Creative swine flu surgical masks
The swine flu has not only unleashed a flood of fears and concerns, but also creativity. The surgical masks people have started to wear have also become a blank canvas for some to demonstrate their individuality, creativity and sense of humor. For example, take these Mexicans, who refuse to let a little thing like a [...]
Read More »Jazz history in iTunes U
I’ve been using the iTunes Music Store pretty much since the day it launched, but I’ve never really spent any time poking around iTunes U, the section of the store devoted to podcasts, videotaped lectures, and other content from universities, museums, and similar institutions. Participants include the Museum of Modern Art, the Tate Modern, the [...]
Read More »Sell your energy savings?
While many of us buy carbon offsets and similar products from companies like Terrapass and NativeEnergy to achieve “carbon neutrality,” producing and selling these credits has generally been limited to bigger players. Earth Aid Enterprises, creators of the Earth Aid Kit, would like to change that equation. A new service from the company allows Earth [...]
Read More »“Classy professionals” seek wingwomen for $35/hour
photo by colorcritical Let’s say you’ve got enough disposable income — even in the middle of a recession — to call yourself a “classy professional” who drinks in “upscale bars.” And let’s say that — despite the recession — all this disposable income doesn’t seem to be working on the ladies like you’d hoped it [...]
Read More »Allan Holdsworth – Backstage at Iridium Jazz Club (Part 1)
Allan Holdsworth onstage at Iridium Jazz Club NYC April 25 BETWEEN SETS WITH ALLAN HOLDSWORTH (PART 1): Just three blocks north of Times Square in Manhattan, you’ll find the world-famous Iridium Jazz Club (51st Street and Broadway). Featuring a perfect blend of the top established names in jazz and the most talented up and coming [...]
Read More »10 futuristic green corporate buildings
Some of these buildings exist only on paper (or rather a computer hard drive), but this is a list of 10 large office buildings “that are not only bold, beautiful and futuristic, but ‘green’ too.” I’m especially impressed by the “Cactus Building,” a new government building in Doha, Qatar. As the name suggests, it “draws [...]
Read More »Life as an Open Story
This is a weekly column written by Annie Howell and Lisa Robinson, two filmmakers and film professors who are wondering where modern storytelling is heading. I’ve been thinking about the number of people who are streaming their lives as open stories over the web. All these personal narratives are unfolding by short sentences or photos [...]
Read More »100 abandoned houses
Kevin Bauman photographed 100 abandoned houses in Detroit, creating a somewhat spooky tableau of the current recession. He writes: 100 seemed like a lot, although the number of abandoned houses in Detroit is more like 12,000. Encompassing an area of over 138 square miles, Detroit has enough room to hold the land mass of San [...]
Read More »President Obama, furniture mover
There are lots of great images in the just-posted Flickr set by White House photographer Pete Souza, but this is my favorite: In preparation for a meeting about the economic recovery plan, President Obama and Vermont governor Jim Douglas shift a couch in the Oval Office. The set is filled with lots of casual, revealing [...]
Read More »Nothing says class like a beautiful glass dildo
Celebrating a special occasion with your significant other, and need a set of toys to fit the mood? When even your best silicone toys won’t do, consider these finely crafted glass dildos, perched atop their very own champagne stems. We hear they go great with Prosecco. (Alas, these aren’t actually for sale… yet, at least. [...]
Read More »Teenaged video artists tackle recycling
How do you get a teenager thinking beyond angst, driving, and the Friday night dance? Officials in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, answered that question with “Give them a video camera and production tools.” The county’s “Rev Up Recycling” contest challenged student teams from area high schools to create public service videos on recycling. The contest [...]
Read More »Favorite Typefaces of 2008
You may take them for granted, but a quality typeface is almost like a functional work of art – and yes, they’re still generally craftted by hand. I suppose April isn’t too late to discuss last year, so without further ado: Typographica lists their favorite typefaces of 2008. Sensationalism aside, it’s significant that the ever-increasing [...]
Read More »Just what do you think you’re doing, Alex?
Remember HAL 9000? The deadly T-2000? Sensitive David? The Nexus 6 replicants? Cylons? Reaching even further back, there’s Gort, Maria…even Robby! It wasn’t too long ago that computers and robots which paralleled or exceeded human ability were reserved exclusively for sci-fi and fantasy films. It’s a familiar story: man makes machine. Man is served by [...]
Read More »How the other half lives
This beautiful short film “Day of Light” or “Dia de Luz” created by Love Light & Melody, a nonprofit organization, “chronicles an epic celebration of life in La Chureca, the trash dump community of Managua, the capital city of Nicaragua.” Day of Light from Love Light & Melody on Vimeo. [Via]
Read More »Growing tomatoes in your apartment
Gardening’s all the rage now — even the Obamas have gotten in on the game. Growing your own food doesn’t just provide great-tasting produce and a sense of satisfaction, though: in a conversation in March, Ogden Publications publisher (and farmer) Bryan Welch noted that starting a garden may be the single best thing you can [...]
Read More »James Jarvis, ONWARDS
Onwards from AKQA on Vimeo. In collaboration with Nike, UK artist James Jarvis’s short animated film ONWARDS imagines a kind of magical non-linear world through which a funny little stick figure character enjoys running. I thought the evening sequence towards the end was particularly brilliant. Jarvis adds: The film was inspired by certain personal experiences [...]
Read More »Naked News (04-27-09)
Study: Children Exposed To Pornography May Expect Sex To Be Enjoyable If Mainers and New Yorkers embrace Iowans’ “mind your own business” mentality, their states could be the next to legalize gay marriage (hope, hope). Of course, then you’ll get whackjob judges like this all over the place refusing to perform any marriages, just so [...]
Read More »The new muxtape: Thirty Thirsty
Thirty Thirsty (think “thirty minutes for thirsty ears”), is my new favorite audio blog that features terrific 30 minute mixed sets that are only available for a month. It’s a great way to discover new music, hear some old classics, and just pass the time while bobbing your head to summer jump off jams.
Read More »TV + literature = brilliance
If iconic television and solid literature got married, Slaughterhouse 90210 would be the resulting offspring. This blog pairs up television images with memorable literary quotes. Check out some examples below:
Read More »Bob Dylan, Blondie and Radiohead, Modernist-style
In a similar vein to the vintage book cover mashups posted here last month, an Australian designer has created a series of Modernist reimaginings of classic album covers by Depeche Mode, Lou Reed, Pink Floyd, and others. They’re excellent. Here’s R.E.M.’s: [via Jason Kottke]
Read More »Gas mask juxtaposition
In light of the swine flu outbreak and the sight of surgical masks everywhere, I can’t help but be reminded of gas masks. Burberry gas mask by Brooklyn artist Mark Stafford. Gas masked sculpture by Spanish street artist SpY. Gas mask shower head by Chris Domino. Knitted gas mask by Teriyakimoto at Craftster. Siddhartha Gotama [...]
Read More »All Chicago’s a Stage
If you were in Chicago last week and heard an inordinate amount of huzzah’s, to be or not to be’s, or do you bite your thumb at me’s, it’s because Mayor Daley declared last Thursday “Talk Like Shakespeare Day.” In honor of the bard’s 445th birthday, Daley invited “citizens to screw their courage to the [...]
Read More »Michigan universities launch online tools for planners, activists, citizens
Are you looking for information on lightening your neighborhood’s or town’s environmental footprint? Want to figure out how to reduce your own energy and material consumption? Or, just need facts on hand for that annoying climate-change denying brother-in-law? Michigan’s largest universities have released new online tools that may have you covered in all of these [...]
Read More »Lucy and Bart: Future humans
Lucy and Bart is a collaboration between artist Bart Hess and “far future designer” Lucy McRae that deconstructs the human body and peers ahead into various possibilities of “future human shapes” while paradoxically utilizing low-tech prosthetics. View more here. [Via]
Read More »Product-placement pioneers: the hair-metal band Autograph
Jon Fine of BusinessWeek has a great post about one of the earliest-known examples of product placement in a music video: the pen company Paper Mate’s sponsorship of Autograph’s 1984 video for “Turn Up the Radio”: Yes, this actually happened: In 1984 Paper Mate found an unknown poodle-rock band called Autograph, gave ‘em some bucks, [...]
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