On Wednesday, the good folks at the Arts, Culture and Technology Meetup invited me to speak in conjunction with Social Media Week. I had about 7 minutes to talk about everything I've done up to this point, which was tough, but was I was humbled and gratified to receive a strong response afterward. Thank you to all who came out.



My fellow speakers were fabulous and inspiring - be sure to check them out as well:

Nic Rad
Adam Smith
William Powhida
Rachel Perry Welty
Yanira Castro

Labels: art, internet, personal, technology

Really, what's the need for data like highs and lows?

Labels: culture, design, humor, illinois

For Social Media Week New York, I'll be speaking about social media art and my various social media projects. It's Wednesday at 7p, and the RSVP is here (it's full right now, but there's a waiting list).

I'll be joined by artists Nic Rad, Adam Smith, William Powhida, Rachel Perry Welty and Yanira Castro. Hope to see you there!

Labels: personal

Last night, I watched Inglourious Basterds.

It's been reviewed to death, so I don't have too much too add, but it's certainly vintage Tarantino, with gorgeously choreographed action scenes, sharp dialogue consistent with the different countries involved (this time in not one but four languages), brutal violence bordering on the comical, amoral, stylish men and beautiful women.

And that, I realized this morning, is what makes this film. All this time, we've been laughing and cheering and wretching at Tarantino's presentation of gory violence as entertainment. We've been celebrating the glamorous murderers and lowlifes played by Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Harvey Keitel, Lucy Liu, comforting ourselves with the fact that it's okay to laugh because it's all fictitious anyway.

What's key is to view this film within the context of the director's broader work, with that same hip presentation of violence and amorality we've grown to love. The laughter all of a sudden becomes uncomfortable. We start to wonder about the difference between Christoph Waltz's Jew hunter and Samuel Jackson's hitman, both smooth-talking, bad ass motherfuckers who kill for profit and power.

And then to top it off, we witness a most meta of grand finales: Nazi brass view a film celebrating the impossible heroics of one sniper and the violent deaths of his enemies shortly before we, the film viewers, celebrate the impossible heroics of one Jewish girl and the violent deaths of her enemies.

Godwin's Law was never clearer.

Labels: film, review

I got a new watch this week. It's a big beautiful white analog watch with automatic gears, a technology that appears to go back as far as the 18th century. I wind it at night before I go to bed, but otherwise, the kinetic energy generated by my wrist keeps the gears turning for days at a time. I have three watches now--all of them analog. I have my Freelook white watch, a thin stainless steel watch with a red face from Guess, and a more formal black rectangular watch from Kenneth Cole. Each of their faces follow a basic circular format that goes back to at least the advent of the sundial.

I remember when digital watches were all the rage. The cool kids had fancy digital screens that counted the seconds and could serve as stopwatches and timers. Sometimes their watches would even beep on the hour, or when school ended. The nerdy kids had calculator watches, and some kids even had infrared watches that could send messages to each other. I even won a small design contest online when I was in my teens, and the main prize was a cute digital alarm clock/radio that my mother still keeps in her room. But that eventually faded, and next thing I know, even Target has more analog clocks than digital in their sales collection.

Of all the digital trends I read about and follow, the one I'm least enthusiastic about is the e-book. I certainly like the concept of the e-book. I like that a book could be interactive and that months' worth of reading could be kept in a small device that could easily fit in a purse or carry-on. I in fact read books on my iPhone and keep a few hours' worth of reading on me at all times. But I have a hard time believing that the e-book could ever replace the paper book.

A lot of my friends and colleagues have analog watches. Some are battery operated, some are wind-up. None of them could ever be as accurate as the clocks on their mobile phones, which are synced up with atomic clocks and automatically update as they traverse time zones. And it's that line of observation that helped me understand my reservations with e-books.



I have a feeling that e-books will be incredibly popular for a good many years. And this is a great thing. E-books will make books more accessible to more readers, especially as their production costs lower; they will offer innovative new ways to experience storytelling, with multimedia and hypertext possibilities only now being explored online; and they will offer new ways to share information, with social notes and other uses we can only begin to imagine.

But the really clever book publishers will understand what physical books offer that no e-book can: that the physical book is as much a design object as it is a tool for reading. The trailer above, from the New Zealand Book Council, offers a glimpse into the possibilities. As we anticipate Wednesday's arrival of the Apple tablet, the possibilities of which truly excite me, I try to remember that even the most beautifully-designed e-book, or tablet, or what-have-you could never replace a beautifully-designed book.

It's like this watch, I suppose, tick-ticking away with mechanical energy. My smartphone has a snazzy background and an accurate clock, but there's something about this watch that completes a look, that makes people notice, that is as much a design object as it is an indicator of time. The printed book, I suspect, will never go away.

Labels: 21st, design, fashionbeautystyle, technology

What's striking about the sight of two restaurant workers, tucked in the back of the space to sleep, is that it's such a striking sight. Outside of college campuses, subway stops and airports, it's rare to see people actually sleeping in public, especially if they're gainfully employed by that same establishment. The screen, which blocked them from almost everyone (except me and my dinner partner) seems to acknowledge this.

To what extent is the taboo against public sleep a cultural norm? Why is it more acceptable to spend $5-10 on a cup of coffee than 20-30 minutes on a nap? In my ideal world, we'd have better-defined public sleeping spaces, free from the cult of caffeination.

It's already done in some places: A place to rest one's head

Labels: citylife, culture, new york

Labels: rio grande valley, texas

One of the many water stations throughout the Valley. Got me thinking about water drinking practices--when we ordered agua, restaurants more often than not served agua de botella (bottled water), rather than tap. I didn't make the connection till I saw these stations throughout.

Got me thinking also about bottle sizes. In New York, SIGG water bottles are all the rage. Ain't nothin' that small in Texas.

See also: Drive thru culture

Labels: culture, environment, health, rio grande valley, texas

In McAllen Airport: a phone booth converted into a laptop station (notice the teeny tiny phone jack), now rendered totally obsolete by airport-wide free wifi.

Labels: rio grande valley, technology, texas

The other night, I watched Sin Nombre, directed by Cary Fukunaga. If you do watch it, watch it for the stunning visuals and what seems to be a well-researched depiction of life south of the border, on your way up north. I don't have much to add to this ITN review (above) and this Doha Tribeca Film Festival interview with the director.

Labels: film