lia: “A computer expert who killed his 76-year-old mother on 5 February appears to have skinned her before taking to the street in the dead of night wearing her bloodied flesh, it was reported on Friday.”
lia: !!!
andrew: wow
andrew: everyone knows you don’t wear white people after labor day

Siemens recently announced the digital graffiti service they’ve been working on for a while:

Post-its are exceedingly practical. They’re a handy way of letting people know if you’ve gone out quickly to shop or to lunch, or for reminding you to do things. However, you can’t stick these yellow memos in mid-air – at least not yet. But that will be possible in future with the virtual post-its from Siemens Corporate Technology’s research laboratory in Munich. Dieter Kolb’s team of specialists have developed computer programs that assign cell phone messages to specific locations. The user can leave a message, known as a digital graffito, at any geographical point. This is a kind of SMS attached to one spot. When the recipient reaches the defined point, the message appears on his or her display. Unlike the classic SMS, the message is not sent to the addressee as such, but is only activated when the addressee comes within a defined radius of the location specified for the graffito. Another difference is that, if required, the message can be read not only by one person but also by a number of cell phone users – like a real graffito plastered on a building wall. This allows a whole range of new applications, for example for special offers and advertising messages aimed at a large readership, or for making arrangements with friends.

As Warren Ellis says, this “obviously has just hideous possibilities for advertising. But the potential for art is also pretty impressive.” I agree with him and am trying to be optimistic but as the amount of spam I get in my email and on my blogs keeps on increasing I’m beginning to wonder if, you know, no one can have nice things for very long anymore.
Related (cellphone-based and to do with physical location) projects from my fellow ITP kids, off the top of my head: John Geraci’s Grafedia, Ian Curry’s Bluefish, Dennis Crowley & Co’s Conqwest, Elliott Malkin’s proposal for eRuv.
Also one of my ideas for a future iteration of 24in48 was that when people’s cellphones can send location metadata along with the MMS, it would be neat to have one of the viewing interfaces be a map of the city, updating live with the location of the photos as they arrive. Clay Shirky‘s suggestion was to see if I could tie into the Dodgeball database somehow since it stores lat/long coordinates, but that would require people logging into Dodgeball every time they move somewhere different—and there are already too many keypresses involved in moblogging for the average person. Hardware manufacturers need to get it down to just two clicks: the first to take the photo and the second to send it to a preferred email address.
(With a third to send it to any other address from your address book, of course. An informal survey of my friends who moblog suggests that long tail is at work; many of us have Flickr saved as “* Flickr” in our address books, since it’s what we send our cameraphone photos to 99% of the time and having the asterisk puts it at the top of the list and saves us the time and energy of scrolling down to find it each time. Kathryn and Matt‘s s700i phones are halfway there: they pop up a list of the last five addresses you’ve sent photos to. Which is good but not quite good enough!)

I really do feel that one of the best things Flickr has going for it is that the very talented and hard-working people who build it have great senses of humor. I mean, how many companies do you know that would change the logo that appears on their pages to something like this in the face of rumored acquisition?

Anyway, here’s Señorita Caterina on the rumors:

We talked to a guy at Business 2.0 back in November or December—that was the start of all these rumors—and we got the sense he was fishing for a story that wasn’t there.

Of course this doesn’t surprise me anymore. Reporters have quoted Stewart as saying something I said, quoted me as saying the opposite of what I said, omitted the material part of what I said and published just the subordinate clauses….

But it’s still kind of fun having all these people talking about us. Makes us feel like the popular kids at high school. Who’s dating who!!!!

A friend is someone who thinks of you when they receive a homebrow David Hasselhoff calendar in .doc format, and can’t wait to file transfer it to you over IM. Andrew is that friend for me and if you don’t have that friend, well, I’m stepping up to the plate and putting it up here for your downloading and printing pleasure: thehoffcalendar05.doc.
(Visitors to my apartment will perhaps recognize September’s pinup as being from the same photo shoot as the 8.5 glossy that graces my living room, bringing cheer to everyone who drops by.)

Players of the MMORPG Second Life have their own version of Christo & Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates! You can see more screenshots here.
[ thanks, Ranjit! ]

Amy of Amy’s Robot pointed out this afternoon, quite correctly, that “every single blessed one of the NYC-oriented blogs will feature wads of nearly identical photos of the Christo and Jeanne-Claude The Gates Central Park project starting this weekend.”
Screw ’em all! Not only did I walk to the park this afternoon, but I doubt any other damn NYC blogger is going to have a photo of their companion doing this:

Kidding aside, the fabric hasn’t even been unfurled from the gates yet and I already think The Gates is a magnificent project. I’ve never really gotten the appeal of Christo & Jeanne-Claude’s wrapping projects before, but I found my walk through the park today, under the gates and on paths I know well, very moving.
The Gates are huge, much taller than I expected them to be. But they’re just the perfect size—any smaller and they would be overwhelmed by the park, any bigger and they would be far too imposing. I was surprised by how organic they felt to me, not alien at all. Perhaps that comes from Central Park itself being a planned environment, even if it doesn’t seem that way to most people.
I liked this bit from The Gates Official FAQ (and how much do you love that it actually has one?):

The artwork is not the process of unfolding the fabric, but rather the sum total one experiences by exploring Central Park once The Gates are unfurled. Every person’s exploration will be different. That is why the artists say whatever part of the park you are in is the best part of The Gates.

Hopefully I’ll get to experience The Gates a few times in the coming days, on paths familiar and unfamiliar to me. Drop me a line if you’d like to come along!
Here’s another of my photos of The Gates, pre-unfurling:

You can see my photo set from this afternoon on Flickr; also check out photos tagged thegates, posted by myself and others.
More about Christo & Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates: page on the official Christo & Jeanne-Claude site, the comprehensive nyc.gov site. I’ve leafed through these three lovely books on The Gates: Christo & Jeanne-Claude: The Gates: Central Park, NYC, 1979-2005 (a program of sorts), Christo and Jeanne-Claude: On the Way to The Gates, Central Park, New York City (published last year, about what the artists had to do to get the project running, features sketches and interviews), and Christo: The Gates Portfolio.
More about Central Park: Wikipedia entry, Central Park Conservancy (the official site), centralpark.org (fan site).

Let me assure you that the only thing better than this photo is an infinity of it—prepare yourself to behold the true apex of animated gifs, The Hasselhoffian Recursion.
[ thanks, Alaina! ]

Many happy returns of the day to Alaina, for whom making 30 look good is the least of her gifts—she’s a delight to know and be around, and makes everything better just by being herself, even cross-continent. New York doesn’t miss you as much as I do!
Here is a photo of us from last year outside the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory, only one of countless tasty places I’ve come to love that she’s introduced me to:

Kindly ignore the strange white man in the background, and thanks to David for taking the photo!

I noticed Tokyo Craigslist launch a few weeks ago and wondered how it would do, considering that the site is completely in english—is it really going to be used by the japanese, or is it going to be used mainly by resident foreigners? Poking through the site now neither one is the case, most of the posts I’m seeing are from posters in the US. I went through all of the major categories, of course, but since as we all know the most interesting ones are the personals, let’s talk about those.
Men Seeking Women, the most heavily-trafficked so far (where by heavy I mean five or six posts a day) brings us such gems as I AM 23 MALE US CITIZEN, U R ????, IN NEED OF CITEZENSHIP? – 23 (CALIFORNIA), Tom Cruise lookalike in NYC seeks Japanese girlfriend – 37, GREAT OPPORTUNITY FOR JAPANESE WOMAN TO LIVE AND WORK IN AMERICA ! – 39 (San Francisco), NYC Musician seeks his Yoko!!, and I would like to find a japanese wife younger,sweet & well off to marry – 50 (California/Hawwaii). So yeah, mostly white guys with japanese fetishes.
Women Seeking Men has less than half the posts of M4W. The posters here are pretty varied: japanese women in Japan, some looking specifically for american men (either in Japan or in the US, race not specified); japanese women or women of japanese descent in the US, some looking specifically for japanese men; and korean women looking for japanese men.
Men Seeking Men has only five posts total right now, which I’m sure anyone who’s ever looked at M4M at any CL incarnation in North America will find shocking. Two of the five are americans visiting Tokyo looking to hook up, another is a curious 29-year-old who writes, “I have recently heard about bukkake and wanted to know if any of you have some stories or advice to give me about it. I would like to get someone to invite to bukkake in California.”
Women Seeking Women is even more pathetic than I expected it to be, only one post! She says, “Ok girlz, I need some help here… if you look like “M” or “Claire” from Sexysappho (dot com) PLEASE contact me ;)” Only one of the SexySappho models (NSFW) is Japanese and she’s not M or Claire, so I’m guessing this post was spammed to various CLs.
Many posts on Casual Encounters are from american men visiting Tokyo looking to hook up with japanese women, or american men (usually New Yorkers, but Los Angeles and San Francisco represent too!) looking to hook up with japanese women in their own cities, which is what I expected, but I did find one post from swingers: bi white couple wants asain couple – mw4mw – 49 (oregon) pic. Too bad they’re a continent away and can’t spell, or they might be getting some hot race-mixing swinger action RIGHT NOW.
Finally, everyone’s favorite category: Rant & Raves! Tokyo RNR gets a few posts every once in a while, some pissed off with how Tokyo Craigslist doesn’t serve the community: The problem with CL Tokyo is… (TOKYO) (“First and foremost, what in the fuck is it that you people don’t get…? It’s craigslist *TOKYO*. Would you stupid mother fuckers stop posting such ridiculous shit like your shitty assed two bedroom apt in buttfuck Kansas?!@”), Assholes, be quiet (Asakusa) (“If you want Japan youhave to come here, otherwise, keep your fantasies to your local R&R board. Please. …If I see you on the train platform I am going to push your ass in front of the shinkansen and you will end up being shitkansen.”). The most well thought out post is this heartfelt plea to Craig himself, Re: Is this CL TOkyo, doesn’t feel like it! (boston):

well other cities have got spsms, too. but just becuase the overall potings are so few in the tokyo site, it looks like a spam bulletin board. as you said, almost all of the tokyo postings are from japan-geeks in the states or spammers.

basically the japanese people’s english skill is limited, and they are not interested in posting ads in english, which, to them, means taking a risk of making grammartical mistakes. (which i don’t care about at all as you can tell) don’t think this country is same as other non-english speaking countries. japan is definitely one of the few countries where people strongly (very strongly) feel englishly-challenged.

craig, you’ve got take some actions to prevent spams and/or attract more japanese readers/posters. otherwise this site is going to die sooner or later. craig, you can’t just rely on month-to-mouth to promote this site in tokyo. a majority of english-speaking people in tokyo are japan-otaku whose japanese friends (mostly girlfriends) are not capable of reading/writing in english. but there are many other potential japanese CL users out there, and they probably don’t have any connections with CL users, or english speakers in general.

craig, you’ve got to reach out directly to real “japanese people” to spread this site in japan. please try to reach the japanese media and tell them this is a great site for those who want to “actually use/practice enligh”—reading and writing. learning english is always a hot issue there. always a lot of top-selling books in japan are related to how to communicate in english. craig, i’m sure, as a japanese, that is the only way to keep this tokyo site alive. i don’t want japan-otaku perverts take it over. i want this site to be a place where japanese people, for the first time, really overcome their negative obsessions about their english skill and fear of communicating in a foreign language… and eventually a place where many english learners enjoy english communication and feel confident in their language skill.

It’ll be very interesting to come back to this post in a few months, and then a year, to see how Tokyo Craigslist has evolved and what steps (if any) the usually hands off CL team has taken to change things.
Also I’d like to point out that I typed in manila.craigslist.org and for the first time there’s actually something there! I don’t know when they’re going to officially launch Manila Craigslist, but it’s up and running, so pass the word. I’ve long been wanting CL to come to Manila, Filipinos are incredibly social and increasingly netsavvy and it will be fascinating to see how quickly it picks up. How will the CL staff be able to deal with users who effortlessly, naturally codeswitch between English, Tagalog, swardspeak and street slang? How long till office IT departments start blocking CL at work, the way many of them block all IM clients and Friendster?

The update: I’m done with school but not done with school. My thesis essay is three weeks late and I’ve not made much progress since the deadline passed; I had just about half the page count done then, in highly unsatisfactory chunks, I don’t have much more than that now.
Most every day for the past two months or so I’ve spent a few hours sitting in front of my Powerbook, watching the cursor blink in and out, in and out, in and out. I can write short emails about my thesis, regurgitating the elevator spiel that I crafted all semester and perfected during the Winter Show, and discuss it with people in depth, even explaining most everything that I should be talking about in my paper, but I can’t seem to write it out. And it’s really fucking killing me—I have to get my resume and portfolio together (both of which have I haven’t touched in three years) find a job, clean my apartment and find a roommate, and I can’t do any of these things yet because I have this huge thing hanging over my head.
The experiment: I haven’t been writing here (or anywhere else; I can barely get myself to reply to emails these past few weeks) because I’ve been trying to write the paper. Since that clearly hasn’t been successful in the least, perhaps starting to post here again and all that entails will get my juices flowing again?
Here’s Tom Coates from earlier today, nailing how I’ve been feeling, “On forcing oneself to do stuff”:

So why does it sometimes seem such a bloody enormous battle to convince oneself to even start doing a piece of work? What kind of stupid fucking evolutionary process ends up with procrastination, paralysis and apparent indolence? I mean, what kind of creature does well in the world by sitting at home in front of a computer for three hours in the early evening trying to motivate itself to write something about set-top boxes?! Where’s the reproductive advantage there?!

Stupid bloody world that should make me be this way and then make me neurotic about it.

He got his trio of set-top box posts done within the day so hopefully I’ll bang my essay out within the week. Wish me luck?