENT: Drinking Liberally invites you to "watch liberally, cheer loudly and debate lividly" tonight, all with a drink in your hand and the New Hampshire primaries on TV. They wonder if the Granite State surprise the nation, and invite partisans of all stripes, and undecideds, to come find out.

7pm // Circus Bar [9th Ave between 43rd and 44th] // Free

MUSIC: It's Ecastatic Peace night at the Knit. The night is named after Thurston Moore's record label and as such features bands with his stamp of approval (though be warned, he did approve Pagoda). Tonight enjoy the eccentric sounds of MV & EE with The Golden Road, Thurston Moore Groop, Tall Firs, Religious Knives and a deejay set by Derek Stanton of Awesome Color. That's quite a hefty lineup!

8pm // The Knitting Factory [74 Leonard St] // $12

Before that, head over to the Virgin Megastore for an in-store performance by London songstress Kate Nash. Her Bowery show is sold out, so it's your only chance to catch her! Listen here.

7pm // Virgin Megastore Union Square // Free

THEATER: Deep breath: Kamala Sankaram’s one woman multi-media murder mystery chamber opera opens tonight at HERE as part of their tenth annual Culturemart festival of works in progress. Sankaram’s intriguing production, which ends tomorrow, is called Miranda 5X; it manipulates perspective through a combination of film, live opera, and real-time video effects, staging a murder mystery play in which “the audience is allowed to see through the eyes of the five different murder suspects, and to experience their last interactions with Miranda, the victim.” – John Del Signore

8:30pm // HERE Arts Center [145 Sixth Ave] // Tickets cost $15.

Originally posted by Jen Carlson from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 14, 2008 10:41 AM

I've gotten totally re-obsessed with Kathy Acker, the East Village writer who died in 1997. It started with this recording of Acker reading a poem [Warning: audio, 2 minutes, 28 seconds, and not really safe for work!] that was released in 1980 on the LP "Sugar, Alcohol & Meat" by Giorno Poetry Systems and recently digitized by UbuWeb. Her New York accent is one that has largely disappeared since; she sounds amazing. Then I found this, which is an incredibly long mp3, the first 3/4s of which is a Michael Brownstein reading. The end, though, is a monologue which then becomes a stageplay by Acker about a woman, her suicide, her grandmother, and her psychiatrist. It is absolutely not safe for work, what with its endless use of a certain word for ladyparts that goes over well in Scotland but not at all (yet!) in the U.S.

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 14, 2008 10:00 AM

Just because, an entirely selfish list of five AppleiPhone-related things I'd love to see come out of Macworld this week. Not being a shareholder (you idiot --ed.), these matter to me more than some 0.3" thick flash-RAM based tablet multitouch Macbook bundled with free EVDO for life as long as you consume all your media through iTunes.

• Bluetooth syncing for calendar and contacts. Somewhere in a drawer at home I have an old Nokia that will iSync to iCal and Address Book; why is it that I have to plug my iPhone in to get my latest calendar updates in my pocket?
• Landscape view for mail. Not to read more effectively, but to type more effectively. It's just more comfortable typing in landscape mode.
• Haptics feedback for typing. Speaking of typing, I'd love a little, tiny piece of vibrate action when I type. The typing sound is annoying (to me and others), but I need a bit of feedback to make typing feel a bit more...real.
• Navizon. They'll have to add this, right? Isn't this already available on a bunch of other devices with Google Maps apps?
• A Kindle app for the iPhone. I did order a Kindle, but they're hopelessly backordered to the point where Amazon customer support can't won't tell me even what month it's targeted for. In the meantime, if Kindle really is a "service" and not a device, how about an app for supporting that service on the iPhone?

Hey, three of the five meet the "something in the air" criteria, don't they?

Originally posted by Michael Sippey from this is sippey.typepad.com, on January 14, 2008 9:51 AM

Filed under: Software, iPhone

Mobile Scrobbler is the Last.fm client developed for the iPod touch and iPhone. In its upcoming 1.4.0 recent release, Mobile Scrobbler will allow you to query its metadata database by searching on track and artist from the command line.

To do this, you need to access the MobileScrobbler executable inside the application bundle on your iPhone and issue a command along the following lines:

./MobileScrobbler -track "Shimmer" -artist "Fuel" -album ""

The developers write, saying the album string will be optional--you can pass an empty string as shown here.

This is a great little feature that shouldn't be overlooked by anyone who has command-line access on their iPhone or iPod touch. For a further preview of Mobile Scrobbler 1.4, check out this screenshot tour.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Originally posted by Erica Sadun from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), on January 14, 2008 9:30 AM

Apple's home page has been updated to encourage browsers to come back and watch the keynote on "Tuesday afternoon." As far as we know this does not mean a live stream of the event (thank goodness, otherwise who would read our liveblog?) but the after-event video should be up quickly and streamable for your viewing pleasure.

Thanks elixirgraphics!

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Originally posted by Michael Rose from The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW), on January 14, 2008 9:25 AM

I'm an avid NetNewsWire user and was ecstatic when they announced it is now free. I don't know if the announcement inspired me, but I decided the release of NNW 3.1 would be a good time to create a custom style. I've been a longtime user of EAB - Gray, so I used Eduardo's code as a base to get started.*

More than anything, I wanted a design that stayed out of the way. Reading posts via feeds instead of actual sites lets me consume more data. Having a simple, highly legible style makes it much easier. Here are the problems I hoped to solve and I think this new style does a good job with it.

• Highly legible type that squeezes as much content as possible on a page. Helvetica, Verdana and a base font size of 11px helped make this possible. I think short posts, long posts and image-heavy posts look good, if I do say so myself.
• Feed metadata that's easy to process. I like having the data at the top of the screen, but NNW defaults to putting it all in one line. Simply Structured adds labels and makes everything a little more orderly.
• Images that float right or left when they're supposed to. When an image style is not embedded inline, the style won't come through. I fixed this by adding styles for some common image style declarations. (If you end up using Simply Structured and find styles I haven't included, let me know and I'll put them in.)
• Even though I don't use it, I also adjusted the style to work with the widescreen view. You can see an example at the bottom of the entry.

Putting this together was a lot of fun. After years of worrying about IE6, Firefox 1.5 and who knows what else, it was refreshing to work in a closed system. I've never used :before before!

The style still isn't perfect, but it suits my needs. The biggest concession was cutting off long URLs in the feed metadata box, which only bothers me a little. If you do find any other problems, feel free to leave a comment and I'll do my best to fix it.

Installing Simply Structured

1. Download this: simply-structured-nnw.zip.
2. Unzip it and place "Simply Structured.nnwstyle" in the folder you keep your NNW stylesheets, which defaults to USER_NAME/Library/Application Support/NetNewsWire/StyleSheets/.
3. Open up NNW. If the style menu is not visible in the lower right corner of the application, click "Show Styles Menu" in the View menu. Then select Simply Structured and you're good to go!

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* Expect a post later this week about creating your own style and another one with my biggest feature request for NNW.

Originally posted by (author unknown) from Capn Design, on January 14, 2008 8:33 AM

Christian Nold maps cities. But instead of mapping their physical layout, he maps their emotional geography.

He uses a technique he invented called biomapping where participants walk the area connected to a system that measures galvanic skin response - a measure of the electrical resistance of the skin which is known to give a rating of arousal and stress.

The system is also connected to a GPS device, so the stress response of each person is physically mapped onto the landscape.

His maps describe an area in terms of how stressful it is, and so far, he's mapped Greenwich in London, San Francisco and Stockport.

He's also done a project that maps the sensory experiences of Newham.

I had the pleasure of meeting Christian the other night and one of the best things is is that he's persuaded Ordinance Survey, the UK's mapping agency, to print the maps!

I have a copy of the Greenwich map and so far everyone I've showed it to has been blown away.

You can buy paper copies of the maps, but also view them in full detail online.

Link to Emotion Map.
Link to Christian Nold's website.

Originally posted by vaughan from Mind Hacks, on January 14, 2008 8:00 AM

Kenyatta ruled as a chicken:

Originally posted by Andrea from Andrea Harner, on January 14, 2008 6:34 AM

Zagat Survey announced today that owners Tim and Nina Zagat are ready to cash out. Or, rather, that the company is interested in "strategic opportunities to grow its business," with such opportunities including an outright sale of the thing. While Zagat has struggled to become vital online, there's absolutely no denying the power of the book in print. Our two cents is that if Barry Diller hasn't acquired the company by the end of the day—and created an umbrella management team to oversee it, along with Citysearch, Menupages and OpenTable (the latter two he has limited interests in)—then someone is asleep at the wheel at Diller's Interactive Corp. The Times weighs in today as well:

The sale is likely to attract broad interest and the company could become a trophy asset for a media mogul seeking a bit of extra gloss and power. The business could as naturally end up in the hands of Barry Diller’s IAC/InterActiveCorp, which owns Citysearch, as it could in Bruce Wasserstein’s company, publisher of New York Magazine, or even in Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.

It is unclear how large a price Zagat will attract. While the company is a worldwide brand, its actual business is much smaller. People briefed on the company’s finances suggest the company could be valued at more than $200 million, which would still be a drop in the bucket for an Internet company or a wealthy executive.

In 2000, Zagat was valued at more than $100 million...· Zagat To Explore Strategic Growth Opportunities [Zagat Survey; .pdf]
· Zagat Family Is Putting Guide Empire on Market [NYT]

Originally posted by BL from Eater, on January 14, 2008 5:42 AM

Former Yankees second baseman Chuck Knoblauch, who became most famous for errant throws to first base -- one even hit Keith Olberman's mother -- found himself in the news in December when his name popped up in the Mitchell Report. Unlike Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens, Knoblauch remained silent until Thursday. He said he wasn't upset with the report but didn't deny using human growth hormone, a substance Pettitte has admitted taking but Clemens has denied. All three players were linked to Brian McNamee, Clemens' personal trainer.

“I have nothing to defend,” Knoblauch said from his home in Houston. “I have nothing to hide at the same time.” The Times also quotes him as calling the Mitchell report "crazy" and "interesting" and saying that he wants nothing to do with baseball. Knoblauch's career suffered a considerable decline after he came to the Yankees in 1998, but he still contributed above-average offense for a second baseman. He could have tried something to get back to the level he had in say, 1996, when he posted an outstanding .448 on-base percentage? Even though he's avoided the Mitchell report storm so far, he probably can't do that forever.

Elsewhere, someone's suing the Yankees, but based on the $221 in damages he wants, the Yankees should still be able to afford Alex Rodriguez. The claimant brought suit in a small-claims court in Brooklyn. He wants a refund for five tickets from 2002-2007 -- including one from a game against Barry Bonds and the Giants and another from Game 2 of the 2003 World Series -- because the Yankees broke their implicit promise to provide a fair and honest game. Everyone knows what Bonds is accused of, and Pettitte started that World Series game. We assume the claimant, whose last name is Mitchell, is not related to Senator George Mitchell.

Originally posted by Tom Boorstein from Gothamist Weekly Favorites, on January 14, 2008 4:40 AM

In 2007, 30-year-old New York City-based graphic designer Nicholas Felton had 58 vacation days, performed 2 karaoke songs, spent 4.7 days on planes, read 26% more book pages than he did in 2006, ran 190.5 miles, and thought Josh & Ellen's wedding was the best of the year. You may view his annual report here; the print version costs a mere $5 and ships in February. In this year's report, just as in his 2006 report, Felton noted he may have consumed alcoholic drinks that went unrecorded. CHEATER.

(link)

Originally posted by choire@choiresicha.com from kottke.org, on January 14, 2008 4:05 AM

The editors of An Atlas of Radical Cartography wrote in to promote their book. "An Atlas of Radical Cartography is a collection of 10 maps and 10 essays about social issues from globalization to garbage; surveillance to extraordinary rendition;...

Originally posted by Jonathan Crowe from The Map Room, on January 14, 2008 3:57 AM

Damn good coffee.

Originally posted by finn from Modcult, on January 14, 2008 2:50 AM

I try to envision his last winter, London, cold and damp, the snow’s curt kisses on empty streets, the Thames’ black water. Chilled prostitutes lit bonfires in the park. Vast locomotives sobbed somewhere in the night. The workers spoke so quickly in the pub that he couldn’t catch a single . . .

Originally posted by Adam Zagajewski from The New Yorker, on January 13, 2008 7:00 PM