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June 28, 2008
When You Talk To The Seaweed
While we were drawing monsters today, Raul Andres told me a story which I transcribed.
When You Talk To The Seaweed
A very long time ago when there were no dinasaurs there were people riding monsters. No, no, sitting on the monsters on their backs and they would help them with their arms. The people had no cars but a lot a lot of toys everywhere and they ate no monsters, just broccoli but when they were sick they ate vitamins. When they were hot they ate flies and dragonflies and when they were cold they ate bumblebees. When they were inside they ate straw but usually they ate food outside at nighttime like a picnic. But the monsters had no mouths and the people put food on their backs with their arms.
The end.
Filed under: on kids
Tags: 3years7months, broccoli, food, monsters, raul andres, the three year old mind
Wall-E's easter eggs and inside jokes
with more unconfirmed ones listed in the comments
Starting to Wonder
Following up on David's post below, why is McCain outspending Obama two-to-one in Missouri?
We had reader reports suggesting this last week. And in response to those reports readers from a number of other swing states reported seeing the same thing -- a flood of McCain ads and only a much smaller number of Obama ads.
When we checked in with Obama campaign, the impression we were given was that this was more a matter of viewer perception than reality. But the Post-Dispatch's reporting makes it clear that in Missouri at least it is very much the reality.
I've got my hand on only a small patch of a national campaign elephant. But voter preferences are much more malleable in these early summer months than in the Fall. So I am curious to know why what we're told is the heavily outfunded campaign is dominating the airwaves in at least some key areas.
New Volkswagen Ads Make Us Happy
In Brazil, Volkswagens no longer run on gas—they run on beer, milk, and tomatoes. Popular ad agency BBDO skipped the glossy pages and billboards for these cute storage units, as part of the German auto company's "for every kind of load" campaign.
After the jump, check out some Volkswagen ads of yesteryear. Spoiler: There are no milk cartons involved.
However, E-A-T is especially effective.
June 27, 2008
Unsung commuter wheel from Mavic
It’s easy to miss Mavic’s Speedcity wheelset among their road racing and mtn offerings; I think that Mavic missed a chance to jump on the commuter trend by not marketing this more. Mavic bills this as a way to road train on your mtb, but they should have said that this wheelset with their innovative spoking system and superb hub design is good to go in your disc-equipped 700C road/commuter bike. This would be a fine upgrade for many riders.
You must search Mavic’s mtn section for these wheels, wedged between their cross-country and freeride models. Because you can swap this 700C wheel into a disc-equipped offroad steed, Mavic says you can use road tires and train on the road. Even if you have rim brakes, Mavic sells an interesting adapter to mount the V-brakes at the appropriate height. But most serious mtn bikers are going to have a real road bike to train on. I mean, use the right tool for the task, right?
(I suppose you could use these wheels on your mtb as an intermediate way to make your mtb more cyclocross worthy… since you could then use 700x32 knobbies…. but I digress)
The rear hub is 135mm spaced, wider than the standard 130mm road standard. However, any bike made to take disc brakes is likely to have the wider spacing anyways. Bikes like the Salsa Casseroll. Speedcity are compatible with rim brakes, but the real value is linked to their disc mount (either ISO or Shimano’s “Center-lock” pattern). The relatively narrow rim makes it more appropriate to road 700C tires than big, fat “29-er” tires. Mavic’s proprietary “Fore” drilling, easily replaceable cartridge bearings, and straight-pull, steel spokes have given excellent service in wheels like the Ksyrium Elite. With a disc-brake, one should expect many seasons of use in rainy climates like Seattle.
Speedcity wheels carry over from Mavic’s 2008 catalog without any changes, including the price. At $450/pr retail, the Speedcity wheelset competes pretty well against custom built wheels on comparable quality hubs.
Note: Meet the Guys from BP
The crew from Baseball Prospectus, including Will Carroll, Joe Sheehan, Steven Goldman, Jay Jaffe and Derek Jacques, will all be at Foley’s in New York on Monday, June 30, along with special guests Will Leitch and MLB.com’s Fantasy 411 Crew, for a pizza feed and to talk baseball.
For more information on attending this event, click here.
Joanne Lucas knowing that Florent would remain open as some sort of diner but not telling anyone,...
Joanne Lucas knowing that Florent would remain open as some sort of diner but not telling anyone, allowing everyone to get all weepy, really pisses me off. I mean, she shut off the fucking gas this week — “I’m sorry, devoted patrons, but we cannot cook you one last plate of french fries! Sob!” — knowing fully well that she was going to reopen on Tuesday. Good show, lady. You’re no better than Barbra Streisand selling tickets for her farewell tour.
Ride the City
To those who enjoy their status as breathing, sentient beings, riding a bicycle in New York City can be daunting. Aggressive taxis, delivery trucks and carelessly opened doors create a minefield that makes casual cyclists want to hang up their Schwinn. But New York can be safely navigated. Though it's painfully inferior to European cities, it does have a growing network of relatively safe bike lanes (thanks largely in part to Mayor Bloomberg). Ride the City, currently in beta form, is a site launched earlier this month to help aid the process.
Much like Google Maps or HopStop, Ride the City takes two addresses and details the shortest route between them. But unlike the aforementioned sites, it zeroes in on existing bicycle lanes and ignores inhospitable roads like the Queens Midtown tunnel or the BQE. Users can choose between the most direct route, the "safe route" (as many bike lanes as are convenient) and the "safest route" (more bike lanes, especially designated "greenways"). RTC adds "caution" signs as well when the route traverses portions that have a history of accidents.
I used the site to map out a ride to work, and it was remarkably close to the route I've painstakingly devised over numerous trips back and forth. It did, however, faithfully abide by the direction of traffic on a couple portions where I usually go against the tide. Which isn't a bad thing. It's comforting to know that the site treasures my well-being even more than I do.
Originally posted by Doug Black from Cool Hunting, ReBlogged by Dan Torop on Jun 27, 2008 at 04:03 PM
Obama Campaign Manager's New Video Lays Out Strategy For Victory
This is pretty novel. Obama campaign manager David Plouffe has filmed a new Web video of himself, using a laptop in his office, in which he rallies the troops with a PowerPoint about the campaign's strategy to win the general election.
The Obama campaign is emailing out the video to supporters. Give it a watch:
In it, Plouffe makes points similar to the ones he made in a PowerPoint presentation to reporters the other day, but with a new PowerPoint. Now the Obama camp wants it to get out to its broader audience of supporters.
Plouffe optimistically tells viewers that John McCain doesn't have many opportunities to grab any of the 252 electoral votes that went to Kerry, while the Obama camp is going after 2004 red states like Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada, and even some "unusual" places like Alaska, Montana and North Dakota.
At the same time, Plouffe make sure to stress to supporters that they can't just take it easy. As he points out, the apparent cash different between Obama and McCain will be mediated by the RNC's $50 million lead over the DNC -- not an inconsiderable difference, considering that the McCain campaign will be relying on the RNC for a lot of heavy lifting.
"John McCain, the RNC, the shadowy outside groups, are not gonna let this election happen without a fight," Plouffe says. He adds a warning that Michelle, too, will be a target: "And so right around the corner we're gonna see millions of dollars attacking Barack, attacking Michelle Obama, and we have to have the ability to fight back."
WALL•E - Robot with the heart of a Mac
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Apple
Several TUAW readers have reported after seeing midnight showings of Disney-Pixar's new and highly-rated movie WALLo.E that when the robot boots up, he makes the standard Mac startup sound. That's not the only Apple connection with the movie.
Of course, Steve Jobs is the largest single shareholder of Disney after Pixar was purchased by the entertainment giant for $7.4 billion in 2006. He still serves on a steering committee for Pixar that oversees the Disney-Pixar animation businesses, and he's on the Disney Board of Directors. I'm not sure, but he may be tapped to be the first CEO of BuyNLarge...
WALLo.E's job is to wander around an abandoned Earth, pick up trash, and compact it into small blocks. However, when he finds something nostalgic that he likes, such as an iPod or Rubik's cube, he keeps it.
The object of WALLo.E's desire, EVE, was actually designed with the assistance of Apple Senior VP of Industrial Design Jonathan Ive, who apparently spent a day with the Pixar team in 2005 consulting on the ultra-sleek floating robot.
Thanks to Matt for the heads-up and inspiration for this post!Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
The tyranny of sourdough, AKA San Francisco's bread problem. It's...
The tyranny of sourdough, AKA San Francisco's bread problem.
It's sour because in the US, particularly in San Francisco, it's hard to buy good bread. About 75% of the decent bread in my grocery store, both fresh baked and industrial, is sourdough. Consumers think sourdough is shorthand for quality. It's not. In fact, sourdough is seldom the appropriate bread for a meal. It makes lousy sandwiches, lousy breakfast, it clashes with cheese. It's good with creamy soups, and it's good plain with butter. But the premium bakeries all push sourdough, and so sourdough becomes synonymous with "good", when it's not.
This is probably more than 50% of the reason why I left San Francisco.
(link)
Penmanship
By Alvin R. Dunton, B . Harrison, J. W. C . Gilman, John D . Williams, Silas Sadler Packard Published 1877 J.W.C. Gilman & Co.
The Shutter: Grand 275, Nicola Paone, and Dosa Hut
It's been a strange week in shutters. We had both the long planned closure of Cafe Grey and the last minute sale of Bette. Then there was of course the mysterious shutter/non shutter over at Savarona. As usual there are still a few stragglers left:
1) Clinton Hill: Clinton Hill Blog reports on the shuttering of a beloved bar: "I have received word from TWO different sources that Grand 275 (located at 275 Grands, obvs) is closing. Fear not — it doesn’t seem to be an issue with poor business or rent increases, but more that the owners are ready to do something new (hopefully in the same space?)." [ClintonHillBlog]
2) Murray Hill: Crain's brings the news that Murray Hill old timer Nicola Paone will close tomorrow: "Nicola Paone, the favorite Italian restaurant of a long line of mayors including Rudy Giuliani, celebrated its 50th anniversary in April. This Saturday evening, the Murray Hill stalwart—a victim of old age—will serve its last mealss..Mr. Auriana says he will either sell the building at 207 E. 34 St....or lease it to another restaurant." [Crain's]
3) Gramercy: Kosher-NY has some shuttering news from Lexington Ave: "Saravana Bhavan Dosa Hut, which was formerly located at 102 Lexington Avenue, between East 27th Street & East 28th Street, is now closed. It seems as though a non-kosher restaurant, Tamil, will be opening it its place." [Kosher-NY]
— photo
The Big Leagues
Robert Palmer:
We mentioned yesterday a rumor that Apple won’t cut a check for iPhone application developers until the dev’s share of the sales tops $250. A lot of commenters were upset about this, if it’s true: TomWBrowning said “So if you make an app that costs $1 you won’t see a penny even if 359 people buy it?”
From the (indie) developer’s perspective, this stinks.
If you’re thinking in terms of a couple hundred dollars, your app probably isn’t even going to get listed in the App Store. The App Store isn’t going to be like VersionTracker or MacUpdate, where every piece of junk gets listed as it’s submitted.
Props
Hillary Clinton.
Blogs to check out: Noble Pig
Blogs to check out: Noble Pig We're suckers for food sites with great photography. But there's a lot more going on at Noble Pig, which is why we read it religiously these days. In addition to great recipes with the aforementioned photographs, the site boasts wine tasting notes (with a shopping list handy via the sidebar), and observational pieces about everyday life outside of the culinary.
Roku + Netflix
Real movies the instant you want them have been expected for ... well... at least 100 years. You think of a movie, then you can watch it. This trick has been tried scores of times over the past decades, but never seemed to work. Clunky boxes. Expensive contracts. No choices. Weird constraints. Lousy pictures. But now, finally, the trick works.
The Roku box from Netflix allows you to watch movies on your TV whenever you want to, for no extra charge, in DVD quality. It is a tiny thing that sets up in a few minutes. If you have wi-fi in your household it will link up to that so you can put the box near your TV. For achieving such a complex task it has a remarkably simple interface and no-fuss approach, very similar to an iPod. We were watching a movie within ten minutes of opening the shipping box.
You use a small clicker to control your Netflix queue on your TV. Movies are streamed (no waiting beyond a few seconds at the start) in unexpected big-screen TV quality. I don't know how they do it. It is miles better than the streaming on those little YouTube boxes. There is no noticeable stutter, blobs, lags, or hiccups. But it ain't hi-def, either.
The service is a joy to use. You manage your queue -- adding and re-ording flicks -- on your computer, and the Roku box automatically syncs up. Back at the TV you click through the instant choices, pick one, and in a few seconds the movie starts. You can pause, change movies, and resume the first where you left off.
Here's the kicker: you can watch as many movies (no ads) as you care to. There is no extra charge beyond the basic Netflix monthly (and you can still get them mailed to you as DVDs if you prefer). Ten movies a month or a hundred. Anytime. This thing is dangerous.
Here's the only caveat: so far only about 10% of the total Netflix catalog is available for instant download. But that total is naturally swelling by the day.
The Roku box is cheap at $100. You can watch all the instant Netflix movies for free without it, if you want to hook your PC up to a large screen, or watch on your monitor. Since the Roku is so small and wireless we can move it to our projector and stream movies to the big wall.
It's a nicely done cool tool.
-- KK
Roku
$100
Available from Roku
Related items previously reviewed on Cool Tools:
10 Reasons Why Vista Isn’t That Bad
Written by Jason Chen
Of all the ware Microsoft churns out from its sweatshop of “lightning bolt, lightning bolt” nerds, Windows is the one most inexorably tied to the public image of the company. As Bill Gates leaves the building, we look back on the last baby birthed—if not fully gestated—under his watch, the swan song operating system that he himself has issues with. Although we agree that Vista could have used a bit more time shoved back into the silicon womb for some feature buffing and bug fixing, it’s not nearly as bad as most people are making it out to be. That’s right, I’m actually happy with Windows Vista, which I use about one-third of the time I spend at a computer.
This may be counterintuitive, seeing as our guy who defended Windows doesn’t even like Vista, but I’ve used Mac OS X and Vista side by side and simultaneously for over a year (and before that, Mac and XP) thanks to the dual-computer-controlling app Synergy. Here’s why Vista’s not that bad:
1. It’s more secure than Windows XP. After being implicitly responsible for botnets and security breaches through the incredible popularity of their Windows XP, Microsoft went back and made sure Vista is more secure than its predecessor. And it is. According to security firm PC Tools, Vista had 639 unique threats over a six-month period, whereas XP had 1021. This came from much internal restructuring under the hood, but there’s a chance that it might be due to Vista being a smaller target than XP for malware as well.
2. It’s the best looking Windows yet. Despite any complaints users may have about Aero hogging up too many CPU cycles or requiring a video card from this millennium to use, it’s still the best looking Windows yet. I mean really, do you remember what XP looked like out of the box? With that gigantic balloon of a task bar and the green Start button. Vista’s glass definitely trumps that. And then there’s the underlying graphical framework changes which allow new features like live thumbnails. All these visual effects may require more power, but you can’t deny that it’s pleasing to look at.
If you want to disable Aero for certain applications for performance or compatibility reasons, see here.
3. Games work just about as well as under XP. There’s a slight performance degradation under Vista when compared to Windows XP using the exact same hardware. Is it noticeable? Probably, but it’s somewhere around the level of 10%. There’s also the consideration of DirectX 10 and the visual improvements you’ll get in the future when more developers really take advantage of it. With a slightly better video card, you won’t even really notice that you’re going at 90FPS versus 100FPS.
4. Vista Media Center is a fantastic DVR. Microsoft integrates their fantastic Windows Media Center Edition into Home Premium and Ultimate, and it’s pretty much the best DVR you can get outside of getting a TiVo. Combine it with various Media Center Extenders, of which there are lots (such as the Xbox 360), you can get HDTV streamed to anywhere in your house from one computer in your office. Our only complaint is still that Cable Labs doesn’t allow you to stick a CableCARD tuner onto just any appropriately spec’d Vista PC—you actually have to buy a machine pre-made for CableCARD.
5. The sleep mode works. Sleep mode in Windows XP was essentially a shortcut for locking up your computer and forcing you to reboot. It actually does what it’s supposed to in Vista.
6. Built-in search is better and more useful. Vista’s searching feature relies on cataloging your hard drive, then searching the resulting database to quickly (and easily) find your files. By default it’s just limited to a couple user folders, but if you expand it to your entire hard drive, you’ll be able to find anything fast, much like the way Spotlight works on a Mac. The downside is that during the first day or two, everything slows down while Vista indexes your computer. Best to leave it on overnight or over a weekend while you’re away.
7. User Account Control is useful for some people. I have to admit that I’ve turned this off but UAC—the thing that pops up and asks you for your password whenever you do something on the system level—is useful in theory for many people, especially those who share a family computer. Hide the administrator password from your parents/grandparents/kids so they won’t be able to install any weird apps they’re not supposed to. In practice, it’s a bit annoying in that it pops up for mundane things that shouldn’t really need system-level clearance. It’s a step in the right direction; however, if you want to disable UAC for certain programs, see here.
8. Drivers support isn’t as bad as it’s made out to be. Although “Man gets Windows Vista to work with printer” may be an actual non-Onion headline, the root cause of his original woes was that the man installed a Windows XP printer driver instead of the correct Vista one. But there is a smaller percentage of users who—no matter how old or new their peripheral is—can’t get it to work with Windows Vista. The blame for this lies on peripheral manufacturers who either can’t or won’t update their drivers to support the new OS. There’s not much you or Microsoft can do here, but it’s rarer than you’d think from reading the internet.
9. It’s not any buggier than Windows XP. This is a bit of a corollary to #1, but out of the many, many Vista users we’ve seen, they almost all agree that the only times Vista has crashed or blue-screened on them was when they were doing something they usually don’t do. The OS by itself rarely crashes in everyday use, and compared to even OS X Leopard, it’s pretty damn sturdy. In a year’s worth of daily use, we think the OS has probably only crashed once, if that.
10. Vista is not slow if you have enough RAM. One of the main complaints that users have is that Vista is slow, but they either upgraded Vista from an old machine or they purchased a “Vista Ready” system with only 512MB to 1GB worth of RAM. You can run Vista with 1GB of RAM, but like OS X, you really want to have at least 2GB. Modern operating systems get fatter because they DO more stuff for you under the hood, such as optimizing your memory for the applications you run often so they load faster.
We’re not saying that Vista doesn’t have its faults or that Windows 7 won’t be better, we’re saying that Vista is just not as bad as people are making it out to be. If you’re on XP and you’re afraid to upgrade, don’t be. It’s no worse than Windows XP if you pay attention to the stuff I mentioned above. As long as you’ve got a reasonably decent machine—and if you’re reading Giz it’s likely that you do—you’re pretty safe in upgrading.
That said, we do have some major complaints:
1. Things aren’t where they used to be. Holy shit. This one is the worst. Various settings are hidden under levels of menus, and for some inexplicable reason, Add/Remove Programs is no longer Add/Remove programs. What’s the point of this? So people can use the hundreds of wizards more?
2. File transfers are slower than on XP, which is slightly fixed with Service Pack 1, but still has problems. Here’s the reason why. And if you’ve got problems with slow browsing, see here.
3. Wireless networking is a pain. Windows has never been great at presenting wireless networking with an intuitive UI, and Vista might be even worse than XP in this department. Stuff’s buried behind various weirdly-named menus, which you have to (at least the first few times) guess at to see.
4. Lots of balloon notifications pop up on the taskbar. Here’s how to shut them off.
5. Folder view in Windows Explorer doesn’t remember your settings. Here’s another huge pain users have run into when browsing a folder and all of a sudden having Explorer think that these are photos because there’s just one photo in the directory. Here’s how to turn that off.
Bonus Vista Tip: How to recover files from Vista’s built-in shadow copy here.
Wonderful news for liberal media.
The brilliant Mark Schmitt is taking the reigns of the Prospect. I know Mark (he wrote for me at TPMCafe), and can’t say enough good things about him as a writer, thinker, and all around great dude.
Mark, I hope, will shake up the often stale feeling labor/left editorial line at the magazine (stale not in ideology, which I basically am all for, but in tone and relevance). He’ll also hopefully help my fellow new media youngsters over there (Deputy Editor Ann Friedman, the essential Ezra Klein, etc.) keep pushing the Mag in a webby direction. He is, after all, a quite accomplished blogger.
Washington, D.C.—Mark Schmitt has been named Executive Editor of The American Prospect. Schmitt has been a contributor to the Prospect since 2001 and a columnist for the magazine since 2005, as well as a frequent contributor to its Web site and award-winning blog, TAPPED. He is currently a senior fellow at the New America Foundation where he helped to develop a new initiative on The Next Social Contract, a cross-cutting effort to find the underlying principles and policies appropriate to the emerging economy.
Before joining the New America Foundation in 2005, Mark was a program director at the Open Society Institute in New York for seven years. Previously, he served as policy director for Sen. Bill Bradley of New Jersey, as well as a senior adviser on Bradley’s 2000 presidential campaign. He is an expert on budget and tax policy, reform of the political process, and the history and role of ideas in politics.
In addition to appearing in The American Prospect, Mark’s writing has been published in The New York Times, The New Republic, Democracy, the Financial Times, and other publications, and he has contributed chapters to several books. His own blog, The Decembrist, was named one of the five best political blogs by Forbes magazine in 2003, and he has also been a regular contributor to TPM Café.
Prospect Board Chairman Benjamin Taylor said, “Mark is the right person at the right moment in the Prospect’s history and as the country appears ready to enter a new era of progressive politics. We’re thrilled to have someone with Mark’s extraordinary talents taking over the editorial reins at The American Prospect.”
“This is the moment for The American Prospect. TAP has seen the possibilities of a new progressive era since its first issue in 1990, and it will be central to the conversation in the years ahead. I’m thrilled at the opportunity to work with the current staff of the magazine, which includes some of the best young journalists anywhere, along with the brilliant founding editors, Bob Kuttner and Paul Starr, and Harold Meyerson,” Schmitt said.
Harold Meyerson will return to his role as editor-at-large to devote more time to writing features for the magazine. Schmitt will begin in his new role on July 14.
Martian Garden
[Image: Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona].
The soil chemistry on Mars is apparently just right for growing turnips. After digging up soil in a region of the Red Planet nicknamed Wonderland, the Phoenix rover "found trace levels of nutrients like magnesium, sodium, potassium and chloride," which is "the same basic chemistry as garden soil." These soil samples are also "fairly alkaline," we read, "with a pH of 8 or 9. This level of alkalinity is common for many Earth soils, and myriad bacteria and plants, including vegetables like asparagus and turnips, can thrive at such a pH."
So could we develop Mars gardens in our landscape architecture classes – pre-emptive landscape grafts that we'll export off-world for future planting?
Obama Hires Top Hillary Policy Adviser
A key hire by the Obama camp: He reportedly signs up senior Hillary policy adviser Neera Tanden, one of her top loyalists, as his new Director of Domestic Policy.
Tanden, a fixture on many a Hillary campaign conference call, was a key architect of her health care plan, which was probably the one domestic policy proposal of hers that was most often compared favorably to Obama's.
Rave Reviews For Heath Ledger in Dark Knight
The first reviews are in for the new Batman flick, The Dark Knight, and critics are raving about, what would unfortunately be, Heath Ledger's final complete movie role.
"I can only speak superlatives of Ledger, who is mad-crazy-blazing brilliant as the Joker," Rolling Stone's resident movie guru Peter Travers wrote. "It's typical of Ledger's total commitment to films as diverse as Brokeback Mountain and I'm Not There that he does nothing out of vanity or the need to be liked.
"Ledger's Joker has no gray areas — he's all rampaging id," he continued. "He creates a Joker for the ages."
Pete also says that Heath's performance could, very well, put him in the Oscar race. "If there's a movement to get him the first posthumous Oscar since Peter Finch won for 1976's Network, sign me up," he writes.
Heath's death is also acknowledged in the credits of the flick, along with one of the film's special-effects technicians, who died in a stunt in September.
"In memory of our friends Heath Ledger & Conway Wickliffe," the tribute reads.
Heath was an amazing talent and his loss continues to be beyond sad.
Thinking Like a Cocoa Programmer
Being a great Mac or iPhone programmer means more than just knowing Objective-C and the Cocoa, it means thinking in a different way about designing and writing software. Understanding how experienced Cocoa programmers looks at things will help you get closer to becoming an expert...
June 26, 2008
Wall-E is getting excellent reviews so far...it's currently rated...
Wall-E is getting excellent reviews so far...it's currently rated a 92 on Metacritic.
(link)
Expression Engine vs. Textpattern
Jon Hicks:
Once people got wind that I’d been trying out Expression Engine, I’ve been badgered with the question “Which one should I use: Textpattern or Expression Engine?”. This post is to try and answer that […]
little rips in the urban fabric
Roberta Smith in the New York Times on Eliasson's water falls: "The experience of Mr. Eliasson’s artful addition to the urban landscape depends on everything around it — the city’s changing pace, light and (real) weather. And on you. The falls can be looked at from near or far, alone or in groups, on foot or bike, from boats and bridges, in snatched glimpses on the move or staying-in-place contemplation. They fake natural history with basic plumbing, making little rips in the urban fabric through which you glimpse hints of lost paradise and get a sharpened sense of Whitman’s, the one you already inhabit."
Photo of the Day: Gorgeous Oregon Strawberries
Last weekend I picked up some strawberries at my local farmers' market (McCarren Park in Brooklyn, New York), but they weren't nearly as beautiful as the ones Lelo picked on Sauvie Island outside of Portland, Oregon. Read more about her day of strawberry picking on her blog, Lelo in Nopo.
Related
The Great Strawberry Ice Cream Debate
Essentials: Strawberry Shortcake
Let's Talk Strawberries... What's your favorite recipe?
"yes we can" - the george carlin remix
Ill Doctrine recently remixed the Obama "Yes We Can" video as a tribute to George Carlin, and it is awesome. He mentions in his YouTube description post that Carlin's "7 dirty words" court case happened at his radio station.
liz phair on guyville
Liz Phair's made a new documentary about her 1993 landmark "Exile in Guyville," timed with a reissue of the album. New York Mag's Vulture has a great interview with her, and as the father of two daughters whom I'm doing my best to raise as strong, vocal and opinionated young girls (and me arguably being one of those "guys") I absolutely loved this particular bit...
It was interesting to learn from the documentary that you were pretty surrounded by guys on the making of Exile.
I really was in Guyville. When I went back to the documentary, the one unifying thing with the guys is, they all talk a really long time, and then I get a tiny little word in edgewise. They were all like, "This is what's good," "This is what you should like," and I was like, [sing-songy] "fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you."The documentary's bundled with the CD version of the reissue -- you can pick it up at Amazon and other fine retailers, I assume.
BLOCKBUSTER Exclusive: Florent to Re-Open as R & L Restaurant on Tuesday!!
Krieger, 6/11/08MEATPACKING DISTRICT— Though the MePa institution Florent will close this Sunday night, landlord Joanne Lucas has confirmed that she will reopen the space as R & L Restaurant, the restaurant that preceded Florent, just two days later. Lucas tells us that she initially shopped around the lease to a couple of retailers and eventually changed her mind: "We thought about having someone lease it but then I decided to just take it over myself. It used to be my father's diner before it was Florent."
And get this: she will be keeping pretty much the same menu as Florent and will keep on all the staff members that still work there. When asked why Florent isn't involved in the new evolution she responded, "Florent from what I understand is moving on to a new chapter in his life." Many will see this as a happy ending for the Florent saga. He may be gone, but the space will remain unchanged. Yet you still have to admit this was a clever move on Lucas' part, a way to rake in the revenue from an established restaurant at a time when even retailers aren't willing to pay the rent she was reportedly asking. This could be a temporary solution while she waits for a tenant.
· All Florent Coverage [~E~]
Trails Less Traveled - Interactive Graphic - NYTimes.com
entral Park was designed for refuge, discovery and communing with society. Not for running. Yet 150 years later, its 843 acres are a paradise for runners. Learn new trails inside Central Park and listen to experienced runners describe their favorites.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/06/26/style/20080626_FITNESS_MAP.html
Create your own Ira Glass narration with Radar's This American Life story generator
Create your own Ira Glass narration with Radar's This American Life story generator
Outsourcing the News: Not the Best Idea
A CNBC story reported today that in an effort to stand out amid the ever-struggling newspaper business, the Orange County Register will outsource some page layout and copyediting duties to India. Can I say that I think this is probably the most ungodly, exceptionally bad idea ever? Although it's reported that the outsourcing will start on a trial basis, why even do that? How does this make sense? How does this help? I have to be honest, I've never really understood the whole outsourcing business -- apart from it's crude and shameless reality: let's get other people to do it for cheaper. Journalism, hobbling along as it is on its one good (or somewhat good) remaining foot, is about work, good old fashioned get-your-hands-dirty work -- asking the questions, going the distance, following leads, cultivating authentic relationships and ideas. And of all things to outsource, copyediting? Have you ever spent 45 minutes on the phone with a Dell representative in India? At least outsource restaurant reviews or culture pages or art news -- something that might make sense to ask someone from India to contribute to a regional paper out of Orange County. Something that might actually make a regional paper stand out.
Internal AT&T Memo Indicates Groundbreaking iPhone 3G Feature: MMS
Check this out. New reports are coming in that a very interesting memo is currently circulating internally at AT&T. Said memo reportedly lists a variety of features that will supposedly be included on the upcoming iPhone 3G. Among them is an exciting new service that - get this - allows you to send SMS-like messages that include multimedia attachments. Imagine! The service, cleverly named Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) supposedly allows users to attach one or more image, audio file or even video and deliver the message along with text. The recipient of the message will then see and / or hear the multimedia on his or her mobile. Nutty. None of this is confirmed as of yet, but how sweet would it be if a mobile phone had functionality like this?! Oh Apple, you’ve done it again! Next thing you know we’ll find out that Apple has figured out a way to copy text from one place and paste it to another. Ok, that’s just crazy talk.
