Aaron Hillegass on the Cocoa Text System
As a preview of our Cocoa 2 Bootcamp, I did a presentation on the Cocoa Text System for the Atlanta CocoaHeads. Here is the video and sample code.
« May 10, 2009 - May 16, 2009 | Main | May 24, 2009 - May 30, 2009 »
May 23, 2009
Techcrunch reports CBS secretly gave Last.fm data to RIAA
Arrington says CBS lied to Last.fm and gave it to the RIAA without their knowledge; Last.fm is vehemently denying it, implying a personal vendetta
A Pokemon of a Different Color
Ever since we all saw that first red Gyarados in our adventures in Johto, different colored, or shiny, pokemon have been a rare find, and heavily sought after. The chances of randomly finding a shiny pokemon in the wild, through fishing, or normal encounters is a staggering 1 in 8192. This means that through the normal course of a game, you probably won’t come across one at all!
During the days of Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald, but luckily the game developers felt that we, the players, deserved a couple different avenues to make shinies a little easier to come by.
The most common method today to get a shiny is though chaining, using the Poke-Radar. There is still skill involved, which I personally have had very limited luck with.
The other way to make things a bit easier is using what has been coined ‘The Masuda Method’. The Masuda method is a way to have a little better luck in obtaining a shiny under the right circumstances.
It was revealed through a blog post by Junichi Masuda, who is a director on the board of Game Freak inc, that it is advantageous to use the GTS. He pointed out several different benefits. You can read the full blog post here.
One line in particular is important here, “rare colored Pokemon’s Egg can be found little easier.” This meant that by utilizing the GTS, it would be easier to hatch a shiny egg. Well, this didn’t exactly give the entire picture, but it was intriguing news nonetheless! After months of research (by someone else, mind you) it was discovered that this meant there was an interesting interaction with pokemon from different languages. So those that were able to tear apart the game’s code and figure out what was going on, were able to determine that taking 2 compatible parents (for instance, one American male Charmander, and one Japanese female Charmander) and depositing them into the daycare had a dramatic impact on the chances of finding a shiny.
The odds went from 1 in 8192 to 1 in only 2050, that is almost four times easier than a normal encounter!
Here is a video showing a hatching of a shiny charmander using this method on my platinum cartridge! A few notes that may help answer some of your questions - thanks go to several members of the pokefarm public that helped to dig up this info!!
This will work with any breedable pokemon. This will work using a foreign Ditto and another breedable pokemon from your own game. If you save after picking up the egg, you can soft reset for better IV’s. IV’s are the only properties of the egg that is set upon hatch, rather than on picking it up from the old man. (i.e. Nature, Ability) Natures will not pass from the parents when they are of different languages, so an Everstone will have no effect when held by the mother in this case. This method works in Diamond, Pearl, and Platinum. In order to check it’s IV’s without saving you’ll have to either have many Rare Candies (about 30-40 to narrow it down very well) or to get a rougher idea, visit our PokeFarm forums for tools to help you on finding out more. I believe that covers all the main questions that have been asked lately. If you have any questions that aren’t covered here, make sure to check the Diamond/Pearl/Platinum Question and Answer section and ask away!
See you on the Farm!
Whitdjinn
Whitdjinn is one of the original farmers from when we still used HMTK.com as the base site to distribute Pokemon.
Lineup: Church and Reyes Out
Ryan Church will not be in today’s starting lineup, instead Angel Pagan will start in right field.
According to Adam Rubin in his blog for the Daily News, if Carlos Beltran is able to play centerfield, then David Wright will be tonight’s DH, while Fernando Tatis will start at third base
Ramon Martinez will once again start at shortstop in place of Jose Reyes, who continues to miss time with tendinitis in his right calf.
Jonathan Malo was a late scratch from today’s Triple-A game in Baffalo, leaving some to speculate that he could be waiting in the wings should the Mets decide to put Reyes on the disabled list.
Grumpy Park Slope
I took advantage of the beautiful Brooklyn weather today and visited the third (not yet completed) Cafe Grumpy location. Located at 383 7th Avenue in Park Slope, it’s just past the bustling 9th Street. No, not that 9th Street. The 9th Street that connects Prospect Park to Red Hook. I should have called first though, [...]
Newest New Cool Editor
It was a mighty fine experiment: Take an original fast-forward science fiction writer, who has been subscribing to Cool Tools from day one (before it was a blog), who edited the final issue of the Whole Earth Catalog's zine (the original model for Cool Tools), and who had worked with me many times before (appearing on the cover of the first issue of our zine Wired) -- take this fellow and turn his creative mind towards the utilitarian workaday routine of Cool Tools. That was the idea a month ago in hiring Bruce Sterling as editor of Cool Tools.
Well, that fine experiment did not work out. Bruce Sterling is retiring from his very energetic stint as Cool Tools editor. Some kind of personality mismatch. These things are always mysterious, even when they work. No big deal. Only thing is to move on. I am really looking forward to working with Bruce again because if you want "think different", if you want true originality, street level honesty, entertaining insight, and a remarkable stylist, Bruce Stering is your guy. Really. I learn something from Sterling in every encounter with him, and I am easily bored. Sterling has never bored me.
Cool Tools is boring in that workaday jeans and boots sort of way. Utilitarian. WYSIWYG. No "skins." So we are going to stick to our workaday useful ways. The newest new Cool Tool editor, Elon Schonenholz, is not boring but not flashy either. Elon was one of the 200 candidates rounded up in the casting call last month. He has experience as a editor and reviewer at Consumer Guide, Mountain Bike magazine, a weekly paper, and is currently a professional architectural photographer. His home site is here.
As always, most of the reviews on this site are written by readers (and every one of them by actual users). This site is only as good as the material that flows into it. The job of Elon, or Bruce, or Stephen, or Charles, or myself, is only to sift, edit, tidy up, and to head off misunderstanding before the review is posted. Send Elon a rave about your favorite cool tool; address to elon at schoenholz dot c o m.
To reiterate what is wanted:
Cool Tools publishes only positive reviews of stuff that works. We love tried and true tools, rather than flimsy and faddish gadgets that only look good on the screen. A cool tool...
1) Is not commonly known, or if known, not appreciated for this particular use.
2) Really works over a long time period.
3) Is significantly better than the competition.
4) Assists individuals (verses institutions) in self-empowerment and self-learning.
5) Is not one you've invented, sell, or promote.The ideal Cool Tool review begins: "Over the years I've tried dozens of tools to accomplish X, but this one is by far the best thing. After using this tool every day for 2 years, it continues to amaze me. The problem it solves for non-professionals is this..." and it goes on to say why this item is so wonderful compared to other choices.
Don't Challenge My Assumptions!
Peter Merholz: "People in organizations are afraid of what their customers actually think. If they had to face this reality, it would call into question many assumptions. People don't want their assumptions challenged. So, they'd rather a) come up with excuses or b) use unhelpful 'market research' tools like surveys and focus groups, tools whose data is squishy enough that it can be interpreted to suit any beliefs."
Don’t Challenge My Assumptions!
In a post on Maya Design’s blog, David Bishop asks, “Why is it so hard to talk to users?” and presents all the different excuses he’s heard for not engaging with customers in the design process.
In reading his post, I realized the answer to his question is simple, and wrote him the following:
People in organizations are afraid of what their customers actually think. If they had to face this reality, it would call into question many assumptions. People don’t want their assumptions challenged. So, they’d rather a) come up with excuses or b) use unhelpful “market research” tools like surveys and focus groups, tools whose data is squishy enough that it can be interpreted to suit any beliefs.
The reason I’m confident about this answer is because it’s pretty much true of human nature — we resist information that challenges what we already believe to be true. For many, if not most, companies, actual conversations with customers would demonstrate that closely held beliefs are actually canards.
May 22, 2009
A Lender Be
Last year, I read Bill Clinton's book, Giving, subtitled "How Each of Us Can Save the World." In it, Clinton issued lots of advice that would be completely unhelpful to any normal person, such as, say, starting a foundation. (I'll get right on that.) But he did write extensively about Kiva, a group that connects aspiring entrepreneurs around the world with people like you or me, who might be willing to give a little money to get them started.
Here's how it works: Kiva partners with international microlenders to find prospective lendees, then the stories of these entrepreneurs are posted to Kiva's website. You contribute money towards their loan, and you'll be emailed when the entire loan amount has been reached. The lendee has about a year to repay the entire loan; you'll get regular updates about the loan repayment.
I was drawn to a single mom in Mexico who ran a flower shop and was looking for $1200 to help her get supplies so she could actually start shipping her floral arrangements. I contributed a small portion of that in April 2008 and was notified this week that she has paid back 100% of the loan. In June 2008, I also gave a little to a carpenter in Togo who needed to buy some more tools. So far, he's paid back 75% of his loan, so 75% of my loan is available to me. I could get my money back (since it was a loan, and not a donation) but instead, I just reinvested it in another entrepreneur. This time, it's going to a 29-year-old man in Ghana who supports some younger siblings by trading/selling hardware. (The money will let him muy some of his materials in bulk.)
Polonius advised Laertes "neither a borrower or a lender be", and while I'm sure there are a lot of people who wish they would've taken that to heart a little more in the past few years, there's still a lot to be said for lending. Kiva shows the internet at its very best - connecting hundreds of thousands of people all over the world, all to help one person at a time.
"Please respect the lei."
Obviously, the missing ingredients for my office are a lei and cookies.
Flâneur
(via janelle)
Hurley has a blog
Sweet Marvin Candle! How come no one told me that Hurley from Lost has a blog?
Tags: jorgegarcia lost tv weblogs
Photo of the Day: Soda Jerk Slinging Scoops
Photograph from Library of Congress/Flickr
A soda jerk working in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1939. The term soda jerk came from the motion of the arm while adding soda water to an ice cream soda. Soda fountains were once ubiquitous at drug stores. [via Howard]
Hybrid cutlery
A Venn diagram showing the relationships between hybrid cutlery like the spork, spife, knork, and the little known splayd. See also forkchops.
Tags: food venndiagrams
ian pool: superheroes
toronto based photographer ian pool imagines the lives of superheroes if they were average people.
in comic books and movies, superheroes are extraordinary people. they save lives and have super powers
that allow them to do almost anything. that being said, it may be difficult to imagine what batman would
do on a tuesday night, or how the incredible hulk walks his dog. these questions and more are answered
in this series of photographs that capture the super human characters, doing completely ordinary things.
http://www.ianpool.com
How to Make a Portable Picnic-in-a-Briefcase
For all those times you want to bring a little piece of vegetation and scenery around, designer Paige Russel at Design*Sponge has the thing for you: The Green Space Travel Case, made of an old briefcase fitted with turf, a wildlife scene, an ice pack, and your lunch.
Happy Memorial Day Weekend (With Gusto This Time)
When Memorial Day weekend rolls around, here at Streetsblog we usually take the opportunity to note the advent of the summer driving season -- and all the waste and violence that entails. This year's going to be a little different, because we've got a major livable streets milestone to celebrate in New York City.The full transformation will take a few months to set up, but come Memorial Day, pedestrians will finally have some breathing room at Times Square.
With all those cars headed out of town, DOT is going to re-route traffic at Times Square around Broadway and onto Seventh Avenue. Come Memorial Day morning, New York City will have brand new public spaces carved out of the street, smack in the middle of Midtown. If you're staying in the city for the long weekend, it's time to party.
The Times Square Alliance will be out bright and early Monday setting up beach chairs. Virgil's Barbecue will be firing up the grill. At some point, a giant movie screen will get unfurled for a noon showing of "On the Town" (it's the last day of Fleet Week, folks). I suspect that I won't be the only New Yorker heading over to Times Square for the first time in ages.
So, this year we're not holding anything back: Happy Memorial Day weekend! We'll see you back here on Tuesday.
Rays Stadium Search: Go North, Young Squad
If you’ve been holding out hope of the Tampa Bay Rays would be playing in their previously announced wacky sail-roofed waterfront park one of this years, hope no longer: Team execs officially stuck a fork in that plan this morning, saying they now plan to look about ten miles north in central Pinellas County. That would provide somewhat easier access for the more well-heeled fans in Tampa and points east, but also means starting from scratch both on finding a site and finding money to pay for it. The Rays’ stadium search coalition of business and political honchos is expected to report back on its findings later this year, at which point we should know whether they’re serious about trying to go to a public vote next year or whether any serious stadium talk is years down the road.
By the way, before any of you raise it (you know who you are): The recent stadium-building roadblocks hit by the Rays and the A’s does not mean that MLB is likely to contract those two teams anytime. Aside from all the reasons contraction was unworkable last time around, both teams are still in the top ten in the league in operating income — after revenue-sharing, yes, but still no worse than other teams like the Orioles. It took a decade for MLB to give up on Montreal, and that was when Washington was ready at hand as an alternative — expect Tampa Bay and Oakland to get plenty more rope.
Thomas Keller: Ad Hoc at Home
If you're daunted by The French Laundry Cookbook and Under Pressure, Thomas Keller is coming out with a more accessible cookbook based on his casual Yountville restaurant: Ad Hoc at Home.
Keller showcases dishes that can be made every day (and not just for special occasions). Invaluable lessons, secrets, tips and tricks -- as well as charming personal anecdotes -- accompany recipes for such classics as the best fried chicken, beef Stroganoff, roasted spring leg of lamb, hamburger, the crispiest fried fish, chicken soup with dumplings, potato hash with bacon and melted onions, and superlative grilled cheese sandwiches, apple fritters, buttermilk biscuits, relishes and pickles, cherry pie -- 200 recipes in all.
It's due November 1. Ruhlman, did you have a hand in this one?
Update: Ruhlman says "yes".
Tags: adhoc adhocathome books food michaelruhlman restaurants thomaskeller
Quick Fixes for Common Itches
Every once in a while, if you use Movable Type long enough, you can run into little glitches or things that are confusing. We thought we'd round up a couple of random ones that have seemed common lately, with the hopes that it makes things a little more fun and a little less frustrating.This one cropped up in Movable Type 4.25 (the release where Motion was introduced). If you have a category name like "Diamonds & Pearls" and you set
- Filtering entries by category name gets weird if my category name has spaces!
<mt:entries category="Diamonds & Pearls">, you get an error instead of your entries! No good. So, we made a quick little patch to fix it. Just follow the outlined steps there and you should be set.Oooh, tricky. What's probably happened here is your
- Sometimes I can't click into the text editor when writing an entry or page!
mt-config.cgifile lists the full path for your site's MT install, something likeStaticWebPath http://www.example.com/mt/mt-static/but you've visited your MT install athttp://example.com/mt/, without the "www" part. Because of the web browser security works, MT can't load the editor part of the Create Entry screen, and that makes everybody sad. You can get around it immediately by making sure to visit the address you have set up in your configuration file, or solve it more permanently by using a relative path instead of an absolute one. In this example, you'd replace something likeStaticWebPath http://www.example.com/mt/mt-static/withStaticWebPath /mt/mt-static/so that MT won't be so picky about what address you're using.
Bonus Tip: Themt-config.cgiconfiguration options are listed here. Handy to bookmark for future reference!You usually have to do one additional step to get scheduled tasks going on your Movable Type install. Movable Type uses a scheduling system to trigger these events. If you're simply doing scheduled entries, you can actually get Movable Type to run scheduled tasks by subscribing to your System Activity Log's feed. This is a cool little under-promoted feature that gives you an RSS feed of everything that goes on in your Movable Type install, and as a side benefit, every time your RSS reader or browser requests the feed, scheduled tasks are run.
- Halp! My scheduled entries aren't publishing as scheduled!
Got a bigger site, or just want a more robust scheduling system that can handle things like a Movable Type Publish Queue? Then you'll want to set up MT's Run Periodic Tasks system. Don't worry -- if you know your way around your web server, it's not too complicated. Once you've got all that running, grab Byrne Reese's Publish Queue Manager plugin and you'll be able to see exactly what's going on with the system.
- I want to set up a queue to do my publishing for me!
We'll try to share more tips and tricks as they pop up, but in the meantime here's one last gem to bookmark: A great page on the Movable Type wiki offering up template tag recipes to do all kinds of cool things on your site. No plugins needed, and the sky's really the limit for the ideas people have shared.
Quick Fixes for Common Itches
Every once in a while, if you use Movable Type long enough, you can run into little glitches or things that are confusing. We thought we'd round up a couple of random ones that have seemed common lately, with the hopes that it makes things a little more fun and a little less frustrating.This one cropped up in Movable Type 4.25 (the release where Motion was introduced). If you have a category name like "Diamonds & Pearls" and you set
- Filtering entries by category name gets weird if my category name has spaces!
<mt:entries category="Diamonds & Pearls">, you get an error instead of your entries! No good. So, we made a quick little patch to fix it. Just follow the outlined steps there and you should be set.Oooh, tricky. What's probably happened here is your
- Sometimes I can't click into the text editor when writing an entry or page!
mt-config.cgifile lists the full path for your site's MT install, something likeStaticWebPath http://www.example.com/mt/mt-static/but you've visited your MT install athttp://example.com/mt/, without the "www" part. Because of the web browser security works, MT can't load the editor part of the Create Entry screen, and that makes everybody sad. You can get around it immediately by making sure to visit the address you have set up in your configuration file, or solve it more permanently by using a relative path instead of an absolute one. In this example, you'd replace something likeStaticWebPath http://www.example.com/mt/mt-static/withStaticWebPath /mt/mt-static/so that MT won't be so picky about what address you're using.
Bonus Tip: Themt-config.cgiconfiguration options are listed here. Handy to bookmark for future reference!You usually have to do one additional step to get scheduled tasks going on your Movable Type install. Movable Type uses a scheduling system to trigger these events. If you're simply doing scheduled entries, you can actually get Movable Type to run scheduled tasks by subscribing to your System Activity Log's feed. This is a cool little under-promoted feature that gives you an RSS feed of everything that goes on in your Movable Type install, and as a side benefit, every time your RSS reader or browser requests the feed, scheduled tasks are run.
- Halp! My scheduled entries aren't publishing as scheduled!
Got a bigger site, or just want a more robust scheduling system that can handle things like a Movable Type Publish Queue? Then you'll want to set up MT's Run Periodic Tasks system. Don't worry -- if you know your way around your web server, it's not too complicated. Once you've got all that running, grab Byrne Reese's Publish Queue Manager plugin and you'll be able to see exactly what's going on with the system.
- I want to set up a queue to do my publishing for me!
We'll try to share more tips and tricks as they pop up, but in the meantime here's one last gem to bookmark: A great page on the Movable Type wiki offering up template tag recipes to do all kinds of cool things on your site. No plugins needed, and the sky's really the limit for the ideas people have shared.
India's election symbols
India just finished a mammoth election. With over a billion people it's the world's largest democracy by far, and with several hundred languages, at least two alphabets, and only a ⅔ literacy rate communication is a challenge.So I'm fascinated by this photo of a ballot. Every candidate is represented by their name in Sanskrit, Roman, and with an abstract symbol. Vote for the train, the whistle, or the telelvision set? Such a simple way to help people who can't read pick their candidate.The collection above is from an incomplete list of symbols I found online. The icons look abstract to my American eye, but they're symbolicly rich for snarky deconstruction.
Recovery.org Tracks The Stimulus Faster Than The Guys Spending It
Are you eager to know how much of the $787 billion economic recovery effort is paying for transportation projects in your home state? Odds are that you'd head to recovery.gov, the official government site for stimulus data -- but there you'd find a confusing pastiche of charts and planning documents.
It's a nice logo, but is the website up-to-date? (Photo: adrants.com)
In Florida, for example, the Obama administration's stimulus site reports no money allocated so far to transit projects. But the Florida Public Transportation Association site lists several trolley and bus projects that are slated to get help under the recovery plan.
So what's going on? As the Washington Post reported yesterday, recovery.gov is getting lapped by recovery.org, a stimulus money-tracking site run by the private database company Onvia. Recovery.org has an easy-to-use search function that allows you to track projects getting money down to the county level.
As it happens, Florida's Miami-Dade County just got $70 million in formula funding for new buses that should help alleviate the pain of planned route changes. But that's not the only useful feature on the privately run site.
Recovery.org also maintains a breakdown of where each state is directing its federal recovery aid. There you'll find facts both dismaying and enlightening: Florida has so far allocated about $316 million to transit, or less than 10 percent of its $3.6 billion in total stimulus expenditures. Meanwhile, its transit ridership has been growing at a faster rate than the population.
Massachusetts, by contrast, has allocated more than 17 percent of its $1.8 billion in stimulus money, or $319.7 million, to transit. New Jersey did even better, sending more than half a billion dollars -- nearly 22 percent of its stimulus share so far -- to improve transit options.
Which other states are focusing a significant share of their early stimulus spending on transit? The full list of transit spending, courtesy of recovery.org, follows after the jump.
Alabama: $46.5 million
Alaska: $41.6 million
Arizona: $100.6 million
Arkansas: $28.4 million
California: $1.1 billion
Colorado: $103.5 million
Connecticut: $137.5 million
Delaware: $17.6 million
D.C.: $124.9 million
Florida: $316.2 million
Georgia: $143.6 million
Hawaii: $43.8 million
Idaho: $18.4 million
Illinois: $467.5 million
Indiana: $84.3 million
Iowa: $36.5 million
Kansas: $30.7 million
Kentucky: $50.3 million
Louisiana: $65.7 million
Maine: $13.3 million
Maryland: $179.3 million
Massachusetts: $319.7 million
Michigan: $135 million
Minnesota: $94.1 million
Mississippi: $25.5 million
Missouri: $85.1 million
Montana: $15.6 million
Nebraska: $23.3 million
Nevada: $49.5 million
New Hampshire: $13.2 million
New Jersey: $524.2 million
New Mexico: $27.7 million
New York: $1.2 billion
North Carolina: $103.3 million
North Dakota: $11 million
Ohio: $179.8 million
Oklahoma: $39.2 million
Oregon: $75.7 million
Pennsylvania: $343.7 million
Rhode Island: $29.6 million
South Carolina: $41.2 million
South Dakota: $11.3 million
Tennessee: $72 million
Texas: $374.5 million
Utah: $58.1 million
Vermont: $5.7 million
Virginia: $116.1 million
Washington: $179 million
West Virginia: $18.7 million
Wisconsin: $81.6 million
Wyoming: $9.3 million
Morrissey Is 50
Steven Patrick Morrissey, patron saint of artistic homosexuals and East L.A. Mexicans and the hags attendant to each, observes his 50th birthday today. Depending on which side of 1969 you are born, that should make you feel either incredibly old or incredibly young. Morrissey is observing his half-century in typical style: with two hometown shows at the Apollo in Manchester. And now I am going to take to my bed for the rest of this sunny day. Have a great weekend!
Peter Davis' Status Update: Good Head (Pieces)
My favorite T-shirt designer, David Jon Acosta of Gold Saturn, now has a line of flowered headpieces called Wild Child. Each headpiece is named after its "personality." Are you "the socialite" or "the rebel" or "the visionary" -- or all three? "Living in Miami I'm always inspired by women who wear flowers in their hair," Acosta tells me. "In the Victorian era, the flower you wore in your hair had meaning and said something about you." 
Sasha Grey: “Intellectual Seriousness”?
Shared by Eve
Alex!
A reader asks: “Can you translate this thing into English, please? ‘Ms. Grey, whose career in pornography has been distinguished both by the extremity of what she is willing to do and an unusual degree of intellectual seriousness about doing it….’” That is A. O. Scott in today’s Times, writing on The Girlfriend Experience. We think we know?
Basically, having seen less of her porn than apparently Scott has (as I have seen exactly none of it), that means “She only does hardcore slut porn in knee socks but sometimes she wears glasses and Twitters whilst getting double-teamed.”
As for the rest of the review—can’t parse it!
Skillet Street Food Is a Big Hit at Seattle Mariners Games
I’m a huge fan of the food at Safeco Field, home of the Seattle Mariners. It’s got to be the only stadium in the country where you can score Thai curry, clam chowder, and an order of edamame along with the typical popcorn, peanuts and Cracker Jack. I’ll go to an M’s game at the Safe just so I can order an Ichiroll, the spicy tuna creation named for the single-named star of the team (Ichiro) or to dive into seared salmon drizzled in a sun-dried tomato beurre blanc at the Hit It Here Café. But with the recent arrival of Seattle’s premier mobile kitchen, I’m well fed before I even pass through the turnstile.
Skillet Street Food is now parked on the home plate side of Safeco Field a couple of hours before home games, serving an abbreviated version of its ‘round town menu. This kitschy kitchen located in an Airstream Trailer offers a winning lineup of sandwiches: pulled pork, fried chicken and a creation not-so-humbly called "The Burger."
Said burger is made with grass-fed beef from Painted Hills, a ranch in Eastern Washington that doesn’t use hormones or antibiotics. The thick hunk of ground chuck gets some competition from the all-star, house-made condiment, Bacon Jam. It’s the kind of sticky/salty/just a bit sweet accompaniment that makes you think as you’re savoring it: “Man, if they bottled this stuff, they could make a million bucks.” (Well, they have. It’s for sale online. Though, they’re not yet millionaires.)
Hand-cut fries are included in the price, which hovers in the $10 range. (They do not fuss at you when you ask to split one sandwich, which I did. This was, after all, an appetizer. Because I had to hit my favorite stands inside, too.) Get those fries poutinized, topped with an herbed gravy and cheese curds. When you request poutine, the guys taking orders will call to the kitchen, "Give me a side of poo!” Mmmm. Just the thing to get you all set up to sit for nine innings of play.
About the author: Former Seattle Post-Intelligencer restaurant reviewer is now working in kitchens around the Northwest and is writing a book about her journey from critic to cook. She blogs at LeslieKellyWhiningandDining.blogspot.com.
Skillet Street Food
At Mariners games, on the corner of 1st Ave S & Edgar Martinez Dr S, Seattle, WA 98134 (map)
Check out daily locations and schedule at skilletstreetfood.com
India's massive general election
On May 16th, 2009, the Election Commission of India announced the results of its recent month-long India-wide election for their lower house of Parliament - the largest democratic election in the world. An estimated 714 million voters (from a population of 1.2 billion) were eligible to cast their vote in one of five separate phases at over 800,000 polling stations, starting on April 16th. Logistically difficult, massive in scale, and opposed by various rebel groups, separatists and protestors, the elections still managed to be held with minimal disruption, with an average voter turnout of greater than 56%. The big winner was the the Indian National Congress party, which will form the new government under the incumbent prime minister Manmohan Singh. As with any photo story from India, it is impossible to capture every aspect in just a handful of pictures - collected here are only some of the scenes that played out across the nation over the last month. (40 photos total)
Could Cheney Be (Gulp) Right?
The most pointed attack on President Obama in Dick Cheney's speech yesterday was his claim that after all is said and done Obama is still reserving to himself the right to use "enhanced interrogation techniques" in the future. We documented that this talking point is a riff off comments made by CIA Director Leon Panetta -- and that it's arguably stretching what Panetta actually said. But it should be noted that Chris Matthews gave David Axelrod a chance to rebut Cheney's claim, and Axelrod only danced around the question. Watch the video. We asked the White House yesterday to comment on Cheney's claim and got no response.
Judah Friedlander Hates St. Louis-style Pizza
Wow. From Grub Street's "New York Diet" series, 30 Rock's Judah Friedlander on St. Louis–style pizza:
I can tell you what I had the weekend before that I’m still obsessed with. I had a gig in St. Louis. Nice people, St. Louis, but I’ve never seen an entire city fuck up a pizza so bad. I get a ride from the airport to the hotel. We pass by an Imo’s pizza, which is a large chain there, and the guy starts getting a boner for this pizza place. So I go “Hey, how’s this place,” and he goes “awwww, dude, that place is the best in the city, you gotta go there. It’s an institution.” They make it St. Louis style. When I looked at it, I thought I was on some kind of hidden-camera prank show. The cheese they use, Provel, is part provolone cheese product, part Swiss cheese product, and part white Cheddar product. When it melts, it’s just kind of a gluey consistency, and when it dries it’s just kind of plastic. It stinks — like, literally, it smells bad. The dough, they probably fucked it up as bad, or worse, than the cheese. They make their pizza with no yeast, so I would like to say it’s like a cracker or a round matzoh, but it’s like a really shitty stale cracker. And then they have barely any sauce on it and it seemed like it came out of a can 50 years ago. I’ve never seen a place miss all three elements of the pizza.
not just weird. creepy weird.
The little laptop company that couldn't, OQO, has gone under, and TechCrunchGear made this really strange little "memorial video" with a warbly guy singing a lyrically-challenged Candle in the Wind. This is the creepiest thing I've seen all week.
ProPublica Wants You to Steal Their Stories
A couple of weeks ago ProPublica posted a note on their site asking their users to “steal” their stories:
You can republish our articles and graphics for free, so long as you credit us, link to us, and don’t edit our material or sell it separately.
Put in CC terms, the public-interest journalism non-profit has chosen our Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license. Since the announcement, The Los Angeles Times, Mother Jones, USA Today, Salon, Politico, and Huffington Post have published ProPublica’s work and they’re encouraging other newsrooms to do so as well.
Check out the original announcement or ProPublica’s policy on advertising and commercial use.
Under the waterfront
New York magazine reports on what lies beneath the water of New York Harbor, including $26 million in silver ingots.
The Hudson's main current has, for all of recorded history, clung to lower Manhattan's edge, skimming along the West Side. Battery Park City, built in the seventies, juts out into that flow, and since then, the current has been cutting a new channel, out toward the center of the river. That current is scraping mud off the top of the Lincoln Tunnel where it never did before; the underwater traffic tubes have lost 25 percent of their soil coverage in some spots. If the tubes ever became exposed, they would be at risk for shifting, cracking, and terrorist threats.
(thx, jack)
Tags: nyc
How Can I Be Sure?
Favianna Rodriguez How Can I Be Sure? $30 This print is based on a large linoleum block I did about my multiple facets of being a woman, an artist, a Xicana, a daughter, an entrepreneur, a worker, etc. I extracted a piece of the large linoleum block (which measures 9 square feet) and I made a small screenprint of it. The title is based on one of my favorite songs from Tears for Fears, Pale Shelter. "How can I be sure ? When your intrusion is my illusion How can I be sure When all the time you changed my mind I asked for more and more How can I be sure When you don't give me love You gave me Pale shelter" This print is a very small edition 2-color screenprint on brown textured paper approximately 6 x 11 inches, ripped edges signed / numbered edition of 25
Memorial Day Sales!
Jen at MOMSPatterns (the pattern above is from her store) is offering 20% off from Friday (today) through the 26th (Tuesday). Jen's coupon code will be 'decorationday' since "it sounds purdier than 'memorialday'". Jen was striving to list 50 new patterns each day until the sale, so there's a good chance of doing some real stocking up on the oldies!
Wendy at Pattern Stash will have a 4 day sale over Memorial Day weekend - from Friday May 22nd to Monday May 25th. Just use the code Dressaday in the "Note to Seller" when checking out, and 15% of your total purchase will be refunded.
Rita at Cemetarian is in, too: she'll give 20% off anything on her website from Friday the 22nd through Monday the 25th. Use the coupon code "Summer".
Lisa is offering a combination discount: Memorial Day and Indy500 weekend: 10% off at the Vintage Fashion Library with coupon code
INDY500 (and you can combine this with your Miss Helene's purchases, if you let Lisa know in advance -- she has to set it up specially)!
Carol has a pre-Memorial Day sale running now until the end of today, 5/22. 25% off of all stock at www.dandelionvintage.com. Hurry!
Janet at Lanetz Living is running a "May Sale", put the word "May" in the coupon box and get 25% off your entire order. Good for one order only and expires June 14th.
Pam has three sites so she's running three sales! At Glamourstitch on ETSY:
Buy 2 patterns get one FREE! (In the notes section of your order simply state 'DressADay' and she will send you a revised invoice through PayPal.)
At www.GlamourSavvy.com they are having a 25% Off sale. Just type in 'Glamour' for the coupon code and the discount will automatically apply.
And finally, over at www.Glamoursurf.com they're offering 15% off with the same code ('Glamour') at checkout.
Trudy at HotPatterns is offering 20% off the "Vintage Hotpatterns" range today through Monday!
Penny at Antique Dollhouse of Patterns has had a rough week. (She lost one of her cats to liver failure and the other is not doing well.) To cheer herself up she is running a random sale, depending on the pattern: the discount will be at least 10% but possibly even 40%!
Sheila at Out of the Ashes is running a 15% off sale, Friday (effective 12:01 a.m.) through Monday.
Holly at Lucite Box is doing something a little different -- she's showing "featured items" on her home page in a gold oval frame. In that frame, she's featuring one item from each category on lucitebox.com.
During the four day sale, she'll mark-down items in that frame each day. The discount will vary depending on the item. Many of the discounts will be at least 20% off. Moreover, she's changing the featured items every day over the holiday weekend, so it's wise to check back often!
College Humor Scores Ironic Victory
Score another one for the fun-loving boys of College Humor; now the Washington Post covers their stealth/fun campaign to make the infamous “Three Wolf Moon T-Shirt” the best-selling thing on Amazon. Their next project, we hear: a grassroots, Internet-based movement reforming parental abortion notification laws in Midwestern states. Oh no, wait, sorry, this just in—actually they’re going to hit the beach and pound some brews. Rock!
d-nice documents the homeless emcee
A sad story about a clearly intelligent and thoughtful human being who has suffered a great deal and made many mistakes. D-Nice, yes, that D-Nice, is a talented videographer and editor who has over a dozen videos posted on Vimeo as part of his "True Hip-Hop Stories series." For any fan of hip-hop, it's a nice journey. Also, I'd like to know what camera/lens he is using, because I absolutely love it.
Update: Just noticed that the camera is indicated on the Vimeo video page. It's a Canon EOS 5D Mark II, same camera we just used to shoot a tv commercial (yes, it's an SLR!).
May 21, 2009
Phife This, Phife That!
A Tribe Called Quest's Phife Dawg has bounced back from kidney disease to become an assistant high school basketball coach and recruiter... on both coasts! (He also has a new production company and record label.) According to a SLAM article, Phife will "assist with player relations, running practices, and in-game situations like substitutions and recognizing the hot-hand."
“I’m not turning my back on my love for beats and lyrics,” Phife says in the article. “That’s the reason I’m getting this opportunity to coach and recruit. I want to touch lives through basketball as I did with music.”
Not only is it great to find out that Phife is healthy and doing well, but it's fun to read all the great puns, mostly from the commenters:
- "Can He Coach It?"
- "His starting five will be Brown, Yellow, Puerto Rican and Haitian…"
- "You also know Phife will set an example keep his players healthy and in game shape, as evidenced by his ability to hit it from the back and not catch a hernia."
Candy Colored Clown
This "In Dreams"-centric edit of "Blue Velvet" scenes is so incredibly awesome:
I could watch this all day.
Miyagawa Connect
Twitter / Tatsuhiko Miyagawa: If you like my module, ema ....If you like my module, emailing me thanks is okay, rating it 5 star on CPAN is good, blogging about it is the best :)http://search.cpan.org/~miyagawa/Net-Twitter-OAuth-0.05/lib/Net/Twitter/OAuth.pm
Infinite Summer
Infinite Summer: on online book club which means to read Infinite Jest this summer.
Tags: books davidfosterwallace infinitejestYou've been meaning to do it for over a decade. Now join endurance bibliophiles from around the web as we tackle and comment upon David Foster Wallace's masterwork, June 21st to September 22nd. A thousand pages ÷ 93 days = 75 pages a week. No sweat.
Open Development vs Making a Big Splash
I find it very interesting how Sun does not get the very basic principle of true community Open Source development - you’ve got to give up on making a big splash.
Traditional close source company often develop product in the secret and when it comes out as a surprise for computers and making a big splash for the users. Does it remind you something ? Yes! this is exactly how Innodb Plugin was released last year or MySQL 5.4 performance improvements this year.
Community did not know about them and did not participate early in this efforts.
Another big splash which seems to be planned later this year is “Performance Schema” - which is in development for years as this post claims but to date there is no code for community to play with
I believe if you want to learn true community respect, you’ve got to respect (and so involve) community. You should show your early and buggy code and let community play with it and complain. This is true Open Source development and it takes guts.
I should praise Drizzle for having code available from very early days. I should praise Monty for having Maria storage engine tree available from its early and buggy days. I should praise Falcon and PBXT teams which were not shy to show us multiple redesigns they had to go through. This earns my respect and this is how I think Open Source development should be done.
At Percona I think we’re doing relatively well - our trees are public and lauchpad and I do not think we had ever a project which was cooking internally for more than a month. As soon as we got something which was interesting enough to start playing, such as Xtrabackup we got it out, just stating this is very early code.
Google does not get very many points on this one - I think they are very obsessed with “everything Google does must be great” policies which prevents them from releasing code before it is complete and properly tested at least internally. Though I think Google do not position themselves as doing Open Source development but rather being kind enough to publicly share the development which is done internally. This is fair and I appreciate it.
So why Sun and Oracle are after big splashes ? Well I think this is the only way tradition companies know how to market the stuff. If project starts from single line of code and growths day by day to completion it is very hard to build excitement around it. There is no big news just a slow process.
I would argue however releasing certain code as Stable/GA should be enough of event for masses - it is not however enough for community which see it just as minor incremental development from Initial Alpha/Beta releases.
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Illustrated Guide to Steak Cuts, Plus Grilling Tips
If you're new to steak, beef up (pun intended) your meat knowledge with this overview of nine affordable cuts of beef from food writer Tony Rosenfeld at The Washington Post. Rosenfeld also shares steak grilling tips plus photos.
Related
Robert St. John's Grilling Tips
Chris Lilly's Grilling Tips
The Lobels' Grilling Tips
Drake featuring R. Kelly “Best I Ever Had (Remix)”
When most people love songs, they simply play them over and over or turn them into self-identifying ringtones, but for the Kells, his adoration is taken a step further: he wants to BE on the record. Over the past couple of years, Robert has embedded himself within hit songs from Kanye West, Mariah Carey, The-Dream, Ciara and Beyonce, his, at-times hilarious, contributions always seeming to tinge with the regret that he didn’t record the songs first.
And like everyone else, it looks like he’s caught the “obsessed-with-Drake” bug too, so much so that he feels a need to bombard the rapper/ singer’s breakout single “Best I Ever Had”.
Unfortunately though, besides the semi-noteworthy “Baby girl I’m rich/ I can buy your ass whatever/ Money in the sky/ Look, see I changed the weather” line and an…erm, interesting dig about fucking haters with a “sandpaper dick”, his appearance here is a bit of bore, lacking the wacky sex metaphors he used to be able to sling out with ease with an over-reliance on more cliché-ridden lyrics about post-club, hotel sex sessions.
This is one instance where R. Kelly probably should have just stayed a hands-off admirer. Besides, instead of trying (and ultimately failing) at upgrading someone else’s career, he really should be concentrating on recording a buzz-worthy new album that could rescue his own.
DL: “Best I Ever Had (Remix)” (alt)
Leftovers: The Day's Stray Links
- Hot Diggity Dog: For this writer, the arrival of summer means the beginning of hot dog eating season. [WaPo]
- Dog Fight: Sara Lee sues Kraft over hot dog taste claims [CT]
- Mmm, Cheese: How to melt cheese without having it congeal [Seattle Times]
- Soda Tax Facts: "Top 8 things you need to know about the soda tax aka the sugar tax" [Epi-Log]
- Chick Chic: The backyard chicken movement is catching on [NPR]
data.gov is Live
Twitter is currently echoing the excitement of open data advocates and data geeks alike, due the release of data.gov, an open and free web repository that aims to provide public access to US Federal Government datasets. Or, in official terms: "The purpose of Data.gov is to increase public access to high value, machine readable datasets generated by the Executive Branch of the Federal Government". However, while this means that the data has finally become freely available, it is certainly not yet accessible or even understandable for lay people. The huge homepage banner "Discover. Participate. Engage." therefore seems a bit hollow, as long as there are no interfaces and visualizations to really allow the general audience to explore the knowledge and insights hidden within. We are therefore all curious when and what online data visualizations will soon exploit this opportunity to bring data closer to people!Hence Sunlight Labs has just launched, in partnership with Google, O'Reilly Media and TechWeb, a contest called "Apps for America", including $25,000 in awards." The contest submissions will also show the creativity of developers in designing compelling applications that provide easy access and understanding for the public, while also showing how open data can save the government tens of millions of dollars by engaging the development community in application development at far cheaper rates than traditional government contractors."
If you are interested in data.gov, you might also like USgoXML.com, another index of web services and XML data sources that have been provided by the US government.
You might also want to know that today was also the launch of the Open Government Initiative.
More information and (mixed) reviews about the data.gov website can be found at Huffington Post, Wired and ReadWriteWeb, and probably at many more news outlets very soon.
European Union, what are you waiting for?
The Economics of Star Trek
Andrew Leonard notes, as some others have, that in the new Star Trek movie, young Vulcans are taught the meaning of "excludable" and "rival." I am delighted to see economics...
flea market mapping
The Where 2.0 conference is just wrapping up, and I was lucky enough to be involved in two sessions.
On Tuesday, Shawn and I hosted a workshop followup to our Maps From Scratch tutorial first performed/taught/endured/magicked at Etech conference back in March. You can read more about the tutorial and check out our public Amazon Machine Image at mapsfromscratch.com.
Earlier today, I got to talk about my love of old-timery map georectification, and these are my slides:
Now I'm listening to Aaron Cope talk about donuts and shapefiles.
I don’t even know anymore.
In the service of parents everywhere, Fox Atlanta today released a list of text acronyms parents should know. As much as we applaud their commitment to child safety and paternal supervision, many items on the list are inaccurate or flat-out wrong. Here are the actual translations. Print them out and keep them by the computer; they’re bound to come in handy.
8 Already had dinner at home
1337 Confiscating Aquitaine
143 $1 for 3 balls [at amusement park]
182 Punk but with pop sensibilities
1174 Weaned from breast too young
420 Actually enjoy Phish
ADR I have an attention deficit disorder and am prone to typos
ASL Deaf, American
Banana Need calcium badly
DUM Dreading Upcoming Menstruation
DUSL Dreading Upcoming Science Lab
FB Fuck Bono
FMLTWIA Fuck Michael Lewis, “TrailFever” Was Inadequate, Annoying
FOL Fond of Leno [easily amused]
GNOC Want potato dumplings
GYPO Roma people put a curse on me where I lose weight no matter how much I eat
IAYM I Adore Yellow Mustard
IF/IB If Slash Is Busy [promise made by musicians trying to diplomatically avoid doing a celebrity cameo on your album]
IIT Does your vagina have the necessary tenacity that will provide me with pleasurable friction during the act of intercourse? [Alternately: I’m In Town!]
ILF/MD I am a doctor who really enjoys fishing
IMEZRU I am going to perform your baptism
IWSN I Want Sting Neutered
MOOS Huge CNN fan
WYCM Why did you ejaculate?
NALOPKT asljasfalsfdj [laughter]
NIFOC Nuke Iran For Our Comfort [mainly used by American pundits chatting with Israeli Prime Ministers]
NMU My SATs suck
PAL Parents Are Listening
PAW Parents Are Watching
PIR Parent In Room
POS Parent Over Shoulder
SorG Rex Sorgatz listening/watching/in room/over shoulder
TDTM Felching
Note: MetsBlog’s Comment Section
Earlier this week, I was forced to temporarily shut down the comment section on MetsBlog.com.
According to traffic history and old and recent surveys, less and less people are reading my blog’s comment section, and more and more people feel the current level of discourse reflects poorly on the overall blog.
The thing is, during much of the first four years of MetsBlog.com, long before my affiliation with SNY, and long before site-wide sponsors, the comment section had been a place where Mets fans would respond to me and my work with intelligent, relevant statements and criticism about what had been written in that specific post. I enjoyed the feedback, as it was respectful and thoughtful, and I often received compliments from other readers and other blogs about the insight people gained from peeking in on this section of the blog.
In the last year, however, the comment section has changed in to a place where only a small, inclusive group of 30 or so readers mostly speak to and among themselves, often creating their own discussion, separate from the topic at hand. In other words, the comment section has become a message board. Of course, there is nothing wrong with a message board, but it is different from
a blog. They are two totally different forms of communication, and serve different purposes.
As a result, old school, original readers of MetsBlog.com, who were once very engaged years ago, eventually turned away from the comment section, only reading what I write to the main page, which is a shame.
So, I am now working to create a parallel space on MetsBlog.com that can serve as a more relaxed, open environment for fans to vent, discuss topics and exchange ideas among themselves, while returning the official comment section to a special location where only a trusted group of readers can respond to one another, me and the topic at hand.
I believe this change will help realign the public comment section with my blog’s overall brand, while also creating a new location for fans to have an open and honest discussion about the team we all love.
Thank you for your patience and understanding, as I work to make these necessary adjustments to MetsBlog.com,
Mecca 3.0
“Mecca, the holiest city in Islam, is going to be redesigned and a proposed master plan just leaked to Youtube.” This video is fucking amazing. It is some goddamn Dune-level shit and stuff.
I have something in the new issue of Wired (page 24), which is a...
I have something in the new issue of Wired (page 24), which is a riff on this NYT story.
How gesture aids thinking & learning
Interesting Scientific American post on recent research into how physical gesture aids cognitive processes. Excerpt:
Students who are coached to make the “v” gesture when solving a math problem like 3+2+8 = ___+8 learn how to solve the problem better. But students also do a better job even if they were coached to make the “v” shape under the wrong pair of numbers. The very act of making the “v” shape introduces the concept of “grouping” to the student, through the body itself.
(Full article: With a wave of the hand)
The research suggests that gesturing helps children learn new math concepts, even if the gesture is a rule artificially created by the researchers. The article connects this research to the increasingly prevalent Embodied Cognition theory of mind, which was an early inspiration for Siftables.
We’re very happy to see continued research in these areas, as it further informs our efforts in developing learning applications for Siftables.
The Gayest Typeface Ever
Here is a font, brought to our attention by designers House of Pretty, in which every letter is formed by a twisted jockstrap.
I've lost control again
Jonah Lehrer, who is seemingly in a race with Michael Lewis these days to see who can write the most books and articles in a 12-month period, writes about self-control in the New Yorker...what it is, how it works, and how it affects things like achievement, happiness, etc. The article focuses on the efforts of Dr. Walter Mischel and the marshmallow test that he developed to measure self-control in young kids. With the marshmallow test, kids are given a mashmallow and they are told that they can eat it right away or, if they hold out, they can eat two marshmallows.
Once Mischel began analyzing the results, he noticed that low delayers, the children who rang the bell quickly, seemed more likely to have behavioral problems, both in school and at home. They got lower S.A.T. scores. They struggled in stressful situations, often had trouble paying attention, and found it difficult to maintain friendships. The child who could wait fifteen minutes had an S.A.T. score that was, on average, two hundred and ten points higher than that of the kid who could wait only thirty seconds.
I must have really underachieved on the SAT because as a four-year-old, I would have likely waited forever...I don't like marshmallows.
Tags: jonahlehrer psychology waltermischel
One of my most vivid childhood memories was watching that...
One of my most vivid childhood memories was watching that terrifying twin alien birth in the original V miniseries. (It’s not so terrifying anymore — it looks like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle coming out of the womb.) Based upon the trailer, I am completely stoked for the new ABC miniseries, which will star Elizabeth Mitchell (the other in Lost), Morena Baccarin (the hooker in Firefly), and Laura Vandervoort (the supergirl in Smallville).
Rhizome 50,000 Webpage Roll Call
We would like to thank everyone who has contributed to Rhizome over the last seven weeks by purchasing pixels on The Rhizome 50,000 Dollar Webpage. We missed a few people in our first post so here's an updated version. Thank you so much to all the contributors. There's one week left to participate so we urge you: get involved now, make your mark, buy pixels today!
Roll call of contributors below:
Another Unknown Time, The Disagreeing Internet, Chris Coy, Ideas for Creative Exploration, Up it up!, Dennis Knopf, Michael Bell-Smith, Marc Kremers, MTAA, Hans Verhaegan, Miro, Paperheart, Mark Tribe, paintings that move, Kendra Gaeta, Glowlab, Pluralmedium, Mariah Fee, webjam, Tumbarumba, Andrew Venell, 39 Forks, The Groundswell Collective, Sal Randolph, Fat Little Bird, Eyes on the Ties, Christopher Pappas, blackaeonium: Lisa Cianci Ted Davis, Pitchaya Sudbanthad, Rob Cornell, Quite MIce, Petrafael, Peter Horvath Harm Van Den Dorpel, Club Internet, Charles Broskoski, Participatory Politics Foundation, Nasty Nets, Michael Mandiberg, MasterList2000 - A. Bill Miller, Cory Arcangel, Light Industry, Eric Dymond, Flictions xurban_collective, One Million Points of Light, Patrick May, Melissa Roberts, BECA Gallery, Lori Hepner, Mr. Matt Spangler, Sally Mckay and Lorna Mills, Ola Vasiljeva, Britta Gustafson, Wonderful Life, XPACE, Matthew Williamson, Magical Elves, Snoozebot, Migrating Forms, Kat Savage, Visual Living, Elise Roedenbeck, Kurt Schlough, Hair Shirt, Luke Palascak, Bob O'Connor, Source of Yellow, out_4_pizza, Ash Sechler, ArtCat, Ben Needham, Alex Mooney, dorkbot, Jacob Pongratz, Nathaniel Stern, janedapain, Constant Dullaart, Toporek, Wooden Iron, Blown Up Explosion, blownupblowup.com, Rodan Tekle, Collin LaFleche, Parker Koo Ito, Steven Read, Lee Gainer, TANLINES, Jon Rafman, Ben Coonley Brooklyn Acadey of Music, Enrich Medium, Charles Westerman fnnnf, Scenes of Provincial Life, Greg Leuch, Sentimental Value, Archives & Museum Informatics, A Million Keys, Net Art Sucks, Jason Metcalf V-TV Art Verbal Television, Bo Lee, Patrick Lichty, Foxy Production, Unicorns, And/Or, 6312414236, Pixel - Lapse, Sheree Rensel, Unseen Worlds Records, Spirit Surfers, Pash* JD Walsh, Jasper Elings, BFFA3AE, Timothy Gaewsky, Least Wanted, Krista Hoefle, Cynthia Lawson, Two Coats of Paint, Audio Dregs, Brooklyn Artists Label, David Rager, The Path, David Pierce, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Video Data Bank, Artie Vierkant, Pixel Quilt, FFD8, Fred Benenson, opsound, iconomaniacs, VVORK, Timothy Buckwalter: paintings + drawings, Scott Blake, Creative Path, M. Leaf-Tierney, Creative Commons, TJ Norris, Brian Ries, Jesse Suchmann - (*_*), Ron Rosenzweig, Julie Ahn, Send me Something, Caitlin Jones - Yo Gabba! UK, iplug.in, Mike Linksvayer, Eric Dever, Tom Bogaert, Postmasters, RSG, El Celso, C-MONSTER, Rosa Lowinger, Yvonne Connasse, Art Fag City, Gay Swan, SanSuzie, Ron Hutt, Emily Grenader, Matthew Ballou, Psychotropic Horizons RAM :: Open Shakespeare Alliance, KERNEL, The Instructional Capital, thatisaworkaround.com, top_down/bottom_up, Derek Buckner, The Center for Collective Wealth, Ed Osborn, Nick Lally, NEWSgrist, Daniel Jacoby, Eric Doeringer, OTO Tonstartssbandht, Jeremy Levine, Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof, theodoros dd giannakis, An Artist in Brooklyn, Mindhue Artwork, Cotteleston Cheong Kwon : daté.es, Andrew Milmoe, Matthew Green, Joy Drury Cox, Valentino's Muse, Design is Casual, Yann Vanderme, Lisa Roumell Ms. & Mr., beam me up, SPHERELAB, Julia Weist, culturehall, Jan Kather, AD Pawley, chashama, Danny Coeyman, Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery, Daniel Turner, Kate Fauvell, Daniel Turner, horen.net - consultant e-business, art numerique, Jerome Saint-Clair, Robert Roth - Health Proxy, Chris Kaczmarek, Paradoxy Products, New Zoid Times, Arts Machine, Michael Manning, Jody Zellen, Tickets for Profits, Creative Travel, Po-Po-Mo Ho, Bill Evertson, ONE art guide, Over MY Dead Body You Will, David Harper for Creative Capital AIDS-3d, Teneia Wooten, We are the Strange, Digital Art Museum, Rachel Zoe, The $100k Homepage Grover Watts Photo Appreciation Society, The Eclipse Gallery, Million Flower Garden, Light & Wire Gallery, Dewil, Brooklyndiy
Conde Nast rescues Portfolio.com website!
Conde Nast rescues Portfolio.com website!:This is pretty big. Conde Nast is reviving Portfolio.com by transferring it to a different unit of the parent company (Advance), American City Business Journals, publisher of local-business editions in cities throughout the US. The Observer reports:
The Charlotte-based ACBJ, which runs all the bizjournal.com Web sites, will assume full power both editorially and on the business side of the Web site, and has hired from portfolio.com managing editor Josh Moss to become the lead editor of this site. The new portfolio.com team will be staffed at Advance’s offices at 750 Third Avenue.
Tim Bradbury, president at ACBJ, said portfolio.com would start with a staff of roughly five on the edit side. He said that the Web site would look roughly the same as it does now, and that there would be minor tweaks to the design. The “Condé Nast” in the logo, for instance, will be dropped; the f in “Portfolio” will stay.
And from the press release:
“We knew that Portfolio.com was a highly valuable asset, with an established digital brand, strong direct navigation by users, and a solid long tail of traffic from content published over the past two years,” David Carey, Group President, Condé Nast said.
Good. Maybe they won’t fuck it up this time.
Taste Testing the 'World's Best Coffee'
Andrew Purvis of Guardian's Word of Mouth tries "the world's best coffee," the Esmeralda Special from Panama, which sold for $117.50 a pound in an online auction this past Tuesday. "It was sweet, fruity and floral, more like jasmine tea," Purvis said. But for something that cost 100 times more than Fairtrade coffee, was it that much better?
Jack Kerouac's fantasy baseball league
Unbeknownst to his close friends, Jack Kerouac invented a fantasy baseball game and played it for most of his life.
[Kerouac's game charted] the exploits of made-up players like Wino Love, Warby Pepper, Heinie Twiett, Phegus Cody and Zagg Parker, who toiled on imaginary teams named either for cars (the Pittsburgh Plymouths and New York Chevvies, for example) or for colors (the Boston Grays and Cincinnati Blacks).
He collected their stats, analyzed their performances and, as a teenager, when he played most ardently, wrote about them in homemade newsletters and broadsides. He even covered financial news and imaginary contract disputes. During those same teenage years, he also ran a fantasy horse-racing circuit, complete with illustrated tout sheets and racing reports. He created imaginary owners, imaginary jockeys, imaginary track conditions.
Don't miss the slideshow of some of Kerouac's notebooks and publications related to his imaginary sports.
Tags: baseball fantasybaseball jackkerouac sports
Buzzfeed
Those that know me, know I love the web, and especially viral web trash. So, on this note, I am pleased to report that for the next little while, Ill be a guest "blogger" at Buzzfeed. Im not sure where Ill go with this yet, as I am still experimenting, or how exactly it will differ from my hot links and utube favs, but I am excited to be trying this out. My buzzfeed "blog" is located here FYI.
Nokia opens Ovi Maps to third party developers
Nokia Wednesday announced the latest version of Ovi Maps which people to add personal location-based content. This marks a shift from the one-size-fits-all static bitmap maps commonly found on the web. Nokia offers dynamic vector-graphic maps as a browser for all personal map experiences - whether on the web or on your compatible mobile device.
Nokia also announced the release of the Ovi Maps Player API, a simple way to embed the rich and dynamic Ovi Maps experience into any compatible website using basic JavaScript.
This opens the Ovi Maps service and technology for third parties wishing to add greater contextual innovation to their websites for a deeper level of integration, sharing and collaboration with their audiences. Now websites like lonelyplanet.com or social networking sites can include Ovi Maps which can be personalized with their users' collections of content and then synchronized onto their compatible mobile devices.
"Ovi Maps is evolving from a consumer service to a live and dynamic platform for location-based services and content shared between the mobile device and the web. By adding this richer dimension to Ovi Maps we are both creating new experiences for consumers and new opportunities for developers," says Michael Halbherr, vice president, Social Location services at Nokia.
"The Ovi Maps Player API offers an open and easy-to-use map browser based on simple web technologies that can be embedded into any website. This is the first step toward an ecosystem where developers can access Nokia's unique contextual assets, such as location, to create mobile applications that will redefine how we use our mobile devices. "
"We are thrilled to be one of the first companies to be working with the Ovi Maps Player API", says Stephen Palmer, President, Lonely Planet, EMEA.
"This is a transformational partnership, which makes Lonely Planet content available regardless of time or place. Working with this new platform adds value to the Lonely Planet offering and together with Nokia we will help more travelers connect profoundly with their world, everyday."
The latest version of Ovi Maps application on your device is enhanced through additional features and services, opening up a new world of possibilities with better maps than ever before: high resolution satellite and terrain maps - both in 2D and 3D views - 3D landmarks for over 200 cities, rotation, tilting, night view, and fly-overs and fly-throughs.
Ovi Maps also offers enriched POI information by Lonely Planet, Michelin and Wcities, as well as a weather service that provides 24 hour and 5-day forecasts. Walk from one place to another by using Walk, pedestrian navigation with routing optimized for those on foot, providing better orientation in a city or outdoors. Or use Drive, fully fledged car navigation with enhanced safety and real-time traffic information covering now more countries.
What Happens to a Closed-Down Auto Plant?
The bankruptcy of Chrysler may sound like good news to critics of American auto culture, but the resulting job losses and plant closures are poised to deal a serious blow to already-struggling midwestern towns. Which is why it's heartening to see that the Obama administration is working on a plan to help clean up the land surrounding shuttered plants and give it back to its rightful owners in local communities.
Chrysler workers leaving a plant (Photo: New York Times)
Inside the EPA, a trade publication in Washington, reported this week that the government will pay for revitalizing closed auto plants that would otherwise be at risk for joining the list of environmentally blighted Superfund sites. "Local land use" will also be a priority in turning the sites back over for future use, according to the report.
Could we soon see parks or even bike trails being built where domestic manufacturing plants once stood? That change will be a long time coming, but at least the process has begun.
Tim Gunn, The New Iron Man?
Marvel Comics is releasing a new series of comic books on August 26th that revolve not around the worlds of Spidey and Clark Kent, but models and fashion.
What we know so far, according the NY Times, is that "Models Inc." will feature a trio of ladies - Spiderman's love Mary Jane, Millicent Collins or Millie the Model, and Patsy Walker who is also a superhero named Hellcat - working to clear Millie of a crime she didn't commit, the murder of a set designer.
And their wise leader? None other than Tim Gunn - who gets to wear Iron Man's suit!
We couldn't think of a better choice. His calming tones and rational thinking are just what your average model turned world-saving superheroine needs, right?
What other real-life fash characters would you have make an appearance? And what would their powers be?
Related: Marvel Comics - Tim Gunn - Iron Man - Patsy Walker - Millie the Model
Lady, That's My Skull
(via flickr)
Untitled
This dude’s tumblr is combining multiple State refs with a shockingly high Eva-Greens-per-post ratio. In fulfillment of the scriptures, I must link him. Again.
A Visual Campaign 08
(via boingboing)
There is a new graphic novel on the scene that chronicles the 2008 election and it looks amazing. Called 08: A Graphic Diary of the Campaign Trail, the book is by Dan Goldman(of Shooting War fame) and starts with the GOP’s defeat in the 2006 mid-terms and continues through election day.
From what I can tell, the images are rich and the text that accompanies them does great job of providing insight and documenting the historic event. Give a look to a beautiful panel from the book below.
You can download an excerpt from the book HERE : 20 page excerpt (35MB PDF)
You can buy a copy of the book HERE.
Army’s Other “Don’t Tell” Policy
USA Today: “Army commanders are failing to punish or seek treatment for a growing number of soldiers who test positive for substance abuse, possibly because they don’t want to lose any more combat troops, the Army’s vice chief of staff has warned.”
Serious Heat: Create Your Own Spice Blends
Photo courtesy of Sudhamshu on Flickr
I don’t know about the Serious Eats community, but Chile Pepper’s employees are drowning in an assortment of spices. My shelves can barely keep up with the demand. For those who live in Atlanta, there is no greater treasure than the DeKalb International Farmer’s Market, which sells fresh spices at an oh-so-reasonable price. When I go to visit family in the South, I always leave extra room in my suitcase for a massive amount of spices from the indoor market.
With so many spices at your disposal, why not use these to create your own spice blends?
I prefer a five-spice blend heavier on the black pepper and less on the cloves, so commercial brands always end up too clovey for me. Problem remedied by making it at home. Also, make your own chili powder by using a variety of ground chiles like ancho and smoked paprika; then add salt, cumin garlic powder and oregano. This way, the heat preference and smokiness can be controlled to your liking. Chile Pepper created its own chili spice blend from ancho, cayenne, chipotle, tea-smoked sea salt, celery seed and other spices. Want a sample of our Get Zesty seasoning? Post a comment below of a description of your favorite spice blend and five winners will be chosen at random. In the meantime, have fun creating your own spice blends with the following recipes.
Five (5) people will be chosen at random among the eligible comments below. Comments will close Friday, May 22 at noon ET. The standard Serious Eats contest rules apply.
Spice Blend Recipes
Starting this July, the first iPhone developers from last year will start having their iPhone...
Starting this July, the first iPhone developers from last year will start having their iPhone Developer Program memberships expire. A developer cannot submit updates after the membership has expired, but presumably the app would be removed from the App Store as well. (I’m not sure if anyone actually knows whether that’s the case.)
This is actually a good mechanism: it’s an automatic removal of abandoned apps. It will probably help remove a lot of the gold-rush crapware, but a few legitimately good apps might disappear as well if the developer either forgot to renew the membership or no longer felt that it was worthwhile. Users of removed apps can continue using them, but they can never gain any new users, effectively forcing the apps’ death.
I wonder how many apps will disappear before September.
Making “Omnivore’s Dilemma” required reading doesn’t fly at agriculture college
Strike up the banned: Washington State University picked “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” as this year’s “common reading” selection for all incoming freshmen, just as UC Berkeley has for next year’s — and then dropped it, citing budget constraints. Oddly, the university had already purchased more than 4,000 copies of the book. Some on campus say that the university, which has a
prominent agriculture college, bowed to pressure from agribusiness
interests. (Chronicle of Higher Education; subscription required)
Portrait of Yuri Kochiyama
Alec Icky Dunn Yuri Kochiyama $30 Justseeds is putting together a book to be published by Microcosm Publishing. This is a reduction print/portrait I made of Yuri Kochiyama, an inspiring long-time activist, a former internee in WWII Japanese-American Internment camps, and closely tied in with political prisoner support and black liberation struggles from the 60s to the now. It's "4 colors", which would be black and three shades of gray.... 4 color reduction print 13"x16" cotton paper signed
jas bhachu: rubik's cube font generator
jas bhachu at the liverpool school of art & design created the 'rubik's cube font generator'
earlier this year for a brief that asked students to produce a visual representation of the word 'move'.
the design uses a standard rubik's cube with stamps on four of its sides so that users can make
their own typeface. an ink pad and multi-lingual instructions are also included in the neat little pack.
box: 157 x 150 x 160 mm
instruction guide: 297 x 420 mm
cube: 90 x 90 mm
more images and info can be found here.
via CRblog
RunPee.com Suggests the Best Movie Bathroom Breaks [Movies]
Jumbo-Sized soda and intricate plots are a dangerous mix. Get relief, and the most out of your movie-going money, with RunPee.com, a site that's like a friend who's seen every flick out there and knows when the bathroom break moments are.
It's a simple idea that's executed well on the web. The left-hand side has links to the current box office leaders and new releases, and clicking on one gives you the various timing points and narrative cues to head to the restrooms if your last stop before the cinema was a bar, coffee shop, or the concession stand. Choose a break point, and the top box explains what will happen right before you've got three minutes to make a run for it.
Want an example? If you're checking out "Star Trek" this weekend, right when Capt. Pike says, "Chekov, you have the con," you've got about three minutes of exposition ahead that you can probably pick up on later. If you don't mind spoilers, or you're attending your second showing, click the unscrambling button below the first cue to find out exactly what will be happening while you're away.
Find us a site that helps you get back to your exact seat during dark and quiet moments, and we'll suggest the ultimate movie site merger. In the meantime, RunPee.com is the second friend you can consult before picking a flick.
Can America's debt get too big to pay?
Reader Matthew Kelley writes with a question:
Our national debt is over $11 trillion, it is not unreasonable to think that in my lifetime I will see a quadrillion dollar national debt. Do you think that there is a level of debt at which the United States would pull a ‘latin america' and just default on the debt?
First, it's a bit of a stretch to think that in your lifetime the national debt will hit $1 quadrillion. Let's say you have 50 years to live, and let's say that, pessimistically, inflation averages 5% a year over that time. US GDP is now about $14 trillion, and if real GDP growth averages 3%, then we'll have nominal GDP growth of 8% a year for 50 years, which would take us to about $650 billion. So a quadrillion-dollar national debt in 50 years' time would require a debt-to-GDP ratio of about 150%. It's all possible, but if you just tweak the numbers a little — say you have 45 years to live and inflation averages 2.5% and real GDP growth is 2.5% — then GDP is just $125 billion when you die, and there's no way you could have a quadrillion-dollar national debt.
But more to the point, for all the rhetoric from campaigners about countries struggling under their debt burdens, there really isn't much of a correlation between the level of a country's debt and the probability that it's going to default — especially not when that debt is wholly denominated in domestic currency. Countries with low debt-to-GDP ratios can default — just look at Ecuador right now — while countries with very high debt-to-GDP ratios can stay current on that debt indefinitely — Japan is the most obvious example, but there are many more.
If you want to come up with a scenario where a developed country defaults on its debt, you're most likely to look at a case like Italy, where the debt is denominated in euros and there's a non-zero chance that the country is forced out of the eurozone; in general, if you want a sovereign default, the best way to get one is to find a country with hard-currency borrowings which then has a massive devaluation. That can't happen in the US — there's no currency mismatch between its tax revenues and its liabilities.
Even a doom-monger like John Hussman says that Treasury bonds are “default-free securities” and that the worst-case scenario is not 5-6% inflation for a year or two, but 5-6% inflation for ten years. (Which he calls “a near-doubling of the U.S. price level over the next decade”.) Neither of these things are likely to increase the chances of default — in fact, quite the contrary. Since the US has only a tiny number of inflation-linked bonds, a strong dose of inflation would therefore substantially decrease the real value of the US national debt.
Essentially, the only way to get to a quadrillion-dollar national debt is via inflation — but inflation manages to reduce debt levels all by itself, meaning there's no need to default any more. So a US default is almost certainly not going to happen.
May 20, 2009
Flags, Windows, Lucky Numbers and Hidden Mickeys
Another new version of Windows is nearly upon us, as Microsoft will release Windows 7 later this year. Vista was greeted with probably a few too many jeers, which in the tech industry means Windows 7 will probably be greeted with a few too many cheers as compensation. I've used it for a while, and Windows 7 is fine or even great if you like Windows, and will not be fine if you don't. But I found some interesting points in the initial marketing materials that are starting to become visible across the web.
Microsoft's gradual design evolution from Windows 3.1-era "What's design?" to XP-era "We're trying our best!" has graduated with Windows 7 into the first visual design touches that are thoughtful, clever, and perhaps even witty. It starts with the logo and promotional graphics for the new version.
There's been a (likely-unplanned) public reveal of the branding around the new release thanks to a site called Windows Lounge. Staying true to Microsoft's uncomfortably awkward corporate culture, the Windows Lounge site is a standalone one-page website that features a YouTube video and some text instructions, all designed to get Microsoft employees to join a Facebook group where they can talk privately about what's planned for the new Windows release. Yes, they're using Google's video service and a private Facebook group to have a conversation that, being aimed at Microsoft employees only, could take place on their own intranet. But I'm not judging that part!
Instead, look at the clever "7" graphic I've included here, which I cropped from one of the Microsoft promo sites. It's clear and simple, like the "7" name itself — no inscrutable "XP", no overly-broad "Vista", just a version number like software used to have in the olden days. Sure, the overdone lens flare gives it a little bit of that I'm-blinded-by-your-brilliance presumptuousness that made squinting my way through the otherwise-delightful new Star Trek movie a little painful. But overall? It's as good a job as any logo Microsoft's done, and it maybe even suggests a > greater-than sign, subtly indicating that this new product represents an actual improvement over whatever version of Windows you're enduring now.
But the moment of delight in truly pleasing designs comes in the reveal, in the sense of discovery that maybe there's something unexpected or unexpectedly familiar in a graphic. It's that moment of FedEx arrows and hidden Mickeys. Which hit me when looking at the familiar Windows flag logo. What if we take this new 7 logo and overlay it on that old standby Windows flag? We get something like this:
Hey, that's pretty cool! It's not perfect, probably as the result of some hand-tuning of the 7 logo. But to take a familiar icon like the Windows flag and use an element of it in a new way — that's a step forward for Microsoft's visual design efforts in terms of thoughtfulness and care. It even echoes the simple, understandable branding of the new platform itself, which uses a lucky number to try to get back some of that feeling (now almost completely forgotten) of when people used to be curious and excited about new Windows releases. You can imagine exactly how they'd animate this luminescent logo in an advertisement, without even having to see it done — that kind of evocative immediacy has rarely characterized any past Microsoft design efforts.
Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that the larger corporate culture at Microsoft outside of groups like the Zune team is largely indifferent to design, except where it's actively and aggressively anti-design. Take the official corporate logos page on the company's press site. It features the usual array of Microsoft, Office and Windows logos, along with other smaller products and whatever the hell the Forefront/System Server mesh-typhoon thing is supposed to be. (It's a logo that screams "this product is not for people who like having sex!") But then there's that familiar Windows flag, in large and small versions, laid out however you might want it.
The small version is basically the same as the Windows 7 logo you see above. And the big version, designed for print editors to use in their publications? It looks like this. You can almost hear the folks who were just celebrating their success with the 7 logo sighing and shaking their heads when you click on that link.
An Audience of Creators
Everyone's quoting various parts of that Denton interview, but this was the surprising stat to me: "Nielsen research shows that nearly 34% of Gawker readers have their own blogs, a key influencer statistic. Gawker readers, it turns out, have their own audience." Update: Biz Insider digs up more numbers. "Turns out they're young, computer-savvy, RSS-reading atheists with good cholesterol:"
The Yips
This past Sunday, Mike Pelfrey, a starting pitcher for the New York Mets, balked at the mound three times in a game against the San Francisco Giants. Baseball rules spell out clearly what constitutes a balk. It's not uncommon but it is costly, as runners on base instantly advance to the next base. Three times in one game is, unfortunately, uncommon. Pelfrey blamed it on a temporary case of the yips, a sudden and inexplicable loss of ability.
First baseman Jeremy Reed later told reporters that he tried to say something to Pelfrey to get his mind back in the game but had little experience in that role. Sometime jams in baseball can be resolved by one perfect pitch, but what if the pitch is lodged somewhere, out of reach. What line can you cast to get it out?
In fall 1995, I attended a Galway Kinnell-Gary Snyder reading at the University of Richmond. I was with a friend who was an avid Kinnell fan, and on the drive to the campus, she tried to describe the experience of hearing him read his poetry live. "You'll have to hear it for yourself," she told me, giving up. The theme of the reading was the environment. Snyder read new poems and a few from Turtle Island, which won the 1974 Pulitzer Prize for poetry. Then he turned the podium to Kinnell. My friend was right. Kinnell had a wonderful, deep voice and read his poems in measured and steady cadences. It was an example for me of how to be a good reader of poetry without engaging in theatrics. After reading some of his poems, he shared "One Ordinary Evening" by Virginia Hamilton Adair, who published her first collection at the age of 83. (Ants on the Melon was published the following year.) As far as poetry readings go, this was excellent.
Then Kinnell announced that the last poem he would read would be "The Bear," his signature poem. It's a long poem, and what made Kinnell's readings of The Bear so famous is that he could do it entirely from memory. So he began--
In late winter
I sometimes glimpse bits of steam
coming up from
some fault in the old snow
and bend close and see it is lung-colored
and put down my nose
and know
the chilly, enduring odor of bear.A few stanzas into the poem, Kinnell stopped. He started from the beginning and, again, stopped in the same place. He paused and said that something was breaking his concentration. Like others, I looked around trying to find anything out of place, out of the ordinary. But the door was closed, no one was going in and out, and we were quiet. Did he see something we couldn't see? It quickly became clear that Kinnell would not get out of that jam and, then, from one of the front rows, a man whispered the line that had been misplaced in Kinnell's memory. Without glancing up Kinnell repeated the line and kept going. He read this entire, brutal and gorgeous poem out loud. When he finished, he reached into the cheering audience and grabbed the man by the hand, grateful that he had got him through the inning.
Nick Denton Believes In Content
The king of Gawker Media, Nick Denton, is featured in an interview over at Ad Age. Naturally, a lot of the focus is on advertising revenue and the fact that Denton doomed it last year, and then did well enough after all. While online revenue for a blog network like Gawker Media is interesting, this caught my eye:
If a good exclusive used to provide 10 times the traffic of a standard regurgitated blog post, now it garners a hundred times as much. That should be reassuring to people. The content market is finding its new balance. Original reporting will be rewarded.
Denton then goes on and talks about recent strategic hires to strengthen the voice of the network’s key titles. Content is king yet again, eh?
Possibly Related Posts
MySQL Pays attention to Bugs (Finally!)
I should say I can see results of new engineering/refactoring/bug hunt efforts inside Sun/MySQL.
Over last couple of weeks I started getting a lot of messages from the bugs system about bugs I reported long ago which were deferred to be fixed later or were left in open state. Here is example of such a bug.I really hope this effort will result in a lot of these old annoyances fixed, which really matches my vision for MySQL - we do not need more big features we need old ones to work well and be convenient.
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Netflix Prize progress
A check of the Netflix Prize leaderboard shows that the team in the lead is very close to the 10% improvement needed to win the $1 million prize with 9.71%. Three members of the top team recently wrote about their experience for IEEE Spectrum.
Tags: netflix netflixprize
Yahoo! Placemaker, extract world locations from unstructed content
also, Yahoo released the huge GeoPlanet/WOE placename database under a CC license
Public Service 2.0: ProPublica Reporting Network Launches Today
My dear friend and former colleague Amanda Michel launched a new fabulous project today with ProPublica. Anyone who is fortunate enough to know her, knows that any project she is behind is bound to be extraordinary. And this is no exception.
Amanda writes, “The Reporting Network will organize readers, guiding them to ‘commit acts of journalism,’ as it’s put by Marc Cooper, my former colleague from our days running the citizen journalism site OffTheBus. Call it crowdsourcing. Call it collaborative reporting. I’d prefer not to debate semantics. Instead, let’s talk about what the Reporting Network will do.
By collaborating directly with the public, we aim to better cover seminal issues from Manhattan, where ProPublica is based…we aim to deliver a greater range of information. E-mail, cell phones, instant messenger, ProPublica.org and social networking sites such as Facebook are our tools. Questions that hold public figures and those in power accountable are our guides. I am both editor and organizer. Those who participate in our reporting initiatives — that’s you — are Reporting Network members.”
The first assignment: Adopt a Stimulus Project
“The government will spend $27 billion repairing roads and bridges as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Those projects are estimated to create 765,000 jobs of the 3.5 million promised by the Obama administration. You have probably heard accounts of how the billions will be spent. A bridge here. A road there. But what’s the big picture? Will repaving highways and bolstering overpasses create as many jobs as the administration says? Are they wise investments, reconstruction projects for the 21st century? That’s why we’re asking ProPublica’s readers to hit the pavement this summer. Chances are your daily commute already takes you by a road or a bridge that will be fixed with stimulus money.”
You can check out ProPublica’s AN AMAZING tool to find local reconstruction projects by state.
If you want to make sure the government is spending the stimulus money as planned, grab a notebook, pick a project, and report on what you find.Here is how to join the ProPublica Reporting Network.
Maureen Dowd Has TONS Of Blog-Reading Pals, Okay?
Thank heavens: Leon Wieseltier did not lead Maureen Dowd astray. Plagiarism-wise, at least.
Evan Roth's Intellectual Property Asshole Competition
he painted the HOPE poster and the AP photo it was based on; whoever C&Ds him first wins [via]
Kindle app for iPhone updated
Filed under: Software, iPhone, iPod touch
Amazon's Kindle app for iPhone [App Store link] was updated this week to include, among other things, landscape mode! Hooray! Additionally, you can change the color of both the text and the background. I like the "Sepia" option; it's similar to the way Classics looks.
Finally, you can turn pages by tapping on either side of the screen (I still prefer to swipe). You'll remember that the Kindle store for iPhone is still only accessible via Mobile Safari, and was optimized a few weeks ago.
Kindle for iPhone was introduced in March of this year and has been popular since.TUAWKindle app for iPhone updated originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 20 May 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Comes Up Again At White House
Air America lady Ana Marie Cox asked about “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” at the just-concluded White House press briefing. And, like others before her, she didn’t get much of an answer, it sounds like—Obama will work with Congress, blah blah, though apparently the White House spokesman copped to that kicking people out of the military weakened the military. (Awaiting transcript.) If I was super-militaristic and into killing people, I’d be very upset about this whole thing.
Braid for Mac released
now there's no excuse not to buy it
Links from May 20
Long delayed roundup of links:
- Dan Benjamin: Top 10 Programming Fonts. I’m currently giving Inconsolata a whirl.
- Jasmin Blanchette: The Little Manual of API Design. A very interesting looking PDF that I intend to read.
- John Quiggin: Austrian Business Cycle Theory. A very well written critique.
- Advanced NFL Stats: Draft Success by Team. Not enough attention is paid to the long term results of the draft.
- James Carr: TDD Anti-Patterns. I’m a sucker for lists like this.
- Firediff. A diff plugin for Firebug.
- Continuing Intermittent Incoherency: Ending The ga.js Wait.Using Dojo to address some of the problems with ga.js, the JavaScript file used by Google Analytics.
- Eliot Spitzer: If Judge Posner believes this, the world really has changed - One of the most prominent free market intellectuals thinks the market is incapable of setting CEO pay. Judge Posner has gone on to say many even more provocative things lately. This week he’s guest blogging for Andrew Sullivan.
- AisleOne: 8 Simple Ways to Improve Typography In Your Design. Very good article on improving your use of type.
- James Duncan Davidson: Dear Speakers. Tips for conference speakers.
- Ajaxian: FirePHP: Tying together Firebug and PHP. A means of packaging debug information for Firebug to consume with AJAX responses.
- LearnHub: How to Compare Hosted DNS Providers (with Data!). DNS performance is an underrated piece of the overall site performance picture.
- Seed Magazine: Getting Past the Pie Chart. On the state of data visualization.
- USA Today: Announcing baseball’s all-stars in the broadcast booth. Ranking the baseball broadcasters.
- A.V. Club: Turn off the shuffle: 25 great albums that work best when listened to from start to finish.
- Findings from the A LIST APART Survey, 2008. The results are interesting, but what I really like is the CSS used to create the charts.
- Web Style Guide 3. Filing this away for later.
- Chad Fowler: 20 Rails Development No-No’s. Compiled from responses to a request for feedback on Twitter.
- Last.fm Blog: Mapreduce Bash Script. Very elegant hack.
- Migrating from svn to a distributed VCS. This is specific to the Python code base, but it is a great general resource.
- Digg the Blog: Introducing Digg’s IDDB Infrastructure. Something I need to digest.
- Patrick Peak and Paul Barry: Presentation on BrowserCMS. It’s an up and coming CMS built using Ruby on Rails.
- Rogers Cadenhead: Bit.ly Builds Business on Libya Domain. On the risks of relying on the technical governance of an authoritarian dictatorship.
- dotfiles.org: .zshrc. A collection of zsh init scripts.
- UXmatters: Refining Data Tables. Tips on creating usable reports.
- Z-Shell Frequently-Asked Questions. From my recent zsh obsession.
- Fried CPU: zsh: The last shell you’ll ever need!. zsh advocacy.
- 2009 Rubyist’s guide to a Mac OS X development environment. This is where I got the idea to try zsh in the first place.
- Time: Detroit’s Beautiful, Horrible Decline . An amazing set of photos.
- James Dumay: Mac OS X Tip: Preventing accidently launching FrontRow when cycling windows. This happens to me all the time.
- Ms. Glaze: Make It Nice or Make it Twice. Very much applicable to software development.
- Michael Ruhlman: Duck Confit: It’s What’s For Lunch. Who doesn’t want to confit their own duck?
Avoiding mixed messages
Last week I received in the mail an appeal to support the World Wildlife Fund. This is an organization I generally respect. Its motto: "WWF's ultimate goal is to build a future where people live in harmony with nature."
Yet the mailing I received from WWF contained 17 pieces of paper. Every piece is bright white, none are noted as recycled or post-consumer, and most have four-color printing on them.
I've never given to the WWF, but I have a membership at the American Museum of Natural History, so I guess I'm a good target. To curry my favor, the WWF thought it best if it sent me
- an appeal letter
- a blow-in showing the impact of my donation
- five "occasion" cards (Thinking of You, etc.) for my use
- five envelopes for the cards, bound by a piece of gummed paper
- a sheet of wildlife stickers
- a sheet of personalized return address labels (attached to the donation form)
- and an envelope for sending in my donation
I know direct marketing works, so I'm not going to debate whether I should have gotten mail from the WWF. But that doesn't absolve the mixed message this envelope sends.
How can an environmental organization send 17 pieces of paper, unsolicited, to potential constituents? How many envelopes did they send out--10,000? 100,000? This campaign could have used a million sheets of paper, or more--98 percent of which were summarily thrown in the trash (or, hopefully, recycled). All of which runs directly counter to the organization's stated mission.
I actually came away from this mailing less inclined to support the WWF, not more. That's a serious misstep for a marketing campaign.
Cookbooks That Teach
On Sunday I put a call out on Twitter for books that a 60-year-old guy could use to teach himself to cook and got scores of suggestions: Lots of Julia of course, but others that got three or more votes were Bittman's How to Cook Everything, Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Food, and The Joy of Cooking. A couple mentioned Tom Collichio's Think Like a Chef and Madeleine Kamman's The Making of a Cook. A few kinds souls mentioned Ratio, a not unreasonable suggestion as it explores the fundamentals. But after I read all these comments, and, having been speaking intensively with a couple of publishing executives about the changing nature of cookbooks I wanted to put this out as a post, to discuss the nature of the new cookbooks and also so that people can name their favorite teaching cookbook in comments so we have a more permanent record of them than we do on twitter.
I pulled the above stack (photo by donna, thanks!) randomly but they are all good books and all teach in their own way. And "own way" is the key here. Most of them don't overtly try to teach (Alton's and my books do, and the CIA pro chef series is an explicit culinary textbook), but some are more effective than others by being more than simply a compilation of recipes.
Now that the tsunami of free recipes has flooded the cooking landscape, what is the purpose of cookbooks? Some of the points addressed by Sydny Miner of S&S and Bill LeBlonde of Chronicle Books at The Greenbrier included the fact that once we needed books of recipes, compilations, such as Joy or Craig Claiborne's The New York Times Cookbook. But now, because recipes are a click away, books have evolved. They come now with voice, with story, with a distinct personality. Also, as Miner pointed out, decades ago, somebody in most households cooked (usually a mom) who passed a fundamental set of skills down to the children so that recipes could read, "use a lump of butter the size of a walnut, mix together with flour, egg, sugar, pour into a cake pan and bake in a moderate oven until done." That was enough. Now we must be very specific in our instructions because not everyone knows what moderate means, mix together how, etc. We managed to lose a generation of cooking knowledge.
Bill LeBlond commented that he was much, much more interested in unconventional ideas because the old model is just not selling anymore.
And while at Greenbrier a reader emailed to say this: "After getting used to reading food blogs, I’m looking for the stories behind the food. Today, for example, I browsed through 2 older David Lebovitz cookbooks and I missed the stories. I now find traditional cookbooks to be dry/boring without the wonderful stories I read on (good) blogs. Plenty of people can make up a recipe, but not many are good story tellers or have something particularly interesting to say."
What are the best teaching cookbooks out there and what are we now looking for in today's cookbook?
First photos from the "Sesame Street" shoot today at Tompkins Square Park: How soon before the paparazzi and groupies (and drugs, natch) arrive?
Shared by alainaOn Avenue B. I'm going to heckle Fozzie Bear. (Uh, is he still on the show...?)
Should have worked from home today.
Food in Iceland During the Global Economic Crisis
Fish market at Kolaportið in Reyjavik.
In the latest episode of The Food Programme from BBC Radio, Richard Johnson investigates the impact of the global economic crisis on food in Iceland. There's more interest in eating local food and growing food locally in order to save money on importing from other countries and increase self-sufficiency. In an interview with Johnson, a fisherman says, "We are eating more traditional foods like meat pudding, sheep heads...now people are all of a sudden making haggis again. This was almost forgotten about. This is cheap, good, and nutritious food." Other topics include the fishing industry, whaling, and greenhouses powered by natural heat.
Related
Snapshots from Iceland: Grilled Whale from Saegreifinn
Snapshots from Iceland: Overloaded Open-Face Sandwich
Snapshots from Iceland: Hot Dog from Baejarins Beztu Pylsur
Lauren Conrad’s Novel, Annotated
Here is a helpful annotation of the excerpt recently released of reality star Lauren Conrad’s novel. (There are troubles with this piece of literature, apparently! “This is not the Lauren Conrad I know and identify with, the Lauren Conrad the girls who form the audience for this book know and identify with, the Lauren Conrad who obsesses and freaks out and holds grudges and who always, even at her lightest and happiest moments, has angst and tension burning under her celebrity skin.”)
Math and the City (and the elephant)
This should provide a sufficient amount of "whoa" for the day: mathematically speaking, how are elephants and big cities the same? A: both cities and elephants have developed a similar level of efficiency in the distribution of resources and transportation.
Geoffrey West of the Santa Fe Institute and his colleagues Jim Brown and Brian Enquist have argued that a 3/4-power law is exactly what you'd expect if natural selection has evolved a transport system for conveying energy and nutrients as efficiently and rapidly as possible to all points of a three-dimensional body, using a fractal network built from a series of branching tubes -- precisely the architecture seen in the circulatory system and the airways of the lung, and not too different from the roads and cables and pipes that keep a city alive.
(thx, john)
Tags: cities evolution mathematics science stevenstrogatz
Christie’s Auctioning Dylan’s First Plaigiarism?
In the post below on the forthcoming auction of Bob Dylan’s juvenilia, commenter “formerly it takes a lot etc.” directs us to this message board, which points out that the “Little Buddy” poem is actually an old Hank Snow song, making this one of the earliest examples of Dylan’s process of cultural collage. The Guardian comments, archly: “Dylan wouldn’t be the first teenager to cheat on his homework, but he’s almost certainly the first to find the end result so valuable. Christie’s, who valued Little Buddy at £10,000, have yet to comment on the discovery that they are Snow’s lyrics.”
Artist Stages ‘Intellectual Property Asshole Competition’
In one corner: Shepard Fairey, an artist whose built his empire on appropriated art but files cease and desist letters to artists who co-opt his work even for parody purposes. In the other corner: The Associated Press, the world’s biggest news service sometimes less accurate than MTV that claims “fair use” only applies to them, not others. These two challengers will vie to win a new competition organized by Evan Roth, the Graffiti Research Lab co-founder and Hova textualizer, who writes:
Who is the bigger intellectual property asshole? … I have created hand painted canvases of Shepard Fairy’s Obama Hope poster, and Mannie Garcia’s Associated Press photograph and put them for sale on my website here and here.
The first person to send me a cease and desist notice wins!
Place your bets, folks. The two artworks are included below.
Terminated Dept.
Looks like Ebert didn't think much of T4.
Terminator Salvation :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews
... most of the running time is occupied by action sequences, chase sequences, motorcycle sequences, plow-truck sequences, helicopter sequences, fighter-plane sequences, towering android sequences and fistfights. It gives you all the pleasure of a video game without the bother of having to play it.I'm fully prepared to dissent with him, of course. I get the impression that after stuff like Lars von Trier's Antichrist, his mind is very much elsewhere right now. (And for those of you in the videogames-as-visual-art category, he gave you that much more ammo for the attack ... although I'm 110% sure he's pretty tired of that whole argument, too.)
Bloomberg’s Insane Spendy Campaign PSYCHO HORRORSHOW
Short and Boston-ey New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg has already spent $18 million on his reelection campaign this year. Against NO ONE. And so this results in what is most likely the greatest story ever written, about the Bloomberg campaign’s army of consultants and volunteers, who are basically spending the election eating pizza and, like many people in City Hall, waiting for potential jobs at the Bloomberg Foundation, which is where all good loyal Bloomberg soldiers go to work-retire and attend conferences and take people out to lunch and recline in splendor. Not that things aren’t so cushy now at the campaign, when you are making $16,000 a month to pursue labor endorsements, or your web company is billing Bloomberg $1.7 million for, like, a website. Hahahaha! EVERYONE IN THE WORLD MUST STOP AND READ THIS!
Lee un Pinche Libro (Read a Fucking Book)
Santiago Armengod Lee un Pinche Libro (Read a Fucking Book) $25 El mensaje de este grabado fué inspirado por la libreria anarquista colectiva Left Bank Books de Seattle, WA. Queria conjuntar una imagen sumamente positiva con este mensaje tan imperativo. La importancia de crear nuestras propias conclusiones y criterios para no caer en la desinformacion de los medios. The message of this print was inspired from Left Bank Books, an anarchist collective bookstore from Seattle, WA. I wanted to put together a positive image with this imperative message. The importance of creating our own conclusions and criteria to prevent mass media desinformation. One color Wood block print 13" x 16" Cotton Paper Signed/Numbered
Talk: The Future of Science Publishing
I think about the fusion of mobile and Web all the time. And I’ve been talking about and thinking about designing services and software for years. But I also was an academic researcher for about 10 years, with 18 co-authored papers.
All this converged about a year and half ago when I met Matt Cockerill from BioMedCentral, an Open Access publisher of scientific papers.
He had a sort of embarrassment of riches - servers full of papers, videos, info. The problem was how to take all that info and make it work, derive relevance, give value back to the scientists.
That got me thinking. I framed it as a problem - how to make it easy to find-navigate-recombine-share? Suddenly, I saw this as one of the big challenges for the Web.
Now, I see it everywhere in other areas, but science publishing catches my attention, mostly due to my recent focus back on science.
The Rise of the Scientific Paper
Scientific papers arose about 450 years ago as a way to distribute, between scientists, public letters and correspondence on findings and reports. The natural scarcity of publication and distribution made this a necessity.From this arose lead publishers (for example, Nature and Science) and all that science publishing entails - star editors, reputation, authority, impact factors, and so on.
But that’s so Web 1.0.
Waves of the Web
OK, so I try really hard not to use the Web 1.0, Web 2.0 etc terminology. I view the Web more in waves than labels. Each of these waves take the cycle of create, consume, connect to another level.For me Wave 1 was the Age of the Hyperlinked Document. The first wave was characterized by a rush to digitize traditional publishing assets, such as databases, newspapers, encyclopedias. This wave also saw the rise of Web indexes (Yahoo), search (AltaVista), email, and the browser wars. But in the end, the creators were traditional publishers and indexers. Regular folk just "browsed" stuff, without any contribution.
Wave 2 was the Age of the Fragmentation of the Web. This wave saw the coming of micropublishing (blogs, wikis), emergent (crowd-sourced) indexes (wikis, delicious), social networks, and new ways to search (Google, Technorati). And expectations of interactions with people and content was heavily influnced by IM (rapid morsels of conversational text) and rich interfaces (through flash, video, and AJAX). But the biggest change (at least in this story) was that everyone became a publisher
Publishing, therefore, had gone from static monoliths to morsels of info free to socialize. This has caused the collapse of traditional publishing (witness the record and newspaper industries). Furthermore, there has been an explosion of morsels of data on the Web. Everything has become search-able, comment-able, link-able, embed-able, feed-able. Data and people mix in a social, living, Web.
In short, Wave 1 weakened traditional publishing that used to be based on scarcity. Wave 2 made everyone a source of info, everyone an annotator of data, everyone a publisher; it took hyperlinked documents and morselized the web.
How have scientific publishers fared in this Wave 2?
They've basically kept the status quo. Online. Stuck in Wave 1.As with many other traditional publishers, science publishers replicated their closed subscription-based model on the Web, republishing their content online.
Open Access has been battling the status quo for 10 years (at least in terms of access). Only now are they getting strong recognition, impact factors, authority, and a little respect. But they are predicated mostly on and restricted heavily by the traditional model of science publishing (for example, stuck to impact factors).
Recently science publishers have been experimenting with comments and annotations. But with little traction (and I have a few ideas as to why). And, granted, the non-paper publishing part of traditional publishers have embraced the Web, but I am speaking of the core product here.
So many similarities...
The irony is that Tim Berners-Lee actually envisioned the Web as a way to share science information and publications. Openness and sharing are at the heart of science. And the core cultural structures replicate well online. Wave 2 behaviors are the same as in research: find, navigate, recombine, share.
And the Web also has structures found in traditional publishing, such as ways to deal with authority and primacy.
In short, science publishing as it should be mirrors the Web.
If there is a Wave 1 and Wave 2, is there a Wave 3?
My view is that we are entering the true era of (and need for) the Semantic Web. Context is about relevancy is about meaning is about semantics. I claim that the semantic Web has not advanced in the past many years because the focus has been on what I call "librarian" tasks of formatting data and manually building ontologies and so on.What we know now (from Wave 2 behavior) is that emergent semantics, created through data-mining, but especially via people just using the Web, will be key in helping us navigate the sea of data. In short, the next wave of the Web will require a mix of data mining, librarian tasks, and people to make sense of it all.
How do I see science publishing taking advantage of the Web?
I mapped out behaviors and how it could be on the Web.
Culture vs tech
Risking sounding dramatic, I think more changes are inevitable, despite publishers wishes to hold on to traditional structures. But the sad irony is that the future of science publishing depends on culture not tech. All the tech is here, and it’s evolving, mixing Web, mobile, context, semantics and other wonder, whether the scientific publishers want to or no.But will scientists lead the way?
This post was written from the notes of my talk at the 3rd WLE Symposium in London back in March (presentation below).The Future Of Scientific PublishingView more presentations from Charlie Schick.
Database Helper
I’ve been in a lot of Cloud-flavored discussions recently about what kind of Platform-as-a-Service offerings might hit sweet spots. On several occasions, People Who Should Know have said things like “A huge proportion of apps, even really big apps, can coast along just fine on a single MySQL instance with help from memcached.” Some numbers crossed my radar today that would tend to support that theory; and they’re sort of astounding.
Check out Zoran Radovic’s Scaling Memcached: 500,000+ Operations/Second with a Single-Socket UltraSPARC T2. The title kind of says it: hundreds of thousands of ops per second, and a saturated 10G Ethernet link, with a 1U single-socket server. Now, benchmarks aren’t reality, but them are still some mind-boggling numbers.
Our Shanti Subramanyam has been mining the same territory with the new Nehalem boxes; see Memcached Performance on Sun's Nehalem System and Multi-instance memcached performance. And there were some even scarier numbers being bandied about on an internal email list; stay tuned.
But still, at the end of the day, that throughput on a single-socket box is the real news story, to my eye.
May 19, 2009
May 20, 2009
Untitled, Daniel, Wyoming, 2008 from the series A Most Serene Republic Photo © Tim Carpenter
Wired v. Wired.com
I'm finally getting around to reading this post from Joel Johnson about Wired and Wired.com. I want to respond to nearly every single commenter, but I'll instead just act paralyzed and mention some of the people who show up in the comments: Chris Anderson, Brian Lam, Sean Bonner, Gary Wolf, and Felix Salmon.
Jimmy Kimmel Demolishes ABC’s Upfronts
Jimmy Kimmel Demolishes ABC’s Upfronts :Wow. Here are some excerpts from the NY Times’ ArtsBeat Blog:
If ABC is so confident in its new fall shows, [Kimmel] asked, why is it announcing them at the same time it announces the midseason shows that will replace those fall shows? “This show ‘Shark Tank’ has the word tank right in the title,” he said.
To the ABC advertisers, Mr. Kimmel said, “Every year we lie to you and every year you come back for more. You don’t need an upfront. You need therapy. We completely lie to you, and then you pass those lies onto your clients.”
Returning to ABC’s advertisers, Mr. Kimmel said, “Next year on ‘Grey’s Anatomy,’ your product could kill Dr. Izzie. It just depends on how much you want to pay.”
Before departing the stage, he said: “The important thing to remember is: who cares, it’s not your money.”
Quote of the Day
The Powell's blog has a regular feature called Q&A, in which they ask many different authors the same standard questions. This week, they asked religious scholar Huston Smith to "offer a favorite sentence or passage from another writer." His response:
The final words of Saint John Chrysostom: "Thanks, thanks for everything; praise, praise for it all."
One Pitch, One Out: Daydream Believer. But if you want to see how a good pitcher deals with a jam, watch that last inning. Watch how Stokes directed his fastball like a whip to get the hits he needed.
1986 Donruss Video Rip
I got a little bit rambunctious on this pack rip, but as you will see there was wooo-worthy Epicness inside.In a sad note, the card that got the big reaction out of me has gone missing. You see, a few cards into the opening I accidentally dropped a couple of the cards on the floor so I gave up and just started chucking them over my shoulder. The card in question is now AWOL and presumed to be hiding on top of a cabinet or perhaps behind an appliance. I sent a pile of '85 Fleer doubles out as a search party but have heard no report back.
Here's three of the better cards from the pack for you guys who don't click on strange videos.I've got another rip in the can, one ready for editing, and three projects lined up in pre production so expect more where this came from soon.
BONUS DRINKING GAME!!!I say "Finally" take a drink.I call '86 Donruss "Garbage" take two drinks.I do something completely inane and embarassing that makes you giggle like an idiot, chug.
Snapshots from South Korea: Pizza Doughnut from Mister Donut
From May 8 to May 12 I visited Seoul for the first time, mostly to eat as much food as I could and learn about a cuisine I knew little about.
I know I just wrote a post about Mister Donut, but that was about the doughnut I liked. Here's one that was less successful and strange enough to deserve its own post.
As the story* goes, one day the chefs at Mister Donut headquarters thought, "Hey, why don't we make a doughnut that's pizza-flavored?" And enough people responded with, "I don't know; let's try it," that the Pizza Roll became a reality.
The Pizza Roll has at least two purposes: to delight the palates of the savory doughnut-craving public, or to fulfill the curiosities of people who had never before come across a pizza-flavored doughnut. In my group's case, it was the latter.
The doughnut was reheated for a hint of gooey cheese action and cut into four pieces for easy sharing. And that's where the trouble began, as all the innards had shifted to one side of the doughnut. Or that might just be the way it's made. The fillings of cheese, tomato sauce, and ham were kind of pizza-like, if you're eating a ham pizza. The soft dough wasn't as sweet as their regular doughnuts but still had a touch of sweetness, which is definitely not something I think of when I want to eat pizza.
Overall, the Pizza Roll doesn't satisfy a doughnut craving, nor a pizza craving, nor even a savory dough craving since it's a tad sweet. After getting zapped in the microwave, it's just an oily dough ring with meager fillings.
Mister Donut's regular donuts are great, my favorite being the Pon de Ring. Go with those; avoid anything with "pizza" in it.
* This story may not be entirely true. Because I made it up.
Film: The English Surgeon
I saw a fantastic documentary last night: The English Surgeon. It follows a British neurosurgeon as he and an Ukrainian surgeon work to diagnose and treat patients in a make-shift clinic set up in a KGB hospital. The film is a fascinating look into neurosurgery, life in Ukraine, and the disparity in the level of care available in the two countries.
The film focuses on the treatment of a man suffering epilepsy brought on by a brain tumour, and shows (in graphic-but-fascinating detail) the surgery to remove it. The staff can’t perform the usual protocol where the patient is put to sleep while the skull is opened, then woken for the tumour removal (so that critical areas of the brain can be mapped and avoided), so he remains awake for the entire procedure. Amazing to watch.
Highly recommended if you’re interested in healthcare, neurology, life in Ukraine or just good documentaries in general.
The trailer (warning, a few medically graphic moments):
Where/how to see it:
- San Francisco: Catch it at the Red Vic tonight or tomorrow.
- New York: A run starts at Cinema Village on July 24th
- The DVD is available in the UK now, and comes out in the US (and Canada?) September 8th. (It’s available for queuing on Netflix and pre-order on Amazon now.)
Very Briefly on Dowd
I generally think we're too quick to pull the trigger with charges of plagiarism. I haven't said anything about this because I really didn't think I had anything to add. Whatever the mechanics of how it happened, I never thought it was intentional. Dowd and the Times quickly corrected it, which I appreciated. And for me, that's pretty much the end of it.
Jacob Holdt and Life-long subjects
Last Friday, I had the chance to hear Jacob Holdt (he being the Danish vagabond who traveled the most poverty-stricken, racist parts of the United States in the 1970s with $40 in his pocket and created the book American Pictures) talk at the New York Photo Festival in DUMBO. He talked of many topics: his love affairs, joining the Ku Klux Klan, living amongst the impoverished black communities in America, touring with his book, bringing about change through love, his involvement in fighting global racism, and the many friends of his who during his life have been murdered or gone to jail. He has lost and loved and laughed often, and his stories share his complete lack-of-fear and penetrating idealism in trying to understand broken and violent communities, and the ways he has perennially lived with the idea that people who have endured pain early in their lives should have another opportunity to live—with less pain (and less hatred).
Holdt’s journey through the United States is in and of itself remarkable, but what caught my attention most, was the way he has visited recurring persons throughout his life–people who have become friends and his subjects, an extensive cast of characters that includes former lovers, a young boy with a proclivity for leaning on one arm, or a Klan member, and a man who went to jail for murder who Holdt helped get out and later became one of the directors of the American Pictures documentary (video and sound).
Many photographers make a single strong portrait of a person they only meet once, but I think many stronger and more intimate portraits are often born out of subjects photographed over a long period of time. I think of Wolfgang Tillman’s images of his then-boyfriend, the painter Jochen Klein, of Annie Liebowitz’s images of Susan Sontag, of Tierney Gearon’s photographs of her mother (The Mother Project), and of Mary Ellen Mark’s ongoing relationship with Erin Blackwell (aka Tiny), a woman she first met as a 14-year old homeless street kid in Seattle while making the documentary Streetwise in the early 1980s. Whether it is the photographer’s investment in the person (most of the examples above being significant others or family-members), having a collection of portraits of a single person—taken by a single person—nearly always translates into a surprising store of memories for recounting how both parties lives have had weaving paths that intersected again and again during moments the photographs were snapped.
Holdt’s series is most surprising, however, because there is always a power struggle happening between the photographer and subject, and here one could easily see his images as exploitative or humiliating as he captures many in their decrepit shacks, laying drunk, naked or caught in sexual acts. What makes it not feels exploitative is that he shows commitment to the people by participating in their lives over the course of sometimes 30 or 40 years, revisiting these same shacks and same people, with an outward dedication towards seeing who they have become and how they are doing. I recommend taking a long look through his website (and go hear him speak if you ever get the opportunity). I, myself, am on a hunt for a copy of his book, which has been out of print since 1977 when the KGB revealed they were trying to use it in a battle to cease humanitarian aid programs in the United States. If you find one, let me know.
N.B.
1. I suppose this is where I’ve been.
2. Two good shows opening this week: Christian Chaize’s Praia Piquinia at Jen Bekman Gallery (5/20, 6-8 p.m.) and Drawing Contemporaries @ Eyebeam (5/21, 6-8 p.m.)
3. Do not miss the excellent collection of American Museum of Natural History diorama scans from the early 1900s that are now available online.
4. The work of Estelle Hanania
At Long Last, Kids, The Hipster Sports Bar: Warren 77
After changing the NHL rule book and interning at a fashion magazine, Rangers left-winger and 2007 PAPER Beautiful Person Sean Avery has garnered a new title in his campaign to become our favorite hockey player: restaurateur. Avery has found two new teammates in Chris Miller, a former art dealer, and Matt Abramcyk, of the recently shuttered, soon to be reopened Beatrice Inn (apparently Abramcyk's Beatrice Inn partner Paul Sevigny's been telling folks it's reopening soon!), whom he befriended on Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon’s hockey rink in Pound Ridge, New York. Warren 77 (guess the address) marries the Beatrice’s antique veneer to a sports bar vibe; antique Rangers memorabilia adorns the walls alongside retractable TVs. On Friday night, John McEnroe and Sevigny joined various other athletes and socialites at the pub’s opening party. Warren 77 is currently taking dinner reservations: call (212) 227-8994. Photo from urbandaddy
Giddy About Glee!
Former Curtain Cutie Matthew Morrison will star on the small screen tonight in the pilot episode of the new comedy Glee, airing after part one of American Idol's season finale on Fox. Morrison recently starred in South Pacific on Broadway and is now playing a teacher who wants to save the flailing misfit-filled Glee club at a highschool in Ohio. Spring Awakening star Lea Michele plays a girl who would rather listen to the Les Miz soundtrack than Top 40 hits and signs her name with a star indicating her undeniable future on the Broadway stage. When I first heard about the series also starring Jane Lynch (from the Christopher Guest mockumentaries) I was skeptical, but it looks hilarious -- I've included a long preview that I've already watched about five times today. It's so funny and there's also a shirtless shot of Matthew. Bonus! After tonight's pilot episode the show is not scheduled to be back until the fall when I will definitely be adding it to my DVR list.
Eater Inside: The Brooklyn Star
[Krieger, 05/19/09]Williamsburg: Coming off a weekend of friends and family previews, Momofuku and Rusty Knot alum Joaquin Baca's solo venture The Brooklyn Star is pretty much finished up and ready to go at 33 Havemeyer, right between the Bedford and Lorimer L stops in Williamsburg. Sadly, and isn't this always the case, the city isn't quite ready to give them the final go ahead to open on Thursday as planned (some insiders tell us it's probably due to that glorious brick oven, a pain to get permits for).
So while we wait for final word on the opening, let's take a look around at the small space, formerly the beloved Brick Oven Gallery, and Baca's comfort food menu, below.
Bread
Cornbread $4
Buttermilk Pancakes $4Small
Wedge Salad with Bacon Buttermilk $6
Half Dozen Raw BBQ Oysters $18
Summer Squash Casserole $8
Dr. Pepper Ribs $16
Fried Green Tomatoes with Roasted Tomato Vinaigrette $9
Sweet Tea Chicken Wings $11
Black Eyed Peas and Rice $7
Fried Pig Tails $11
Mac and Cheese $9Big
Country Fried Steak with Mashed Potatoes and Hot Slw $12
BBQ Catfish with Grits and Fried Cucumbers $14
Chicken and DUmplings $12
Whole Trout, Creamed Corn $16
Smothered Porkchop, Scalloped Tomatoes and String Beans $16
Pan Roasted Skirt Steak, Twice Baked Potato and Asparagus $19
Meatloaf, Collard Greens, Tomato Gravy, and Mashed Potatoes $16
eMailbag: The Wright-Reyes Mets
Justin M sent in an e-mail asking:
Yesterday, Matthew Cerrone wrote, ‘I know it’s a big blow in terms of statistical production, but I am not that worried or disappointed to see Delgado out of the lineup. In fact, I bet David Wright, Jose Reyes, Daniel Murphy and others end up creating a different identity for this ballclub, in the absence
of Delgado’s big-time presence.’ What does that mean?
In today’s Bergen Record, Bob Klapisch put it best, writing:
“Ever since David Wright’s first nuclear season in 2005… the Mets knew they’d been blessed with a future superstar… Mex was guru of the ’80s, and to a lesser extent Mike Piazza filled that void in late ’90s… Now it’s Wright’s turn - ready or not… Delgado is/was an adequate defender, nothing more. And his presence in the clubhouse is/was neutral at best. This isn’t to say the Mets won’t miss Delgado… But the Mets have enough talent on the roster to avert another choke job, assuming a leader emerges. That person, of course, is Wright, who at 25 finally is showing signs of becoming a latter-day Hernandez.”
Like I wrote a few weeks ago, I still believe the Mets should build around Wright, Jose Reyes, Mike Pelfrey and Johan Santana, finding younger, ‘grittier,’ tough players to support them and follow their lead.
Today, the overall team is more like Delgado and Carlos Beltran, i.e., quiet, even-keel, all business, big-name, veteran-type professionals.
Instead, I’d like to see a tougher, quick, aggressive, younger, defensive-minded, maybe even cocky, group of role players put around Wright and Reyes, who, when at their best, embody this swagger and sensibility.
This is not to say the current 25–man roster is incapable of winning. It’s just, like I have said before, most things being equal, I bet I would have more fun watching the above scenario… and removing Delgado and his big-time presence from the clubhouse will free Wright and Reyes to take on a larger leadership role, reshape the character and identity of this team.
Ted Kennedy's Cancer In Remission
Some pleasant news from Capitol Hill: The Hill reports that Ted Kennedy's cancer is now in remission, and he should be back to work full time soon.
Harry Reid told reporters that he spoke with Kennedy's wife, and was told that the Senator will return to work the first week of June.
Kennedy is expected to have a big order of business to deal with, too: The markup for health reform legislation in his Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
"Lost" Puzzle in Wired Magazine
For the April 09 issue Wired Magazine, I was asked to create a cryptographic puzzle based on the television show Lost. Specifically, I was given a "clue" to encrypt.
Here are details of the puzzle and solving attempts. Near as I can tell, no one has published a solution.
Creating something like this is very hard. The puzzle needs to be hard enough so that people don't figure it out immediately, and easy enough so that people eventually figure it out. To make matters even more complicated, people will share their ideas on the Internet. So if the solution requires -- and I'm making this up -- expertise in Mayan history, carburetor design, algebraic topology, and Russian folk dancing, those people are likely to come together on the Internet. The puzzle has to be challenging for the group mind; not just for individual minds.
Do I need to give people a hint?
DC Mythbusting: The Height Limit!
courtesy of ‘NCinDC’
As an urban planner in DC, I cringe every time I hear a myth about the city (OMG, if I hear the “Pierre L’Enfant hated John Jay” reason for there being no J Streetone more time I’m going to scream). One of the most widespread myths I hear from out-of-towners and Washingtonians alike is that the height limit in DC states that no building can be taller than the dome of the Capitol, and that the limit was enacted to preserve views of the Capitol and Washington Monument. This is just plain wrong, and I’m here to tell you why.
Back in 1894, the Cairo apartment building was built on Q Street NW in Dupont Circle. At 14 stories tall, it was the tallest building in the city at that time, and some residents had concerns about it. Would it overwhelm the lower-density neighborhood? Was it structurally sound? Would existing fire-fighting equipment be able to reach top floors? Those last two questions were primarily the reason that Congress stepped in in 1899 to establish the Height of Buildings Act. Technology at the time was advancing quickly, but questions remained about the safety of such a tall building. Height limits at the time were fairly common in American cities, including Boston and Chicago.
The 1899 Height of Buildings Act established that no building could be taller than the Capitol (289 feet), but if that’s the case, why don’t we have a city full of 28-story buildings? Well, in 1910 the act was amended to restrict building heights even further: no building could be more than twenty feet taller than the width of the street that it faces. So, a building on a street with an 80-foot right-of-way could only be 100 feet, or 10 stories. This preserved the “light and airy” character of Washington that Thomas Jefferson envisioned. This 1910 law is still in effect today, and it essentially means that no building can be taller than about 13 stories (with the exception of Pennsylvania Avenue, which is zoned in some places to allow buildings of up to 160 feet).
courtesy of ‘brownpau’
Today we DC residents are lucky that we live in a human-scale city without the wind tunnels and shadowed streets that other cities have. There are no huge expanses of surface parking lots downtown (with one notable exception), because the value of land is so high. Rooftop decks provide beautiful vistas of the city, and yes, you can see the Washington Monument and the Capitol dome from many places. However, it’s also true that the height limit is artificially raising rents downtown (DC’s downtown real estate value is second only to Manhattan), constraining development and therefore limiting tax revenue to DC, and that many companies are being pushed out to Arlington or Bethesda, where skyscrapers are allowed. And the restrictions on building heights near Metro stations seems counter-intuitive to the tenets of transit-oriented development. But I’ll leave the debate over the height limit to the Washington Post and the real estate guys and the worriers and the urban planners.
So now you know– the height limit has nothing to do with being able to see the Capitol dome from anywhere in the city. In fact, there are three buildings (not counting the Washington Monument) in the city today that are taller than the Capitol. First commenter to correctly guess all three gets my congratulations and respect– I could only think of one!
Update: I love how many commenters are sharing their opinions on this! It’s really an issue that people feel strongly about, and there are really compelling arguments on both sides. I wanted to address the issue of how sure I was that the original height act was there for fire and safety reasons, and to answer: I’m pretty sure. I first learned about it in September of last year at a lecture at the National Building Museum on the Height Limit, which you can listen to online. There are also a number of online sources that back me up: the planning website Planetizen describes the fire-fighting issue, while DesignCult describes the technology and safety issues. Surveyor Wendy Lathrop describes both the fire hazards and the building material and structural concerns that inspired height limits at the time. If you’re interested in the history of height limits in general, I’d recommend reading Chapter 3 (”The Sacred Skyline”) of Robert Fogelson’s book Downtown: Its Rise and Fall.
As it turns out, many cities had height limits at the turn of the century, but the District’s was never repealed and it became a distinctive feature of the urban landscape. Why was it never repealed? Possibly because people really liked the “light and airy” character that Thomas Jefferson envisioned, possibly because after the advent of rooftop decks, District residents loved their views, or possibly because it would require an act of Congress to change it. Either way, it has become ingrained in DC’s culture, and it looks like it’s here to stay.
Joel Johnson on the divide between Wired Magazine vs. Wired.com
great comments from Wired employees past and present, including Chris Anderson, Leander Kahney, Steve Silberman, and Brian Lam
DIY Espresso Machine at Make Magazine
I learned how to make espresso on a Gimme La Marzocco Linea. Unlike any other espresso machine I've used before or since, it had a custom temperature regulator, designed and built by Tomas Reyer and Andy Schecter. The device is called a PID ("Proportional, Integral, Derivative") controller. It's basically a thermostat -- albeit, a thermostat with advanced fuzzy logic and a Back to the Future display panel. And it works! I still have vivid memories of the bittersweet chocolate shots it pulled.
If you're wishing you could have a PID of your own, good news: Make Magazine just posted a bunch of advanced coffee tutorials, including one on how to install a PID in your espresso machine. The pdf is free and available for download at their site. For extra points, you can also follow their instructions to build a hydraulic tamper or your very own coffee roaster (hint: it involves plenty of propane). Anybody out there have a bandsaw I can borrow?
Over one million downloads for Stanford's iPhone dev course
Filed under: Odds and ends, Podcasts, Developer, iPhone, SDK
Here's a telling sign of the popularity of iPhone development: we posted about an online course being offered by Stanford just a few months ago, and in that time, the course has been downloaded over a million times through iTunes. The director of iTunes U at Apple says this is the fastest any course has ever hit the million mark.
Only those attending Stanford will get credit for completing the 10-week course, but the material is available to the public right there in iTunes. And of course there are lots of ways to learn how to make apps on the iPhone -- Auntie TUAW has answered that question, and we've even got an iPhone Dev 101 series to help you wrap your mind around all of it. The iPhone itself seems made for newbies, and considering that there's apparently lots of money to be had in Ye Olde App Store, it's no surprise that people are flocking in huge numbers to the documentation.
Whether any of those apps are any good, of course, is still up in the air. But who knows -- someone who starts with the free iTunes U course might one day be a game-changing designer. There's got to be at least one winner in those million downloaders, right?TUAWOver one million downloads for Stanford's iPhone dev course originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 19 May 2009 12:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Wally Backman needs a promotion
Found this audio of Wally Backman ripping his team apart after their first loss of the season. Gotta love this guy. This is the fire that won us a championship in 86. Still looking for similar audio of Jerry Manuel.
[Caution: Back when I used to work, this would have qualified as NSFW...I'm not sure how general office decorum has evolved in the last six weeks, so play at your own risk.]
[Thank you Mets Today]
The $50 and Up Underground House Book
Another book for the People Haven reading list.
See also: Cave Sleepers.
(via bldgblog)
How a ‘Green House of the Future’ Can Impede Environmental Progress
How a ‘Green House of the Future’ Can Impede Environmental Progress.Roger K. Lewis in The Washington Post: “The Wall Street Journal got into the game recently with a report on concepts by four architectural firms that the newspaper asked to imagine the ‘Green House of the Future.’… Speculating about visionary green houses is tantalizing, but much greater benefits accrue at a larger scale.… Focusing on hypothetical designs of free-standing houses can even be a distraction.… No matter how green individual homes are, suburban sprawl is intrinsically anti-green. It generates infrastructure inefficiency; car dependency and rising fossil fuel demand; carbon-emitting, time-wasting road congestion; and, despite availability of inexpensive land at ever-greater distances from jobs, escalating development, construction and public service costs.… Transforming neighborhoods, buildings and infrastructure to accommodate new functions may be the best way for architects and the real estate industry to help create a greener planet.”
CarsForaGrand.com: Simple idea that's generating big bucks
CarsForaGrand.com shows all cars currently on eBay for under 1k. Simple idea, yet Chris Hedgecock, the site’s founder, is earning a high six figure a year income from it. He recently managed to get nationwide attention for the site by driving cross country in one of the cars too.
After we hit New Orleans we noticed the coverage kind of snowballing. For example, the news story we shot in San Diego got picked up by their sister station in LA, the one we shot in El Paso aired in San Francisco, etc. By the time we were done in Miami, the story had gone national… on the largest day we did over 110,000 uniques – all for free…
So to recap, if you have an idea get off your ass and just go for it. The worst thing that can happen is you will learn something new, and you might just succeed beyond your wildest expectations in the process.
The whole thing is a great example of how you can take even the simplest of ideas, execute the heck out of it, market it creatively on the cheap, and see big rewards. Nice job Chris.
Jezebel Slaps Back
Anna Holmes, proprietress of ladysite Jezebel, goes balls out (can we say that?) against the recent spate of self-promoting, fact-averse detractors. Here’s a small sample.
If I’m starting to sound pissed, it’s because I’m starting to GET pissed. These adventures in unhelpful, self-righteous semi-hysteria (yes, I went there) completely overlook the dozens of thoughtful, passionate, courageous and engaging women on self-described feminist blogs who actually deserve to be featured in fancy Sunday newspaper editions and on the pages of ambitious new websites, women who are grappling with and debating issues of a whole host of issues, including the wage gap, women of color, the ongoing epidemic of violence against women, the continued attacks on abortion rights…I could go on.And she does. Do read it.
Sherlock Holmes trailer
The trailer, in HD, of Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes movie with Robert Downey Jr. (as Holmes) and Jude Law (as Watson).
Tags: guyritchie judelaw movies robertdowneyjr sherlockholmes trailers
Question: Jerry Manuel and Ryan Church
In one of the more painful moments of the season, Ryan Church missed third base last night, while rounding the bag
on his way to scoring what could have been the go-ahead run.
However, Joe Torre immediately called to the umpire for an appeal, who called Church out for stepping in front of the base – not on it.
To me, it looked like Church knew he goofed up, as he sheepishly looked over his shoulder while limping back to the dugout.
“I thought I touched it. I thought I did,” Church said from his locker following the game. “That’s why I kept going. If I had any doubt I would have stopped. I just feel terrible for not being able to touch the bag. It’s a simple thing to do. I didn’t do it.”
…yes, we know you thought you touched third… that’s the point… you thought you did, but you didn’t… ugh…
The other newsworthy element, though, is that Manuel essentially left Church out to dry – first, by not arguing the call, and later by not defending his actions during the post-game talk with reporters as he normally will do.
Honestly, I never bought in to the popular talk that said, ‘Manuel is no fan of Church,’ which started in spring training. However, it’s hard to deny it following last night’s events. I mean, Manuel literally turned his back on Church when he entered the dugout after the play. Crazy.
Manuel clearly has no issue with arguing calls. He does it a lot. At minimum, he jogs out to clarify, last week he bumped the ump. Yet, last night with Church, he did nothing. Why? Did he take his cue from Church’s body language, which suggested the ump would be right? Did Razor Shines signal weigh out? Or, did Manuel essentially quit on Church, for the final time? If so, why? What’s Manuel’s beef with Church, who’s hitting .276 with just eight RBI?
Here’s the thing, whatever the reason, something isn’t right, and this may end up being the beginning of the end of Church’s time in New York – especially since Angel Pagan is hitting, and with so many other options on the bench.
Mike Francesa, do you have anything to add? I bet you do.
Michael Lewis' The Big Short
Michael Lewis' book about the ongoing financial collapse has a name: The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine.
A brilliant account -- character-rich and darkly humorous -- of how the U.S. economy was driven over the cliff. Truth really is stranger than fiction. Who better than the author of the signature bestseller Liar's Poker to explain how the event we were told was impossible -- the free fall of the American economy -- finally occurred; how the things that we wanted, like ridiculously easy money and greatly expanded home ownership, were vehicles for that crash; and how shareholder demand for profit forced investment executives to eat the forbidden fruit of toxic derivatives.
It's not out until November 2 but you can pre-order it from Amazon. (thx, brian)
Tags: 2008recession books finance michaellewis thebigshort
Arts Engine + Cinereach = More Socially Conscious Filmmakers
The amazing Arts Engine and the inspiring Cinereach have decided to team up in an effort to make it easier for young socially conscious filmmakers to create work.
They will be working together on the annual Media That Matters Film Festival and plan on expanding the workshops and resources that are offered to the filmmakers in the short film festival that is focused on films that inspire social change. They will also be putting out a weekly column together called 90 Second Cinema. The column will focus on media that is making a difference (media that matters) and will be published on Arts Engine website.
This is very exciting news for all young filmmakers who wish to explore the issues facing our world and for those who like to watch films about the issues facing our world - as we can’t see new and exciting work if filmmakers don’t have the resources they need to make it.
Below is the new beautiful promo vid for the fest and two of my favorite Media That Matters films from last year. Enjoy and be sure to read up about this year’s collaborative fest.
(Another) New York Subway Stations Ridership Map (1905-2006)
Just a few days ago, the Subway Sparklines post did gather some interesting reader comments on how, or how not, to visualize the historical ridership of the New York Subway.Well, here is an alternative: Sha Whang, visual designer at Stamen Design, developed "NYC MTA Ridership (since 1905)" [diametunim.com]. The concept is simple: absolute or relative ridership levels are indicated by subway line thickness, and users can navigate through time by using the slider in the bottom right. More information can be found on his blog.
Sad Mac
I got a new unibody MacBook today, and for the first time ever, getting a new Mac hasn’t left me happy. Dear Apple: Please bring back either FireWire target mode or a replacement that, you know, works.
It used to be, when you got a new Mac, you started up your old Mac in “FireWire target mode”, and plugged it in, and this thing called Migration Assistant turned your new Mac into your old Mac, only newer and faster and better. It might take as much as a couple of hours, but who cares? This is a killer feature. Er, this was a killer feature.
The new MacBooks don’t have FireWire. That’s OK, when it comes up it invites you to wire up your old mac via Ethernet, fire up Migration Assistant, and let ’er rip. Only it progressed from “4 hours 37 minutes remaining” to “2 hours 50 minutes remaining” and then said “The other Macintosh has gone offline.” Repeatably.
Well OK then, it says it’ll also restore from a Time Capsule backup. I have one of those. It got on the WiFi all right, and has now spent five hours in “Checking Time Machine Backup” mode. My confidence that this is going to work is subsiding fast.
In the old days, I would have been happily running on the new machine by now, cheerily blogging about my shiny new Mac. As it is, it looks to me like Apple, not to put too fine a point on it, removed a killer feature from a flagship product. This doesn’t feel like a good idea.
Um, dear LazyWeb: Advice would be welcome.
May 18, 2009
Usain Bolt speeds to record in 150 meters
Yesterday, Usain Bolt broke the unofficial record at the rarely contested distance of 150 meters, running it in 14.35 seconds on a temporary surface set up in Manchester's city center. This sounds made up, but here's the video.
(via biancolo)
Tags: sports trackandfield usainbolt video
Alan Richman Names Top 25 Pizzas in the U.S.
Chicago Upstart Great Lake Has Country's Best Pizza
Alan Richman (left) and Lucali proprietor-pizzaiolo Mark Iacono (right) hold a copy of the June 2009 issue of "GQ" in front of Iacono's Lucali (the No. 2 pizza in the U.S.) at press event celebrating the story's May 19 publication. The issue contains Richman's "American Pie," a list of the top 25 pizzerias in the country.
In the June issue of GQ, food writer extraordinaire Alan Richman ranks the top 25 pizzas in the U.S. after visiting what he considers the top 10 pizza cities in the country.
The story is much too monumental to really do justice here. (Richman sampled 386 pizzas at 109 different pizzerias.) Go read it for yourself on GQ.com—or do yourself a favor and buy the magazine on the newsstand. It comes out tomorrow (May 19). For pizza freaks, this one really is worth having in print. Here are the salient points:
Italians Do Pizza Wrong; the U.S. Gets It Oh So Right
I totally agree with Richman here:
Pizza was created by the Italians—or maybe by the Greeks, who brought it to Naples, but let’s not pile on the bad news. Right now it justly belongs to us. We care more about it. We eat more of it, and unlike the Italians, we appreciate it at dinner, at lunch, and at breakfast, when we have it cold, standing up, to make hangovers go away. Italians don’t really understand pizza. They think of it as knife-and-fork food, best after the sun goes down.
Pizza isn’t as fundamental to Italy as it is to America. Over there, it plays a secondary role to pasta, risotto, and polenta. To be candid, I think they could do without it. Not us. Over here, it’s one of the few foreign foods we’ve embraced wholeheartedly, made entirely our own.
Oh, snap. Suck it, Italy. [More analysis, after the jump.]
Richman's List Skews Heavily Toward Newcomers
It's a refreshing list. I'm a guy who reads far too much about pizza (is that even possible?), and as such, I'm tired of seeing the same old boring Top X-many lists held down by the same old stalwarts in NYC, New Haven, and Chicago. Richman's list has just enough old-school places on it to lend it credibility and ward off any accusations of blatant pot-stirring.
The top 10, for instance: Great Lake (Chicago), Lucali (New York City), Pizzeria Delfina (San Francisco), Pizzeria Bianco (Phoenix), Bob & Timmy's (Providence, R.I.), Sally's Apizza (New Haven), Tomato Pie (Los Angeles), Co. Company (New York City), Tacconelli's (Philadelphia), and Tottono's (Brooklyn).
See what I mean?
Some Heavy Hitters and Popular Favorites Are Notably Absent
Not on Richman's list: Di Fara (Brooklyn), Mozza (L.A.), Franny's (Brooklyn), Spacca Napoli (Chicago), Pizzaiolo (Oakland), Cheese Board Collective (Berkeley).
Or they're waaaaaay down the list: Perennial NYC favorite Una Pizza Napoletana just barely squeezes in at No. 25. Then again, given Richman's diatribe against Italian-style pizza, this ranking isn't surprising—Anthony Mangieri strives to make a pie that's more Naples than Napoli. And maybe he succeeds; Richman says, "I believe it's more enjoyable than almost any pizza in Naples—maybe in all of Italy." Oh, snap. Suck it, Italy.
List Ferrets Out Some Lesser Known Pizzas
I don't know if I should admit this, but of the 25, I had not heard of the following: Bob & Timmy's (Providence, R.I.), Luigi's "the Original" (Harrison Township, Mich.), and Niki's (Detroit).
And the following are places that I've heard about but that don't seem to get a lot of love in the national pizza press: Tomato Pie (L.A.), Tarry Lodge (Port Chester, New York), Buddy's (Detroit), and coal-burner Tomatoes Apizza (Farmington Hills, Mich.).
The List
At the press event I went to that celebrated the story's release, GQ folks had a cheat sheet that laid out the Top 25, sans descriptions, for ease of comparison. I'm going to give you it here, but I absolutely urge you to get this issue if you really care about pizza. There are only a few magazine or newspaper articles that have made it onto my list of seminal pizza reading material, and this is one. That said, here is the list for your perusal:
01. Great Lake (Chicago)
02. Lucali (Brooklyn, NYC)
03. Pizzeria Delfina (San Francisco)
04. Pizzeria Bianco (Phoenix)
05. Bob & Timmy's (Providence, R.I.)
06. Sally's Apizza (New Haven, Conn.)
07. Tomato Pie (Los Angeles)
08. Co. Company (Manhattan, NYC)
09. Tacconelli's (Philadelphia)
10. Totonno's (Brooklyn, NYC)
11. Tarry Lodge (Port Chester, N.Y.)
12. Frank Pepe (New Haven, Conn.)
13. Luigi's "the Original" (Harrison Township, Mich.)
14. Gialina (San Francisco)
15. Buddy's (Detroit)
16. Antica Pizzeria (Marina Del Ray, Calif.)
17. A16 (San Francisco)
18. Al Forno (Providence, R.I.)
19. Galleria Umberto (Boston)
20. Famous Joe's (Manhattan, NYC)
21. Tomatoes Apizza (Farmington Hills, Mich.)
22. Osteria (Philadelphia)
23. Santarpio's (Boston)
24. Niki's (Detroit)
25. Una Pizza Napoletana (Manhattan, NYC)What's your take? Is Richman right on or did he miss something?
Related
- Great Lake, The Slice Review (01/2009)
- All Slice intel on Lucali
- All Slice intel on Pizzeria Delfina
- All Slice intel on Pizzeria Bianco
- Sally's Apizza is the rudest pizzeria Slice has ever visited!
- Co. Company Pizza: A Photographic Extravaganza of Pizza Porn
- Slice's intel on Totonno's
- F*** Sally's: When in New Haven, Go to Frank Pepe's Instead (review, 08/2004)
- All Slice intel on Famous Joe's
- Slice's intel on Una Pizza Napoletana
New LEGO Architecture sets to feature Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum and Fallingwater [News]
Shared by mathowie
Wow.According to a press release from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, the next LEGO Architecture sets designed by Adam Reed Tucker will be inspired by the buildings of the iconic American architect (1867-1959).
The Guggenheim Museum in New York City will be celebrating its 50th anniversary later this year.
Wright designed Fallingwater in 1934 as the private home of Edgar J. Kaufmann, and the house remains one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s best-loved structures to this day.
Neither set is available from the LEGO Shop yet, but were apparently released on May 15 at the opening of an exhibit at the Guggenheim.
Via PrairieMod.
Why are you doing this to me?
Shared by Marcus
this is by far my new favourite blog.
Yes. Okay? Yes. I want to come sit on the hammock. Are you happy? This whole situation is just awful, ever since I found this photo I've been a complete mess. I've started calling up people in the neighborhood who have hammocks and asking them if they've had any bear visits lately. I hired the CIA to evaluate the photo and figure out what type of trees are in the background so I can figure out what is the most likely location of the hammock. Do you have any idea how much time it takes to recreate a photo in a three dimensional holographic workspace?
Jesus Christ, Bear, not only are you forcing me into this situation, you are making me come up with cutesy fucking headlines like "I thought you said you were going to mow the lawn" and "Sleepy the Bear says only you can prevent afternoon napping." I HAVE A REPUTATION TO UPHOLD, BEAR. Get off the hammock and go eat something with blood in it so I can think about the dichotomy between your cuteness and your insatiable thirst for flesh.
Babe Ruth Home Run Log - Baseball-Reference.com
Along with the minor league data, we licensed the SABR Home Run Encyclopedia which is quite frankly a stunning accomplishment in baseball history. I’m working on getting this together for everybody (and I do mean everybody back to 1876). If you want to brainstorm what you would like to be able to do with this in the comments, go ahead. First order of business, is to add a nice summary similar to what we have for the event finders. I’m make a full announcement in the next few days when it is live on the server.
[this is good]
Alan Taylor, the super hero behind Boston.com's The Big Picture, got to watch the shuttle take off on its Hubble repair mission, and included one of his own pictures in the post about the launch.
The Dollar Redesign Project
I saw this linked from ISO50 this morning: The Dollar Redesign Project is a competition (Campaign? Bit of fun?) to promote the idea of fully redesigning the US banknotes, possibly on a regular basis, like many banknotes the world over:
The American Dollar has not truly been redesigned since about the 1930s. The Dollar ReDe$ign Project is your opportunity to theoretically ‘change’ that. Yes, technically there are many limitations and complications when it comes to bank note design, but if the Swiss can do it on a regular basis, why can’t we North Americans too?The Dollar Redesign Project
There are only a few designs on there at the moment, some a bit jokey, but of the serious ideas I quite like the ones in the first set below. I can’t see any notes that deviate too far from the originals being successful, as there are so many cultural and linguistic associations with the ol’ greenback; it may seem tediously conservative, but notes that aren’t predominantly green just won’t feel like dollars. I hope the designs go further than the ‘stick a guilloche on it and call it a banknote’ idea - guilloches are beautiful things - I wrote about them before, here - but it takes more than a few of those to make a successful banknote.
Perhaps a little too reliant on that colour bar to tell them apart, but I like these.
I like the return of the original US motto (translated and updated), E pluribus unum, on this one.
Relative sizes of UK notesOne usability feature common to many banknote systems, and I’m surprised the designs so far haven’t addressed it, is to have different denominations in different sizes. UK banknotes do this (see right) and it’s reasonably easy to feel whether you’ve a £5 or a $20 note in your pocket because of it. £50 notes, while far from the tablecloth-sized notes of old, seem positively enormous compared to a fiver. I wonder how many mistakes are made every year from having all the notes the same size?
Of course, no article about banknote design would be complete without a mention of Ootje Oxenaar’s designs for the banknotes of the Netherlands below, now sadly replaced by the rather dull Euro notes. At the risk of seemingly terribly shallow for a moment, to my mind the design of the Euro is a pretty good reason for the UK to keep the pound. Banknotes are like little works of art, and to squander the opportunity to produce a remarkable and beautiful design for them is a sad thing. I shall be watching what comes out of the Dollar Redesign Project with interest. I may even have a go myself.
A few of Ootje Oxenaar’s designs for the Netherlands banknotes. More here.
The New Elite - Baseball Digest - 1950 - Google Book Search
Baseball Digest - 1950 - Google Book Search
File under nothing new under the sun. This article has it all. A reference to “male hormone lozenges”, a reference to the need for a player’s union, and a complaint that players today are just too soft.
In thinking about it a bit more. I don’t know if this is an oblique reference to PED’s or if it is a reference to the players needing more, umm, cojones.
*Cinema -- Star Trek
Star Trek (2009)
I thought I was gonna like this, and I really did.
I've never seen a Star Trek movie before, but that didn't matter. I knew the basic characters, the basic premise, and of course, all the well-known catch phrases.
I totally was so excited to see this because Jennifer Morrison (Cameron from House) was in it. Even if I knew she'd only be in it for a few minutes.
I had no idea that Eric Bana was Nero until.. right now, looking at imdb. Too funny. Eric Bana should only ever be the guy in Munich.
Simon Pegg, as Scotty, was easily my favorite character. Simon Pegg is just the best guy ever.
Every signature phrase made me just laugh out loud. It was so funny to hear people saying those lines and meaning them...
I just have a vision of the writers having a big white board with a list of all the signature phrases they needed to use in the movie, and writing the movie around those lines.
Overall I loved it. It was all I expected it to be, and even a little bit more.
How to Prevent Perl 5.12
I want software development to be so predictable that it's boring. I want people to take release dates for granted. I want them to yawn at completed deprecations. I want all of the surprises in new versions of Perl and Parrot to be delight at improvements: code runs faster, new features make your projects simpler and more elegant, rough edges keep disappearing. I want the development process to become repeated cycles of ideas, design, implementation, testing, refinement, and release. I want this cycle to happen annually, if not quarterly.
I want steady, sustainable progress in small, achievable, repeatable, and verifiable steps. I believe that's the only way to save Perl and its ecosystem from slow decline and irrelevance.
That's why I write here. This is a manifesto. My transparent intent is to identify obstacles and convince the rest of the Perl community to work around them (or better yet, to remove them). Some of those obstacles are the way we teach Perl. Some of those obstacles are the way we write and distribute Perl. Some of the most persistent and pernicious obstacles are the way we develop Perl itself:
- No one can predict when (or if) Perl 5.12 will come out.
- No one can predict which features it will have. (You can predict that it will have at least some of the new code currently in bleadperl which will not go into Perl 5.10, but can anyone tell me what those are?)
- No one can predict how many point releases there will be in the Perl 5.12 series (nor the Perl 5.10 series, for that matter).
- No one can predict how long people will support Perl 5.12, or Perl 5.10 for that matter.
I've written about the DarkPAN dependency management and support problem before. It's unrealistic to expect volunteers to maintain code they can't see, if that code even exists. That's unrealistic. p5p's attempts to do so are unsustainable; there's no feedback. There are only two motivations: the desire to write high quality software, and the desire to avoid guilt and shame. (That's false guilt, by the way.)
While thinking about a documented support policy for Perl 5, I came across a comment from Adam Kennedy:
I see the appropriate (and achievable) Long Term Support period for Perl as being around 8-10 years.There are many possible descriptions of this expectation. The most polite I can imagine is "unsustainable". The easiest argument against it is one of the most persuasive.
Ten years ago, the newest Perl release was 5.005_03. Lexical filehandles, three-arg
open, and the warnings pragma did not exist. Unicode was unreliable.There have been fifteen stable releases of Perl in the intervening decade, even with the unpredictable release schedule. Biannual releases would have produced twenty stable releases of Perl. Quarterly releases -- my preference -- would have produced forty stable releases of Perl.
I won't speak for anyone else, but you couldn't pay me enough to support forty versions of a piece of software released over a decade. Good luck convincing a sizable fraction of the other 930 or so people listed in the Perl AUTHORS file to do the same.
The proper approach is to:
- Document a sustainable support and development policy, then follow it.
- Establish a regular release schedule.
- Extract all essential DarkPAN features worth supporting into tests for the core test suite.
- Replace the feature pragma with a pragma which explicitly limits the running instance to those features present in a specific release.
- (After fixing
feature...) Change the default behavior of Perl 5 to enable modern features.- Encourages businesses which believe they really must use ancient versions of Perl long past their shelf lives to purchase support contracts from businesses willing to take on that burden.
Continuing to pile this support burden on volunteers who do not know if the DarkPAN exists, let alone suffers from changes in modern Perls, is a great way to ensure that Perl 5.12 will never come out.
Put more positively, my suggestions are ways to reduce the barriers to participation for people who have an investment in the present and future of Perl 5. That's the only way to make Perl and its ecosystem sustainable: to divide the work among everyone who wants or needs it to succeed.
Elephant Bottle Opener
Elephant Bottle Opener. Another great gift.
Keeping Score - Numbers Indicate Rodriguez Didn’t’ Tip Pitches With Rangers - NYTimes.com
Keeping Score - Numbers Indicate Rodriguez Didn’t’ Tip Pitches With Rangers - NYTimes.com
We did a little work for Dan Rosenheck who wanted to look into the pitch tipping allegations around A-Rod. I looked at it as per his requests and sent him what I found. I’ve seen many comments that said something to the effect that this doesn’t prove anything as the nefarious behavior may have taken place with only one or two other players and therefore it wouldn’t show up in the overall numbers.
So that said, here are the 30 at bats I’ve found where the score differential was six or higher, 6th inning or later, and A-Rod had either an extra-base hit or a line drive. I’m offering these without comment.
| pitcher | second_base | shortstop | date_game | inn | sc | RoB | play | play_desc | +--------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------+------+------+------+---------------+--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Esteban Loaiza | Homer Bush | Alex Gonzalez | 2001-08-17 | 8 | -9 | 000 | HR/78 | Home Run (LF-CF) | | Armando Almanza | Luis Castillo | Alex Gonzalez | 2003-06-15 | 8 | -7 | 000 | S8/L | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Chris Bootcheck | Trent Durrington | Alfredo Amezaga | 2003-09-20 | 6 | 7 | 000 | HR/89/L | Home Run (Line Drive to CF-RF) | | Ramon Ortiz | Adam Kennedy | Benji Gil | 2001-06-25 | 7 | -7 | 000 | HR/8 | Home Run | | Aaron Taylor | Bret Boone | Carlos Guillen | 2003-07-28 | 7 | 6 | 110 | S9/L.2-3;1-2 | Single to RF (Line Drive); Young to 3B; Blalock to 2B | | Travis Miller | Luis Rivas | Cristian Guzman | 2001-08-28 | 8 | 9 | 000 | 7/L7 | Lineout: LF | | Matt Wise | Adam Kennedy | David Eckstein | 2002-06-25 | 6 | 6 | 110 | S7.2-H;1-2 | Single to LF (Line Drive); Young Scores; Rodriguez to 2B | | Ben Weber | Adam Kennedy | David Eckstein | 2003-07-24 | 8 | -6 | 010 | S9/L.2-3 | Single to RF (Line Drive); Blalock to 3B | | Alan Levine | Benji Gil | David Eckstein | 2001-04-12 | 7 | -10 | 000 | D7 | Double to LF (Line Drive to LF Line) | | Travis Driskill | Brian Roberts | Deivi Cruz | 2003-05-25 | 7 | -6 | 000 | HR/8/F | Home Run (Fly Ball) | | Omar Daal | Brian Roberts | Deivi Cruz | 2003-05-30 | 8 | -7 | 100 | D7/G.1XH(762) | Double to LF (Ground Ball thru LF Line); Blalock out at Hm/LF-SS-C | | Kerry Ligtenberg | Brian Roberts | Deivi Cruz | 2003-07-22 | 9 | -6 | 000 | S8/L | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Randy Choate | Alfonso Soriano | Derek Jeter | 2001-08-02 | 7 | 6 | 000 | S8 | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Orlando Hernandez | Alfonso Soriano | Derek Jeter | 2002-07-29 | 6 | -7 | 000 | S7 | Single to LF (Line Drive) | | Sterling Hitchcock | Alfonso Soriano | Derek Jeter | 2002-07-31 | 7 | 8 | 110 | 9/L9.2-3 | Lineout: RF; Catalanotto to 3B | | Mark Wohlers | Alfonso Soriano | Enrique Wilson | 2001-08-02 | 8 | 8 | 100 | S9.1-2 | Single to RF (Line Drive); Velarde to 2B | | Armando Benitez | Joe McEwing | Jose Reyes | 2003-06-11 | 9 | -6 | 000 | 4/L | Lineout: 2B | | Gary Glover | Ray Durham | Jose Valentin | 2001-05-12 | 9 | 8 | 110 | HR/7.2-H;1-H | Home Run; Greer Scores; Velarde Scores | | Jorge Sosa | Antonio Perez | Julio Lugo | 2003-07-20 | 6 | -12 | 000 | S7/L.B-2(E7) | Single to LF (Line Drive); Rodriguez to 2B/Adv on E7 | | Joe Slusarski | Jose Vizcaino | Julio Lugo | 2001-06-09 | 6 | 8 | 000 | S8 | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Mike Venafro | Frank Menechino | Miguel Tejada | 2002-04-11 | 8 | 6 | 000 | D7/7D | Double to LF (Line Drive to Deep LF) | | Mike Magnante | Mark Ellis | Miguel Tejada | 2002-07-26 | 8 | 8 | 000 | D7 | Double to LF (Line Drive to LF Line) | | Rodrigo Lopez | Jerry Hairston | Mike Bordick | 2002-07-07 | 6 | -8 | 100 | HR/7.1-H | Home Run; Catalanotto Scores | | Jeff Tam | Orlando Hudson | Mike Bordick | 2003-04-30 | 6 | 6 | 000 | S8/L | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Jay Powell | Todd Walker | Neifi Perez | 2001-07-13 | 7 | 6 | 000 | S8 | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Rolando Arrojo | Mike Lansing | Nomar Garciaparra | 2001-08-05 | 6 | -6 | 000 | HR/7 | Home Run | | Jason Phillips | John McDonald | Omar Vizquel | 2002-08-11 | 6 | 8 | 000 | HR/78 | Home Run (LF-CF) | | Jason Beverlin | John McDonald | Omar Vizquel | 2002-08-11 | 8 | 6 | 100 | S7.1-2 | Single to LF (Line Drive); Catalanotto to 2B | | C.C. Sabathia | Ricky Gutierrez | Omar Vizquel | 2002-05-05 | 7 | -7 | 110 | S7.2-H;1-2 | Single to LF (Line Drive); Murray Scores; Greer to 2B | | Livan Hernandez | Jose Vidro | Orlando Cabrera | 2003-06-06 | 7 | -8 | 000 | S9/L | Single to RF (Line Drive to CF-RF) |I then took these 30 AB’s and looked at the cases where the opposing keystone combo had an extra-base hit or line drive in the same setting. Note that A-Rod was pulled for a lot of late innings in blowouts, so there are fewer PA’s to check here. Here is what we get.
| batter | pitcher | date_game | inn | sc | RoB | play | play_desc | +-----------------+-------------------+------------+------+------+------+-------------------------+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Mike Bordick | Jay Powell | 2002-07-07 | 7 | 6 | 010 | S/89.2-H | Single (Line Drive to CF-RF); Gil Scores | | Homer Bush | Kevin Foster | 2001-08-17 | 7 | 8 | 000 | S7 | Single to LF (Line Drive) | | Orlando Cabrera | Rosman Garcia | 2003-06-06 | 7 | 8 | 000 | S7/L | Single to LF (Line Drive) | | Luis Castillo | R.A. Dickey | 2003-06-15 | 6 | 6 | 000 | S8/L | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Jerry Hairston | Anthony Telford | 2002-07-07 | 6 | 6 | 100 | T/78.1-H | Triple (Line Drive to LF-CF); Mora Scores | | Adam Kennedy | Todd Van Poppel | 2002-06-25 | 8 | -7 | 001 | S8.3-H | Single to CF (Line Drive); Salmon Scores | | John McDonald | Danny Kolb | 2002-08-11 | 8 | -7 | 000 | S8 | Single to CF (Line Drive) | | Frank Menechino | Doug Davis | 2002-04-11 | 9 | -7 | 100 | 5/L5 | Lineout: 3B | | Alfonso Soriano | Francisco Cordero | 2002-07-31 | 8 | -9 | 000 | D7 | Double to LF (Line Drive to LF Line) | | Jose Valentin | Jeff Zimmerman | 2001-05-12 | 7 | -7 | 000 | HR/9 | Home Run | | Omar Vizquel | John Rocker | 2002-05-05 | 8 | 6 | 100 | D7.1-3 | Double to LF (Line Drive to LF Line); Diaz to 3B | | Omar Vizquel | Jay Powell | 2002-08-11 | 6 | -7 | 111 | S9.3-H(UR);2-H(TUR);1-2 | Single to RF (Line Drive); Fryman Scores/unER; McDonald Scores/Team unER; Diaz to 2B | | Todd Walker | Rick Helling | 2001-07-13 | 7 | -7 | 000 | HR/89 | Home Run (CF-RF) | | Enrique Wilson | Pat Mahomes | 2001-08-02 | 8 | -9 | 100 | S9.1-2 | Single to RF (Line Drive); Williams to 2B |Make of it what you will.
Hubble's final servicing mission
On Monday, May 11, after months of delays and preparation, NASA's Space Shuttle Atlantis launched from the Kennedy Space Center on the final servicing mission to the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. The seven crew members left Florida for low Earth orbit at 2:01 pm, for a scheduled 11-day mission, including 5 days of Extra-vehicular activity (EVAs) to work on the Hubble. So far the repairs appear to be going very well - the final EVA is scheduled for today, and the landing planned for May 22nd. I was fortunate enough to attend the launch at Banana Creek viewing area, and wish to extend my gratitude to all the people at NASA. (Only one of the photos below is mine) (31 photos total)
Studies: Coffee may be good for you
Drink your coffee! Believe it or not, studies now show that it may be good for you.
Balk Talk
Last night Mike Pelfrey became the first pitcher in 15 years to balk 3 times in one game. Pelfrey’s game came one day before the 21st anniversary of Dave Stewart breaking the record for balks in a single season . Of course, Stewart’s feat came during 1988, “the year of the balk” in which a minor rule change and strict umpire enforcement lead to a ridiculous number of balks being called (.22 per game). Keep that in mind when looking at the following list of players with 3 or more balks in a game (since 1954) :
Cnt Player Date Tm Opp GmReslt App,Dec IP H R ER BB SO HR Pit Str GmSc IR IS BF AB 2B 3B IBB HBP SH SF GDP SB CS Pk **BK** WP ERA +----+-----------------+-------------+---+----+-------+---------+----+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+---+----+--+--+--+--+--+--+---+---+--+--+---+--+--+--+------+--+------+ 1 Bob Shaw 1963-05-04 MLN CHC L 5-7 GS-5 ,L 4.1 5 6 6 6 6 0 29 25 19 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 5 0 12.46 2 John Dopson 1989-06-13 BOS DET W 8-7 GS-4 3.2 6 5 5 5 3 0 95 44 27 22 17 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 1 12.27 3 Gene Walter 1988-07-18 SEA DET L 3-12 6-8 2.1 3 3 2 1 1 0 54 34 2 2 13 12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 4 0 7.71 4 Joe Magrane 1988-06-17 STL @PIT W 7-3 GS-8 ,W 8 5 2 2 3 6 0 119 73 67 35 30 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 1 2.25 5 Rick Honeycutt 1988-04-13 OAK @SEA W 12-7 6-9f ,S 4 7 4 2 0 1 0 57 40 0 0 19 17 2 0 0 0 0 2 1 0 0 0 4 0 4.50 6 Bobby Witt 1988-04-12 TEX @DET L 1-4 CG 8 ,L 8 5 4 4 6 5 0 135 71 55 36 29 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 4 0 4.50 7 Bob Friend 1963-04-13 PIT @CIN W 12-4 CG 9 ,W 9 6 4 3 3 5 1 63 38 33 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 4 0 3.00 8 Mike Pelfrey 2009-05-17 NYM @SFG L 0-2 GS-6 ,L 6 6 2 2 2 2 0 78 48 52 25 23 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 0 3.00 9 Al Leiter 1994-04-23 TOR MIN W 8-6 GS-7 ,W 6.2 8 5 5 5 7 1 120 71 40 32 27 2 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 0 6.75 10 Tim Layana 1990-04-18 CIN SDP W 11-7 4-5 ,W 2 1 2 2 3 1 0 36 17 0 0 10 7 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 9.00 11 Fernando Valenzue 1989-08-22 LAD @MON L 2-4 GS-6 ,L 6 7 4 3 3 6 1 99 56 47 27 24 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 4.50 12 Eric Plunk 1988-08-07 OAK SEA L 7-12 6-8 ,L 3 6 5 5 2 1 1 63 35 0 0 16 14 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 3 0 15.00 13 Jim Gott 1988-08-06 PIT NYM L 3-5 8-8 ,BL 0.2 1 3 3 3 1 0 28 14 0 0 7 4 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 40.50 14 Todd Burns 1988-08-01 OAK @CHW W 10-2 GS-6 ,W 6 6 2 2 0 3 0 89 61 55 23 23 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 0 3.00 15 Mark Eichhorn 1988-06-06 TOR @CLE L 3-6 6-8f 2.2 1 1 1 1 0 0 31 15 2 2 11 9 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 3.38 16 Bob Welch 1988-05-20 OAK @NYY W 11-3 GS-7 ,W 7 7 3 3 3 6 0 108 69 54 29 26 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 3 0 3.86 17 Jeff Sellers 1988-05-06 BOS @MIN L 0-5 GS-7 ,L 6 5 5 5 5 8 0 120 68 45 28 23 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 3 1 7.50 18 Don Heinkel 1988-05-03 DET OAK L 2-8 5-8 4 5 3 3 3 3 1 88 49 2 1 20 16 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 3 0 6.75 19 Jose Guzman 1988-05-02 TEX @BAL L 4-9 GS-6 ,L 5.1 9 9 8 6 8 1 117 67 18 31 25 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 1 13.50 20 Joe Niekro 1988-04-19 MIN NYY L 6-7 GS-2 ,L 1.2 7 7 7 2 1 1 47 24 12 13 11 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 0 37.80 21 Dave Stewart 1988-04-19 OAK CAL W 8-3 GS-7 ,W 7 7 3 2 2 6 0 108 71 57 30 26 2 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 3 1 2.57 22 Steve Trout 1988-04-17 SEA CAL L 4-7 GS-4 ,L 4 7 5 4 3 2 0 82 47 29 25 18 0 0 0 3 0 1 1 2 0 0 3 2 9.00 23 Mike Birkbeck 1988-04-15 MIL NYY L 1-7 GS-2 ,L 1.1 5 6 6 3 0 0 49 25 17 12 8 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 40.50 24 Jose Segura 1988-04-12 CHW @CAL L 6-15 3-4 1.1 5 5 5 3 0 1 48 22 1 0 12 9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 33.75 25 Bob Welch 1988-04-10 OAK @CAL L 4-6 GS-6 ,L 5.1 6 5 5 2 6 0 90 49 40 23 20 2 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 3 0 8.44 26 Teddy Higuera 1988-04-10 MIL @NYY L 6-7 GS-6 6 7 3 3 1 5 0 105 71 50 25 24 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 3 0 4.50 27 Jack Morris 1988-04-09 DET @KCR W 11-4 GS-8 ,W 8 6 4 4 1 6 1 107 68 59 30 29 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 3 0 4.50 28 Dave Stewart 1988-04-09 OAK @CAL W 8-6 GS-8 ,W 8 7 6 6 5 4 1 112 64 43 37 29 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 3 0 6.75 29 Roger Clemens 1988-04-04 BOS DET L 3-5 GS-9 9 6 3 3 4 11 1 135 89 70 36 31 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 3 0 3.00 30 Les Lancaster 1987-07-05 CHC SFG L 5-7 GS-5 5 7 4 4 2 6 2 41 25 23 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 2 7.20 31 Charlie Hough 1987-06-10 TEX @SEA W 9-5 GS-6 6 5 5 4 5 2 0 41 30 22 1 1 0 2 0 1 0 1 0 0 3 0 6.00 32 Dave LaPoint 1986-09-02 SDP @PHI W 6-2 GS-7 ,W 7 6 2 2 2 7 0 66 30 28 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 2.57 33 Bob Walk 1985-08-15(2) PIT @STL L 3-4 GS-6 6 9 3 3 2 4 1 44 26 24 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0 3 0 4.50 34 Dave Smith 1982-06-25 HOU LAD W 7-5 GS-2 2 4 3 3 2 0 0 34 12 9 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 3 0 13.50 35 Phil Niekro 1974-09-07 ATL SFG L 0-6 GS-6 ,L 6 6 3 2 2 4 0 52 24 21 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 1 1 1 3 0 3.00 36 Jim Owens 1963-04-24 CIN @LAD L 0-7 GS-2 ,L 1.1 1 2 2 3 0 0 30 11 41 8 4 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 3 1 13.50 37 Don Rowe 1963-04-22 NYM @PHI L 6-8 GS-5 4.2 7 3 3 1 1 0 73 48 38 21 19 1 0 0 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 3 0 5.79 38 Camilo Pascual 1959-05-22 WSH @BOS L 3-4 CG 8 ,L 8 11 4 4 2 8 1 50 36 32 4 0 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 3 0 4.50For more about the balks of 1988 and about balks in general there is an excellent article on the Recondite Baseball website.
Our CEO Tells It Like It Is
I haven't said a lot about the ongoing battle between Craigslist and certain overly-aggressive politicians, but after reading his most recent blog post, An Apology Is In Order, I have to say that I'm really proud of Jim. Having a CEO standing up to politicians and media for what he believes is right and true really reaffirms my decision to join Craigslist last year. Better yet, he's outdone most of the media by, *gasp*, actually linking to relevant information in his post.
Many prominent companies, including AT&T, Microsoft, and Village Voice Media, not to mention major newspapers and other upstanding South Carolina businesses feature more “adult services” ads than does craigslist, some of a very graphic nature. For a small sampling, look (careful NSFW) here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here, and here.Have you fully considered the implications of your accusations against craigslist? What’s a crime for craigslist is clearly a crime for any company. Are you really prepared to condemn the executives of each of the mainstream companies linked above, and all the others that feature such ads, as criminals? craigslist may not matter in your world view, despite our popularity among your constituents, but mightn’t you want an endorsement from any of the SC newspapers for your gubenatorial campaign, whose publishers you’ve just labeled as criminals? Do you really intend to launch a criminal investigation against the phone company? What about potential new jobs connected to big data center buildouts in SC by Internet companies? Are you *sure* you want prosecute all of their CEOs as criminals???Keep it up, Jim.
(comments)
Flicked Off: ‘Angels and Demons’
“Angels and Demons” is a movie about a hot Israeli actress named Ayelet Zurer and her Bottega Veneta handbag, who goes everywhere she does, except when it doesn’t.
The purse arrives at the Vatican, with Ms. Zurer, after she flies in from her super-big particle collider where she is researching Higgs mass and hierarchy problems or something. But in a shocking plot development, her bag soon goes missing!
MMM, where is your $3200 BV bag now? Is it in the police car? How will you get it back?
Oh are you trying to defuse an antimatter bomb you made up in your very large collider by replacing its batteries? Are the batteries… IN YOUR PURSE? WHICH IS HANDILY LAYING HERE ATOP YOUR COAT? EVEN THOUGH IT LOOKS TO BE ABOUT THE SIZE OF A WALLET? Why has your purse shrunk so? Did your purse venture off to do some scenes in Night At The Museum 2 and come back ALL TINY?
Now let us go back in time. SERIOUSLY, WHERE YOUR BAG AT? You know those batteries aren’t in the non-pocket of her dress.
If you had your bag, you could give that poor man some MOUTH TO BAG resuscitation!
Oh here you are, handbag! The bag is handy when they go look in the Vatican archives for directions to the Illuminati church which is mapped out by Galileo! And she steals something there and slips it into… some sort of thing that might carry other things but is invisible and is not a purse!
Then you’re running through some tarps and scaffolding like you were in a post-apocalyptic Stevie Nicks video but you ain’t GOT NO PURSE.
Also in the whole movie somehow you never get to see Ewan McGregor’s wiener.
TUAW Review: RadTech ProCable Shortz
Filed under: Accessories, iPod Family, iPhone, iPod touch
RadTech manufactures a lot of accessories for the iPhone and iPod, but one recently caught my attention. The recently released ProCable Shortz cables are handy in tight places where you need a USB to 30-pin connector cable. I use mine in my car to hook up my iPhone to the stereo via a USB cable. Before the ProCable Shortz, I had a regular sized 30-pin cable and it took over my glove box with a tangle of wires. These cables can also come in handy when you want to charge or sync your iPhone/iPod with your MacBook, but don't want a tangled nest of wires sitting beside you on the desk.
The RadTech ProCable Shortz come in many flavors, but the most recently released USB to 30-pin iPod connector cables come in two sizes and two colors. You can pick up these cable in either 7-cm or 20-cm lengths, and either in white or black. The build quality is similar to Apple's own cables, and in some ways the cabling seems stronger. Prices are not terrible either: Only $7.95-US for the 7-cm cable or $8.95-US for the 20-cm cable. Compare that to Apple's $19.00 US dock connector cable. The ProCable Shortz are available on the RadTech website.TUAWTUAW Review: RadTech ProCable Shortz originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 18 May 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Our New Front Page Design
As you can see, over the weekend we rolled out a new front page design here at TPM. First and foremost we'd like your feedback. Let us know what you think, how you like or don't like it and particularly whether you see any formatting problems. When you do a new design, you try it out on lots of different browsers. But there's nothing quite like a live test. So let us know if there's anything you see.
Next, a big thanks to TPM's Al Shaw, our Associate Publisher, who coded this redesign from the ground up over the last six weeks or so ago. We're really excited with the result.
Now, let me say a few things about the thinking behind the redesign. First, a lot of the changes won't be evident on the first look because a lot of this retooling was about creating more layout flexibility on the back-end. Rather than having one template with feature on the top and then two long columns beneath, the news editors can rearrange the layout depending on what the news of the day is -- a few big features for big news, a lot of smaller items, etc. So a lot of that you'll only see over the coming days and weeks.
Another change is that you'll see there's a news wire section on the right of the main news feature. We did this because we want you to be updated on all the big news when you come to TPM through the day, not just the main story that we're highlighting in the feature well. So we wanted more news headlines above the fold.
Then lower down on the page you'll see we've open a news Voices section where we're highlighting commentary pieces from TPMCafe and other venues around the web, in addition to the most recommended 'reader blogs'.
Take a look and let us know what you think.
The New York Times Plays by Blog Rules. When It Wants! [Media]
Maureen Dowd will get off penalty-free for (she says) accidentally plagiarizing a paragraph of Josh Marshall's material. Fine by us! Can the New York Times stop pretending the internet is ripping it off, now?
There was a time when this little plagiarism incident—even if inadvertent—would have been a big deal. But the "new media" these days, always with the copying and the pasting and paraphrasing—you can see how this could happen by mistake.
So let's give her the benefit of the doubt! Then let's point out that the NYT is one of the loudest newspaper voices bemoaning the idea that they create all the original content and the internet rips it off, in a one-way downhill dance of media thievery. In fact, the NYT itself has a grand tradition of stealing stories from smaller regional papers, parachuting in their own correspondents to re-report and repackage those stories for a national audience.
All papers do that! But none as well as the Times. And just as blogs use NYT stories for raw material, the paper does the same; since they're too straitlaced to stray from polite discourse, they'll just pull what they want to say from a blog, i.e. "Rupert Murdoch has always had his detractors; Snark-purveying wags at Gawker even described Mr. Murdoch as a 'piss-drinking mummy' and insinuated he had sexual relations with several lowland gorillas on a trip abroad, though that could not be independently verified."
They can't say it, so they let us say it, then they say what we said! Just like we use their reporting as a launching pad. Let's just admit we're one big interconnected ecosystem here. We wouldn't want MoDo to get fired anyhow. We're the only ones who get something worthwhile out of her.
[Feel free to borrow our Pinch Moose jokes, NYT.]
I had an empty apartment. I had to. (The original is by Diana...
I had an empty apartment. I had to.
(The original is by Diana Walker, and this remake was shot by Tiff.)
Twittery Earthquake Survivors Assess Damage
A magnitude 4.7 earthquake hit Southern California yesterday, causing concerned citizens to turn to the most trusted name in news for information: Twitter.
As of approximately 10:00 AM Monday, a search for #earthquake shows updates from thousands of users. From the gist of their posts, most people are emotionally shaken from the quake but the physical damage is minimal.Also, an LA chiropractor wonders “how strong a quake it’s going to take to get me to run outside of the house instead of posting earthquake updates to twitter.” He guesses 5.5, but given the way people tend to go on and on about pretty much everything I’m guessing it’ll require actual domicile collapse, and even then you’ll see people standing in doorframes typing out one final hashtag.
Healthy & Delicious: Lighter Home Fries
Note: On Mondays, Kristen Swensson of Cheap, Healthy, Good swings by these parts to share healthy and delicious recipes with us. Have at it, Kristen.
While we may disagree on economic bailouts, abortion law, and whether cilantro is awesome or tastes like soap, Americans universally agree on a single principle: home fries are the freaking BEST. Salty, starchy, crisp on the outside and tender on the inside, they’re the pinnacle of breakfast foods, rivaled in deliciousness only by bacon.
Alas, home fries are traditionally very fatty. When the Husband-Elect and I were searching for a good recipe recently, we discovered the highest rated ones tended to have at least one tablespoon of oil or butter per serving. Not good. So, I embarked on a mission: Using techniques from a few different blogs, I had to create home fries that were both tasty and significantly lower in fat.
First, I opted for Yukon gold over red potatoes because I wanted a buttery taste and texture without too much actual dairy. Second, I sautéed the accompanying onions and peppers in only a little butter, then steamed them to complete the cooking process. Finally, since I don’t own a cast iron pan, we used a large nonstick skillet. That way, I could use less oil but still get a decent brown on the potatoes. The suggestion came from Deb at Smitten Kitchen, who argued that Teflon pans are just better suited to certain dishes (eggs, home fries, etc.). She was right.
In the end, this was good stuff. The recipe had all the benefits of homemade home fries with only about half the fat. And that, Americans, is something we can all be happy about.
Lighter Home Fries
- serves 3 -
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen, All Recipes, and Diet, Dessert, and Dogs.
Ingredients
1 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter, separated
3 Yukon gold potatoes, cut into 3/4-inch pieces
1/2 green bell pepper
3/8 medium onion
3/4 teaspoon Steak or grill seasoning
A few dashes paprika
Salt and pepper to tasteProcedure
1. Place potatoes in a microwave-safe dish, cover tightly with plastic wrap, and nuke on high for 4 to 7 minutes, shaking the bowl halfway through. Once finished, potatoes should be cooked, but not mushy. Remove from microwave and let cool in refrigerator.
2. While potatoes are cooking, chop onion Lyonnaise-style (in crescent moons). Then, thinly slice bell pepper and halve those slices.
3. Melt 1/2 tablespoon butter in a nonstick pan over medium heat. Add peppers and onions, and sauté for one minute, stirring to coat vegetables with butter. Cover pan and let steam for 6 to 8 minutes, stirring occasionally. Transfer to a bowl and set aside.
4. Turn heat to medium-high and melt the other 1 tablespoon butter in the pan. Add potatoes and steak seasoning, and cook for about 10 minutes, stirring every 3 minutes or so. Once potatoes have developed a nice brown crust, add the vegetables back in and cook for 1 minute more or until warmed. Salt and pepper to taste.
Note: Check the salt content of your steak seasoning before adding salt and pepper at the end. Some steak shakes come with quite a bit of both in the mix, and you don’t want to overseason.
Related
Chorizo and Potato Frittata
Paprika-Spiked Home Fries with Poached Egg
Jalapeño Cheese Fries
Expert Tips on Photographing Your Pets
A professional pet photographer shares the tricks of the trade.
A (free) car in every (penthouse) garage: Canco Lofts in Jersey City is offering a perk its owners hope will rev up sales: A free car with every penthouse purchase.
Maureen Dowd’s Tiny Error: So what have we learned? A bunch of non-writers who comment on blogs will denounce Dowd because she steals from her friends. They are ridiculous, because everyone steals from their friends, or else how would you get through the day?Choire Sicha does an excellent job deconstructing the DowdMarshallGate. I have a scoop, though, one you won't read elsewhere. Rumor has it Talking Points Memo rolled out a redesigned front page Sunday morning that featured "reader blog" content more prominently on the front page. The top article, of course, has been the plagiarism article. Coincidence?
Ideas on Launching Homework NYC (Widgets)
I have been brainstorming with a colleague on different ways of pitching Homework NYC Widgets over the summer. These were the ideas we came up with:
“Advertise what New York City libraries are getting ready to launch, something new and different on the homework front.”
What if we thought about it in the same way that movie companies develop anticipation for a new movie? They often do that when there is very little to sell or tell. Might we simply go with something very open-ended and then over the months add small details and pieces of information as we have them?
What if we have teens create video-based mysteries about homework NYC. They could be episodic and lead up to the widgets but not focus on widgets until we are ready. Each short episode could show teens working on homework the old way and leave off with tag line about homework not being the same anymore - coming fall/winter 2009-10.
We could do some really cool stuff with teens getting them excited about the project by creating some sort of videos. Imagine if there were a bunch of 15 second videos each one that leaves the viewer wondering huh…. and wanting to learn more.
We could do something with a Twitter feed too. What if there was a feed that periodically posted clues to what’s coming next for Homework NYC? Teens working on the videos could post those too.
Start by going to libraries that have Teen Centers:
St. George
Grand Central
Mulberry
Bronx Library Center
Grand Army Plaza
East Flushing
Get the momentum started and go to surrounding libraries afterwards, in preparation of the unveiling of Homework NYC Widgets.
Facebook Supports OpenID for Automatic Login
In continuing with our efforts toward greater openness, we are excited to announce that Facebook is now an OpenID relying party. We've been engaging with the OpenID community for a while now. We'll be the largest relying party so far and look forward to contributing back to the community what we learned about how OpenID works with a complex and changing user base.
Over the past several months, we've taken a number of steps that help to build a scalable, secure, and sustainable framework, one that further defines what it means to be an OpenID relying party.
We believe openness and open standards foster a strong developer community with shared goals and interests. So, Facebook joined the OpenID Foundation Board in February of this year.
We've always believed that making the user experience as secure, lightweight, and intuitive as possible, which 200 million people can comfortably enjoy and understand, is one of our top priorities. In the spirit of helping craft a simple and safe login flow for OpenID, we hosted the OpenID User Experience Summit, where we shared lessons learned from developing the Facebook Connect authentication system.
We're also concerned with account security. Again, we shared our experience developing Facebook Connect, where we eventually came up with a design that ensures that users would know that they were providing their login credentials to Facebook, and not some unscrupulous site. We streamlined the OpenID login process while maintaining security, converting the full-page redirect to a pop-up. We worked with the community to develop this pop-up extension to standardize the more streamlined user experience.
We've always let our users express their real world connections. From the beginning, Facebook users could use their college and workplace identities to establish real world networks. Now, they can also use open standards to establish their identities on Facebook.
These are the first steps of many in working with the OpenID community.
Now, users can register for Facebook using their Gmail accounts. This is a quicker, more streamlined way for new users to register for the site, find their friends, and start exploring.
Existing and new users can now link their Facebook accounts with their Gmail accounts or with accounts from those OpenID providers that support automatic login. Once a user links his or her account with a Gmail address or an OpenID URL, logs in to that account, then goes to Facebook, that user will already be logged in to Facebook.
In tests we've run, we've noticed that first-time users who register on the site with OpenID are more likely to become active Facebook users. They get up and running after registering even faster than before, find their friends easily, and quickly engage on the site.
We welcome your feedback on the Developer Forum. And you can read the technical requirements on the Developer Wiki.
We'll keep working on the OpenID experience to make it even better for new and existing users. And we'll continue to work with the OpenID community and others on advancing openness on the Web.
Maureen Dowd’s Tiny Error
Maureen Dowd picks up a funny little correction today, as her weekend column lifted a paragraph from a blog. And we do mean “little”!
Maureen Dowd’s column on Sunday, about torture, failed to attribute a paragraph about the timeline for prisoner abuse to Josh Marshall’s blog at Talking Points Memo.
So, “failed to attribute” is a funny phrase. It’s a phrase that doesn’t show up in other corrections in the paper. HOWEVER! It is a phrase that shows up in this July 10, 1864 account of General Sherman’s movements, which you really should read! Man! If the newspaper read like this today, I would be jumping out of bed first thing in the morning to go get it!
Anyway. The official narrative of the correction is, therefore, that she simply meant to quote that blog.
But Dowd has emailed people, saying that a friend had sent her this language, which she subsumed without Googling in quotes, something the rest of us who steal from our friends never do.
Those two explanations are in total conflict. Clearly Dowd said one thing to Greg Brock, who is presumably still the corrections editor—and this is already an unusual situation, as the op-ed columnists are a segregated pod inside/beside the segregated pod that is the op-ed section.
And she said a totally different thing via emails.
So what have we learned? A bunch of non-writers who comment on blogs will denounce Dowd because she steals from her friends. They are ridiculous, because everyone steals from their friends, or else how would you get through the day?
But what we’ve really learned is that Dowd is too un-savvy with the current age, and too unused to getting publicly hand-slapped, to safely negotiate this tiny, tiny debacle. She made it worse—even while trying to do something smart, which was saying, publicly, “Oh I goofed! My bad!”—which when you do it right, blammo, the trouble disappears.
We’re not climbing on the CRUCIFY HER bandwagon here. Guess what? You shovel out words constantly for a few decades, and mistakes happen. And Dowd has an incredibly low correction rate, even in her time as a reporter. Yes, she’s run down some incredibly wrong roads in her time on the Op-Ed page. And you probably would have too!
Dowd put in some time as a hard-charging Metro reporter and as a magazine writer and also on National, for 12 years, before coming to the opinion page. No doubt her psycho-fiery style in the 80s and early 90s offended the holy hell out of the old guard at the Times, and if I were her, I’d be continually pissed that the kids today have no idea about this, since most of them were born in the 80s.And then also because most of the kids today are merely doing what she is doing, except without navigating an unfriendly and slow-moving newspaper hierarchy.
She is friends with a few other tough women at the Times, who keep to themselves and are mistrustful of the current age of public hue and cry, in part because they have all been abused by it—for reasons that are pretty much unknown to the abusers (youthful resentment). This correction psychodrama, while also totally Dowd’s fault, will merely increase the remove of the op-ed columnists and the other now-old, formerly-new guard of opinionated writers and critics at the Times from the current real world. Lose, lose!
Get your free water at Millennium
My blog post last week about Millennium offering only filtered water at a charge of $1 brought a lot of responses. The restaurant has rethought its approach. I received this message from...
May 17, 2009
New Features for Amazon EC2: Elastic Load Balancing, Auto Scaling, and Amazon CloudWatch
We are working to make it even easier for you to build sophisticated, scalable, and robust web applications using AWS. As soon as you launch some EC2 instances, you want visibility into resource utilization and overall performance. You want your application to be able to scale on demand based on traffic and system load. You want to spread the incoming traffic across multiple web servers for high availability and better performance. You want to focus on building an application that takes advantage of the powerful infrastructure available in the cloud, while avoiding system administration and operational burdens ("The Muck," as Jeff Bezos once called it).
Today, we are bringing you a lot closer to that world! The load balancing, auto scaling, and cloud monitoring features that I talked about earlier are now available. The features work together to help you to build highly scalable and highly available applications. Amazon CloudWatch monitors your Amazon EC2 capacity, Auto Scaling dynamically scales it based on demand, and Elastic Load Balancing distributes load across multiple instances in one or more Availability Zones. The measurements collected by Amazon CloudWatch provide Auto Scaling with the information needed to run enough Amazon EC2 instances to deal with the traffic load. Auto Scaling updates the Elastic Load Balancing service when new instances are launched or terminated to automatically scale the load-balanced capacity. You can instantiate, configure, and deploy these important system architecture components in seconds.
Amazon CloudWatch tracks and stores a number of per-instance performance metrics including CPU load, Disk I/O rates, and Network I/O rates. The metrics are rolled-up at one minute intervals and are retained for two weeks. Once stored, you can retrieve metrics across a number of dimensions including Availability Zone, Instance Type, AMI ID, or Auto Scaling Group. Because the metrics are measured inside Amazon EC2 you do not have to install or maintain monitoring agents on every instance that you want to monitor. You get real-time visibility into the performance of each of your Amazon EC2 instances and can quickly detect underperforming or underutilized instances.
Auto Scaling lets you define scaling policies driven by metrics collected by Amazon CloudWatch. Your Amazon EC2 instances will scale automatically based on actual system load and performance but you won't be spending money to keep idle instances running. The service maintains a detailed audit trail of all scaling operations. Auto Scaling uses a concept called an Auto Scaling Group to define what to scale, how to scale, and when to scale. Each group tracks the status of an application running across one or more EC2 instances. A set of rules or Scaling Triggers associated with each group define the system conditions under which additional EC2 instances will be launched or unneeded EC2 instances terminated. Each group includes an EC2 launch configuration to allow for specification of an AMI ID, instance type, and so forth.
Finally, the Elastic Load Balancing feature makes it easy for you to distribute web traffic across Amazon EC2 instances residing in one or more Availability Zones. You can create a new Elastic Load Balancer in minutes. Each one contains a list of EC2 instance IDs, a public-facing URL, and a port number. You will need to use a CNAME record in your site's DNS entry to associate your this URL with your application. You can use Health Checks to ascertain the health of each instance via pings and URL fetches, and stop sending traffic to unhealthy instances until they recover.
Here's how the services fit together:
All of this functionality is provided in web service and command-line form:
- You can call ListMetrics to get a list of statistics collected by Amazon CloudWatch, and then call GetMetricStatistics to retrieve them. Your call to GetMetricStatistics can include a number of parameters to specify the date range, desired metrics and statistics, metric granularity, and more. You can also use mon-list-metrics and mon-get-stats from the command line. There's a lot more info in the Developer Guide (HTML or PDF) and the Quick Reference Card.
- On the load balancing side, you start out by calling CreateLoadBalancer to create an Elastic Load Balancer, and will receive a DNS name in return. You can include a list of Availability Zones in the call or you can add them later using EnableAvailabilityZonesForLoadBalancer. From there you can add any number of health checks using ConfigureHealthCheck. A call to RegisterInstancesWithLoadBalancer will add your Amazon EC2 instances to the Elastic Load Balancer, and load balancing will commence. You can use elb-create-lb, elb-enable-zones-for-lb, elb-configure-healthcheck, and elb-register-instances-with-lb from the command line. Again, there's a lot more info in the Developer Guide (HTML or PDF) and the Quick Reference Card.
- For Auto Scaling you begin by calling CreateAutoScalingGroup, naming the group and providing the information needed to launch suitably configured Amazon EC2 instances. You then establish the scaling parameters using the CreateOrUpdateScalingTrigger function. The service will then launch Amazon EC2 instances as indicated by the scaling parameters. You can call DescribeScalingActivities at any point to fetch a list of recent scaling activities (instance launches and terminations). Command line equivalents are as-create-autoscaling-group, as-create-or-update-trigger, and as-describe-scaling-activities. Again, there's a lot ore info in the Developer Guide (HTML or PDF) and the Quick Reference Card.
If you're signed up for the Amazon EC2 service, you're already registered to use all of these new features and can begin using them via the web service APIs or Command Line tools. These new features are currently available in the U.S. region with EU region availability coming in the next few months.
You can use these services to make your AWS applications perform better without sacrificing application control freedom of development, choice of tools, speed of deployment, or any other kind of flexibility. You can be up and running with these new services in a matter of minutes. All of these new features are supported through our public forums and also through AWS Premium Support.
Morning Update:As always, a few interesting things came up after I put this post out last night:
- Amazon CTO Werner Vogels wrote about these new features in his blog post, Automating the management of Amazon EC2 using Amazon CloudWatch, Auto Scaling and Elastic Load Balancing.
- RightScale founder Thorsten von Eiken also wrote about them in his post, Amazon adds Load balancing, Monitoring, and Auto-Scaling..
- There's a good discussion taking place on a Hacker News thread.
-- Jeff;
Yes, Actually
Andrew Sullivan interviews the Pet Shop Boys: "We've maintained that the Pet Shop Boys are always an alternative to what's going on. It's 1992, it's all about Nirvana, but there's still the Pet Shop Boys. It's 2009, it's all about the Pussycat Dolls or something, but there's still the Pet Shop Boys. ... It's a way of not really competing -- and it's why I'm not really bothered about success in America because we really try to exist in our world. We do things our own way and, generally speaking, it's been the hard way. Hard, but consistent. ... We did this amazing performance in Dresden that was projected on this big communist apartment block. The orchestra sat in individual balconies around the screen. It was really amazing. We really like [to bring] the sense of an event to what we do. That's why we do the theatrical things onstage -- because we want to bring out the meaning of what we do, not disguise it."
Busted
Not good.
This blog is under construction
I started this blog 10 years ago. Maybe it needs a makeover.
Luc Besson Swims into The Cove
French Director Luc Besson acquired the French rights to the award-winning documentary, The Cove. Winner of the Audience Award at the 2009 Sundance film festival and the audience award at Hot Docs, this “eco-thriller” follows high-tech dive team to discover the truth about the international dolphin capture in Taiji, Japan. Their mission is to stop the annual dolphin slaughter that takes place in a Taiji cove every September.
The reviews of the film are unanimously AMAZING, even Alec Baldwin is diving in and showing his support. I think Rolling Stone sums it up best:
Sundance is known for documentaries. But this baby, a cross between Flipper and The Bourne Identity, packed the heat. Using technology borrowed from George Lucas’ ILM, an intrepid America crew slips into Japan and nails the bad guys for doing terrible things to dolphins.
Watch the trailer after the jump:
Paul Goldberger: Celebrating fifty years of Frank Lloyd Wright's Guggenheim.
In 1959, when the Guggenheim Museum opened, traffic on Fifth Avenue moved in both directions. As you drove northward, the bulbous form emerged from behind flat-fronted apartment buildings like a balloon in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. I first saw the museum that way, as a nine-year-old . . .
El beisbolista, el poeta
Miguel Batista is a published poet and novelist--he's also a relief pitcher for the Seattle Mariners. He started his MLB career in 1992 with the Pittsburgh Pirates but hasn't spent that long with any team, nine in total. Overall, he's had a solid career but his performance this season has been uneven. This is what the Red Sox commentators were observing when one of them mentioned that he also wrote poetry. "You don't hear that often. A baseball player who is also a poet. And he's published too." Upon hearing this, my head exploded.
Batista's official website represents all sides of the man: poet, writer, musician, baseball player and (touchingly) human being. In his own words:Dominicano por destino, pelotero por profesión, poet por pasión" es una frase que resume la vida de Miguel Batista. Porque para hablar de él hay que viajar un poco más allá de su prestigio como jugador de béisbol y ahondar en sus valores humanos, así como en las miles de páginas en que se revela su vocación por la palabra.
Dominican by birth, pitcher by profession, poet by vocation" sums up Miguel Batista's life in an nutshell. To really understand who he is, you have to dig deeper than his fame as a Major League Baseball player, and get to know his human values. You have to immerse yourself in the thousands of pages he has penned as a poet and novelist, revealing his heartfelt passion for the written word.
Baseball season affords players very little down time. Apparently, Dustin Pedroia and Terry Francona play cribbage before games. A lot of players tune out with video games. Batista writes. His first book--Sentimientos en blanco y negro--slowly came together, in fits and starts:
...pese a su agitada agenda deportiva y aprovechando su escaso tiempo libre, en aviones, en el "clubhouse" o donde fuera, Miguel iba escribiendo en papeles sueltos o libretas, sus sueños, sus dudas, temores y amores.
In spite of his hectic schedule and little free time, Miguel wrote on scraps of paper and notebooks, in the dugout, on airplanes, wherever he happened to be. He wrote about his dreams, his doubts, his fears, his loves. It was 1999, and he never imagined that any of his writings might be published one day.
Something about this process--it's fragmentary quality--reminds me of Marina Tsvetaeva, an early twentieth century Russian poet. I read once how Tsvetaeva would quickly pen a line poetry while making dinner or tending to her daughters. Granted she worked under particularly straitened circumstances, but a number of great poets have juggled writing with full-time careers in other professions--for example, Wallace Stevens (lawyer) and William Carlos Williams (physician).
There are a few poems in Spanish and English on his website. Read them and make your own assessment of his work. What interests me, and what I admire, is that Batista makes time for a creative life. And he doesn't compartmentalize it. It isn't relegated, as it was for Robert Mitchum, to a secret, private practice. It's all there in the open--the good, bad and uneven--"...we kindly/ surrender to the most beautiful feeling/ we have always known" ("Perfect Stranger").
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