Sure, the sound is distorted and I’m about a mile away, but for a second it almost feels like you’re there. iMovie wasn’t cooperating, so no editing here, just two raw minutes of Animal Collective live:
Panda was on fire. Actually, they all were. They play with such tension and incredible intensity. I’m still exhausted from it. Easily one of the best shows I have seen as of late, but then again I haven’t seen a dull one in quite some time…
The light show was outstanding, a totally unexpected treat. See more of that and more of them in my pics from the show.
And it was absolutely amazing. Watch for video in the morning, until then here’s the pics:
UPDATE: Finally uploaded two videos.
Let’s see. There’s the iPhone. Granted, that’s almost entirely Apple, but they did need a carrier for the first version, and Ma Bell stepped up. Then there’s AT&T Park, one of the most picturesque ballparks in America, in spite of being home of the woeful San Francisco Giants. And now there’s a fresh batch of Wes Anderson directed commercials, thanks to goldenfiddle from kottke for the tip.
I heard one of them in the background yesterday, but didn’t catch the video, only the story-line and absurd amalgamation of cities and places at the end. All in all, very clever, but nothing without the trademark Wes Anderson seamless movement from scene to scene to pull it all together. Roll the tape:
Typical Wes Anderson brilliance.
As for the dark side of AT&T, see the inimitable emptywheel Marcy Wheeler, at The Next Hurrah for a quick rundown:
Back in June, the Bush Administration invited one of AT&T’s key lobbyists, Ed Gillespie, to serve as White House counselor. A few weeks after that, BushCo expanded AT&T’s resident lobbyist’s role to include most of Karl Rove’s portfolio. Just days after Gillespie took over that role, the DOJ made an unusual intervention into the FCC’s request for comments on Net Neutrality, weighing against Net Neutrality.
Well today, one of AT&T’s former key attorneys, Peter Keisler, just took over the Department of Justice.
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Basically, Bush just gave AT&T the ability to have its long-time lawyer give it legal authority to collaborate with the government to spy on citizens.
And in case you’re worried that AT&T is stuck with no good legal representation, having lost Keisler, rest assured. You see, former Associate White House Counsel Brad Berenson (who also happens to be Kyle Sampson and Susan Ralston’s lawyer) has taken over for Keisler and is working on the AT&T case, among other things.
Reaching back a week for this gem, on the matter of our esteemed former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and his desperate attempts to bury the warrantless domestic spying fiasco:
And finally, it adds another reason why telecom companies are anxious to get immunity for their work on the Administration’s warrantless wiretap program. That’s because some of that wiretapping was based on analysis the telecom companies are already doing on us.
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You see, when these lawsuits go forward, we’ll have a sense not just of how the telecom companies are complicit in the government’s spying on us—but how much they’re already spying on us, anyway.
Luckily, all of AT&T’s and the Bush administration’s “alleged” efforts to spy on their customers and citizens takes place just right outside my front door at 611 Folsom Street. Thanks, fellas. I feel much safer already.
The day was winding down and the fog was rolling in, but there was still plenty to see on our flight back to San Francisco. Here are just a few of the best pictures taken from the window of the airplane…
High above Mt. Tam, nearing the Pacific Ocean. San Francisco, as usual, is covered in fog. Everything else is untouched.
The Golden Gate Bridge takes my breath away every time I see it, no matter the angle.
The entrance to San Francisco Bay at the Golden Gate is a magnet for fog.
Truly iconic. An amazing feat of creativity and engineering.
That’s our neighborhood, SOMA, seldom covered in fog, and often the warmest part of town. And how cool is the curvature on the shadow of the Bay Bridge?!!
There’s 23 more pictures on flickr, including Lake Tahoe, Napa, Oakland, and San Francisco. I had so much fun on the last part of this flight, it was almost enough to wipe away the memory of a six hour delay at O’Hare and the realization that our two week vacation had finally come to an end…
More soon.
My neighborhood in San Francisco, known as SOMA (South of Market Street) or South Beach (even though there is no beach) or Rincon Hill, is in transition in nearly every possible way. What was once an area full of relatively low-slung and often derelict tenements and warehouses stretching down to the wharfs that once lined the bay, SOMA is not only gentrifying but rapidly going massively vertical.
I do not pretend to understand the myriad reasons why it is so difficult to build in San Francisco. Suffice to say it involves a fair amount of the classic NIMBY syndrome cleverly disguised as high-minded civic activism. By intention or pure accident, it creates the impression that “no one” wants San Francisco to change so that in the end very little can, and what does get built is often watered-down in the process.
SOMA, on the other hand, is very much a blank slate. Soon there will be thousands of new residents, but since there is no incumbent community upon which to intrude today, there is no one to advocate for it when it matters most (Jamie’s voice is one very strong exception). Thus, the SOMA of tomorrow is being shaped almost exclusively by the developers building luxury high-rise towers for their ultra-rich clientele…
Please know I have no qualms with the height of these new buildings, no issue with the added density in the neighborhood, and no care or concern with respect to their inhabitant’s wealth. I simply disagree with the way it’s being done, specifically the over-reliance on pairs of isolated towers set on opposite corners of an entire city block, with its perimeter ringed by townhomes.
There is no excitement in this approach, no variety in its rhythm, and absolutely no visual interest at the ground level. Even more to the point, there is no community space, no common oasis, no shared experience for all San Franciscans — all of the “public spaces” in these new buildings are in fact private by virtue of being placed above the townhouses, often five or six floors above street level. These new developments are fortresses, nothing more and nothing less. The entire design scheme exists to preserve the space around (and the admittedly great views from) the towers.
I am in New York City this week, and have been writing this brief manifesto while sitting in beautiful Bryant Park, at the very center of midtown Manhattan. You would never know it from sitting here, but I am just a five minute walk from Times Square, six blocks from the Empire State Building, and a hop away from the busy 5th Avenue thoroughfare. Sure, it’s loud as traffic whizzes by on three sides while sirens wail in the background, but it is truly an oasis. All day long, people wander in and out. Some stop for a brief minute to enjoy lunch, some linger for an hour with a book, and some like me stay all day for the free wifi. Interactions are incidental and ephemeral, but there is a feeling of being connected to something much greater than my own existence…
To be fair, it’s somewhat absurd to compare New York to San Francisco. New York’s fate was sealed many, many years ago with the street grid and the unique constraints it imposed on the city. But, with some notable exceptions, very few blocks are filled with a single monolithic development, most in fact are quite varied with new and old, small and tall, squat and sharp buildings all condensed together. The result is a richly-textured urban fabric.
There are obviously other differences in the two cities, not the least of which is the fact that most people in New York do not own automobiles and therefore rely on walking and/or public transportation. In this regard, the sidewalk is the city’s great unifier: age, gender, race, and wealth are all wiped away by the shared experience. Bryant Park feels much the same way. No, it’s not perfect, but it feels so much more real here than anything back home in San Francisco, and it is precisely the kind of public space that we desperately need in SOMA.
As an architecture and urban planning buff, I was very excited to see the new design proposals for the Transbay Transit Center in San Francisco, and I was instantly drawn to the Pelli Clark proposal for the elegant tower and the lush-green carpet of its rooftop garden (shown below). Then it hit me: all of the health and vitality of the street is once again removed and placed in the sky. Sure, it’s public, unlike the other developments being built, but it’s completely divorced from the city itself…
San Francisco, SOMA in particular, has its problems, not the least of which is the incredible number of homeless men and women living on the street. It seems we have decided that it’s more expedient to pretend this issue doesn’t exist, and to retreat within these fortress developments for comfort and protection. I submit to you that this is a strategic error with huge implications. We are quickly creating a community in SOMA that has no connection to the city in which it resides, one which is increasingly off-limits to the vast majority of its residents.
I strongly believe that inclusion is the way to solve these kinds of problems and create a deeper understanding for all involved. Our culture’s tendency to segment and segregate entire populations is archaic and entirely unacceptable in this day and age. We know better, now we must do better. It’s time that we take a hard look at the world we are creating, even if we have no power to change it today, we can at least begin to recognize our future opportunities and position ourselves to demand better results.
In the end, our built environment has a tremendous effect on our collective psyche. We owe it to ourselves today, and future generations tomorrow, to create a world in which everyone has a right to participate, and everyone has a chance to belong.