Google Public Data

Type "unemployment rate" in a Google toolbar and get introduced to Google's latest cool tool. More...

Wage Deflation

Nomura says wages in the US are now deflating. More...

Odds of a Depression?

See them here. More...

Ladies and Gentlemen: The Swine Flu

I imagine this will seem silly and overblown in a few months, but we'll be glad for the dress rehearsal. More...

Online Ad Deflation

I worked at AOL Time Warner starting in 2001, shortly after AOL had bought Time Warner using a bunch of paper called AOL common stock. We know how that turned out.

AOL actually grew its subscription base until around 2003 and it was very hard for anyone there to understand that the forces that allowed it to dominate in narrowband internet access would not let it do the same in broadband.

Anyway, when it became clear that subscription revenues would go away, the feeling was that a smaller AOL would emerge as an online-only ad-supported business.

Now that's becoming tough too. More...

Nostalgia

This image was taken in the early 1970's at the Orient Heights subway station in East Boston, MA. The train shown went into service in 1924 and featured bare light bulbs and wooden slat seats. I remember them very well before they were replaced by new cars in 1979 that seemed so space-age and now seems so decrepit that they are themselves on the way out.

These trains are gone; the station is mostly replaced as is the bridge in the background. Still reminds me of home (this was my "home" subway station growing up). More...

Retail Deflation

So apparently you can buy almost anything for 70% off. More...

Grazing Manhattan

Sure, the pictures and descriptions of the 747 buzzing Lower Manhattan today were kinda scary, but this video really takes the cake. More...

Second Avenue Sagas

This is the "T" train, aka the Second Avenue Subway that New York City has been trying to build for 70+ years. Continually delayed, plagued by cost overuns, timed forever to start in earnest just as the City's finances collapse, I believe this subway will NEVER OPEN. More...

Delightful Strange

I really don't understand this More...

Balducci's End

So, Balducci's is closing. Yes it's not the original beloved Balducci's of Greenwich Village - that one closed in 2003 - it's the overwrought reincarnation that open in that bank/carpet store on 8th ave.

I never got the original even in its heyday since I found it too crowded and cluttered (Citarella, which has the space now, is far more to my liking).

But still, a sign of the times indeed. More...

Empire State Building April 22, 2009

Earth Day.

But for 60 seconds it looked like this because, er, lighting up skyscrapers is not very "Earth Day," really, as I guess someone pointed out or something. More...

Cool Tour of The Cryosphere

The cryosphere is the part of the earth that is frozen. There's more of it than you might think. More...

Solar Deflation

Evidence the Sun is cooling down. More...

Chart of the Day: NYT Online Revenue

So we all know the newspaper industry suffers from shrinking circulation and declining advertising, but surely online ads were a bright spot?

No. They aren't. Not at the New York Times, anyway, More...

Jesus and all that

Today's New York Times contrasts the fortunes of Flint, MI, where the auto industry is evaporating, with those of West Point, GA, where a new auto plant owned by South Korea's KIA is about to open.

The sign pictured is from West Point. You see, it was Jesus that brought KIA to West Point and, by extension, Jesus who screwed Flint. That's how Jesus works, you see. More...

depression?

HBS's Niall Ferguson claims we're in a depression. Not a Great Depression, but a Slight Depression.

Oh. More...

Bokete

For some reason my dogs keep appearing on a Japanese website. The caption to this one translates as "Today you are leaving wrapped in gauze!" Supposedly. More...

747 Deflation

This was the first commercially-flown 747.

It is now a rusty restaurant in South Korea. More...

Technology Deflation

Smart technology can be embedded in just about anything but that doesn't mean the World always wins. Networked refrigerators are a perennial example of attempts to implement an idea that just might possibly have some use someday with the right implementation, but I'm not sure the World will ever find use for a smart water faucet (with face recognition!) More...

My Commute

I often think I live in NYC's most convenient neighborhood, and this nifty application, which shows how long it takes to get from one address to any other in the city, kinda bolsters my assertion. More...

Spanish Deflation

Prices are dropping in Spain. More...

Empire State Building April 19, 2009

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Civil War Deflation

Sure, we all know some southerners twist themselves into knots about The War Between the States and how it was about more than slavery etc. And at this point in history it's pretty well-known that a lot of the union troops weren't exactly Politically Correct when it came to racial issues, but this nonsense that the Civil War wasn't primarily about the question of slavery is idiotic. More...

Deflation Deflation (i.e. Inflation)

Here we go. More...

Obscurity Inflation

By now you've seen the spectacular performance of Susan Boyle on "Britain's Got Talent," the British "American Idol."

See how she's exploded online. More...

Empire State Building April 16, 2009

Opening night, new Yankee Stadium

More...

And Magazines?

The industry just had perhaps its worst quarter ever, and it may get worse. More...

Google Deflation

We knew this day would come, but apparently the collapse advertising has hit even Google. More...

My Most Interesting Shots (Today) #5

Every day Flickr ranks my most "interesting" photographs. Here are the current top 30.

4 Empire State shots, same as last week.

The same 6 pics of my dogs are still here too.

4 are new this week (3 of which are new pictures).

Earlier sets can be found here. More...

Social Security Deflation

Here's news that Social Security is projected to move back into deficit far sooner than predicted.

Uh oh. More...

Cluelessly Corrupt Financiers

Just when you think the situation at AIG couldn't possibly get more rancid, here's news that AIG boss Ed Liddy owns $3.2MM in Goldman Sachs stock even while he brags about taking only a $1/year salary from AIG. Goldman is AIG's biggest counterparty, so Liddy basically has a far greater incentive to help Goldman than to help AIG.

Nice. More...

NYC Time Bomb

New York City is facing a dire emergency in terms of the benefits it has promised to city workers in the future. The city currently pays more for benefits than for salaries but run the numbers and the costs become astronomical in a few years. It's been easier for decades for city leaders to make concessions to unions that come out of future budgets than to pay more today.

Well, the future has arrived. More...

St. Paul's Chapel

St. Paul's chapel in New York has a remarkable history. It was more or less the only public building in NYC that survived the Revolution intact. George Washington worshipped there. It survived the 9/11 attacks almost unscathed even though the towers collapsed almost right across the street and a lot of the church's trees and gravestones were destroyed. For months after the disaster the church was a staging area for ground zero workers.

One thing that was damaged, though, was the church's organ.

Well, now it has been restored. More...

Socialism Deflation

I don't think most wingnuts who hysterically cry "socialism!" know what the term means. It's basically become a vague term that encompasses whatever secret evil agenda you imagine your lefty opponents are pursuing.

"Secret" is key. Rep. Spencer Bachus says there are 17 "secretly socialist" members of Congress. More...

Empire State Building April 9, 2009

Holy Thursday More...

1930's Redux

Or, Socialism Hysteria Deflation More...

Finally, a Decent Placenta Pasta Recipe

While I could have guessed human placenta is packed with essential amino acids and nutrients (and low fat to boot), who knew it made such a delicious pasta dish?

Here's the recipe, courtesy of MomLogic. More...

Gay Marriage: Waiting for the Old People to Die

Mapscroll has a model predicting when marriage equality might come state-by-state. More...

Steampunk Deflation

Steampunk fetus.

I'm not sure steampunk and biology mix well. More...

Associated Press Deflation

The AP has noticed that many people re-use their stories on the internet without paying. They would like to be paid and are considering, I think, filing lawsuits against pretty much everyone. This sounds a lot like the music industry circa 1995. More...

Empire State Building April 4, 2009

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My Most Interesting Shots (Today) #4

Every day the photo-sharing site Flickr rates my photographs and displays the top 30. Here are today's top 30.

Over time the mix changes, but these have changed a lot since I last posted on the subject on April 2nd.

4 Empire State Building shots down from 5. 6 pics of my dogs down from 5. 5 are brand new.

Earlier collections here, here and here. More...

Mumia Deflation

The Supreme Court has declined the latest appeal from Mumia Abu-Jamal. Abu-Jamal was sentenced to death for the murder of a police officer, Daniel Faulkner, during a routine traffic stop in Philadelphia in 1981. A unanimous jury convicted him and many appeals have been rebuffed by unanimous courts.

Abu-Jamal maintains his innocence and it turns out the processes used to convict him were imperfect, so he has become a cause-celebre among death-penalty opponents worlwide. I don't have a specific opinion about Abu-Jamal but have met many people over the years with the barest understanding of the case who nonetheless will argue that he should be freed, which kinda scares me. More...

Facebook Deflation

I think Facebook in its current incarnation is a fad. By this I mean that the numbers of users and the intensity of their use is not sustainable because much of what makes Facebook compelling is its ability to renew links among long-lost acquaintances and to indulge in nostalgia. Facebook has never been as much about hooking up as MySpace or sites explicitly devoted to sex, and some of its killer apps (like updates) are already being coopted by competitors like Twitter.

That said, social networking as a tool is certainly here to stay, even if Facebook, perhaps, is over. More...

Metlife Mirror

For at least the next few weeks the new condo at One Madison Park, which is covered in glass, will reflect the light from the old Metlife Tower as it does here. Once One Madison Park is occupied, these windows will no longer be dark at night. More...

Activist GOP Judges

The problem with trying to appoint judges who are strict constructionists and not "activists" is that judicial activism is in the eye of the beholder.

Many of the judges who have been instrumental in the various pro-gay marriage decisions have been Republicans. More...

YouTube Deflation

One of the primary drivers of the collapse of media business models has been the availability of funding to startups who give away stuff for free in the hope that they will make it up in volume at some point. Youtube has tons of traffic, which brings tons of cost with it. As a startup it was funded by venture capital. Since Google bought it, it is funded by Google - which is a good thing because it is currently losing $500MM a year! More...

Boston Deflation

So the New York Times Company is threatening to shut down the Boston Globe (which it owns). The Taylors More...

Villagers and Pitchforks

There's a tempest-in-a-teapot in Britain at the moment about Google Street views. Google has cars driving around the country taking pictures along roads which you can see if you use Google maps. In recent weeks these pictures have caught people doing some embarrassing things.

So people are angry. Yesterday the good people of Broughton surrounded and harrassed a Google vehicle.

But here's the rub: Britain has live cameras on every street corner in the country feeding live video 24/7 to the local police. There's basically nothing you can do in public in Britain that's private. More...

Woolworth

This morning, my favorite real estate blog picked up a picture I took a few years ago on a tour of 7 World Trade Center.

Update: As of 3:45pm, the photo has been viewed 400 times. Best ever. More...

Marriage Equality in Iowa

In a unanimous decision, the Iowa Supreme Court struck down a 1998 law barring gay couples from marriage. More...

Empire State Building April 2, 2009

The ESB is supposed to be all white tonight. My call to them confirmed that something is up, but they don't know what.

More...

Alex McCord deflation

Alex McCord is the odd-man-out "Real Housewife of NYC." She and her she-man husband, Simon, are on the one had completely refreshingly honest about their desire to social climb by any means necessary (e.g., posing nude for anyone with a camera as at left) into any niche available.

They are completely transparent about their desire to appear wealthy in public yet they are also oddly unflinching about having people over to their rotting hovel in Brooklyn with its asphalt glass-strewn backyard ("Paradise" when they lie there in their inflatable pool) where they do their best to ignore their filthy screaming young children whom they force to speak French. Their fellow cast members are studies in debilitating insecurity bursting through barely papered together facades, yet Simon and Alex simply don't care about anything except becoming well-known.

Well, now poor Alex has been laid off. It will surprise most viewers to discover she worked. More...

Woeful WSJ

This graph was published yesterday in the Wall Street Journal's Op-Ed page.

What it says is that the Democrats have a 70 year plan to destroy America while the GOP will preserve all we have, control spending, and lower taxes if only we'd let them.

Forget, for a moment, that it's being used to support the silly piece of claptrap that is the GOP's so-called "alternative budget" and just focus on some basics about displaying visual information.

Like, uh, the graph shows projections FOR THE NEXT 70 YEARS! No one can even predict what GDP will be in 5 years never mind 70.

I'm still hoping this is an April Fool's joke. More...

My Most Interesting Shots (Today) #3

Every day Flickr ranks my photos from best to worst in terms of "interestingness," which is a combination of factors like how often people look at them, comment about them, or "favorite" them.

There's been a lot of shifting. Only 5 Empire State shots (down from 9). My dogs are still popular with 8 (the one sprawled on the chair in new). 8 from Fire Island.

Earlier versions here and here.

This is the link. More...

Twitter Deflation

Is Twitter becoming MySpace? I have to admit, the snob in me thinks it's democritizing a little too quickly. More...

Real Housewives Recap

Another Wednesday, another deliciously evil magical realist processing of RHoNYC by Richard of Gawker.

The highlight for me was watching Kelly (left) seethe to the point of combustion when Betheny sniped "you thinks you're Madonna or something" after Kelly was 45 minutes late for a meeting to organize a fundraiser and then apologized by declaring her name could not be used to promote said event.

Still livid a week later, Kelly demanded a meeting with Betheny. Arriving only 30 minutes late this time, Kelly cannot believe Betheny is irked and boils over in response. Betheny's problem is that she is not Kelly's friend, Kelly declares, because she acts like a child and kelly is sick of trying to parent her. GOOD DAY, Madam! More...