Twitter Is Like Those Cameras In London That Watch You Do Bad Things On The Street

My Twitter account recently:

+Terry richardson isnt on facebook. i was jus like "hey i added u las nite" he was like "ha ppl tel me tha all th time but its not me" #

+Wow. jus saw james gandolfini (tony soprano) go off on a street cart vendor on 79th and 5th. was jus like tv, he was angry and said fuk you #

+Ray Kelly should turn his frown upside down #

+Pretty sure i saw cindy adams this morning on 5th and 57th. She didnt look happy but she prolly isnt #

+Long line of about 40 ppl waiting for soup kitchen tu open on 3rd ave btw ave A and B http://twitpic.com/zan0 #

+I love marc jacobs i want to be his friend i want to watch movies with him -overheard at party #

+Saw kevin bacon roll thru the 14th st 8ave subway station las nite and take an extended gander at group of young woman waiting for the train #

+Man, i dont even have a quarter for a debbie cake! -Guy talkin to his friend bout bein homeless and having no money #

+On the m101 bus uptown, driver must be in his early twenties, he didnt want to say. His dad drives and his mom works at the post office. # says its ok, u can put in 25yrs and retire at 55. But he wants to pursue other things. He put his app in 4yr ago and got the call 2yrs ago. #

http://twitter.com/Newyorkist

I Used To Live In Northampton - Korey White

Steamed Crap. 140th and Adam Clayton Powell Blvd. Sounds About Right.

New York Color

That's what I'm supposed to write about here. The "color" of New York. So I'm risking my job here with this post, but I do remember that YM is also a music blog, so hopefully I can sneak this post in without much protest from the publisher. Maybe I can add some NY Color by adding a small note about my dad who arrived in nyc in 1972, and lived on 2nd ave btw 51st and 52nd in a time when Cartier Love bracelets were $280 and came with Cartier's signature on the underside. So that's a small bit of NY color, and the photo at right should count too, for the Kennedy tie in what with Caroline's bid for a Senate seat here.

Speaking of $280.00, that comes to $1,373.48 adjusted for inflation in 2007, though today a Cartier Love bracelet will set you back $3,600, which can be a pleasant reminder of just how much of a nice fucking we are all getting, every which way you look. If these was a team post, Andrew would add some poignant words right here about stagnate wages, weakening of unions, classism run amok, destruction of the social contract, etc..putting a nice big bow on my accusation about getting screwed. But it's not a team post, so he didn't write anything. You get it anyways though, right?

So yah, I want to write about music too. I just read an article in the WSJ about some kid named Ben Hur, and how he sold a lot of albums because some blogger in Kentucky blogged about him on his live journal. I want to help ppl sell albums as well, I like music, and this is a music blog, so I wanted to try this mp3 blogging out.


Did you know that the above song is the original, and the one we all know by Laura Brannigan was a cover? Yup, Italians.

The weekend that Wall Street died

Rolling up to the meetings at around the same time was Goldman's chief, Blankfein. A Goldman aide, referring to days of meltdowns and meetings, carped to Blankfein: "I don't think I can take another day of this."

Blankfein retorted: "You're getting out of a Mercedes to go to the New York Federal Reserve -- you're not getting out of a Higgins boat on Omaha Beach. So keep things in perspective."

From an article in yesterday's WSJ.

Merry Xmas Andrew: Ivan Ulz Performing Fire Truck @ Penny's Open Mic, St Marks, 2007

Penny's Open Mic
Ivan Ulz

Less Threatened by the World's General Inclination Towards the Lowest Common Denominator

Original YM Chris Gage, who once interviewed Hal Hartley for Gothamist, reviews Hartley's new book, True Fiction Pictures and Possible Films.



With a king-indie (sorry) Hal Hartley movie (his boss helped fund his first movie. Boss? Can I have $62,500 and somewhere to stick my boom?), I just wait around for bad-ass Martin Donovan

()

to hit someone, or to be inappropriate

().

If Donovan's not in it, at least a Hartley femme-hot fatale, please: Parker Posey, Adrienne Shelley, Elina Löwensohn

().

True Fiction Pictures & Possible Films (from Soft Skull -- buy it! it! it!), alas, contains narry a fight scene (coulda made a rad pull-out flip-book) but the Q-and-A-format photo-bursting paperback does explains how Hartley's earlier work (Flirt, Simple Men, et al.) was so highly staged it was like a filmed painting:

"My preoccupation at the time was this: is the dialogue necessarily more important than the camera movement? I didn't know. I had always seen my films as pictures of people saying the dialogue."

Or,

Ned Riffle: I want adventure. I want romance.
Bill McCabe: Ned, there is no such thing as adventure. There's no such thing as romance. There's only trouble and desire.
Ned Riffle: Trouble and desire.
Bill McCabe: That's right. And the funny thing is, when you desire something you immediately get into trouble. And when you're in trouble you don't desire anything at all.
Ned Riffle: I see.
Bill McCabe: It's impossible.
Ned Riffle: It's ironic.
Bill McCabe: It's a fucking tragedy is what it is, Ned.

; but by the time of No Such Thing and The Girl from Monday, True Fiction Pictures shows how Hartley'd began focusing on and critiquing media and its creation (and need) of quickly digestible (then regurgitated) products (hello blogs).

"More and more, I find myself pursuing this question of determining what is real. And does the real even matter to people anymore? You know, making this distinction between the facts -- or the truth, I guess -- and information. We love information. People get excited about access to information. Networking. The speed at which information can be moved around. But fewer and fewer people seem to care if that information is accurate. Does it mean anything? Can it be verified? Is it just lies, for instance. Advertising, I guess, would assert that lies -- if they're believed -- are information too. So, we come to believe whatever is information. We believe in information. But information is not knowledge." [Embedded links mine.]

As an aside: Thank you to S.S.P. for putting out an oddly shaped 4C book on someone no one in my family will ever hear of. (What recession?) And now.

You may never see



in a Hartley film, but some of the images he constructs and choreographs are just as striking, as this books shows in with its film stills. He seems to think as much like a painter/photographer ("A movie can be very much composed. And this composition can be very exciting since it's executed by these living and breathing people.") as a filmmaker:



Additional plums the interviewer draws out from Hartley:
-how he finances his small-audience films,
-how/why he made a monster movie,
-the difference of filming in Iceland vs. Long Island,
-the filmmakers who influenced him,
-and how we no longer have "a manner of living together as a community that has matured organically...through common expierence. Now, our manner of living together is dictated immediately through publicity and advertising... We don't, in fact, live together and experience things together that much anymore. It is mediated. In fact, not all of this worries me. A lot of it's fascinating, even."

YM Review of n+1 Review of Jewish Reviews: The Tzitzit Eats Itself

In case you haven’t heard, Jews are talking about Jews again. The piece in question is sometimes fascinating, sometimes confusing, always Jewey in that wonderfully obsessive way of, say, Walter Benjamin (i.e., we probably didn't understand it). Following are the points you'll want to bring up at this weekend's Sisterhood Brunch:

Points of Agreement:

1. Most of the new Jewish media ventures mentioned in the n+1 review have been founded and/or backed by elderly Jews panicked about intermarriage and low birthrates. On their own, left to the free market, these ventures would simply not survive. (The beauty is that many, if not most, of these funding dollars are coming from otherwise histrionic champions of the free market)

2. With the exception of one point (see #3 below), its assessment of Heeb is chillingly spot-on.

3. Generally speaking, almost none of the Jewish ventures discussed has made any meaningful gesture in the direction of coming to terms with Jewish power today. To its credit, n+1 includes both Israel and "the head of neurology at Sinai" in its assessment of Jewish power, and pointedly gives praise to the rare exception: Jewcy's campaign against Abe Foxman for denying the Armenian genocide. Kudos.

4. The piece suggests an interesting quandary, one that has yet to be resolved: What is the purpose of a uniquely Jewish media when Jews are no longer dispossessed and when Jewish perspectives find full expression in American media?

5. Nice Hannah Arendt quote.

Points of Disagreement:

1. “Almost immediately [after the 9/11 attacks], the production of Holocaust literature ceased.” Sadly, this will never be true (although it's possible they were being ironic) (But wait, isn't n+1 post-ironic?) (or is that The Believer?) (McSweeney's?)*

2. Including JDate, even parenthetically, in the litany of Jewish ventures is misleading. Unlike the Jewish magazines, JDate did not originate from a panic impulse but from a profit impulse -- and in this it has succeeded where the others would almost certainly have failed. For this reason, despite its crassness and creepiness, JDate is the only organic venture of the entire lot.

3. I don't think Heeb's mission is "to insult, desecrate, and otherwise trample the feelings of religiously observant or just simply liberal Jewry." I think its mission is to remind the world (repeatedly) that they're edgy, go to cool bars, and have had sex in their lives. Oh, and that they were "brewed in Brooklyn." This will never, ever get old.

4. I enjoy Guilt and Pleasure, even though I'm too much of a Jew, and too middle class in my origins, to ever be invited to their elitist "salons" fashioned and executed by multimillionaires of the 8- and 9-figure variety. But we have to give G&P credit for pieces by Sander Gilman and Eddy Portnoy, and for reproducing amazing artifacts from earlier periods of Jewish cultural accomplishment. It's just too bad the people behind it are rich, self-satisfied pricks.

5. You sold me on "The greatness of this people was also that it once believed its experience of oppression to be a universal one, and its fortunes tied to all those who are oppressed" -- but let's be honest, this is a romantic view of Jewish history framed through the hindsight of the past 200 years. It's time to concede that the 14th century Court Jew crossing the bridge to haggle with the king was not concerned with universal oppression, but solely with Jewish survival. Major swaths of the community are returning to this ghetto-entrenched view, and as much as we're repulsed by its assumptions and behaviors, we can't deny that they have equally valid claims to Jewish history and destiny. The underlying question is whether we should make any effort to change their views, or simply cede the 14th century to them and start something entirely different and new.

* Emergency consultations with the n+1 staff have revealed that they meant the production of Holocaust literature has declined, not ceased.

Personally, I drank so I could feel comfortable, and then to get shitty

Using subtle sarcasm while speaking to a jaded populace of New York City commuters on the subway seems to be a common ploy with advertisers lately, and in a current advertisement in the 123 Line, Jameson whiskey is taking off where Bank of America left.

Seen last week on the 1 and 3 Lines, ads for Jameson whiskey were written with backwards text, or made reference to the ship in their label. (not photo'd) Both ads achieved a desired effect, inviting riders to look closer at the ads, straining to spot the ship in the label or read the backward text. The three ads photographed above however,
missed the mark. "Maybe people drink Jameson because they like to share, not like that guy taking up two seats." "Maybe because there are nine wrong ways to swipe your metrocard, but no wrong way to enjoy
a Jameson." Yah, maybe.

The sarcasm might seem clever and targeted, but I think it's a little weak. I'm reminded of something YM's publisher once said somewhere, to paraphrase, "you're in newyork now, get in the passing lane and hit the gas or pull the car over." In that light, I'd suggest some phrases for this ad campaign that are more pointed, more honest, and more direct. If you're going to talk to jaded people, best not to mince your words or be cute. Speak directly to them.

"You drink a bottle of Jameson in one sitting because you're a total alcoholic...so stop pretending. Pick up two tonight."

"You just got fired from your job that you hated going to anyways, and often would've rather killed yourself than get out of bed for another day at work. Tonight at least, Jameson will make you feel warm inside."

"You want to go out dancing and have a great time, but need a a few Jamesons first. Three shots before you leave the house should do the trick."

That seems better.

UPDATE: The NYTimes has started a blog about alcohol(ics/ism). Hmm, weird. File that under one of the few things I did not know.

Tumblr Tech Support Said This Would Import Properly Now

Did you make it here ok? Great, read this.

thegurglingcod:

I never entirely bought into the idea of blog years, but I’m not sure what else explains the nostalgia I feel for the pre-Tumblr era. At the risk of sounding as if I am pining for some discursive never-never land, like I was some Frankfurt School refugee who wound up beached on a Great Lake, the internets were smarter before Tumblr:

1) Reblogging — The ease of reblogging creates an echo chamber effect, and works to ossify conventional wisdom when it is still far more convention than wisdom. Rather than quoting and responding, it makes it possible to participate in the conversation in the same way that snapping indicates agreement among some sororities. The reblog without comment is a discursive action stripped of content, kind of like poking in Facebook.

2) The feed — unlike Bloglines or Google Reader, it all comes at you in a single torrent. I follow about 30 people, some of whom are rarely active, but returning to the computer after even a few hours feels like shoveling the driveway during a blizzard. At the same time, it is rewarding, as there is almost always something, when after five minutes of actual work at your computer, you crave distraction. It may be a dozen pictures of Strawberry Switchblade, scanned from mid 1980s issues of The Face or NME, posted by someone you keep meaning to unfollow, but there is almost always something. With regular RSS feeds, there is at least the ability to opt to look at what you want, when you want, but still keep track. It may be me, but Tumblr makes me feel more like a rat hitting that little bar over and over than the rest of the internet does.

3) Follow/unfollow — the social networking aspect always seemed like a distraction, and something that offered the limitations of both RSS feeds and social network, with few of the rewards of either.

So I plan to keep posting now and again, as it’s convenient for things that don’t really make sense on the blog, but I plan to unfollow on Tumblr, and then add some back as RSS feeds.

I imagine none of this is of much interest, but I’m wondering if I’m alone in feeling this way.

Ditto for Twitter. (Oh god Rex, please don't tell me there's a HUGE difference.) Both dashboards are useless once you're following more than 10 people, hence our long reluctance to follow anyone. We've caved a bit on Tumblr; not including the personal ones of YM, we're following 3 people. We've succumbed to Twitter as well, mainly for professional (ha!) reasons. I wish both services would let users pick their "top followees" to display front and center, and put the rest in a rolled up ghetto sidebar reader. But even with that enhancement, nothing is stopping this microblogging shitslide.

I believe it was 99 who once said, "eventually blogging will be nothing more than Wikipedia and YouTube links." I guess we're just doing our part.

NYTimes: "what song or piece of art should we transmit to outer space in case anyone is out there?"

"The makers of the new movie 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' have arranged for it to be beamed into space on Friday. What movie, song or work of art should we transmit to outer space in case anyone is out there?"

The NYTimes wants to know.

Dear All, I Will Be Taking The Whole Year Off To Wheatpaste In Beirut. See You In 2010!

Tweet from Marc Schiller of Wooster Collective

If you're feeling extra generous this holiday season and would like to help extend the 12 month sabbatical all these awesome artists will be taking, please consider buying another coffee mug from Bansky, hoodies from Sheppard Fairey, or maybe a Blek Le Rat Limited Edition Box Set. Weeee!

Artist Allan Molho Has City On Lock

The map above displays 10 current locations of Allan Molho's lock installations placed around the streets of Soho. Allan Molho's street art lock installations "are a clever attempt at making permanent a particular 'idea or emotion...Instead of a lock's normal function, I wanted to lock ideas and emotions to a particular place...Yet, it is clear that nothing stays the same. Neighborhoods, the city streets, its buildings and fixtures, its people and culture, its art and its ideas...""

ANIMAL has more about Allan and his project here.

Google Releases Search Habits Of NYC

Google Insights sent out the following items of interest (?)

The United States as a whole is more concerned with Ashley Dupre than are denizens of New York State.

Globally, the search term "New York City" is most popular in:

1. United States
2. Canada
3. Puerto Rico
4. Ireland
5. United Kingdom

In the battle of New York-based searches for the five boroughs, Brooklyn takes a commanding search lead, followed by Manhattan, Queens, Bronx, and Staten Island. NOTE: Brooklyn's popularity has increased steadily over the past four years -- with rises during the summer months:

Umbrella is more popular than Snow Boots in New York, but look at the seasonal shifts.

The fastest growing "food" searches of '08 in New York are:

1. red mango -- 700% increase in searches from '07 to '08
2. cooking games -- 200% increase
3. five guys -- 90% increase
4. nalgene -- 70% increase
5. lollipop -- 70% increase
6. momofuku -- 70% increase
7. buffalo wild wings -- 50% increase
8. anthony bourdain -- 50% increase

I did my own research and found that it appears that people in New York care more about Food, than they do Money, or Shelter.

In New York State, there is no interest in Tumblr outside of NYC, and in NYC itself only a small handful of people care about Tumblr, as opposed to Blogger, which everyone cares about.

Nationally and in NY State, a much larger number of people are more concerned with Harlem than the Lower East Side.

Lastly, in New York, among those who care about issues of importance, those who prefer to write checks have edged ahead of those who care enough to actually doing something.

Man Down on South Bound D Train Tracks at Columbus Circle, "DOA"

Well over a dozen emergency vehicles responded to the Columbus Circle Subway Station on 59th St. at approximately 12:30 am early this morning to reports of a person hit by a train. The following information was reported via my Twitter as I gathered it at the scene.

A dozen or more emergency vehicles arrived at the Columbus Circle subway station N.W. entrance at approximately 12:30 am early this morning. A NY Post photographer present outside the station relayed to me that a person was hit by a train, and was dead. Moments later two EMT's walked past on their way into the station, and asked an officer "where is it?" to which the officer replied, "on the south bound D tracks."

The officer mentioned something inaudible to his partner, and noted, "he's DOA."

The station was open and in use, and I walked inside to see what was going on. All tracks and entrances were operating normally aside for one set of stairs leading down to the south bound train platform, which were roped off at the top with police tape, preventing passage to the platform. Standing at the tape allowed a view of the platform, where the front car of a train was stopped in the station. A dozen officers stood about, with a few more Fire Fighters and EMT's also present. Approximately 10 feet in from the front of the train, was a yellow sheet covering an object on the platform about the size of an exercise ball, an object which laid directly against the train. Laying messily near the sheet were a dozen or so credit card sized papers, which looked like i.d., business cards, etc...

In the spacing that exists between the train and the platform, you could see what looked like fabric—it appeared to be a jacket—peeking out from under the sheet. I overheard an officer on the platform mention, while looking towards the sheet, "there is one over there, and one under the train," and I wondered if the object under the sheet was half of a body.

A plain clothes officer saw me standing at the police tape tapping away on my phone, and marched directly up to me, demanding, "who are you with? who are you?" I told him in answer to both questions, "no one" to which he sternly replied, "you need to leave, you can't be here."

So I did.

Everybody in my family is nice in Dominos

Following story and photographs by Polo Fernandez, 11, a student at M.S. 45 Stars Prep Academy on 120th in East Harlem, for a newspaper a group of students created under the watchful eye of Citizen School teachers Mr. Mastrangelo and Mr. Howell.

My Domino Story
By Polo Fernandez

My brother Zachary, 17 years old and my second oldest brother, is a good domino player and taught me how to play. He plays dominos in the house at least once a week, and is as good as my mother. He plays with everyone in the house; with me, my step dad, my mom. He plays with his older friends when they visit him from Puerto Rico. Watching them play hard and serious games allows me to learn how to play the game better. Often Zachary and his friends will play for money, usually five dollars or less. He always has money to play with. When I play with him, we play for fun, and I have a good time.

Zachary tells me I can get better if I keep playing, practicing with him and other older players. He started playing dominos when he was eight years old, and learned from the best domino player in the house, and that's my mom. My mother is very good and she shows my brother how to play. She should be called the trickster in dominos, because she tricks my brother wild crazy, causing him to play the wrong piece at the wrong time!


Zachary gets his great domino skills in his blood. Everybody in my family is nice in dominos, and Zachary is better than some, not as good as others. Soon, I will be the next best domino player in my family.