There are 11 posts from May 2004.
every two years
Sped through the Whitney Biennial yesterday. It was impossible to do anything else but speed through it; the crowds were too thick, the rooms overly hung and the floorplan too mazelike. Nevertheless captured a couple of decent pics with the camphone, and made a quick list of the work I think is worth seeing at the showâŚ
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Kim Fisherâs abstract paintings.
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Richard Princeâs wall sculptures
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Alex Hayâs paintings of wood grain patterns
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Robert Mangoldâs column paintings
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Golan Levinâs digital piece The Secret Lives of Numbers
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Robert Longoâs charcoal drawings of breaking waves (why does it seem that so many people are commenting on Vija Celmins?)
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And, of course, Hockneyâs watercolors
In case you hadnât noticed, Iâm a sucker for painting. Had very little time / energy to engage with the video work, and most of the installation work screamed âI wanna be Sarah Sze!â To which the obvious reply is âOf course you do, sweetheart. Donât we all?â
what do you mean it's not in your records?
Dear Mercury News / Realcities,
Why do you insist on telling me that âmy email address is not in your recordsâ when I subscribe to receive (and regularly open!) three of your email subscription products? All I want to do is click between this story and this story without going through yet another poorly designed âlog in or registerâ experience.
In other words, you should invest in a single sign-on system â the excuse that âour email address database is managed separately,â is not an acceptable excuse, especially since you use email address as the user ID.
Thanks,
Michael
declan reasoned on privacy
The issue of Reason previously mentioned in this space has hit the newsstands. Declan McCullagh pens the cover story, âDatabase Nation: The upside of âzero privacy.ââ Itâs a remarkably balanced look at the costs and benefits of âthe databasification of American society.â
Markets function more efficiently when it costs little to identify and deliver the right product to the right consumer at the right time. Data collection and information sharing emerged not through chance but because they bring lower prices and more choices for consumers.
Itâs simple economics. Information sharing systems requiring opt-in consent create costs (direct costs related to management overhead and indirect costs related to more expensive product development and marketing efforts); costs which are eventually shouldered by consumers in the form of higher prices or reduced choice.
email and attention management
Esther Dysonâs speaking at Inbox (hey, Iâm in good company!). Despite all the hoo ha about the supposed death of email, Esther posts today about the future of emailâŚ
More fundeamentally, as the world becomes more real-time and connected, the virtual and increasingly the actual configuration of the system is changing. Thereâs a rich, complex, shared data store in the cloud, and mail is simply the passing of notifications and alerts that tell you to pay attention to/download specific items in the cloud that are new or changed or that someone wants to share with you. this creates huge challenges in version control, updating and permission management.
Outside the realm of person-to-person correspondence, email is about notification, information flow, and as Esther points out later in the post, attention management. Estherâs right on the money that clients will evolve to help individuals manage that flow, and make sure that theyâre paying attention to the right stuff. But itâs a two-way street â the senders that get it right will win good will, incremental business and long term loyalty from their readers / users / customers.
licensing answers
Google service idea: they should license the Google Answers platform on a hosted basis to third parties. Knowledge heavy communities (large consulting firms, technology user bases, travel enthusiasts or even hobby groups) could develop their own FAQ base on a branded answers platform, and provide an economic (or points-based rewards) incentive to boot. Iâm an iPod fanatic and looking for the best way to sync Outlook contact data to my device? The discussion forums at iPodLounge are great for roundabout discussion on preferred headphones, but not so great at task-oriented problem solving. Meanwhile, the mother ship Google Answers site isnât topic specific enough to attract the loyal readership of hard core iPod fanatics. Sites would pay a hosting fee, revenue share on the Answer fees, and Google builds higher quality content for indexing. (This was all Judithâs idea.)
geico v. google
Let the conspiracy theories begin: [Geicoâs suing Google](http://news.com.com/2100-1024_3-5215107.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=news âGeico sues Google, Overture over trademarks | CNET News.comâ) (and others) over their use of trademarks in search-based advertising. Geicoâs a subsidiary of Warren Buffettâs Berkshire Hathaway, and Buffettâs a good friend of Gates, so thereâs gotta be some good (and pointless) punditry coming our way⌠|
apple sdk for windows
Interesting news from Ars Technica: Apple opens up iTunes interface on Windows. Iâd love to see all the little iTunes hacks start coming to Windows. Support for Bluetooth remoting, ânow playingâ widgets like there are for WinAmp, etc. What Iâm hoping, though, is that this could enable some enterprising Slim developer to enable Fairplay-protected AAC playback on the Squeezebox.
placing archive
Matt Webb pointed out to me that the waybackâs archive of placing.com might not be so safe, given what the new owners of 99secrets.com have done with their robot excluder. so unless my pal objects, placing has another home at carlsteadman.com/placing.
supermodel personals
More like this, please: Supermodel Personals:
We are Natasha and Svetlana. We look for kind, generous men to give endless love faithfulness. We come to United States to be pop stars. You know Tatu? We better than them. We give good show, no just kissing. We promise you be happy and want to take us shopping.
what are you doing there, anyway?
Canât believe I hadnât seen this before, an excellent essay by Michael Chabon on Berkeley.
The result, perhaps inevitable, of this paralysis of good intentions, this ongoing, floating opera of public disapproval and the coming into conflict of competing visions of the path to personal bliss, is a populace inclined to kvetching and to the wearing of the default Berkeley facial expression, the suspicious frown. Bliss is, after all, so near at hand; the perfect egg, a good nightâs sleep, reconciliation with oneâs mother or the Palestinians, a theory to account for the surprising lack of dark matter in the universe, a radio station that does not merely parrot the lies of government flaks and corporate media outletsâsuch things can often feel so eminently possible here, given the intelligence and the passion of the citizens. And yet they continue to elude us. Who is responsible? Is it us? Is it you? What are you doing, there, anyway? Donât you know the recycling truck wonât take aluminum foil?
placing
Placing.com is available now for the low low price of $6000.
âiâm having trouble finding enough hot air poppers,â i told louis. âpopcorn?â louis asked. âpopcorn,â i replied, âfor the road show prevue.â louis raised his eyebrows. i smiled. âyou could always get a shitload of microwave stuff,â he answered. âyes, thatâs true,â i said. âalthough iâm not sure it would be the same.â âthatâs true,â louis said.
Thank God for Wayback.