Venice in November....
...is most beautiful. There are not too many tourists, and you can get into restaurants to eat fried calamari and octopus salad. The light on the lagoon and canals is unbelievable. Check out my photo album below, left.
« November 2, 2008 - November 8, 2008 | Main | November 16, 2008 - November 22, 2008 »
November 15, 2008
How Did I Miss This?
A Rasmussen poll from a week ago had 64% of Republicans nationwide saying that Sarah Palin was their top choice for the 2012 nomination.
In other news, Mike Wooten, the state trooper and former brother-in-law who Palin abused power over and lied about, is getting reassigned again because of continuing threats to his safety tied to Palin's nonsense.
Is Google making us stupid?
Notwithstanding the alarmist and ultimately misguided title, there’s some truth to what Nick is saying in the article, namely that our ability to deep-think is partly a function of our need to deep-think, and in light of the Internet doing a lot of that thinking for us, we’re losing our ability to call on that skill. In fact, I think a lot of the people who linked to this article were perpetuators of the very problem the article highlights: they skimmed the title and came to an automatic conclusion, without even attempting to digest the content.
I hate to say it, but Nick really has just scratched the surface here; I think the issue is bigger than most people realize. Sure, my perspective may be a bit biased in that I’m certainly a crazy edge-case for which this situation hits very close to home, but, and as I’ve said for years, my “edge-caseness” will increasingly become the norm.
Glossed Over
Link: Glossed Over
According to one report, a Portfolio.com staffer who asked a company executive why the Web site was being penalized for the magazine's woes was told that Condé Nast is first and foremost a magazine company.
"Any rational person would say that's crazy," says a former Condé Nast editor who, like every former or current Condé Nast employee consulted for this article, insisted on anonymity. "To say that we're just a magazine company in this day and age is like saying that we're a buggy company."
Google Maps API Gets Reverse Geocoding
Shared by Bud
Could be quite useful for student mashups
Google has just announced the addition of a valuable new feature for the Google Maps API (the most popular API in our API directory): reverse geocoding. If you are not familiar with geocoding, it is the process of converting an address into a latitude/longitude pair. Likewise, reverse geocoding is the process of converting a latitude/longitude pair into an address. Developers using the Google Maps API have had access to geocoding since its release in June 2006, and geocoding has been integrated with many of the map mashups developed with this API.
Many mapping APIs offer geocoding, but access to reverse geocoding has been quite limited, especially with the Google Maps API. Prior to the addition of this feature to the API, developers had to rely on third party reverse geocoding APIs and services as well as a JavaScript hack to the Google Maps API.
Pamela Fox over at the Google Geo Developers Blog gives a great summary of this new feature:
A much smaller (but important) percentage of developers will want to use a reverse geocoder to let their map users know the address for a particular point on the map, perhaps to help them fill in a form faster (why type when you can click?!). For those developers, we’re now pleased to offer address-level reverse geocoding support to both our HTTP service and the GClientGeocoder class. To make it super easy to use, the interface for reverse geocoding is nearly the same as forward geocoding - the only difference is sending in a lat/lng instead of an address.
Reverse geocoding is available for all 70 countries for which the Google Maps API provides standard geocoding. MeetWays, a site that calculates the halfway between two locations, uses the API to determine the nearest address for the halfway point (and is our Mashup of the Day today):
The API documentation has been updated to include this new feature and there is some sample code available as well. Our Google Maps API Profile includes additional information, including links to over 1,500 map mashups developed with the API.
November 14, 2008
Back when the Mall was very different
Photos like this wig me out:
For those of you who aren't familiar with Washington, DC, that's a view from the top of the Washington Monument looking westward, along the Reflecting Pool. towards the Lincoln Memorial; the photo was taken in 1943. There's also this photo, showing even more buildings in the foreground, buildings that are actually sitting on the grounds of the Washington Monument. Today, none of those buildings you see along the sides of the Reflecting Pool are there, nor are the two bridges that actually cross the Reflecting Pool -- the area is now taken up by the Constitution Gardens.
The story of those buildings is a cool one -- they were the home of the Department of the Navy (and a bunch of other Department of War offices) during the massive military expansion of World War II. All of those buildings were considered temporary construction with the mind that the occupants would move as soon as the war was over and suitable space could be found for permanent Navy digs, something that happened in 1943 with the completion of the Pentagon. Of course, they lived far beyond their original intended lives, but thankfully they were also built as temporary construction, meaning that after a while they started to surrender to the ages. When the mid-1960s brought crumbling foundations and bowing walls, President Nixon had the good sense to order them demolished and the land given back to the National Mall, returning to Pierre L'Enfant's original vision for Washington, DC's public space.
MAKE YOUR TIME.
"Mac version coming soon!"
The Global Community: Take Action Pack
Twelve Months, Twelve Films, Twelve Issues.
Here at MediaRights.org and the Media That Matters Film Festival, we decided to crew up and give you a fresh, focused, all-in-one package of brand new short films, background information, resources, tips and activities on each of the topics covered in the eighth annual Media That Matters Film Festival.
The mission of the festival is to take the concept of "audience" a step further and use short-form, big issue media as a tool to educate and inspire activism.
This month's Take Action Pack will focus on the upcoming wrap of a common calendar year, and the reflections of self and community, both locally and globally, that brings. Check out A Nomad's Life a film focusing on the lives of a nomadic family in Northern Tibet and African Underground: Hip Hop in Senegal, a study in how culture, politics and music can intertwine, then read on to find out more ways to take action in your community.
The Issue
As the year draws to a close, it is a common practice to reflect on all that has happened within the past twelve months, asking ourselves what has changed in our lives, and what has stayed the same. As 2008 draws to a close, these questions of transformation are perhaps more salient than ever. The world is changing at a breakneck speed and the ramifications of this change are being felt all across the globe, albeit in dramatically different ways.
Image by exposedplanet In the increasingly globalized society of the 21st century, issues of cultural identity have come to the forefront of international consciousness. On the one hand, globalization has provided people with access to myriad artistic, technological, and economic resources that may have otherwise been unimaginable for them. On the other hand, these same imports have threatened and displaced cultural values and ways of living that have been in place for hundreds, if not thousands of years.
The holidays are a time during which we, in the United States, are encouraged to think about the many things that unite us a human community. It is also, however, perhaps the perfect time to think about the vast diversity that helps to make our global community so strong. From nations to villages, every local community has its own unique traditions and ways of celebrating during the holidays. There is perhaps no better time in the year to celebrate the many distinct cultures throughout the world that serve not to divide us, but rather to make us stronger.
The Film
This month, we have chosen to highlight two films that address the issue of globalization and cultural identity from very different vantage points. In African Underground: Hip Hop in Senegal, Senegalese Hip-Hop artists discuss influences on their music by American, French and other European groups and show us how they have translated the art form and made it their own. Differing vastly in content from much American rap music, hip hop in Senegal often has a deeply spiritual element, focusing on the practices and teachings of Islam . Through interviews and musical performance, these African Hip-Hop artists discuss the ways in which cultural globalization has allowed them access to an art form originating in the West, while simultaneously stressing the ways in which their own music stands apart from its American roots.
A decidedly separate take on global culture can be seen in A Nomad's Life, which follows young couple Locho and Yama, who live with their infant daughter in the Kham mountain region of Tibet. Locho and Yama continue to embrace a style of nomadic living that has changed little since the first Tibetans domesticated the yak over 8,000 years ago. The encroachment of 21st century life is evident, however, with signs of change everywhere, from the thinning grasslands where they graze their animals, to the rapidly growing county seat where they sell their yak hair and buy supplies. As parents they are caught between a deep attachment to the life they know and love and a desire for a better life for their daughter.
These two films reflect on the vast differences-as well as striking similarities-between communities across the globe, while raising important questions about the stakes of both preserving and importing culture.
For more films about globalization and cultural change, go to MediaRights.org and check out The Global Banquet: Politics of Food, Maquila: A Film of Two Mexicos, Conakry Kas, The Price of Aid and Global Village or Global Pillage?
The Action!
EducatorsFor Families
- Hip Hop is currently one of the most popular arts forms in the world, and thus a perfect tool for teaching critical thinking and media literacy skills to young people. "Flipping the Script: Critical Thinking in a Hip Hop World" is designed to help you do just that. Find out how to bring the exciting and engaging theme of Hip Hop culture and music into your classroom at www.justthink.org.
Daara J
Image by audibletreats- Follow the development of Hip Hop on the African continent by clicking through each of the countries on this interactive map. Learn how these artists are redefining this genre through their culture at www.africanhiphop.com.
- Start a discussion with your students about the many aspects, both positive and negative, of globalization. Talk about the nuances of the issue, e.g. what is the difference between corporate and other forms of globalization? Check out the basics on how to teach about globalization and download class resources at globalization101.org.
- Discuss the difference between the effects of globalization in "developed", industrialized countries such as the United States and "developing", relatively unindustrialized countries such as Tibet. Put a human face to the issue through websites such as The Tibetan Photo Project.
For Youth Leaders
- What foods does your family like to eat at holiday times--or any other time, for that matter? Families around the world have their own favorites, and you can see them in the extraordinary book Hungry Planet. Look at the photos and compare the food expenditure at your household with families from other countries. Catch a sneak preview of the book in Time.
- The holidays are the perfect time to think about the ways your family can help to end world hunger. Find out what you can do at websites like Friends of WFP and learn about projects such as Heifer International which offers activities as well as classroom resources.
- Love the music that you heard in Hip Hop in Senegal? Search the database of Afromix to follow other artists in Senegal and the root of music throughout the African Diaspora. Go to www.afromix.org.
Word of God
Image by NYGUS- Visit Muslim Hip Hop to explore this creative outlet for Muslim artists to express themselves in a halal (permissible) way. Learn about the ways in which music is being used to spread the message of Islam at www.muslimhiphop.com.
- If you are interested in the consequences of a globalized economy on nomad life, look up the Kham Aid Foundation, which provides health education, disaster relief and environmental programming for the people of Tibet. The organization's mission is to help honor and preserve local culture while providing support for the current economic transformations.
And remember -- you can host a screening of the Media That Matters films by visiting our site for more information.
In Conclusion
We hope that these resources will supplement your use of film in the classroom and community. Beyond Media That Matters, we invite you to search around MediaRights to find others films, organizations and to read about other important issues relating to globalization and cultural identity.
Good luck, and let us know what you are doing to encourage awareness or change on these issues! Publish an announcement on MediaRights to encourage others to join you, or send us an email with any feedback!
Happy Holidays!
Cory Arcangel, Adult Contemporary
Cory Arcangel has a new show opening tonight at Team Gallery in Soho called Adult Contemporary. I got a peek at it last night and my favorite piece is called Photoshop CS: 110 by 72 inches, 300 DPI, RGB, square pixels, default gradient "Spectrum", mousedown y=1098 x=1749.9, mouse up y=0 4160 x=0. It's easy enough to whip up your own by following those instructions in Photoshop but the print itself is gorgeous. When you get up close to it, there is no discernible gradation between the colors and, because it's so uniform and smooth and glossy and big, you lose your sense of depth perception and you don't really know how close you are to it. I almost fell over looking at it because I was so disoriented.
(link)
MySQL Binaries percona build7 with latest patches
We made new binaries for MySQL 5.0.67 build 7 which include patches we recently announced.
The -percona release includes:
CODE:
and -percona-highperf release additionaly includes
CODE:
You can download RPMs for RedHat / CentOS 4.x and 5.x for x86_64, binaries, sources and patches there
Entry posted by Vadim | No comment
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NYLON is Not Folding
Rumors are floating around that NYLON is folding, so we did a little investigative research with an, um, inside source, and the official statement is:
NYLON is not folding, in fact, their numbers are up.
Furthermore, their PR team is right now working on a statement saying such, which we should all be getting it in our Inboxes very soon. But if you can't wait, their online team's already on it.
And there you have it, the story in full. And if you want to hear it straight from our super exclusive source (ok, it's Faran), click through the jump!
Glad to hear they're doing well, unlike some others.
Apple adds new iPhone SDK samples
Apple has added six new iPhone developer samples to its reference library. Ars takes a look at each one, all of which add value to Apple's already-rich sample code suite.
This -->
I wish someone hadn't snapped up this pattern (from Lanetz Living) before I got to it ... it's one of those ones that I want just for the illustration. The ecstatic trance that Coat Woman is in ... can I have what she's having, please?
And I like that the original owner of the pattern had to re-focus attention to the actual dress illustration with the scribbled "This" -- you know, since all eyes are so obviously elsewhere.
Why don't we wear these coat/dress combos any more? I know it seems a bit overkillish (or inconvenient) to have a separate coat for every dress, but I really wish I did. And that they were weightless and massless, so that I could cram them all into my suitcase. Now that the weather's gotten colder my packing is always dependent on whatever coat I can take that will go with everything in my suitcase ... and nothing ever does.
I am currently searching for a green leather coat, which I think (ha!) will go with everything I ever wear. I want a single-breasted green leather vintage coat with a slightly frock-coaty vibe, and as far as I can tell, this Does Not Exist. (If you've seen one, you know where to find me.) Green goes with black AND brown AND gray AND the darker reds and oranges that I like, and leather can be dressy or sporty (and doesn't show dirt as much). And if it's vintage, of course, it has that kind of beat-up, broken-in cool ... oh, why can't I find you, Perfect Coat?
The square neckline with the kimono sleeves is also wonderful, isn't it? The little tucks really make it special. Too bad they're hidden under the coat ...
Drift and Oblivion
Presidential transitions are notoriously perilous interludes. The normal calculus of power and responsibility is upended. In recent decades there was seldom enough occurring for it to matter all that much. But that's not the case now. And just in the last day or so it's crystallized in my mind that we may be on track for some serious problems.
First, the management of the almost trillion dollars of bailout money. It's good news that Paulson has dropped the entire toxic debt reverse auction idea in favor of direct infusions of capital into the financial services companies. But there's an unmistakable make-it-up-as-you go-along
quality to it. And while that's probably inevitable and even benign to some degree, there's a lot of hundreds of billions of dollars being assigned by people who will be able to wash their hands of the whole matter in about two months. And that's a problem.Next, the auto industry. Could GM really go under in the next couple months because the Democrats who'd bail the company out are currently at the mercy of the electorally discredited Republicans who want to use the crisis to crush one of the last major manufacturing unions? The continued existence of a domestic auto industry is more than a strictly economic issue. Henry Blodget says we should use the money for "on retraining and job placement than on propping up perpetually weak companies that can't fix themselves." I assume he's making a move into comedy. Because job training and placement into what exactly? Maybe he's become another Bob Reich on worker retraining. But what jobs does he imagine we're going to feed these often older workers into in anything like the short or near term in the middle of a massive recession? Whatever you think should happen it should happen as a matter of considered national policy, not because the Democrats won't be able to break a filibuster or overcome a veto until late January.
I'm inclined to think that at least in the short-term GM may be bluffing, that if relief is in the offing in 60 days that they can find some way to hold on until then. At least I hope so.
Moments of national crisis require experimentation and open minds. But more than anything they demand energy and direction, a plan -- one where the different moving parts interlock together in some rational way. But this feels like drift.
Analysts Lower Online Ad Estimates -- "Again!"
Shared by Jake Dobkin
I'm going to go on record and say Nick's forecast is overestimating. The correct number is 20% decline in display advertising, with some online advertising sectors (especially text ads, CPC/CPA/etc deals) showing modest growth in 2009.
After downgrading Google yesterday and "to reflect a deeper than expected impact of the global economic slowdown," Jefferies analyst lowered their online advertising revenue estimates for 2008 and 2009 -- "Again!" they managed to cheerfully note:
- We now expect global online advertising in FY08 to grow at roughly 17% to $48.4B down from 20%, and in FY09 at 8% to $52.3B down from 13%.
- Our revised estimates imply 23%Y/Y and 9%Y/Y growth in search revenues in FY08 and FY09.
- They also imply growth in FY08 and FY09 of 10% and 6%, respectively for display and other non search ad revenues.
- We believe YouTube will overtime become a major driver of display ads.
- Click on their chart to expand it.
We think the Jefferies analyst are still too optimistic. Display advertising will shrink next year. In fact, Gawker Media owner Nick Denton says it could collapse by 40% before the downturn is over.
See Also:
Google Collapses, Analysts Get Bearish
Nick Denton: Media Sleepwalking Into Extinction
"Clintonites Are Everywhere"
Politico has a good rundown of all the Clintonites that have been invited into Obama's government, and what it all means. Money quote:
"Obama is showing great good sense in making use of their experience," said William Galston, a former Clinton domestic policy adviser who's now at the Brookings Institution. "You have an entire cadre of people in their 30s and 40s and early 50s who were either in senior jobs or second- and third-tier jobs in the Clinton administration, who really earned their spurs and know their way around -- and know something about how the institutions in which they served actually function."The piece notes: "Thirty-one of the 47 people so far named to transition or staff posts have ties to the Clinton administration."
Relatedly, I wanted to revisit a point made here yesterday that made some of you mad. It wasn't really meant to be about Obama but about the experience of this cadre of government professionals "in their 30s and 40s and early 50s" described above.
These are people who are taking charge again in a city that is vastly, vastly different than it was the last time they held power. In the 1990s these then-younger players were heavily constrained by Clinton's less-than-50% win, the ascendancy of conservative ideas, the eventual takeover of Congress by the GOP, and a media where power was much more concentrated in the hands of big news orgs and star columnists and pundit types. The result: Triangulation, cautious governance, achievements with a centrist gloss, and pitched battles with a press corps hell-bent on inflicting daily damage.
Today, they're back in charge at a time when conservative ideas are broadly discredited, the GOP is in ruins, and polls show broad support and even impatience for liberal governance and major change. Their president has a big mandate, and they enjoy sizable Congressional majorities. There's a new media infrastructure to watch their backs.
The sense of opportunity here to reaffirm the public's faith in liberalism, to create a sustained Democratic ascendancy, and possibly to build an enduring Democratic majority, is something that these good people could only have dreamed of back in the 1990s and even as recently as a few years ago. And Obama is tapping their experience of government -- an experience, ironically, informed by a sense of government's limitations and potential for failure -- to make it happen. It's a key emerging storyline that I think will be important to understanding events as they unfold in the coming months and years.
Everything Ed Levine Ate This Week
Grub Street has posted this week's "New York Diet" column, and the featured eater is Serious Eats overlord Ed Levine. If you have ever wanted to hear about every single piece of food Ed ate in a single week, here is your chance.
Regular Serious Eats New York readers (or followers of Ed's diet posts) will find much of what Ed listed as very familiar—like his trip to the newly opened Salumeria Rosi, a great meal at West Branch, pizza bianca from Grandaisy, the sidewalk from Song Kran, and Sal & Carmine's followed by Zabar's frozen yogurt.
new hiphop mix from CPI
After 2005, I thought, there’s just not a lot of good hip hop, but this mix is four years in the making and there’s a lot of great stuff in here. I searched for the least misogynistic tracks, but couldn’t resist putting in a few just for their innovative beats.
Dharma Arts profiles my favorite digital DJ, CPI. You can download all 195 minutes of City Hearts Aimed Skyward at thetastates.com.
November 13, 2008
Nick Swisher
Here are the best OPS+ figures for a guy who batted .220 or worse over a full season in the last 20 years:
Cnt Player **OPS+** BA Year Age Tm Lg G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF GDP SB CS OBP SLG OPS Positions +----+-----------------+--------+-----+----+---+---+--+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+-----+-----+-----+---------+ 1 Rob Deer 108 .209 1990 29 MIL AL 134 511 440 57 92 15 1 27 69 64 6 147 4 0 3 0 2 3 .313 .432 .745 *93 2 Rob Deer 105 .210 1989 28 MIL AL 130 532 466 72 98 18 2 26 65 60 5 158 4 0 2 8 4 8 .305 .425 .730 *9/D78 3 Darrell Evans 104 .208 1988 41 DET AL 144 522 437 48 91 9 0 22 64 84 4 89 1 0 0 14 1 4 .337 .380 .717 *D3 4 Mark McGwire 103 .201 1991 27 OAK AL 154 585 483 62 97 22 0 22 75 93 3 116 3 1 5 13 2 1 .330 .383 .713 *3 5 Kevin Maas 100 .220 1991 26 NYY AL 148 592 500 69 110 14 1 23 63 83 3 128 4 0 5 4 5 1 .333 .390 .723 *D3 6 Nick Swisher 93 .219 2008 27 CHW AL 153 588 497 86 109 21 1 24 69 82 6 135 4 1 4 14 3 3 .332 .410 .742 3879/D 7 Phil Plantier 93 .220 1994 25 SDP NL 96 385 341 44 75 21 0 18 41 36 6 91 5 1 2 8 3 1 .302 .440 .742 *7 8 Jose Valentin 92 .216 2004 34 CHW AL 125 504 450 73 97 20 3 30 70 43 4 139 3 6 2 5 8 6 .287 .473 .760 *6/D 9 Rob Deer 92 .179 1991 30 DET AL 134 539 448 64 80 14 2 25 64 89 1 175 0 0 2 3 1 3 .314 .386 .700 *9/D 10 Pat Burrell 90 .209 2003 26 PHI NL 146 599 522 57 109 31 4 21 64 72 2 142 4 0 1 18 0 0 .309 .404 .713 *7/D 11 Rob Deer 84 .210 1993 32 TOT AL 128 532 466 66 98 17 1 21 55 58 1 169 5 0 3 6 5 2 .303 .386 .689 *9/D8 12 Bill Doran 82 .219 1989 31 HOU NL 142 574 507 65 111 25 2 8 58 59 2 63 2 3 3 8 22 3 .301 .323 .624 *4 13 Jeromy Burnitz 80 .215 2002 33 NYM NL 154 550 479 65 103 15 0 19 54 58 5 135 10 1 2 11 10 7 .311 .365 .676 *9/D 14 Charles Johnson 79 .218 1998 26 TOT NL 133 506 459 44 100 18 0 19 58 45 1 129 1 0 1 12 0 2 .289 .381 .670 *2 15 Devon White 79 .217 1990 27 CAL AL 125 503 443 57 96 17 3 11 44 44 5 116 3 10 3 6 21 6 .290 .343 .633 *8 16 Jeff Blauser 73 .211 1995 29 ATL NL 115 504 431 60 91 16 2 12 31 57 2 107 12 2 2 6 8 5 .319 .341 .660 *6 17 Dick Schofield 72 .206 1992 29 TOT ML 143 502 423 52 87 18 2 4 36 61 4 82 5 10 3 11 11 4 .311 .286 .597 *6 18 Cory Snyder 70 .215 1989 26 CLE AL 132 518 489 49 105 17 0 18 59 23 1 134 2 0 4 11 6 5 .251 .360 .611 *9/6D 19 Desi Relaford 69 .215 2000 26 TOT NL 128 502 410 55 88 14 3 5 46 75 7 71 12 3 2 10 13 0 .351 .300 .651 *6 20 Ray Durham 65 .218 2007 35 SFG NL 138 528 464 56 101 21 2 11 71 53 6 75 2 0 9 18 10 2 .295 .343 .638 *4A few guys on this list - McGwire, Burrell, Johnson among them - had productive seasons after their dismal year. But most of these guys disappeared into nothingness.
Personally, I have no idea what the Yankees were thinking in acquiring Swisher.
ThingM launches MaxM!
Woohoo! ThingM's second product, BlinkM MaxM, has hit the store shelves (first at Sparkfun, soon at FunGizmos). It's (to quote myself), "BlinkMs bigger, crazy sibling. It's an intensely-bright smart LED for prototyping that comes as a package of two components, a control module (MaxM Master) and a daughter board with three ultrabright LEDs (MaxM Blaster). [...] Its trio of LEDs are 50 times as bright as a standard BlinkM and more than 1000 times as bright as a standard LED." I'm also proud of its interactivity. It has 4 analog input lines so that in addition to being an LED replacement that's smart, it's also interactive. We expect to have some examples showing it in a range of applications soon. I'm most excited by the automotive application possibilities. Since it runs on 12v, you can hook it up to car batteries or (and this is a "don't try this if you don't know what you're doing" type of suggestion) directly to the car's electrical system. The possibilities for gaudy, interactive car lighting are infinite. I'm very excited....
JustSeeds Family Portrait
Here is the recent JustSeeds Family Portrait taken in Milwaukee, WI. A couple new and old folks were missing, though. I don't think it was shocking to see Red and Black so heavily represented!!
The 'Real' Palin Emerges
Out from behind the scripted role of the Vice Presidential nominee, America is now being introduced to the 'real' Sarah Palin. I have never doubted the bond and friendship Senator McCain and Governor Palin developed during the 9 weeks they partnered together, but I have doubted Governor Palin's support for the agenda the McCain campaign was selling to America.
Governor Palin is not an economic populist. Her record of accomplishments include, cutting earmarks, cutting corporate welfare, balancing budgets and re-prioritizing spending. In her RGA speech this morning, the fiscally conservative Governor Palin we all respect and admire re-appeared."We're hearing now more talk of additional taxpayer bailouts … for companies, for corporations, perhaps even states now who may be standing in line with their hands out despite, perhaps, some poor management decisions on their part that helped tank our economy,"I believe this is the first of many deviations we will see Governor Palin take from the 2008 campaign policy booklet.
"Republicans can help shore (these sectors of the economy) up without getting any more addicted to opium, other people's money," she argued. "We need to have a rational discussion. What and when is enough enough?"
Time Mag Digs Montreal Bike-Share
Bixi, Montreal's new public bicycle-sharing program, has been listed among Time Magazine's 50 Best Inventions of 2008. While a pilot version of the system debuted this fall, the real action begins next spring, when 2,400 bicycles will appear on city streets along with 300 solar-powered stations.
The bikes are designed to withstand the abuses of careless users or vandals, but they won't have to endure the harsh Montreal winters. The program runs only from mid-April through mid-November.
The pricing structure encourages short, frequent trips. After paying a flat membership fee ($78 full season, $28 monthly, or $5 daily), any trip of less than 30 minutes is free. Each 30-minute period beyond that costs from $1.50 to $6. Montreal invested $15 million in Bixi, and expects to recoup costs.
What could New York learn from Bixi? In addition to the general bike-sharing concept, this city could benefit from modular bike racks that are rapidly installed and expanded to meet growing rider demand, as shown here.
Photo: Stationnement de Montreal via The Bike-sharing Blog
Completely Magical
Now that she's been around for 20 years, everyone forgets quite how extraordinary she is. She could be singing the theme from Sesame Street, and it would sound completely different to how anyone else would do it, and completely magical.
With (Facebook) Friends Like These …
Make drivers chip in for transit? OMG, right?
Looks like at least one of Marty's friends isn't LOL.
Trade from David
No, not that David, the other one. No, the other other one. David Jacobs! I know too many Davids.
Anyway, David and I had an Allen & Ginter trade going on, but by the time we completed it we had both pretty much finished our sets. It ended up being a Braves for Mets swap instead with a couple of A&G cards sprinkled in for flavor. David's package arrived yesterday in a video mailer box with the card packaged snugly inside not one but two bubble mailers inside. This was a well packaged box. I'm going to split this one up and open one of the bubble mailers now, and one later. Here's #1:
2008 A&G Mini #274 John "don't listen to my agent" Smoltz2008 Topps #69 (dude!) Bobby Cox with the Tomato Jersey
2008 Topps #126 Brandon Jones grabbing his junk
2007 Topps #586 Willy "drunk for the Braves, star for the Rays" Aybar
2007 Topps #563 Mike "waggle butt" Gonzalez2008 Spectrum #7 Mark Tei$eira
2008 Upper Deck First Edition #SQ-24 Mark Tei$eira $tarQue$t
2008 Upper Deck First Edition #252 Josh "Give him a chance, Bobby" Anderson RC
2008 Upper Deck First Edition #40 I like Willie Harris and I'm glad he's doing well for the Nats
2008 Upper Deck First Edition #308 Bye Bye Yunel Escobar, the weather is nice in San Diego2008 Upper Deck First Edition #305 CHIPPER!!!!ZOMG
2008 Upper Deck First Edition #304 We gave $8 million and our #1 draft pick for 2 wins from Tom Glavine
2007? Topps '52 Rookies I think #7 Mickey Mantle in the gently falling snow2006 Bowman Heritage Prospects #BHP46 Brandon "one of the reasons a power hitting corner outfielder is a priority this offseason" Jones
2006 Bowman Heritage Prospects #BHP59 Diory "see you in Gwinnett" Hernandez
2006 Bowman Heritage Prospects #BHP80 Dustin "10.91 ERA?!?" Evans
2006 Bowman Heritage #126 Brian "who needs Tyler Flowers when you have a three time All-Star at catcher" McCann
2006 Topps Heritage #390 Brian McCann with the same photo from Bowman Heritage! Good Lord Topps is lazy
Good stuff here from David and I'm only halfway through! What goodies will we see in package TWO?? We'll find out sooner or later! Thanks David!
Worry Grows That Obama Won't Act Swiftly Enough On Health Care
It's common enough for interest groups to wring their hands about an incoming president's priorities. But this is an important story.
There seems to be genuine worry among some health care advocates and opinion leaders that Barack Obama won't move swiftly enough on health care reform, potentially squandering a chance to use his mandate in service of this long-sought goal.
Health care reform advocates are saying that they worry Obama's enthusiasm for health care reform may wane as he confronts other looming challenges. Some senior Dems in Congress are predicting the same, as are some opinion makers.
"If you`re looking for a bold move early on on an issue like health care and immigration, I`ll say no," Chicago reporter Lynn Sweet said the other day on Hardball.
That has prompted no shortage of worry that Obama could duplicate the missteps of Bill Clinton, who failed to act on health care for too long, with disastrous results.
"President Clinton came in determined to do something significant on health-care reform," Ron Pollack, executive director of the pro-consumer health group Families USA, said recently. "A president's leadership is most effective before he expends much of his political capital."
The Obama camp has not sent any signals on this one way or the other, to my knowledge. So it's hard to gauge whether the worrying is rooted in something real -- in what the advocates are being told in behind-the-scenes talks with the Obama transition team -- or whether it's mere caterwauling.
That said, if not now, when? As someone recently said, there's a "righteous wind" at Obama's back. Will there ever be a mandate for accomplishing something this ambitious as strong as the one that exists now?
More on this story soon.
Late Update: Jonathan Cohn argues that some Dems think it can be done -- and has the reporting to back it up.
Tonight: See the Blueprint for a New Upper West Side
Streets designed for safe, accessible, and equitable use. That is the vision of the "Blueprint for the Upper West Side: A Roadmap for Truly Livable Streets," to be unveiled tonight by the Upper West Side Streets Renaissance Campaign. The product of one year of community-driven planning, in consultation with urbanist legends Jan Gehl and Donald Shoup, the 51-page Blueprint [PDF] is an expansive neighborhood-wide plan that would employ many livable streets concepts already in use by NYC DOT.
Proposals include:
- Separated bike lanes and bike boxes on Broadway and Amsterdam
- Bollard-protected pedestrian bulb-outs
- Leading Pedestrian Intervals
- Curb extensions to slow auto traffic and allow for garbage pick-up
- Bus bulbs with bike parking
- Chicanes with reverse-angle parking on cross streets
The Blueprint was composed from input gathered via neighborhood surveys and citizen workshops in a community where drivers account for 10 percent of commutes but absorb 228 times more street space per capita, and where over 5,000 pedestrians and cyclists were injured or killed between 1995 and 2005.
Gehl will be on hand for tonight's reveal, as he was at the project's inception last November. The event is free and open to the public.
Where: P.S. 87, 160 W. 78th St. between Amsterdam and Columbus
When: 6:30 p.m.
● High quality YouTube video hack
You may have noticed that the video of Burn-E I embedded looked a bit better than a normal YouTube video. YouTube has been quietly offering high-quality versions of some of their videos for quite some time via a "watch in high quality" link just underneath the player. It's not HD, but it's definitely an upgrade of YouTube's legendarily crappy video quality. By default all videos on YouTube and embedded on other sites load at normal quality, but there's a way to set your default viewing quality to high, link to high quality video, embed HQ video, and even save HQ videos for later viewing.
Set your default viewing quality to high:
When you're logged in, go to Account / Playback Setup / Video Playback Quality and set the option to "I have a fast connection. Always play higher-quality video when it's available."Linking to YouTube videos in high quality:
If you need to link to a high quality video on your blog, append &fmt=18 onto the end of the YouTube URL, like so:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoTT4WBZ-30&fmt=18
Upon arriving at the YouTube page, you'll see the highest quality video that YouTube pushes out. The full technical details are available here...basically it's a mp4 encoded using H.264 with stereo AAC sound at 480x360.
Embedding high quality YouTube videos:
The &fmt=18 trick doesn't work here, but a similar trick does. For each of the URLs in the embeddable code that you get from YouTube, add &ap=%2526fmt%3D18 onto the end, like so:<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/XoTT4WBZ-30&hl=en&fs=1&ap=%2526fmt%3D18"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/XoTT4WBZ-30&hl=en&fs=1&ap=%2526fmt%3D18" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
Saving high quality YouTube videos:
When you're viewing a high quality video on YouTube, you can use the KeepVid bookmarklet to download the mp4 file for later viewing on your computer, iPod, or iPhone. I tested this with the Burn-E video and the resulting mp4 was in letterbox format (480x198, or roughly the standard 2.40:1 aspect ratio).BTW, here's a comparison of the low and high quality for the same video.
Low quality:
High quality:
Sources: Yahoo! Tech, jimmyr.com, My Digital Life.
If you haven't heard...Kudos to all involved!!!
In no particular order:
The New York Times City Room
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/12/pranksters-spoof-the-times/Irish news
http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/1112/nytimes.htmlNY Daily News
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2008/11/12/2008-11-12_fake_new_york_times_announces_iraq_war_e.htmlThe Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/organgrinder/2008/nov/12/1Gawker
gawker.com/5084164/fake-new-york-times-declares-iraq-war-over-heres-who-did-it - 2 hours ago
The Swamp - Tribune's Washington Bureau http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/11/fake_new_york_times_iraq_war_e.html
Media Life Magazine
http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman2/publish/Newspapers_24/The_great_fake_New_York_Times_prank.aspGothamist
http://gothamist.com/2008/11/12/fake_new_york_times_hits_readers.phpThe Laughing Squid
http://laughingsquid.com/the-yes-men-distribute-fake-new-york-times-iraq-war-ends/Forbes
http://blogs.forbes.com/trailwatch/2008/11/iraq-war-ends-o.htmlNBC
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Its-a-Fake-Bogus-New-York-Times-Declares-Iraq-War-Over.html
WIRED News
http://blog.wired.com/sterling/2008/11/yesmen-still-on.htmlNew York Observer
http://www.observer.com/2008/media/new-york-times-suddenly-big-jokeArtCal
http://zine.artcal.net/2008/11/no-times-like-the-future.phpReuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed2/idUSN1229433020081112
Crain’s New York Business
http://www.crainsnewyork.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081112/FREE/811129940/1097/newsletter01Politico
http://www.politico.com/blogs/michaelcalderone/1108/Fake_NYT_Iraq_War_Ends.htmlBBC: Pranksters Print Spoof NY Times
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7725973.stm
Gawker New York Times Fake New York Times Declares Iraq War Over! Here's Who Did It
http://gawker.com/5084164/fake-new-york-times-declares-iraq-war-over-heres-who-did-it
Gawker The Official Times Spoofer Video Celebration (I like this one)
http://gawker.com/5084554/the-official-times-spoofer-video-celebration
The Independent (UK): Spoof 'Times' puts Obama on notice - Americas, World
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/spoof-times-puts-obama-on-notice-1016129.html
canoe.ca: Fake NY Times reports end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
http://money.canoe.ca/News/MediaHold/2008/11/12/7391596-ap.html#top
International Herald Tribune: Prank NY Times: `All the news we hope to print'
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/11/13/america/NA-US-NY-Times-Spoof.php
Fox News: Prank NY Times: `All the news we hope to print'
http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Nov12/0,4670,NYTimesSpoof,00.html
CNBC: The New York Times Fake Out News Unfit To Print! - Funny Business with Jane Wells
http://www.cnbc.com/id/27683007
Telegraph (UK): Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are over, according to 'Yes Men' NY Times spoof
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/uselection2008/3449636/Wars-in-Afghanistan-and-Iraq-are-over-according-to-Yes-Men-NY-Times-spoof.html
Times Of India: Hoax NY Times declares end of Iraq war
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Its_a_Mad_Mad_World/Hoax_NY_Times_declares_end_of_Iraq_war/articleshow/3706612.cms
NC Times-News: Spoof Times greets New York commuters BlueRidgeNow.com
http://www.blueridgenow.com/article/20081112/NEWS/811120273/0/NEWS05
The Guardian (UK): New York Times 'special edition' spoof perplexes readers
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/nov/12/new-york-times-spoof
St. Petersburg Times: Nothing but good news ... and it was free
http://www.tampabay.com/news/bizarre/article901133.eceBusinessWeek: Prank NY Times `All the news we hope to print'
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D94DLKI00.htm
New York Post: PRANK NY TIMES `ALL THE NEWS WE HOPE TO PRINT' (This one includes the video)
http://www.nypost.com/seven/11122008/news/regionalnews/prank_ny_times_138350.htm
Times Union: RPI professor has hand in New York Times spoof
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=738878
USA Today: 'New York Times' spoof circulated
http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2008-11-12-new-york-times_N.htm?csp=23&RM_Exclude=aol
Los Angeles Times: Pranksters spoof N.Y. Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-timesspoof13-2008nov13,0,7172393.story
Straits Times: Spoof news from NYT
http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Lifestyle/Story/STIStory_301720.html
ABC: New York Times gets pranked - 11-12-08 - Philadelphia News - 6abc.com
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/bizarre&id=6501951
Chicago Sun Time: Fake New York Times Handed Out
http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/1275523,new-york-times-prank111208.articleBlackBook
http://www.blackbookmag.com/article/new-york-times-says-iraq-war-ends/4995
www.nytimes-se.comhttp://www.nytimes-se.com
The Fake New York Times
A coalition of artist-activists led by The Yes Men prank commuters and hack the media with fake copies of the New York Times. NYTimes Special Edition News Release, NY1 In The Papers 11/13/2008, Russia Today: ‘War in Iraq is over’, Gefälschte Zeitung erklärt Ende des Irak-Kriegs, Google News results for fake new york times, The Anti-Advertising Agency, CODEPiNK, Not An Alternative, UFPJ, May First, Improv Everywhere, and Cultures of Resistance. Music: Storie di Mose by Arthur Cravan.
Ramen-Based Pizza Crust
Photograph courtesy of Michele Humes
This past weekend, there was a Ramen-Off contest in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Kitchen. Contestants in the Ramen-Off had to repurpose this stuff of cheap meals, with an eye toward creativity and deliciousness.
The ramen dish above, made by Karol Lu, uses the noodles as pizza crust. As she told the folks at the Brooklyn Kitchen:
I wanted to make something that was the complete opposite of what you think of when you hear the word ramen. I also wanted the dish to be simple, inviting, and something that everyone likes. To me, this is pizza.Even though I'm usually a vegetarian cook-off competitor and cook, I used pepperoni slices, because my vision was to have the pizza look so much like a pizza that it was kind of scary— like the ramen was wearing a pizza costume for Halloween. In the spirit of bad ramen, I made it a point to incorporate the (also nonvegetarian) spice packet.
I baked the pizza in a 10 1/4-inch springform pan (which I may very well have purchased at the Brooklyn Kitchen), and it worked perfectly.
TPM's 8th Anniversary
Happy Birthday to us! As some of you know, today is TPM's 8th anniversary. The site started out on November 13th, 2000, just as it was becoming clear that the Florida recount wasn't just a matter of a few days of confusion but a full-blown multi-week, multi-branch theft of the presidency. It's been a great eight years -- at least great in terms of running TPM, if far from great more generally speaking. And it's weird when I stop to think that I've now spent a decent chunk of my life now running this site.
Let me take a moment to thank all of our readers for your many tips, your readership, and for your contributions, which provided the critical bootstrap of support that allowed us to fund our original expansions from one to multiple sites. And also a heartfelt thanks to TPM's current and past employees, whose dogged and often unsung work has made all of this possible.
As I noted last week, we've got an ambitious plan for 2009. So we believe the best is yet to come.
Obama's Not So Secret Hawaiian Burger Joint
Photograph of avocado burger from Kua 'Aina from skyseeker on Flickr.
After reading Pico Iyer's feature on Barack Obama in Time, Amy Wolf of Sunset Magazine tried to figure out what unnamed Hawaiian burger joint Iyer and Obama had eaten at on Oahu's North Shore in 2006. She came up with two possibilities—Teddy's Bigger Burgers and The Shack Hawaii Kai—the only problem with them being that neither of them is on the North Shore.
My search for burger joints on the North Shore resulted in one prominent answer: Kua 'Aina. I ran this past Serious Eats' Hawaiian contributor, Kathy YL Chan, who responded (through IM), "OMG I LOVE!!! THAT'S MY HOME BURGER SHOP!! THE AVOCADO BURGER!"
Avocado burger? Like the avocado burger Obama had picked up from the unnamed burger joint? According to author Paul Theroux, who was with Iyer, yes; Obama "was squirting ketchup onto seven hamburgers." Here's a more recent photo of Obama at Kua 'Aina. Judging from the photo above, I can see why Kathy responded so excitedly—that's like an avocado sandwich with a burger patty inside.
Kua 'Aina
66-160 Kamehameha Hwy # C, Haleiwa HI 96712 (map)
808-637-6067
Pixar's Burn-E
Pixar presents the adventures of Burn-E, a robot contemporary of Wall-E.
The events in Burn-E's short film take place concurrent with those in the feature film.
(link)
It's Really Time for That Intervention
Now Palin's headlining (literally or figuratively, I'm not sure) the Republicans Governors Association conference.
Late Intervention Update: TPM Reader DH begs to differ: "I beg to differ about getting Palin off the center-stage of Republican leadership. The more she solidifies her status in the GOP, the harder it will be for them to move the party towards a pragmatic, centrist image that attracts independent voters in congressional and presidential elections. The GOP is already defaulting to her. That's good for Democratic candidates. 'Palin 2012!'"
I quite agree from a partisan perspective. The more Palin the better. But I think we also need to think about this from the broader perspective of national dignity. And simple human decency. You're at a party and someone's drinking too much and starting to do embarrassing things. Even you don't like them, and even if the unlovely part of you thinks it's kind of funny, still someone should step in. On the other hand, if Rush and Sean, are up for it, maybe we just tap another keg?
Beginners Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming with Perl
Perl is a great language for processing text and automating tasks. It's also a fully-capable modern programming language, with effective modularization and object oriented capabilities. Though that sounds scary, they're easy to understand (and even easier to accomplish, through shiny modern tools such as Moose and Mouse).
Adaptive checkpointing
Do you know that there are two limits about dirty (modified but not flushed to disk) blocks of InnoDB buffer pool? One is the limit of “amount”. The other is the limit of “age”.
– limit of “amount” –
As you know, buffer pool of InnoDB works as write-back cache of its datafiles. If the buffer pool is filled by dirty blocks, InnoDB cannot allocate new blocks without flushing the dirty blocks and the performance would get worse. This is the limit of dirty block “amount”. We can avoid this limit by setting ‘innodb_max_dirty_pages_pct’ smaller or setting the larger buffer pool size. We might be never at a loss about the limit.
The another limit we should understand is limit of dirty block “age”.
– limit of “age” –
As you know again, because InnoDB write the modifies of datafile to transaction log file synchronously, InnoDB is allowed to treat its buffer pool as write-back cache. The transaction log from the last checkpoint assures the latest-committed consistent data. So, the transaction log must contain the all transaction log from the last checkpoint.
Basically, InnoDB makes the checkpoint passively (it is called “fuzzy checkpoint”). InnoDB makes the point of time when the oldest dirty block occurred as the new checkpoint.
In short,
the dirty block older than the oldest transaction log is never allowed to exist.This is the limit of dirty block “age”.
The max age is determined by the total size of the transaction log files, because InnoDB uses the transaction log circulately. But, the larger transaction log file may not solve the problem of dirty block “age”…
The main essence of the “age” limit problem might be clustered distribution of “age”. If there are huge number of similar aged dirty blocks and their age nears the max age, InnoDB flushes the dirty blocks with its best, but the oldest “age” of dirty blocks might not change and might reach the critical limit. Then InnoDB will pause until all of the old dirty blocks flushed…
I will show you the examples.
The workload is TPC-C like and the graphs show the change of throughput, write IO and checkpoint age with time.<Normal>
The first is the case of normal (not patched) InnoDB.
The intense write IO occur and InnoDB stalls when the checkpoint age reaches the red broken line. After that, InnoDB stalls periodically.
The steady flushing may be short, and there may be clustered distributed “age”. The clustered “age” may causes the clustered flushing and the next clustered “age”…
<innodb_max_dirty_pages_pct(native parameter) & innodb_io_capacity(patched parameter)>
The next graph is the case when I tried to restrain the checkpoint age growing by controlling steady flushing with only innodb_max_dirty_pages_pct and innodb_io_capacity.
There are no sudden stalls, but many write IO and regression of the average throughput. The optimum setting may be very difficult by this method, because innodb_max_dirty_pages_pct and innodb_io_capacity are independent to the checkpoint age.
<innodb_adaptive_checkpoint(new patched parameter) & innodb_io_capacity>
The last is the case of using innodb_adaptive_checkpoint instead of innodb_max_dirty_pages_pct.
During the checkpoint age excesses the light-blue broken line, the steady flushing occurs. If the checkpoint age reaches the next orange line, the flushing becomes more strong. This is the effect of innodb_adaptive_checkpoint. And its strength can be controlled by innodb_io_capacity. (The optimum setting may not be difficult as the 2nd case.)
At first, the checkpoint age touch the red line once and the regression occurs. However after that, the periodical regression waves seem to be attenuated quickly. The clustered “age” may be flatted. There are no the regression of the average throughput.
innodb_adaptive_checkpoint will solve or soften such problems of dirty block “age” limit
with easier setting.In addition, innodb_io_patches.patch also adds
“max checkpoint age“, “modified age” and “checkpoint age“
to SHOW INNODB STATUS and we can check them easily.
Entry posted by Yasufumi | One comment
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Starting Pitcher: Mets lean in on Jake Peavy
According to Scott Miller of CBS Sports, the
Braves are offering Yunel Escobar, Gorkys Hernandez, Blaine Boyer, and either Charlie Morton or Jo-Jo Reyes, and one of two minor-league left-handed pitchers, one of which is believed to be Jeff Locke.
In the report, Miller adds, “The Braves have been pressuring the Padres for an answer by Friday, when the free agent market opens, because they need at least two starters… They are expected to pursue A.J. Burnett, Ryan Dempster and others - sign maybe one if they acquire Peavy, and two if they don’t.”
Buster Olney wrote on Tuesday at ESPN.com that in talks with the Cubs, the Padres may need a third team to facilitate a deal.
“The Cubs and Padres have talked about a deal built around Josh Vitters, the Cubs’ top pick from 2007,” Olney writes.
Meanwhile, in a post to his blog for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Braves reporter Dave O’Brien described the Braves as being ‘peeved,’ and getting ‘antsy,’ with the Padres.
So, yesterday, the Mets and Red Sox ‘inserted themselves in to talks about Peavy,’ reported Tim Brown at Yahoo!, adding, “The Yankees continue to push hard,’ as well.
…from what i understand, though, there is no way peavy will approve a deal to boston or new york, or any big-city, east-coast location, especially in the American League…it’s just not happening…
In his report for ESPN, Olney wrote, “Some sources believe that a trade of Peavy, while not imminent, is inevitable, and could occur prior to Thanksgiving.”
Carrie Underwood & Kenny Chesney Have Big CMA Night
-Photo by Getty Images-
American Idol winner Carrie Underwood continues to prove she was deserving of that crown, as the songstress had another huge night at the CMA Awards.Carrie, who was also the night's co-host with Brad Paisley, took home the award for Female Vocalist of the Year for the third time in a row!
The superstar accept her trophy after singing her hit "Just A Dream," and had a message for one very special audience member.
"Mama, it's real hard to sing when you're in the second row crying," Carrie admitted.
Also keeping their streak in tact was Kenny Chesney, who won Entertainer of the Year for the fourth straight year.
"As much as tonight is about awards, I really believe that being able to stand up here is more about great songs," a choked-up Kenny said on the stage. "This is my fourth time standing up here, and I'm really humbled by it."
What I love most about the CMAs is that everyone always seems like they are having such a blast. There's very little of the "we're all better than you people at home" feeling, and all the stars really seem appreciative.
Makes this city slicker wish she was a country girl sometimes. Ya hear?
November 12, 2008
Obama in 2004
Via this TPM Reader blog, I found out that Beliefnet.com has just published the full transcript of an interview Obama gave in March 2004 to the then-religion reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times, Cathleen Falsani. The interview is principally about Obama's religious beliefs but also, inevitably, draws in many other issues.
Give Up and Use Tables
“We’ve scientifically determined the maximum amount of time that you should need to make a layout work in CSS: it’s 47 minutes. When your time is up, we’ll even give you the table code you need.” Nine months late on this link, but then again it would’ve been funnier a few years ago anyway.
Stripes
Graphics occurring in nature. Shot in San Francisco last Friday.
I can't help it, I still want to have a fancy wedding, even
I can't help it, I still want to have a fancy wedding, even though I know it's WRONG.
SPECIAL TIMES EDITION BLANKETS U.S. CITIES, PROCLAIMS END TO WAR
SPECIAL TIMES EDITION BLANKETS U.S. CITIES, PROCLAIMS END TO WAR
Early this morning, commuters nationwide were delighted to find out
that while they were sleeping, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had
come to an end.
If, that is, they happened to read a "special edition" of today's New
York Times.In an elaborate operation six months in the planning, 1.2 million
papers were printed at six different presses and driven to prearranged
pickup locations, where thousands of volunteers stood ready to pass
them out on the street.Articles in the paper announce dozens of new initiatives including the
establishment of national health care, the abolition of corporate
lobbying, a maximum wage for C.E.O.s, and, of course, the end of the
war.The paper, an exact replica of The New York Times, includes
International, National, New York, and Business sections, as well as
editorials, corrections, and a number of advertisements, including a
recall notice for all cars that run on gasoline. There is also a
timeline describing the gains brought about by eight months of
progressive support and pressure, culminating in President Obama's "Yes
we REALLY can" speech. (The paper is post-dated July 4, 2009.)"It's all about how at this point, we need to push harder than ever,"
said Bertha Suttner, one of the newspaper's writers. "We've got to make
sure Obama and all the other Democrats do what we elected them to do.
After eight, or maybe twenty-eight years of hell, we need to start
imagining heaven."Not all readers reacted favorably. "The thing I disagree with is how
they did it," said Stuart Carlyle, who received a paper in Grand
Central Station while commuting to his Wall Street brokerage. "I'm all
for freedom of speech, but they should have started their own paper."For video updates: http://www.nytimes-se.com/video
The Times responds here and here. Others reported on the spoof as well;
the BBC
Is your company designful?
The best thing I’ve read recently on experience strategy and design is Marty Neumeier’s recent essay for DMI, “The Designful Company.” (PDF) It presages his forthcoming book of the same name. It treads ground familiar to those who have read Subject to Change, though has some new research and datapoints to help bolster the case for organizations to embrace design. The results of a survey of 1,500 executives asked about their most challenging problems revealed this list:
1. Balancing long-term goals with short-term demands
2. Predicting returns on innovative concepts
3. Innovating at the increasing speed of change
4. Winning the war for world-class talent
5. Combining profitability with social responsibility
6. Protecting margins in a commoditizing industry
7. Multiplying success by collaborating across silos
8. Finding unclaimed yet profitable market space
9. Addressing the challenge of eco-sustainability
10. Aligning strategy with customer experienceAnd I loved the insight that companies religiously following Siz Sigma actually performed below the broad market average.
I’m also happy to announce that Marty will be speaking at MX 2009, where he’ll bring his insights from his work and research to our audience, helping them understand how they can make their whole company (not just their department) a designful one.
Down the Tubes?
The last counting of absentee ballots has Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) down to a 971 vote margin over Mark Begich. The vote counters got through about half the absentee and questioned ballots today; and it took Stevens' margin from over 3k to just under 1k. More counting tomorrow.
Thanks to TPM Reader SP for the tip.
God’s Facebook Wall
Created by Andrew B.
Google Flu Trends: Tracking Flu across the U.S.
Google has discovered a close relationship between how many people search for flu-related topics online, and how many people actually have flu symptoms, by comparing their query data with data from the surveillance system managed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Of course, not every person who searches for "flu" is actually sick, but a pattern emerges when all the flu-related search queries from each state and region are added together.It turns out that traditional flu surveillance systems take 1-2 weeks to collect and release surveillance data, but Google search queries can be automatically counted, and geographically located, very quickly. By releasing, and then visualizing [google.org] the aggregated search data to the public, the resulting influenza estimates may enable public health officials and health professionals to better respond to seasonal epidemics and pandemics.
See also Who is Sick - Sickness Map. Via kottke.org and Flowing Data.
Valleywag To Become Section of Gawker.com
Shared by Jake Dobkin
I generally think all of Nick's decisions ultimately turn out to be right-- but this one doesn't make much sense. Valleywag is a great site, well-differentiated geographically, and it doesn't have shiz to do with the NYC gossip scene. Let's hope it's a false rumor.
Rumors are flying that Valleywag will be "shuttered." It won't. It will be consolidated into Gawker.
Gawker CEO Nick Denton foreshadowed this move in this sky-is-falling post this morning. Valleywag's 1 million uniques will be worth more as part of a larger, easier-to-sell audience on Gawker. The posts will run in the main Gawker feed, and Valleywag's front page and logo will remain (the site will live at www.valleywag.gawker.com, or a similar URL). Owen Thomas, the Valleywag, will not be canned.
See Also: Nick Denton: Media Sleepwalking Into Extinction
Manning the Tubes
The Obama transition team announces its internet outreach staff.
Rise to the Moment
I think TNR has this just right ...
The greatest risk for Democrats is not that Obama will try to do too much, but that their terror of failure will lead them to waste an historic opportunity. This is not a Clintonian moment. It is more like the moment Lyndon Johnson inherited in 1965, or the one Franklin Roosevelt faced in 1933--a chance to reshape American government. The Democrats have it in their grasp to master the great problems of public life if they can summon their collective nerve. The only thing they have to fear is fear itself.This is why, perhaps paradoxically, I'm not overly concerned at the rumored cabinet appointments that have some people worried. For a strong-willed president, cabinet officers are there to execute the president's vision and plan. And experience in government is an asset in execution, if it can be detriment to breadth of vision and ambition.
Obama promised big things; and I take him at his word.
(Hat tip to Sullivan for the link.)
Really busy Brooklyn
For his Fabric of Brooklyn project, Tom Mason took photos of scenes in Brooklyn and combined them to depict super-bustling neighborhoods. Reminded me of this wonderful composite image of a busy airport by Ho-Yeol Ryu.
(link)
Stuff from Zach
I'm about to basketball you to death tonight, so let's put a little baseball buffer in between Al Horford and Jack Lambert (there is something as too much awesome) and show off some stuff I got in the mail today. Reader Zach saw I pulled a Mike Aviles RC out of Topps Updates & Highlights and, being a Royals fan, really really wanted him. So, I sent Zach that Aviles and a few Royals cards (lots of Beltran. Jeez I got a lot of Beltran cards) and he sent me back this:2008 Topps Dick Perez Chipper Jones!
Do you know what this MEANS??
I never have to buy another pack of 08 Topps U&H from Wal-Mart ever again!
YAAHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I'm already regretting getting that blaster from Target, even though I got an Asdrubal Cabrera jersey, an Eric Chavez jersey, the 1994 NL West Title and the immortal soul of Ernie Lombardi out of the deal. I'll regret it more once I start opening Heritage High Series packs.This extremely dark card is from 2000 Mystique, a somewhat forgettable set. Of course, I've got a ton of it, but I don't actually see this one in my Chipper box, so BOOYAH!
2007 Upper Deck Triple Play. This was a bonus on one of UD's Fat Packs last year. I think it was in the end of the year series one and two combo packs. I bought one of those packs specifically for the Chipper and I've gotten at least two more from readers in trades. But wait! There's a scratch off game on the back where I can get 10,000 bonus points for Upper Deck's reward program! Which is only for kids! Oh well, a Chipper's a Chipper. I'm cure Canuck will want it, and I need to find some trade bait for that Matt Ryan he pulled anyway.
Thanks Zach! I'm glad we were able to help each other to stop buying Updates & Highlights!
(Hey Zach, if you have a blog, let me know and I'll link it. I can't remember if you do or not right now)
Washington Post blogger shuts down company sending out two-thirds of all spam
in his investigative report, he turned over four months of data-gathering to the colo, who sut them down
it's all right there
David Byrne's long and thoughtful post on his visit to Philadelphia, the Quilts of Gee's Bend and the work of James Castle is worth reading.
Now, one of the qualities that is often brought up to separate Castle or the Gee’s bend artists from those who more regularly show in fine art galleries, auction houses and museums is intention. It is assumed that there is an awareness and intention in a work by Warhol, Ruscha, Betcher, Polke, whomever, that is not there in someone like Castle. I would suggest that his work proves that this is just not true. His intentions may not be geared towards the same marketplace, collectors and trade publications, but aesthetically it’s all there. The response to the world, a way of looking, a seriousness, and an investigation of phenomena, thoroughly done and from multiple angles — it’s all right there.
The Value of Automated Error Reporting
Nick Bradbury: “I’ve been going over the past few months of error reports, and much to my surprise, I discovered that the top three most common problems were never reported in our support forums.”
Wiki Wednesday: Bike Bus
Today's Streetswiki entry comes from Josh, a Livable Streets member based in San Francisco, who writes:
A Bike Bus is a group of cyclists riding together to a specific destination on a schedule with an experienced leader. Bike Buses are often formed by commuters who ride together to work. However, a Bike Bus can be adapted to go anywhere groups of riders want to go- church, shopping, the zoo, parks -- If a road goes there, a Bike Bus can go there. It's called a "bus" because there is a set route and timetable so it can pick up more "passengers" along the way.
The Bike Bus rides two abreast (where legal) and will single up as needed.
The pace of the bike bus is agreed upon by the members that day. Since the Bike Bus serves a safety and a social function, dropping slower riders is generally not a good idea. However, if there are enough riders, splitting the Bike Bus into two or three groups riding different paces can be a good idea. Smaller groups are easier for motor vehicles to pass as well.
TA has been organizing variations on the bike bus for commuters who ride over the Queensborough and Williamsburg bridges. Their bike commuter pools meet up once a month, giving homeward-bound cyclists some safety in numbers on Queens Boulevard and Delancey Street, where physical protection is sorely lacking.
Queens committee chair Mike Heffron tells us all went smoothly on the last Queens Boulevard pool. The next one departs this Friday at 6:30 p.m. from the base of the bridge, on the Queens side.
Bigger Labor
Top labor leaders are getting together tomorrow in DC to put together their campaign to push for key agenda items from the new administration and new Congress.
Not surprising, but still interesting to note, is that the personnel decisions at Treasury don't seem that high on their list of concerns.
She Needs Help
With the cable nets acting as Palin's enablers, who will organize the intervention?
The Cheney version of the Office of the Veep, ensconsed in the Plum Book
Today heralded the release of the Plum Book, which is the listing of all the 7,000-plus political appointment positions available in the U.S. Government; it's a publication I never knew existed until I saw mention of it on the Presidential Transition website (which I, in turn, found out about via the Obama Administration's Change.gov website). It's mostly mind-numbing, but paging through the PDF of it today, I was pretty shocked to see the existence of Appendix 5, entitled "Office of the Vice Presidency". I'm not sure I've ever seen the meaning of this appendix mentioned before:
the Bush Administrationsomeone appears to be using the Plum Book to push the mostly-ridiculed idea that the Office of the Vice Presidency is part-Executive, part-Legislative. Here's the first paragraph of the appendix:The Vice Presidency is a unique office that is neither a part of the executive branch nor a part of the legislative branch, but is attached by the Constitution to the latter. The Vice Presidency performs functions in both the legislative branch (see article I, section 3 of the Constitution) and in the executive branch (see article II, and amendments XII and XXV, of the Constitution, and section 106 of title 3 of the United States Code).Looking at the historical Plum Books, this appendix appears to have materialized in the 2004 edition, well before Vice President Cheney made his claim to the National Archives that his office straddled the two branches of government (that certainly makes it seem like Cheney had that lie planned for quite a while before he found a need to invoke it, doesn't it?). It's all the more curious because the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs is responsible for the contents of the 2008 Plum Book -- this is the very same committee currently chaired by Joe Lieberman and the subject of much news this past week as Lieberman's fate is being debated. Does the Committee really agree with this interpretation of the Office of the Vice Presidency's position in the government, or did they just unknowingly carry the appendix over from the 2004 Plum Book (which was published by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, then chaired by Republican Tom Davis)? This seems like a good question to ask the current membership of the Committee... (which, incidentally, includes Senator Barack Obama until January 20th, when he takes another job).
(Incidentally, this interpretation of the Office of the Vice Presidency didn't make it into the official U.S. Government Manual, which has the Veep's office squarely in the Executive Branch in multiple places, and has as far back as one is able to browse.)
Google Flu Trends uses web search to track real flu
From Google.org (headed by 2006 TED Prize winner Larry Brilliant) comes this neat data display: Google Flu Trends. The project came about after some Google search engineers wondered if, in communities where more people searched on the term "flu," there might actually be more flu. After talking with the Predict and Prevent group at Google.org, they came up with a tool that, they write:uses aggregated Google search data to estimate flu activity in your state up to two weeks faster than traditional flu surveillance systems.
An animated graph shows how, last year, Google data edges the CDC's. You can also visit the site to find the nearest available flu shot in the US.
Red Mango's New Pomegranate Frozen Yogurt
Red Mango, the frozen yogurt chain that's not Pinkberry, just launched a pomegranate yogurt this week, adding a third flavor to the menu's "original" and "green tea." Oddly enough, Pinkberry is also introducing a pomegranate flavor next week, except it doesn't advertise the POM Wonderful juice as an ingredient, as with Red Mango's version.
For me, the appeal of pomegranate is in the seeds. The crunch, the tang, the way they mysteriously dissolve in your mouth. But pomegranate-flavored yogurt? Does pomegranate even have a defined flavor? (Other than generic reddish, tartish fruit?)
It's not Red Mango's fault that the yogurt isn't overwhelmingly pomegranate; I'm not sure pomegranate even knows what it should taste like. Extracting the "essence" of the fruit, but leaving the seeds behind, seems fruitless. (Ha.) For a more pomegranatey flavor at Red Mango, my approach would be the original yogurt with a side of seeds.
All You in Lobby Land
I know a lot of you in the K Street/DC lobbying and meta-lobbying world read TPM pretty closely. So please remember to ping us when you hear about personnel changes and other such happens as the city gears up for the new administration and new congress. Anonymity, of course, guaranteed.
Man Keeps Pizza Oven Fired Up 24/7, 'Just In Case Friends Stop In'
By day, Julian Abramson is a chili pepper farmer about an hour north of Cape Town, South Africa. But whenever he wants, he can also be a pizza oven master since his backyard wooden oven—using wood from a non-native Australian tree—is heated 24/7.
As a farmer, Abramson naturally has pots filled with herbs, tomatoes, and peppers for his pizza's homemade sauces and toppings. His favorite combo: bananas, green chili, and garlic. He makes the thin-crust pies "spontaneously all day whenever he, his family, or random neighbors are hungry."
GoodEater.org contributor Joshua Levin visited Abramson in Tierfontein, South Africa. Levin left so inspired, he's starting a series called “Pizza Oven Lifestyles," which will spotlight members of this growing global subculture of pizza oven mastery. If you know others, contact the GoodEater gang.
Eater Scenes: Freemans, 8 PM
Welcome to our new photo series, where Eater photographer Daniel Krieger visits some of the city's storied restaurants to capture them at a certain, and very specific, point in the day. For our latest installation, we visit Freemans at 8 p.m.
Lower East Side: Favorite of LES scenesters and all manner of good looking fashionable downtowners, Freemans and its designer Taavo Somer are credited with starting a whole new aesthetic both in the food and fashion worlds. Known for its "hidden" location, collection of taxidermy, and homey vibe, the hope is that they'll soon be known for the new menu of incoming chef Michael Citarella. The time to visit, to see and be seen: 8 p.m. First we'll take a look at the bar. Coming up next: the dining room.
· Previous Installations of Eater Scenes [~E~]
Red Hook Vendors: Apparently the appearance of several Red...
Apparently the appearance of several Red Hook Vendors at the Bell House's election party went so well, the Gowanus venue is going to make them a permanent feature: "Just heard from an employee that they will be coming out on a semi-regular basis for events there–starting with the AC Newman concert this weekend." [GL]
Outside.in looking for a CTO
It's been a very good six months at outside.in. We've launched Radar, our GeoToolkit platform, and just yesterday rolled out our API. And we're starting to see our traffic numbers really take off at an amazing rate: our core site audience has grown 400% this year; more than a thousand bloggers and media sites are now using our tools as part of the outside.in network (and it's only about two months old!) And we've got some great new tools and services in the short-term pipeline...
Of course, that kind of rapid growth creates a new set of challenges, most of them revolving around scaling. To date, our amazing co-founder and CTO Cory Forsyth has done a tremendous job creating the whole outside.in ecosystem, from the core site to the network tools to the admin system. But we know that there are big performance and scaling issues involved in building an architecture that can support massive traffic, and play a critical role in the evolving geo-web across tens of thousands of network partners. Putting all that together is a job in itself.
So we're looking for a CTO who has extensive experience building web applications with that level of usage who will work alongside Cory (he'll become our VP of Engineering.) It's a great gig, with lots of fun challenges and about as enjoyable an office environment as you could imagine. Our CEO Mark Josephson has a blog post here that talks about the job in more detail, but if you're interested drop a line to jobs@outside.in with your resume or LinkedIn profile.
Obama Wants Car Czar to Accompany Big Three Aid
More details of a possible Obama administration-led auto industry bailout emerged yesterday when Politico reported that the president-elect wants a "high-profile point person to oversee reforms" attached to any financial aid.
Specifics about the proposal remain unclear. But the transition team says Obama suggested to President Bush on Monday that aid to the auto industry could be coupled with the appointment of "someone in charge of the auto issue who would have the authority" to push for reforms. The details came from a more extended readout of the White House meeting provided Tuesday.
It will be interesting to see how this proposal plays in Detroit, where resistance to change, even in the marketplace it serves, may be the biggest contributor to its current predicament. In the meantime, how might the next president balance his union sympathies and urban policy cred in the name of auto industry "reform"?
● The end of Wall Street and Michael Lewis' new "fucking book"
Michael Lewis takes a look at the current financial crisis and traces its roots back to the 1980s and the events chronicled in his book, Liar's Poker. He begins by introducing us to some analysts and investors that saw the whole thing coming. One of those people is Steve Eisman.
"We have a simple thesis," Eisman explained. "There is going to be a calamity, and whenever there is a calamity, Merrill is there." When it came time to bankrupt Orange County with bad advice, Merrill was there. When the internet went bust, Merrill was there. Way back in the 1980s, when the first bond trader was let off his leash and lost hundreds of millions of dollars, Merrill was there to take the hit. That was Eisman's logic-the logic of Wall Street's pecking order. Goldman Sachs was the big kid who ran the games in this neighborhood. Merrill Lynch was the little fat kid assigned the least pleasant roles, just happy to be a part of things. The game, as Eisman saw it, was Crack the Whip. He assumed Merrill Lynch had taken its assigned place at the end of the chain.
It's a fantastic article, well worth reading to the end...the final dozen paragraphs are the best part of the whole thing. Who knew deviled eggs were so pregnant with metaphor?
As I was reading the article, Matt Bucher dropped a note into my inbox. As hoped for months ago, Lewis is writing a book about this whole mess.
MONEYBALL and THE BLIND SIDE author Michael Lewis's untitled behind-the-scenes story of a few men and women who foresaw the current economic disaster, tried to prevent it, but were overruled by the financial institutions with whom they worked, sold to Star Lawrence at Norton, by Al Zuckerman at Writers House (NA).
The Portfolio piece will definitely find itself into the book, as will this piece on Meredith Whitney, this one on Goldman Sachs, Lewis' subprime parable, and other pieces from Bloomberg, Porfolio, and his upcoming gig at Vanity Fair. One question though...what happens to Lewis' forthcoming book on New Orleans? Did that just disappear?
Cool new Dutch coin
Matthew Dent's new coinage for the UK was pretty great, but this Dutch commemorative coin is a fully contemporary chunk of wow.
On the front, the names of famous Dutch architects form an image of the queen while some Dutch architecture books on the back form an outline of The Netherlands. The design was done using free software running on Ubuntu/Debian. (via design observer)
(link)
Today’s Headlines
- News Predicts $3 Base Fare If MTA Funding Remains Unchanged; Post Forecasts 30 Percent Hike
- Dems Pledge to Aid Detroit in Lame Duck Session; Obama Wants Auto Industry Czar (NYT, Politico)
- Cato Institute: Let GM Fail (News)
- Paterson Eying State Gas Tax Hike (Daily Politics, Post)
- The Frustrating History of East River Bridge Tolls (NYT)
- Markowitz: Bridge Tolls 'Impose an Unfair Tax on the Outer Boroughs' (Real Estate Law Blog)
- Oil Prices Drop Below $60/Barrel (NYT)
- More Evidence That Traffic Is Not Like Water (Cap'n Transit)
- European Tram Makers Jockey to Supply U.S. Cities With New Streetcars (IHT via Planetizen)
- Pricetag for ARC Tunnel Climbs a Billion Dollars (Times Herald-Record)
In Finland We Play On Our Knees
In Finland We Play On Our Knees
Endless riffs: Pharaoh Overlord, live in Finland.
Related, there’s a new Circle album coming out featuring Bruce Duff on vocals. The collaboration was first seen on the Earthworm CDEP in 2006.
And most importantly, I’m trying to get my hands on a copy of the Circle documentary that was released last year, entitled Saturnus Reality. It’s described as “a rock documentary meeting experimental film fantasy; inspired by the works of such as Stan Brakhage and Kenneth Anger.”
2008 Masterpieces Football
So these arrived at Target yesterday, and Thorzul and I got some. I ripped one pack over on APAD, but I saved two of 'em just for you. Awww yeah, you know I treat you right, baby. I'm guessing Basketball Masterpieces will be out sooner or later to take my money. There better be a 'Nique. I'm not holding out hope for any Falcons though, the only birds with a halfway decent moment in NFL history is Tim Dwight with his Super Bowl return and He Who Must Not Be Named with about fifty insane plays. Let's see what I got anyway. Pack 1:
Upper Deck finally credited the artists in this set. Ron does a very impressionistic take on Brady and the tuck rule on this card.
I don't know who this guy is, and I don't care 'cause he's a lousy Redskin. This is as good a time as any to show you the back of one of these cards. For some reason all the rookies in this set seem to be painted with etherial beckgrounds.
Wes Welker? Really? 90 cards in the set (I think) and Wes Welker makes the cut? There better be a fecking Falcon in this set if Wes Welker is in there, goddammit.
Silent Bob is looking over to the sideline where Jon Kitna is dancing and singing "Smokin' weed, smokin' wizz, Doin' coke, drinkin' beers, Drinkin' beers, beers, beers, Rollin' fattys, smokin' blunts, Who smokes the blunts? We smoke the blunts. Rollin' blunts and smokin'..." No wonder Jon's on the IR. Lions shouldn't have drafted a stoner like this, it only hurts the team. Lions fans need to blaze all they possibly can.
Scoring Drive Code CardI give ToppsTown endless crap, yet I still want to log on and try this game. A hypocrite is me.
Pack 2:Yeah! Franco! He's running so fast he's leaving Franco trails behind him. Immaculate Reception my butt, Franco's a time warping space ninja! Man I loved the Steelers when I was a little kid... Then I started following the Falcons and my life was ruined. Oh, to be young and not stupid again...
HOLY
CRAAAAAAAAP
THIS
IS
THE
GREATEST
FOOTBALL
CARD
EVER MADE
PERIOD
I NEVER HAVE TO BUY
ANOTHER PACK OF FOOTBALL CARDS AGAIN
BECAUSE I WILL NEVER PULL A CARD
AS INSANELY AWESOME AS THIS ONE
EVER
I WANT THIS CARD
TATTOOED
TO THE INSIDE OF MY EYELIDS
HOLY
JUMPING
JESUS
ON
A
POGO
STICK
THIS
CARD
IS
AAAAAAAAWESOOOOOOOOOME
!!!!!
!!!
!Who is this fool? I don't care about him, I want more Lambert!
This guy's not even a football player! What's he ever done?? I WANT A REAL FOOTBALL PLAYER!
THAT'S A REAL FOOTBALL PLAYER!!! I FREAKING LOVE UD MASTERPIECES!!!!!
iTunes 101: Deauthorize all computers at once
Filed under: iTS, iTunes, Mac 101
Many iTunes users are aware of the 5-computer limit for purchases made through iTunes. But what happens when you reach this limit? Well, you could go to each computer and de-authorize it by going to Store > De-authorize Computer, but this doesn't work if you get rid of a computer and forget to de-authorize it.
If you have reached your 5-computer limit, then launch iTunes, click iTunes Store, and then click your iTunes user name in the top-right corner of the store window. Once you login, you should see a page with all of your account information on it. In the middle of the page, you should see how many computers are currrently authorized. When you reach your 5-computer limit, a new button will appear here called "Deauthorize All." When you click this button, and confirm, your computer limit will start over at zero.
You will then need to re-authorize the computers that you want to keep. From iTunes, go to Store > Authorize Computer.
Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 section.TUAWiTunes 101: Deauthorize all computers at once originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 12 Nov 2008 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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November 11, 2008
Does Your Grocery Store Have You Crying Tears of Joy?
Not the Wegmans in question, but probably just as awesome nonetheless.
In some ways, I can totally relate to this woman. Because, even though I've only been exposed to Wegmans a couple dozen times—and all very briefly—I love the place.
One of my sons said, “Mom, are you really crying about this?” My daughter buried her head. I knew that (1) I was a complete loser, (2) I will forever love everything that reminds me of my hometown, and (3) I will always have a thing for Wegmans. My fellow flat-A-accented upstate friends understood: Something we all grew up with had moved in next door and now was everyone’s.
Wegmans is a chain of grocery stores that started in Rochester, New York, and that now has locations in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. It's completely amazing—great prepared food, good produce, a gigantic selection of groceries, health and beauty supplies, organic stuff, and various and sundry.
We didn't have anything close to it in my hometown. But how 'bout you? Do you have a local grocery store that you've sworn undying loyalty to?
Google.org tracking flu spread using search queries
brilliant use of search data; get a flu shot before it gets to your state! [via]
The Imaginary 1994 NL West: A blaster battle
From 1969 to 1993, the Braves and the Reds were both part of the NL West. 1994 brought realignment, new divisional foes to both teams, and a player’s strike to disrupt the whole season.
But what if things hadn’t changed? What if the Reds and the Braves had remained divisional foes? The Braves in 1994 stood at 68-46, six games behind the powerhouse Expos when the strike started. The Reds sat atop the newly created NL central with a 66-48 record. The teams, unmoved, would have been vying for first place in the NL West, probably until the end of the year while leaving the rest of the division in the dust.
But who would have prevailed? Who would be the NL West champ? Computer simulations only go so far to solve this puzzle, but I think the best way to end this horribly convoluted construction is simple:
BLASTER BATTLE!!!11!!!1!!
Who: Me and Cardboard Junkie
When: Tonight
Where: Here and there
What: 2008 Topps Updates and Highlights Blaster Boxes
Why: For the coveted imaginary 1994 NL West pre-realignment, and more!Rules and first pitch are around 9 ET over at Cardboard Junkie. So grab some peanuts and break out your rally caps!
Veterans Day
There are few odds and ends to bring everybody up to speed on.
First, today is Veteran’s Day, and I cannot suggest strongly enough that if you can mark the day in some way by honoring those who serve that you know and love, please do. Just as Election Day is a time to observe a civic duty, today is a day in which you might honor the great Americans who choose to serve or who have served. Their willingness to sacrifice for and devotion to the republic deserves our respect as this nation’s citizens. There are a few charities with tremendous records in the help that they provide disabled veterans—notably the Fisher House Foundation and the Fallen Heroes Fund—but tragically there are also a number that exploit the sentiments of those who would give for personal profit. In giving to charities that serve our servicemen and -women, please give with care to make sure that your gift makes a difference.
Second, in case it hasn’t become obvious, we’ve moved into our winter/off-season schedule. While that involves less daily content on most days, outside of observing a few holidays, we’ll be delivering content Sunday through Friday until pitchers and catchers report at the very latest. (That means we get to sleep in on Saturdays, which is rather grand now and again, the dingo permitting in my case.)
Third, consider this a spot-check to see if there’s that much interest among our Chicago readers to see if you want us to try and pull together a Windy City Pizza Feed. Let us know in the Comments section, and if there’s interest, we’ll try and accommodate you.
UNIQLO to Heat Things Up in Times Square
Next Tuesday, November 18, UNIQLO will be warming things up by launching its latest HEATTECH innerwear line! HEATTECH will come in a colorful array of socks, tees, long johns, and more, that all "convert body moisture into heat." The clothing will look like normal Uniqlo fare -- soft cottons in bright colors -- but the best part is that the promo schtick to kick it all off is straight-up baller: a "giant human vending machine." As for what that means, a rep for the Japanese answer to H+M said that Times Square will be overrun by mimes inside a crazy contraption of sorts breaking out a choreographed routine before personally delivering your outfits! To add to the madness, UNIQLO salespeople in futuristic silver bodysuits will be milling about and operating a thermograph scanner detecting everyone's body temperature. The FREE stretch, one-size-fits-all garb are, of course, limited –- 1,000 to be exact –- and have reportedly been a phenomenon in Japan (and the Japanese always know what's what with innovative fashion) so trust us and don't miss out! Details below: WHERE: Military Island, Times Square Broadway and Seventh Avenue, between 43rd and 44th Streets WHEN: Tuesday, November 18, 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
Simply Static Using Git
entp, the Portland based consultancy and incubator recently redesigned. They are proponents of Rails, but for the redesign opted to o static:
Hanging out with a group of developers, it’s hard to convince people that sometimes a static lifestyle is the way to go. For simple brochure sites – I still think 100% static is the best method out there. But there are some challenges associated with this – for example, I wanted to pull in people’s github repositories and rotate out employees at the bottom. Luckily for me, Github offers a nice JSON API with callbacks – so I’m able to pull in everyone’s non-forked repositories (thanks to a quick bribe) and show them there. Storing everyone’s information in a nice static json file allows me to work the rest of my magic, all with Javascript. Our deployment strategy is a cron job running a git pull – so anyone with access to the git repository can edit content and push it live.
Street with a View
You know how cars drive around and take photos of streets for Google's street view maps? Artists Robin Hewlett and Ben Kinsley invited Google to take photos of Sampsonia Way in Pittsburgh, where they would use Sampsonia's residents to stage "a series of tableaux" that would make their street seem like the most happening place on earth. If you follow the photos down Sampsonia way, you'll see a high school marching band, a sword fight, a third story escape, a mad scientist's laboratory, a garage band, marathon runners, sword-to-sword combat and more! This is my kind of mischief.
Here's a list of scenes with a link to how they appear in street view. The video portion doesn't work on the site, so I'll just put in the "making of" video here, which explains how they coordinated the whole thing.
Thanks to Wooster Collective for the link.
Facebook Now Worth About $4 Billion, Revenue Light
Facebook's common stock is now changing hands in private sales at about a $4 billion valuation, a source says (unconfirmed). And Facebook CFO Gideon Yu is indeed trying to raise money in Dubai, the source says (also unconfirmed).
As we all know, Microsoft, Li Ka-shing, and some German investors paid a $15 billion valuation for some preferred stock last fall. Importantly, this preferred stock takes precedence over the common: Microsoft will get its $250 million back before common shareholders get a cent (common shareholders will get to split up what's left). So it is inaccurate to say that Facebook's valuation has fallen from $15 billion to $4 billion.
But it seems safe to say that Facebook will have trouble selling preferred TODAY at a $15 billion valuation, given the change in expectations for the company's business outlook over the past year. Perhaps Gideon can find some folks in the Middle East stupid enough willing to pay that.
Facebook's latest round of employee stock options are priced about 5% higher than the prior round, our source says, at a valuation just north of $4 billion. (From memory, the source recalled a strike price of $9.27 per share, versus a prior round of $8.90.)
Facebook's revenue this year will be about $265 million, the source says, which is less than the $300 million expected. The source estimates that this is composed of about $180 million of ad revenue, $50-$60 million of virtual gifts, and some smaller revenue items. (unconfirmed)
A key upcoming event for Facebook will be the renegotiation of the Microsoft advertising and search deal: The source believes Microsoft overpaid the first time around and will therefore try to negotiate a better deal this time. This could hit Facebook's future revenue growth.
NOTE: None of the "unconfirmed" information above has been confirmed. We will be glad to make corrections if it is wrong. Please write to hblodget@alleyinsider.com.
See Also:
Update on Facebook Dubai Fundraising Trip
Facebook Hemorrhaging Cash, Runs To Dubai For Money
Veteran's Day
I suck. I totally forgot it was Veteran's Day. It's not like it's an easy day to miss, just look for all the ones. Hell, I'm MARRIED to a veteran! Still, I didn't remember it was Veteran's Day until I showed up at the post office and remembered why it was closed. In my defense, work last night was teh suck and I didn't even get to bed until after 4am due to two upgrades bombing at the same time. Still, no excuse. I suck. To get myself right again, here's a mostly complete (26/30) set of 2007 Topps Distinguished Service inserts. If you want to read a good post about Veteran's Day, go check out Houston Card Collector.
Thanks to all the veterans for your service, stay safe out there.
Relief Pitcher: Mets trying to get Bobby Jenks
In his latest report for SI.com, which is full of Hot Stove information, Jon Heyman writes, “The Mets are trying to swing a deal for White Sox RHP Bobby Jenks before doling out free-agent riches to Brian Fuentes or Francisco Rodriguez.”
Jenks, 27, completed 30 of 34 saves in 2008, with a 2.63 ERA in 61 innings pitched, during which opponents hit .230 against him while striking out just 38 times.
…jenks has been a pretty good pitcher since joining the league in 2005, to say the least…what’s more, he is under contract for the next three seasons…so, he’s going to cost a decent number of prospects, should the Mets work to acquire him…
Earlier in the off-season, in Newsday, Ken Davidoff wrote, “The Mets believe they have enough minor-league talent to trade for a closer, such as M’s RHP J.J. Putz, O’s LHP George Sherrill, Royals RHP Joakim Soria and Marlins RHP Kevin Gregg.”
…the thing is, if a team like the Indians and other teams are going to trade for a closer, as reports continue to suggest they will, i still feel the Mets best chance to get a closer will be through the free-agent market…
Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.
Is Student Cynicism Dead?
Examiner Column for November 12.
An expression that didn’t exist when I was a student is “whatever…” The ellipsis at the end is important because the power of “whatever…” is what it doesn’t say. On its surface, it’s colloquial for “It doesn’t matter,” except it is indifference with an “edge” that adds cynicism to that indifference. Not only do users of “whatever…” not care, they are also telling you to “get lost.”
Every election for the past twenty years has left most of my students with a “whatever…” reaction. Most didn’t vote because they thought it didn’t matter who was elected. They ranked politicians with used car salesmen and lawyers on their scale of trustworthiness.
Occasionally a few would become enthusiastic about a candidate only to have their youthful trust crushed by political or personal revelations of an unsavory nature. Then they would come to class and say, “I knew he was too good to be true. They’re all crooks.”Their political cynicism, however, melted during the presidential primaries. “The Obama Effect” was largely responsible for this, but many students volunteered for Edwards and other candidates--largely Democratic, but some Republican.
My students voted in the primaries, and they voted in the general election. They talked about politics before class started, and returned to the subject as they filed out of the classroom. They left class early to hear a candidate speak on campus or in a nearby school. This election has been unparalleled in the level of student involvement.
Georgetown is their nearest “bar scene,” and the night of election results many flocked there to watch results communally. They reported that Georgetown was “unbelievable,” “one huge party,” “people cheering in the streets,” “you couldn’t move it was so crowded.”
Whatever happened to “whatever”?
Students have new faith in the democratic process. If they voted for Obama, they are jubilant. Despite the economy, they are excited about the future. They hope Obama will change the way America works.
If they did not vote for Obama, or stayed away from the polls altogether, they still have renewed faith in our system of government. I don’t see anger or bitterness on the faces of McCain supporters. One young man said he voted for McCain, but still admired Obama and his family. He thinks he will disagree with his policies, but is impressed with his person.
They have confidence that Obama will not abuse the trust all of them have in his integrity and abilities. Where Republicans differ is in their expectations of how successful he will be in bringing reform.
So it’s a good time to be a student in America. The future looks bright even though there are plenty of problems to solve. Unless there is a major deterioration in the job market for college graduates, they will be able to find work and do what they have been trained to do.
“Whatever…” will not disappear from their vocabularies, but students dare to hope they won’t use it about their new president, his government, or the way the democratic system works. One man won the presidential election, but nearly all my students feel like winners, too.
Manhattan comics map
Alternate Manhattan maps, #510 in an infinite series: map of where the Marvel comic book characters hang out in the city.
Update: And of course, fans have made even better, more detailed maps. (thx, sam)
(link)
It's Official: Full Dem Caucus Will Vote On Lieberman's Fate
The full Democratic caucus will vote on whether Joe Lieberman is allowed to keep his chairmanship of the Homeland Security committee at its caucus meeting next week, a leadership aide confirms to us.
Previously, Reid's office had held this possibility out but hadn't made a final decision on whether to throw Lieberman's fate to the full Dem caucus for a vote.
In the wake of Obama's statement today that he doesn't hold any "grudges" against Lieberman and his decision not to take a position on whether Lieberman keeps his chairmanship, I emailed a leadership aide to ask whether the vote would definitely go forward. His response:
"Yes -- this is a decision that will be made by the caucus next week. Absent a stunning series of events there will be a vote next week in the caucus on whether to strip Senator Lieberman of the chairmanship."That would appear to make it official.
The news comes amid signs that Lieberman is losing support among his fellow Senators. The Huffington Post reports, for instance, that the Clintons are not making any calls on Lieberman's behalf. And Senators Chuck Schumer and Dick Durbin are reported to be hoping that Lieberman is given the push.
Now it looks as if these Senators will have an opportunity to vote on his fate, though the exact mechanism of how the vote will work is as yet unclear. More when we learn it.
Late Update: Senator Ben Nelson appears to support Lieberman keeping his committee perch.
Late Late Update: Chris Bowers has a useful look at how each individual Senator is likely to vote. The key point here is that the decision to go forward with the vote offers the anti-Lieberman forces a key opportunity to ratchet up the pressure right now.
Late Late Late Update: How will Reid himself vote? Last week he was reported to be leaning towards stripping Lieberman of his chairmanship. A Senate Democratic aide now tells me that "nothing has changed since last week." This suggests he may vote to give Lieberman the push, word of which could send a signal to other Senators to do the same.
DFW profile
A profile of David Foster Wallace from 1987, reprinted by McSweeney's.
"When you write fiction," he explains as part of his critique of a story about a young girl, her uncle, and the evil eye, "you are telling a lie. It's a game, but you must get the facts straight. The reader doesn't want to be reminded that it's a lie. It must be convincing, or the story will never take off in the reader's mind."
One of his two senior college theses was on philosophy (the other became The Broom of the System):
(link)His senior philosophy thesis, he claims, had nothing to do with writing. "It offered a solution in how to deal with semantics and physical modalities concerning Aristotle's sea battle. If it is now true that there will be a sea battle tomorrow, is a sea battle necessary tomorrow? If it is now false, is a sea battle impossible tomorrow? It's a way to deal with propositions in the future tense in modal logic, since what is physically possible at a certain time is weird because one has to distinguish the time of the possibility of the event from the possibility of the time of the event."
Starbucks Q4 Profit Drops 97 Percent
Despite the rough year, Starbucks still brought in $10.4 billion.
Sprint’s Now Dashboard
Hypnotizing.
Update: Kottke has details on who built it.
Relief Pitcher: Mets with Mild Interest in Street
Following yesterday’s trade, which sent RHP Huston Street to the Colorado, Scott Miller of CBSSports.com said the Rockies
are prepared to turn around and trade him, ‘though to which team he wasn’t sure.’
In a post today on his blog for the New York Post, Joel Sherman writes:
“The Mets have had only mild interest in Street (they are much more intrigued by Fuentes), but are sure to talk to the Rockies. I would think the Cardinals might be the team more likely to make a strong run at obtaining Street.”
In 63 appearances for Oakland in 2008, the 25–year-old Street was 7–5 with a 3.73 ERA in 70 innings, during which opponents hit .229 against him and struck out 69 times.
He had a 2.88 ERA in 2007, and a 3.31 ERA in 2006, during which he also had 37 saves.
Changes at Six Apart
Earlier today, I published the following message on our internal company blog. For those members of our community who wanted to know about the changes at Six Apart today, I've reposted it here publicly for reference.
Today we are making some changes at Six Apart. We are reducing the size of our full time staff by around 8% and are making some organizational changes as we prepare for 2009. This note is to provide some detail and context around these changes.
Everyone is aware of the challenging economic times we face. The uncertainty of 2009 has made planning very difficult but it is clear that next year looks very different now than it did just a couple of months ago. While it would be easy to just blame “the economy” for these changes, however, the truth is more complex.
This year was one of profound growth and change for Six Apart. In addition to welcoming almost 90 new people and growing to a company of over 200 employees, we launched Six Apart Services, Six Apart Media, Blogs.com, Movable Type Open Source and MT Pro, a suite of TypePad-powered products, including Blog It, Blog Link, the TypePad iPhone app and TypePad AntiSpam, and reached the final stage of the biggest technical project in the company’s history: the migration of TypePad onto a new platform. And, as you all know, we aren’t done yet, with several of our most significant product releases still to come this year.
From a financial point of view, the company continues to grow with Q4 2008 on track to be our biggest revenue quarter ever, and cash flows from our revenue, past financings, and sale of LiveJournal providing funds that will serve us well going into next year and beyond. Despite the challenging economic environment, we estimate that the depth and breadth of our products and services will allow us to continue growing revenue throughout this downturn.
So why are we doing this? First, as with many companies these days we are being proactive about keeping our expenses low. Second, with so many changes in 2008, and looking forward to the changing market 2009, we have to rebalance our organization accordingly.
We've been reminded lately that blogging was born out of the last recession in 2001 - 2002, and that during tough economic times creative voices look to powerful, cost-effective ways to connect and communicate with the world around them. With that backdrop, here are some of the organizational changes we are making and why we feel they are necessary:
Through these changes we have had to make tough choices about the right mix of people to meet these ambitious goals and this has resulted in some job cuts. We have cut other expense lines and the management team and I have agreed to take a 15% salary cut as part of these cost cutting measures. All employees leaving through this layoff will receive a severance package with additional payments to cover health care benefits and we will also offer placement services and do what we can to help them land on their feet. We are very sorry to see these good people go.
- Creating Six Apart “Genius” group. We are refocusing our marketing efforts from promoting Six Apart to helping support our bloggers and clients directly. Our marketing, community, and support groups will merge to create a single team whose mission is to help our bloggers be successful. Despite the economy, or perhaps because of it, we believe that more people will be turning to blogging to promote themselves or their business, and we want to provide them with more than just great technology but also help with getting started, design, building an audience, revenue generation, and more. We are committed to having Six Apart remain the best resource for individual and professional bloggers around the world. Bar none.
- Growing Six Apart Services. Our professional services group has grown significantly as our larger clients are increasingly using Movable Type and TypePad as cornerstones of their broader online strategies. Companies have always come to us to help them compete in a modern, social Internet but now they are also looking for more cost effective ways to run their entire web sites and seeing MT in particular as a complete web content management solution. With this has come the need for more support and services. Today we will be transferring several people from around the company into Six Apart Services and have more open positions in that group.
- One hosted technology team. As we all know, the TypePad migration has been a long and arduous project that organizationally split much of the engineering and ops team around various pieces of that project. As migration completes and we move forward, we are bringing the hosted engineering, analytics, infrastructure, open platforms, and operations teams under one leader, Ben Trott.
- Moving forward with Six Apart Media. While we expect that online advertising will be hard hit by this economy, analysts still expect Internet advertising to grow and we expect that Six Apart Media will continue to grow in 2009. We’ve had tremendous response to our advertising program that we launched in April which now includes almost a thousand bloggers and continues to grow rapidly. We are committed to serving these bloggers and helping them make as much money on their site as possible in this environment. We will continue to grow our sales force and account management teams to meet this need.
The management team doesn’t take these changes lightly and agonized over this decision. However, our first responsibility is to the company as a whole and we feel these changes are the right ones to keep the company competitive, secure, and positioned for future growth.
As I’ve said several times in the past, all companies face adversity from time to time, but the mark of a great company is how it responds. Today is a day when we will be tested. A day to help one another. And a day to say some goodbyes.
Tomorrow will be about redoubling our efforts to create an even stronger focus on what's made Six Apart successful: the bloggers we support.
Thank you for all you do.
● The New Yorker's online Digital Reader, an evaluation
The Mind-Blowingly Wonderful: It's every single page of every single issue of the New Yorker, from 1925 to the present, available online whenever you need it. No 9 DVDs needed. No plug-ins either, just a plain old web browser. And it's free with your subscription. Sweet fancy licorice!
The Good: Individual issues are bookmarkable. Forward and back arrows work to flip pages. If you're not a subscriber, you can sign up for four-issue trial or subscribe to just the digital version (~$40/year). At full zoom, the text is clear and easy to read. When an article doesn't appear for free on the New Yorker site, you're directed to the article in the Digital Reader. The DR is in beta and they're soliciting feedback.
The Bad and Not-So-Bad: The Digital Reader works on the iPhone...more or less. It's definitely not optimized for the phone and crashes often but works in a pinch. Some of the issues are missing...1962 and 1963 are largely AWOL. Issue archive always defaults to 2008, even while you're browsing an issue from 1937. Keyword search doesn't seem to work on older issues, i.e. most of the archive. There are a bunch of cool features that they could build on top of this thing: archive-wide search, compile/share lists of articles with other subscribers (i.e. make your own NYer mag from articles from back issues), keyword cross-referencing, etc.
The Ugly: Sadly, the actual reading interface is the worst part of the DR. The reader's interaction with the app relies too much on the mouse...more shortcut keys are needed (zoom, shortcut to TOC, move to top of next column, next/prev issue, etc.). Flipping through the digital magazine is easy enough but reading cannot comfortably be done at the page-flipping size. But when you zoom in, you need to zoom back out before you can flip to the next page. Guess how long it takes until that gets completely annoying? (A: After precisely one page turn.) I'd also like the magazine to fill as much of my screen as it can but instead the size of the viewing window is constrained. Bascially, make the thing as big as the screen will allow and give the reader one button to push to keep reading.
Even more maddening: after a short time, you have to re-login. I don't know if this is triggered by a period of inactivity or what, but it gets on all my nerves. (A "remember me" option that works across browser sessions would be welcome too.)
All-in-all, not enough attention was paid to the overall experience...it feels a bit like drinking fine wine from a sippy cup. That the Digital Reader exists is a great start but its shortcomings put too many roadblocks between the reader and her enjoyment of these great magazines, making the experience less wonderful than it could be. People *love* this magazine and the New Yorker should do everything it can to make people love reading it online.
Death & Taxes Poster
I'm a chart hound. I love the way one large intelligently designed single image can open up a world. My studio walls are covered with such portals. (For previously-reviewed cool charts see the Histomap of World History and A Correlated History of Earth). Recently I've add to my walls the 2009 "Death & Taxes" poster. In one large sheet this chart shows how your federal (US) taxes are currently divvied up among various agencies and programs. No matter what we claim our values are, how we spend our hard earned money speaks a thousand times louder and more truthfully about our real priorities. And what our money says is that we favor war over anything else. The immensity of military spending is made plain in this chart; the paucity of science funding equally vivid. But there are lots of other surprises: The size of health related spending, and highway funding. The numerous large sums for things you've never heard of.
A democracy needs informed citizens. This chart can quickly educate you about your government in a new way, a way in which a long list of incomprehensible budget numbers can not. The brilliance of this chart is Tuftian way it diagrams quick sense out of the complexity of a superpower's government and yet rewards close scrutiny.
You can scroll through this chart at close quarters via the online version, but you'll miss the punch of the big picture. Before you vote this election, spend some time with this guide to see how our national priorities shape up.
-- KK
Death & Taxes: 2009
24 x 36 inches
$30
Available from WallstatsRelated Entries:
Diagrammatic Chart of World History A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods Universal Heritage
Dashboard data overload
I don't know what this is or how it works or why Sprint is involved, but man is it fun to just let the data just wash over you. Wait, the computer woman just said, "Feel free to touch it." Uncomfortable! Who did this, BTW...Josh Davis, tha ltd., futurefarmers? (via airbag)
Update: It was done by Mike Kellogg and Goodby, Sliverstein & Partners. (thx, all)
(link)
McCardell Update
Remember this pattern? I did eventually make it up (see here). At the time I was really shaky about cutting into this pattern -- it's a Claire McCardell, after all -- but I eventually sucked it up and did it, and I was more-or-less happy with the results.
However, YOU don't have to worry, because EvaDress has added this pattern to their repro line, and multi-sized it, too! Click on the image to visit her site.
Also -- it's Veteran's Day (or Remembrance Day, for some of you out there), and if you do anything today (especially if you have the day off), could you do something tangible for a veteran? My son and I are boxing up a ton of books and magazines to send to his teacher's nephew, who is in the hospital in Maryland, recuperating from injuries he got in Afghanistan. I'm sure you know someone (or know someone who knows someone) who is in a similar position. Or you can check out this Metafilter post about other easy ways to send books to soldiers. If you are really motivated, you could also make a small donation to the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans. (I try to earmark mine for their women veterans program.)
And after you've done that, you can enjoy the Veteran's Day sales with a clear conscience. Like the one Sandritocat is having (free shipping to the USA and half off international shipping, plus the 10% DressADay discount you always get in her store).
● Obamaland and McCainland
Obamaland
McCainlandI think it works much better when it's all together, don't you?
Two Announcements
Announcement #1:
The people have spoken and have elected 2008 Topps Updates & Highlights as this weeks blaster what to be opened on this here blog. You could have had Allen & Ginter, but noooooooo. As a result of this electoral victory, Hand Collated has challenged me to a duel. Blasters at 10 paces. I hope he means card blasters and not Star Wars blasters or I'm screwed. Details are being finalized, my box break will be here live at about 9:00pm Eastern.
Announcement #2:
Barring unforseen circumstances, Dayf will be attending his first legitimate card show not tacked onto a FanFest or other such sports marketing opportunity in about a decade. The B.P. Sports Collectibles Autograph and Collectibles MEGASHOW at the Cobb County Civic Center. Details will be posted later this week or you can check out bpsports.com. Or, I dunno, click on the flyer I took the time to scan for you.
That is all...
November 10, 2008
Be like Barack
In Monday’s issue of The New York Times, media columnist David Carr gave readers a great overview of the grass-roots machine president-elect Barack Obama built by harnessing the power of online social networking – a machine that not only delivered the White House to him by a huge margin, but one that will no doubt have a hand in shaping policy and the overall role of the federal government.
By leveraging social networks and permission marketing best practices, Obama amassed a base of millions of dedicated supporters, all of whom willingly entered into what will be long and meaningful two-way conversations. And it all started with an equitable exchange of information for something of real value. This massive and energized support base was given a direct connection to the candidate, with the results being record-breaking fund raising and voter registrations, and an empowered electorate that will have a voice in the Obama administration.
“All of the Obama supporters who traded their personal information for a ticket to a rally or an e-mail alert about the vice presidential choice, or opted in on Facebook or MyBarackObama can now be mass e-mailed at a cost of close to zero. And instead of the constant polling that has been a motor of presidential governance, an Obama White House can use the Web to measure voter attitudes.”
What does this have to do with the music business? Everything! It’s the direct relationship between artists and fans (with nothing in between but the tools facilitating the conversations) that will drive this industry forward. The conversations start with something as simple as trading a free song download for an email address, and will evolve into long-term relationships in which fans are motivated and empowered to support their favorite artists through evangelism, patronage, and even feedback in the creative process.
Maily day: Trading with David
Wow. All I can say is wow. Looking at a stack of 80+ you receive in trade can be pretty intimidating. It’s a stack that makes you feel like what you sent back pales in comparison, no matter what it was. In this case, it was some Mets, some wantlist cards, a stack of the 50th Anniversary All Star Rookies, and a promise for Ring of Honor cards I pull from my Updates and Highlights box (if I ever get time to crack it open) I hope that’ll be enough. If not, well, he’s got my email.
Oh, and you can help David out by visiting his wantlist here. Hit it up and help him out.
Here’s some highlights:
It looks like Juan is contemplating the existential difference between fair and foul. If a mere speck of dust can determine the difference between a double and a do-over, what possible meaning can his life have?
Yeah, that’s right. World Series. You got a problem with that?
Someone at Topps forgot that cards are for kids.
SHARKS! DEAR LORD, SHARKS!!!! SAVE YOURSELF!!!!!
I’m going to go ahead and say it: Cordero was a 40 million dollar mistake for the Reds.
Just a cool card. These are the ones that make A & G stand out in the crowd. Why isn’t it a short print, though?
The woman who Lincoln called “the little lady who started [the] Great War.” I’m ashamed to admit I’ve never read Uncle Tom’s Cabin. I was planning to go to the bookstore tomorrow anyway, so maybe I’ll pick it up then.
Anyway, thanks again to David and I hope what I’ve sent can measure up.
Leapin' for Obama
I saw this photo and had to share it. I absolutely LOVE it.
When Barack first won, I just could not believe it. My cynical nature needed Fox News to report it. Then I needed McCain's speech. Then I needed to go to bed, wake up and hear NPR tell me that it was true. When all of that happened, I realized that this was for real. I cried with joy and disbelief. I cried all through Morning Edition and into BBC World News.
My story is not new. Many of you reading this cried with joy (hopefully). But now I am filled with feeling that the way I see race relations in the US are now forever altered.
I never knew how cynical I had become; how I honestly thought that this country was far too racist to let this happen. Now I have to rethink everything. And I want to. I don't want to craft all of the arguments about this country still being racist because of X, Y or Z. This is a new day. Anything is possible.
So now what? What holds you back? I realized that some unknown forces hold me back at times and well, I have to think about that. My life can be whatever I want it to be. Now I know it is so. Onward!
Card Of the Week 11/10/08
This Card of the Week is going to cause some people to scratch their heads, so a little set up is in order. People who have been following the blog for a while know I'm a big Red Dwarf fan. I've gome to grips with the fact that there will never be a movie, Craig Charles became a DJ, Chris Barrie is probably now a Tory MP from Cholmondeley (ok, he isn't but I'd like to think he is), Danny John-Jules is now a ninja, Robert Llewellyn is the host for a nerdy reality show and that awful Series 8 is what we're going to be left with as the parting images from that genius show. Yeah, sure, there's supposed to be a Red Dwarf Special in production*, but the movie was supposed to be in production 6 or 7 years ago so I'll believe it when I see it. Anyway to understand this week's card you need to know about the Red Dwarf episode The Inquisitor.
Basically the plot of the episode revolves around this crazy immortal God-Robot thing that has decided he is the ultimate judge of humanity and everyone who has not lived a worthwhile life must be eliminated. So this robot travels through time visiting every single person who ever lived andinsults themdetermines if they are worthy of living. If not, the Inquisitor zaps them out of existence and replaces them with someone else who would have been born had the sperm for this unfortunate slob not been quicker. So, knowing this, let's pretend that the Inquisitor had showed up at the Topps corporate headquarters looking for 2008 Updates & Highlights. He's all ready for a zappin' and is prepared to write '08 U&H right out of the fabric of space and time and replace it with 2008 Bowman Heritage. Since he is a fair insane megalomanaical bloodthirsty robot, he gives the set one chance to justify its existence. I have been appointed to be the advocate for this doomed set (after pointing to the 21 followers of my blog in order to keep myself from getting zorched) and I lay down one card that makes the Inquisitor turn around and walk out the door on his way to an urgent appointment with Nancy Grace. This is that card:
Ok, now everyone is COMPLETELY confused. We've somehow transitioned from an episode of Red Dwarf to an entry in Kevin's Orioles Card O the Day blog. I'm guessing the reaction to this choice is somewhere between bewilderment and angry incredulity. I don't even like Updates & Highlights**, I've been griping about it for over a year now and I just sacrificed Bowman freaking Heritage to save this garbage? For a card of Oscar Whatsisface? Who is this guy anyway? How can this card personally justify the existence of Topps Updates and Highlights? Well, let's look at the back of this wonderful card and you'll see why a card of Oscar Salazar is worth it.Just look at those stats. No, I mean really look at them. FULL. CAREER. MINOR. LEAGUE. STATS. There are more minor league teams on the back of this card than major league games played. Let's look over this career, shall we?
1994 - Signed by A's as an amateur free agent.
1998 - 26 games with the Arizona League Athletics (Rookie League).
1998 - 28 games with the Southern Oregon Timberjacks (Low A).
1999 - 130 games with the Modesto A's (High A).
2000 - 111 games with the Midland Rockhounds (AA).
2000 - 4 games with the Sacramento River Cats (AAA).
2001 - 130 games with the Midland Rockhounds (AA).
2001 - 5 games with the Sacramento River Cats (AAA).
1/24/02 Waived by A's, Signed by Tigers.
2002 - 53 games with the Erie Seawolves (AA).
2002 - 8 games with the Toledo Mud Hens (AAA).
2002 - Eight Glorious, Blissful Games With The Detroit Tigers
7/31/02 Waived by Tigers, Signed by Mets.
2002 - 28 games with the Binghamton Mets (AA).
2/17/03 Signed by the Angels.
2003 - 39 games with the Arkansas Travelers (AA).
2003 - 7 games with the Salt Lake Stingers (AAA).
5/24/03 Cut by Angels.
5/31/03 Signed by Royals
2003 - 78 games with the Wichita Wranglers (AA).
1/26/04 Signed by Indians
2004 - 44 games with the Akron Aeros (AA).
6/18/04 Cut by Indians
2005 - Played in Mexico
2006 - Played in Venezuela
2007ish - Ended up in Baltimore's system somehow
2007 - 136 games with the Bowie Baysox (AA).
2008 - 112 games with the Norfolk Tides (AAA).
2008 - Thirty-Four Heavenly, Orgasmic Games With The Baltimore Orioles Where He Actually Produced This Time
After all that, he gets called up when Steve Trachsel flops utterly and makes the most of his opportunity. The 30 year old infielder popped five home runs, hit .284 and earned himself at least a look in spring training for a job off the bench. The guy scrapped and clawed his way through a decade of bouncing around the bush leagues to earn a spot in the 2008 Updates & Highlights set. As far as I can tell, the guy only has three other cards from non-minor league sets. The guy's earned a card. No Topps U&H, no card. The set has justified its existence, and Oscar's card is the Card of the Week.
* Jesus Christ, there's a TV channel in Britain with my name. I thought the radio station was bad enough. Now do you understand why I go by Dayf?
** I better learn to like it quickly though, as it won the runoff election*** for the next blaster to rip.
*** If I go to Target and there's a blaster of Stadium Club Baseball there, Topps U&H can go to hell and burn brightly, democracy be damned.
Is Graphic Design Art?
Your chance to weigh in, courtesy of Mr. Essl.
EaterWire: Lox Populi, Back Forty Pigs, Mo Pitkins Sold, And More
EAST VILLAGE— It was "in contract" five months ago, but the Observer reports that Mo Pitkins has finally sold: "The building once home to Mo Pitkin's House of Satisfaction has been sold for $4 million...The squat edifice, at 34 Avenue A, was sold to an entity called LAMNG Corporation. The building has been on the market for more than a year, with an initial listing price of $5.5 million." What's more, according to CB3's agendas, a Corp to be formed is applying for a full liquor license at the Mo Pitkin's space tonight. [NYO; EaterWire]
LOWER EAST SIDE— Today Russ & Daughters launched their long planned blog, Lox Populi. Read about Pickle Day, a visit from Tony Bourdain, a party they're hosting at the Tenement Museum, and more. [EaterWire]
EAST VILLAGE— Back Forty is now roasting up and serving whole pigs every Monday night. From the release: "To prepare the pig, chef de cuisine Shanna Pacifico bones it herself; fills it back up with the meat, fresh herbs, garlic, and seckel pears; slowly oven-roasts it; and then slices it to-order as a dinner entree. A thick slice of the roasted swine costs $24 and comes with black beans and sauteed seasonal greens." [EaterWire]
LOWER EAST SIDE— Per the officials at the Living Room, the LES bar/music venue now has a photo booth. [EaterWire]
MURRAY HILL— The Feedbag reports that the Grand Saloon has finally reopened after it shuttered "for renovations" in mid-September. It is now called The Globe: "The new Irish owners restored the bar, careful to preserve its old-world charm. A fireplace apparently adds to the warm feel, while the TVs there for game watching don’t overwhelm the space...In approximately three weeks time, the kitchen will debut for lunch, dinner and late night bar snacks." [TFB]
A case for Catalyst
By Jay Shirley
Software is like any other product that is depended upon for doing any particular function. Software, vehicles and computer hardware are all simply tools intended for a particular audience; audiences that tend to become polar, enthusiastic and fanatical. Whether it is the car tuning crowd, the overclockers or the Perl hackers, they share the same thing in common: being devoted to something.
This devotion drives a great number of innovations, and this is where Software really stands out. Particularly amongst the Open Source crowd, where Software is bound with something even more polarizing: Personality
The merging of software and personality is both a blessing and a curse. People are seldom more motivated than when working with something that feels alive; but to attack or criticize is, by definition, personal.
The people who are the most knowledgeable to defend, market, recommend (or even attack) are the ones already entrenched. They are part of the personality mesh, and as such it is exceedingly difficult to try to promote and defend a software product without going into the years of positive experiences one has shared with the product.
This article is no different. I love Catalyst and have used it for years. I will, however, attempt to back up my passion with articles of reason and rational points rather than espouse virtues that are little more than anecdotal.
To get started down this path, I think it is important to properly frame Catalyst in scope. On its own, it doesn't do much. It certainly doesn't do much well, but Catalyst by itself is really little more than a web server; it is a request handler and dispatcher and sends the response to the client.
By itself, it fails to talk to a database or handle sessions. It won't even authenticate a user. It has no template system, and no caching. So why does Catalyst have a fanatical fanbase and successful sites with it?
Quite simply, it's the CPAN.
The Catalyst philosophy is populist, not dictatorial. A belief that tools should be built to do a specific feature or function, but not require usage of any given tool; granting flexibility to a developer to solve problems the Catalyst community has not thought of how to solve.
Catalyst doesn't require you to use Template Toolkit or Mason. It doesn't push DBIx::Class as The One True ORM. It lets you pick. It trusts that you are a software developer and you are solving a problem. Catalyst just makes it easy to make your decision, and integrate that solution and start working. Between helper scripts and thin model adaptors (Catalyst::Model::Adaptor), there is virtually no hassle in integrating any CPAN module or custom code directly into your applications. The side-effect of the "trust the user" philosophy, aside from a fantastic framework, is that it is quite simply just that: a framework. It operates and evolves on the principles of synergy alone, striving to make the whole greater than the sum of its parts. A simple goal of striving to make a developers life easier, more productive and deliver higher quality results.
The results are easily quantifiable. Software development, at its core, is about solving a specific and well-defined problem. The more advanced the software is (in evolutionary, organic growth), the tasks at hand are solved more efficiently, properly and faster. The most significant improvements in development speed and quality come in the form of frameworks and libraries that have been peer reviewed, tested, poked and approved by the fanatical masses.
This lowers the barrier of entry to solve problems, and in general increases the supply of developers to meet the seemingly inelastic demand of problems that need solving. In effect, there is a framework for everybody, from the novice tinkerer who simply has an itch to scratch to the mathematically minded engineers that operate on puritan principles. Catalyst strives to match the pace of the whole spectrum, which is significant work. It makes the upfront learning curve a bit steeper than it could be. Looking historically over the documentation and tutorials, this will change and the learning curve will be greatly reduced.
The important thing that every developer, whether extending Catalyst or using just the minimums, Catalyst is simply a tool. Tools in the software sense are different than in the tangible world, they can change shape and function. They can easily be used incorrectly, or adapted and accidentally solve an unexpected problem.
Catalyst developers understand this, and the goal is to simply develop a robust foundation, particularly in the web application space, to solve problems. How those problems are solved is left up to the developer, though. The Catalyst community, just as the Perl or any other community, has suggestions and opinions but ultimately the responsibility lies on the developer. A core tenant of the Catalyst (and the greater Perl philosophy) is to trust that the developer knows enough to solve the problem. The tool should never impose philosophical beliefs; imagine if a hammer would only hammer specific nails, what problems could be solved then?
This lack of capability, or rather tools being an obstacle rather than an aid, was what drove Catalyst to grow and evolve. Taking original concepts from other frameworks (like Maypole) and extending those ideas in an open minded fashion, and also to use more modern development practices and factor out common code to be shared outside of Catalyst.
When Catalyst hit version 5.5 several years ago, the codebase was solid enough to call mature. It was grown up, but not done growing. At this point, the mature development cycle began and rather than a rapidly growing and changing framework, a stable and robust framework was in existence. This started a chain of high-quality (and some high-traffic) sites that were built on Catalyst. There was much rejoicing.
There are a lot of websites running on Catalyst, for a full list please view the Catalyst wiki.
Jay Shirley is a Catalyst evangelist, an EPO founding member and just another Perl hacker. He's launched and managed several large scale projects on Catalyst, as well. He is the co-founder of Cold Hard Code, LLC, a company set up to use Perl and open source technologies to spawn quality websites.
ObamaBats
It’s remarkable how this politician has inspired the world of design: an enterprising freelance graphic designer created these twenty-four illustrations of President-Elect Barack Obama and packaged them as a TrueType font, free for download.
Just one of many forthcoming graphical immortalizations of this man, I’m guessing. Unless he disappoints in a major way.
architectural montage art by fillip dujardin
belgian photographer fillip dujardin specializes in architectural photography. while much of his work is taking
pictures of contemporary buildings by some of northern europe’s top architects, he also produces art.
using photographs of a verity of building typologies, dujardin laces them together to create non-existent
often impossible buildings. the building montages begin with a model in cardboard or computer model and
then dujardin seeks out suitable buildings. the results look like architecture gone wild, bizarre buildings
from the past or futuristic creations by contemporary architects.
http://www.filipdujardin.be
via bldgblog
Friends in High Places
A high-level senate Democratic source tells me former President Clinton is making calls on Sen. Lieberman's behalf.
I can also confirm, on the same basis, what Huffington Post has already reported, that President-elect Obama is signaling to Senate leadership and other party officials that he wants Sen. Lieberman to be in the Democratic caucus in the 111th Congress.
That doesn't mean he doesn't want him punished in some way. I have the sense -- though this is more speculation on my part -- that he's agnostic on that question. But he wants him in the caucus -- which would seem to give Lieberman some real leverage.
I'll have more on the Lieberman story soon.
Late Update: Kos has some more thoughts gaming out the options for Joe.
Vital MomoWire: Bakery/Milk Bar Menu Unleashed
East Village: Feast your eyes on the official, just-this-second released Momofuku Bakery/Milk Bar Menu. As promised, there are flavored milks, soft serve flavors, a variety of pork buns, cookies, breads, and "non-traditional pastries." But we also have some serious pie and cake action, and if you'll direct your attention to the right side of the menu please, some intriguing "etc." items including a deep fried poached egg or two and the rumored Volcano. These items can all be yours daily starting 8 a.m., hopefully as early as this Friday. Soft serve, buns, milks, and shakes are guaranteed all day long while the rest of the menu is offered from until 5 p.m. or until supplies run out.
· Momofuku Bakery/Milk Bar Menu [Official PDF]
· Fall Tracking BLOCKBUSTER: Momofuku's Milk Bar Set to Open "Soon" [~E~]
· Plywood Super Special: A Peek Inside Momofuku's Bakery/Milk Bar [~E~]
Hacking the UI to make Movable Type better
One of the great things about Movable Type is the multitude of ways it provides for folks to modify the core user interface without disturbing existing functionality. In fact Movable Type allows virtually anyone to:
- easily skin any screen in the application without requiring you to touch a single line of code.
And any developer to:
- transform the user interface on the fly with transformer callbacks - a system inspired by Greasemonkey, a popular Firefox add-on.
- define their own screens and seamlessly add them to the application via its menuing system, or through page actions.
It is these systems that we can use to help prototype and test new functionality and concepts in a more agile way that allows us to be more responsive to the feedback we receive. Take for example one of our latest hacks: an improvement to the User Management area for a blog:
This new plugin, available to users of Movable Type 4.2 and greater provides an improved layout and design to the user management area. There is not a lot of added functionality under the hood... yet. That is of course where you come in: what kind of added functionality would you like to see? And what do you think of the new design? What additional changes would you like to see? What kind of activities do you engage in most frequently when managing your readers and members?
daytum
I'm digging Daytum so far, the site from Ryan Case and Nicholas Felton "for collecting and communicating your daily data." The UI is a bit inscrutable at first -- you have to want to use it -- but it encourages experimentation. The data capture mechanism -- and the underlying data model -- is flexible enough to support multiple viz's of the same data set, which should be fun...as long as I can figure out something more interesting to track than number of cups of coffee imbibed and number of hours slept. (Feature request -- layer one data set on top of another...)
[Sponsored by...] 20x200: It's Art for Everyone
20x200 is built on a simple formula: (limited editions + low prices) × the internet = art for everyone.
We offer limited edition fine art prints at ridiculously affordable prices. Savvy art-addicted collectors are signed up for the mailing list — our newsletters give them advance notice of editions before they become available on the site's homepage.
Each week we announce at least two new prints, one photograph and one work on paper, in three sizes and editions. Priced at $20, $200 and $2000, the prints appeal to collectors emerging and established and often sell out in minutes. To accommodate that demand, we've recently started to expand our inventory, releasing special double editions, and larger $50 and $500 prints.
"Art for everyone" has been my goal since opening my gallery in NYC in 2003. I really believe that more people should collect art, not just to enrich their lives, but also because patronage matters. Why spend your money on posters from IKEA when you can build a collection of limited edition prints and photographs and directly support the artists who are creating them? In other words: Buying art is good and good for you.
I describe 20x200 as the gateway drug of the art world. Once you're hooked, you'll be coming back for more.
Finally, a word about why 20x200 is sponsoring kottke.org. We're pretty bullish on curation at 20x200 HQ, in art, in shopping, and in finding good stuff to read online. We've all been enjoying Jason's well-curated selection of links for years now, so we jumped at the chance to show him some love. Aside from that, our hunch is that if you like your web well-curated, you'll like our well-curated art too.
Outfielder: Sox looking to Trade Jermaine Dye
In a post to his blog for Newsday, Ken Davidoff lists three
teams who are willing to deal a veteran player, such as the White Sox, who are looking to trade OF Jermaine Dye.
…if the Mets need to acquire a corner outfielder with power, who has leadership skills, successful post-season experience, and a short-term contract, dye should be of interest to them…
…from what i can gather, the Sox will likely want a pitcher back in a deal for dye, who they are eager to move, in an effort to get younger and free up some cash…
Dye hit .292 with 34 HR, 96 RBI and a .344 OBP in 154 games for the White Sox this season.
He has hit at least 20 home runs during each of the last four seasons, while playing mostly right field.
Dye will earn $11.5 million in 2009, after which he has a mutual option in 2010 for $12 million, or a $1 million buyout that could make him a free agent.
Mac: The platform fit for a king
Filed under: Odds and ends
Saudi Arabian King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, or just King Abdullah for short, is among the expanding league of world leaders who choose to 'think different' and use Apple products.
In a photo provided to us by TUAW tipster Mohammed Al-Muhaidib, King Abdullah is seated on the right, in front of a 30-inch Cinema Display. His highness was monitoring the procession of the hajj in Mecca, the holy annual pilgrimage.
Michael Rose and I joked before last night's talkcast that former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, who sits on Apple's board of directors, sure is busy selling Macs to all these leaders at home and abroad, including Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, and U.S. Vice President-Elect Joe Biden.
Thanks, Mohammed!
TUAWMac: The platform fit for a king originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 10 Nov 2008 11:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Bleacher Creature Sighting
I really hate to totally steal this picture from Rowland's Office, who got it from The Hipster Dad, but I have been asked so many times about the legend that is... THE BLEACHER CREATURE that I would feel derelict in my duty to not share.
I've seen very few photos of this mythical beast and even though it appears to be eating a small child, this is the best photo I've seen of the critter. For those of you who haven't lived in Atlanta for over 35 years The Bleacher Creature was the Braves' cuddly mascot in the late 70's. I would actually much rather have this second cousin of the Swamp Thing back as our mascot seeing that our current one is a shameful Mr. Met knockoff. So sorry for stealing your precious childhood memories Hipster Dad, but I would be remiss in my duties as a Braves fan not to share the awesome. Now I just need to find a picture of the dude who always dressed like a monk at the Braves games in the 70's.
November 9, 2008
Exhibit A on why I now regret not buying Traded sets when I was a kid
I was going to do a more substantive post and maybe get some of my trade stuff together tonight, but instead I watched the Hawks and spent a half hour looking at videos of cuttlefish on YouTube. I like cuttlefish, they remind me of little baby Cthulhus. Anyway, I stumbled upon this card while sorting through a box of Braves cards and felt a twinge of regret.This is Pascual Perez' first Topps card in a Braves uniform. I would have gone nuts for a card of I-285 back in 1983 but I was too cheap to buy a set for 7 bucks. Of course I was spending my money instead on bricks of cards from the '60s and '70s, and I would surely have busted open the set and trashed half the cards and lost a third of the rest, but still. The card is somewhat odd in that Pascual made the Traded set in 1983, even though he was traded to the Braves in 1982. Why wasn't he in the '82 Traded set? Why wasn't he in the '83 base set?
The really disappointing thing about this card is because it ended up in the Traded set, the highlights on the back are for the 1983 season and not 1982. Thus, there is no highlight for Pascual Perez on August 19, 1982 and that's just a shame.
Coming Soon
As my final project with The Baseball Card Blog, I've decided on an epic. In the spirit of my previous adaptation (see below for an abridged, baseball-card version of A. Bartlett Giamatti's "The Green Fields of the Mind"), I will be setting Ernest Thayer's classic poem "Casey at the Bat" to cards. It seems like a fitting way to end things.
I haven't decided yet if I should post it all at once, or in serial format and then all together when it's finished. I can tell you this, it will take a bit of time to assemble. I also only have a tentative lineup of cards to include. So, if there are cards you think I should include in this, leave a comment to this post.
How wrong they were | Salon News
“I think it’s probably going to be Romney for the Republicans, Hillary for the Democrats” and other spectacularly bad predictions made during the past electoral cycle.
Remind me why we listen to these idiots, please?
Justseeds Will Resume Blogging When We Return From Retreat
Roger & Josh enjoying Milwaukee's fine cuisine
Emanuel: Obama's Priority Will Be Middle Class Tax Cut
By Michael A. Fletcher President-elect Barack Obama plans to push ahead with a middle-class tax cut soon after taking office, his choice for White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said today. Speaking on ABC's "This Week," Emanuel also hinted that the president-elect would not postpone a tax hike for families earning more than $250,000 a year, despite the deepening economic slowdown. He said that Obama's tax proposal, which he said would reduce taxes...Please click on the title to continue reading this entry.
Career Runs Created Leaders by Draft Round: Rounds 1-10
Here are the players with the most career runs created for each round of the player draft. (The player draft started in 1965.) This list is being presented as is. It is not intended to be the best hitters from each round. There are certainly too many other factors to consider to create such a list. I am including the links if you want to draw your own conclusions.
Today we’ll start with rounds 1-10.
1st Round: Barry Bonds 2892, Rafael Palmeiro 2040, Frank Thomas 2003, Ken Griffey 1934, Gary Sheffield 1901
2nd Round: George Brett 1878 Mike Schmidt 1757 Cal Ripken 1729 Jason Giambi 1476 Alan Trammell 1255
3rd Round: Eddie Murray 1941 Tony Gwynn 1636 John Olerud 1455 Tim Salmon 1206 Gary Carter 1184
4th Round: Rickey Henderson 2164 Jeff Bagwell 1788 Luis Gonzalez 1641 Graig Nettles 1265 Paul O’Neill 1241
5th Round: Tim Raines 1636 Dwight Evans 1612 Lou Whitaker 1395 Ray Durham 1177 Amos Otis 1114
6th Round: Hal McRae 1136 Cecil Cooper 1134 Sal Bando 1069 Devon White 1022 5 Eric Karros 935
7th Round: Wade Boggs 1750 Darrell Evans 1499 Jim Edmonds 1364 Willie Randolph 1139 Reggie Sanders 1060
8th Round: Eric Davis 985 Ron Belliard 655 Al Martin 652 Hal Morris 622 Jody Reed 572
9th Round: Fred McGriff 1704 Steve Sax 848 Mark McLemore 797 Bill Russell 757 Jesse Barfield 752
10th Round: Brady Anderson 1118 Mike Sweeney 867 Rusty Greer 731 Vince Coleman 688 Frank Catalanotto 598
Next time we can take a look at later rounds.
The Mini Depression and the Maximum-Strength Remedy
This is not the Great Depression of the 1930s, but nor is it turning out to be merely a bad recession of the kind we've experienced periodically over the last half century. Call it a Mini Depression. The employment report last Friday shows that job losses accelerating, along with the number of Americans working part time who'd rather be and need to be working full time. Retail sales have fallen off a cliff. Stock prices continue to drop. General Motors is on the brink of bankruptcy. The rate of home foreclosures is mounting.
When Barack Obama takes office in January, he will inherit a mess. (Because I'm an informal economic adviser, I should remind anyone who reads this blog that it reflects only my thoughts and therefore should not be attributed to him or to anyone else advising him.) What to do?
First, understand that the main problem right now is not the supply of credit. Yes, Wall Street is paralyzed at the moment because the bursting of the housing and other asset bubbles means that lenders are fearful that creditors won't repay loans. But even if credit were flowing, those loans wouldn't save jobs. Businesses want to borrow now only to remain solvent and keep their creditors at bay. If they fail to do so, and creditors push them into reorganization under bankruptcy, they'll cut their payrolls, to be sure. But they're already cutting their payrolls. It's far from clear they'd cut more jobs under bankruptcy reorganization than they're already cutting under pressure to avoid bankruptcy and remain solvent.
This means bailing out Wall Street or the auto industry or the insurance industry or the housing industry may at most help satisfy creditors for a time and put off the day of reckoning, but industry bailouts won't reverse the downward cycle of job losses.
The real problem is on the demand side of the economy.
Consumers won't or can't borrow because they're at the end of their ropes. Their incomes are dropping (one of the most sobering statistics in Friday's jobs report was the continued erosion of real median earnings), they're deeply in debt, and they're afraid of losing their jobs.
Introductory economic courses explain that aggregate demand is made up of four things, expressed as C+I+G+exports. C is consumers. Consumers are cutting back on everything other than necessities. Because their spending accounts for 70 percent of the nation's economic activity and is the flywheel for the rest of the economy, the precipitous drop in consumer spending is causing the rest of the economy to shut down.
I is investment. Absent consumer spending, businesses are not going to invest. Exports won't help much because the of the rest of the world is sliding into deep recession, too. (And as foreigners -- as well as Americans -- put their savings in dollars for safe keeping, the value of the dollar will likely continue to rise relative to other currencies. That, in turn, makes everything we might sell to the rest of the world more expensive.)
That leaves G, which, of course, is government. Government is the spender of last resort. Government spending lifted America out of the Great Depression. It may be the only instrument we have for lifting America out of the Mini Depression. Even Fed Chair Ben Bernanke is now calling for a sizable government stimulus. He knows that monetary policy won't work if there's inadequate demand.
So the crucial questions become (1) how much will the government have to spend to get the economy back on track? and (2) what sort of spending will have the biggest impact on jobs and incomes?
The answer to the first question is "a lot." Given the magnitude of the mess and the amount of underutilized capacity in the economy-- people who are or will soon be unemployed, those who are underemployed, factories shuttered, offices empty, trucks and containers idled -- government may have to spend $600 or $700 billion next year to reverse the downward cycle we're in.
The answer to the second question is mostly "infrastructure" -- repairing roads and bridges, levees and ports; investing in light rail, electrical grids, new sources of energy, more energy conservation. Even conservative economists like Harvard's Martin Feldstein are calling for government to stimulate the economy through infrastructure spending. Infrastructure projects like these pack a double-whammy: they create lots of jobs, and they make the economy work better in the future. (Important qualification: To do this correctly and avoid pork, the federal government will need to have a capital budget that lists infrastructure projects in order of priority of public need.)
Government should also spend on health care and child care. These expenditures are also double whammies: they, too, create lots of jobs, and they fulfill vital public needs.
Expect two sorts of arguments against this. The first will come from fiscal hawks who claim that the government is already spending way too much. Even without a new stimulus package, next year's budget deficit could run over a trillion dollars, given the amounts to be spent bailing out Wall Street and perhaps the auto industry, and providing extended unemployment insurance and other measures to help those in direct need. The hawks will argue that the nation can't afford giant deficits, especially when baby boomers are only a few years away from retiring and claiming Social Security and Medicare.
They're wrong. Government spending that puts people back to work and invests in the future productivity of the nation is exactly what the economy needs right now. Deficit numbers themselves have no significance. The pertinent issue is how much underutilized capacity exists in the economy. When there's lots of idle capacity, deficit spending is entirely appropriate, as John Maynard Keynes taught us. Moving the economy to fuller capacity will of itself shrink future deficits.
The second argument will come from conservative supply-siders who will call for income-tax cuts rather than spending increases. They'll claim that individuals with more money in their pockets will get the economy moving again more readily than can government. They're wrong, for three reasons. First, income-tax cuts go mainly to upper-income people who tend to save rather than spend. Most Americans pay more in payroll taxes than in income taxes. Second, even if a rebate could be fashioned, people tend to use those extra dollars to pay off their debts rather than buy new goods and services, as we witnessed a few months ago when the government sent out rebate checks. Third, even when individuals purchase goods and services, those purchases tend not to generate as many American jobs as government spending on the same total scale because much of what consumers buy comes from abroad.
Fiscal hawks and conservative supply siders notwithstanding, a major stimulus is in order. Government is the spender of last resort, and the nation is coming close to its last resort.
Gilbert Arenas Gets Obama Tattoo
Just in case you happen to read the Bog but not the Wizards Insider....With so many of Gilbert's previous tales having been later proved to be slight exaggerations, this one actually could be Top 5 in his all-time smack-your-head-into-your-monitor weirdness. Michael Lee reports: Arenas has decided to show his permanent support of President-elect Barack Obama with a tattoo. Arenas had the words "Change We Believe In" tattooed onto the fingers of his left hand in cursive writing. Then, Gilbert showed the outside of his pinky finger, which had "44" inked on it. Arenas shortened Obama's campaign slogan, "Change We Can Believe In," choosing not to add ink to his thumb. Arenas has "change" written on the outside of his index finger; "we" on the inside of his middle finger; "believe" on the inside of his ring finger; and "in" on the inside of his pinky and "44" on the outside
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