The Brian's Den

Wasatch Mountains in Deer Valley #mountains #snow #ski #featured...

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:38:46 -0500

Wasatch Mountains in Deer Valley #mountains #snow #ski #featured #utah (Taken with Instagram at Stein’s Way)

Deer Valley #utah # mountain #nature #winter #ski #featured...

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:14:10 -0500

Deer Valley #utah # mountain #nature #winter #ski #featured (Taken with Instagram at Stein’s Way)

The Sounds of Chinatown at NYC’s Columbus Park

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 15:03:00 -0500

The Sounds of Chinatown at NYC’s Columbus Park

The bush and a clearing at Harriman State Park — an hour...

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 07:09:00 -0500

The bush and a clearing at Harriman State Park — an hour out of NYC.

Tranquil Central Park Reservoir Reflecting the Skyline (Taken...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 17:05:00 -0500

Tranquil Central Park Reservoir Reflecting the Skyline (Taken with Instagram at Central Park Resevior)

Icy Pond in Harriman State Park (Taken with Instagram at...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:04:00 -0500

Icy Pond in Harriman State Park (Taken with Instagram at Harriman State Park)

Ducks in the Central Park Reservoir #nyc #centralpark...

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:00:00 -0500

Ducks in the Central Park Reservoir #nyc #centralpark #reflection #skyline #water (Taken with Instagram at The Central Park Reservoir)

Mayor Bloomberg at @tumblr HQ announcing new @nycgov social...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 12:29:52 -0500

Mayor Bloomberg at @tumblr HQ announcing new @nycgov social media channels (Taken with Instagram at Tumblr)

All day, Land Rover has had a banner ad for its new Range Rover...

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 23:01:00 -0500

All day, Land Rover has had a banner ad for its new Range Rover Evoque on the homepage of nytimes.com. The ad seeks to convey the car’s popularity by displaying, in real-time, the number of tweets about the car. Viewers can then tweet about the car right from the advertisement, effectively giving Land Rover free advertising for the car. It is interesting to note that there have only been 19 tweets using the hashtag #RangeRoverEvoque (which automatically pre-populates into tweets sent from the ad) today, nearly all of which are from the “Range Rover Evoque Owners Club.”

I wonder, however, if this type of advertisement will become more prevalent going forward and whether people will be inclined to tweet from ads.

Simplest explanation of social media sites I’ve ever...

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 08:56:52 -0500

Simplest explanation of social media sites I’ve ever seen.

Photo by douglaswray on Instagram.

View of the #NYC Skyline from the Brooklyn Bridge (Taken with...

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 09:29:46 -0500

View of the #NYC Skyline from the Brooklyn Bridge (Taken with Instagram at Brooklyn Bridge)

"“State of” syndrome has assuredly spread. It is flourishing in New York, now more than ever. A few..."

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 23:50:32 -0500

“

“State of” syndrome has assuredly spread. It is flourishing in New York, now more than ever.

A few days into 2012, the governor gave his State of the State talk. The mayor followed with his State of the City speech.

Because New York is graced with five borough presidents, each of whom insists on being heard, we have been subjected to a series of State of the Borough spiels. The leaders of Queens and Staten Island spoke last week. Wednesday night was Brooklyn’s turn, and Thursday will be Manhattan’s. The Bronx will speak up later in February.

But wait, as they say on late-night television, there’s more. The City Council speaker will deliver her take on the State of the City next week. A week later, the city comptroller plans for the first time to give a speech of his own.

Nor are city agencies immune to “State of” fever. In the not-distant past, a parks commissioner insisted on delivering a State of the Parks address, though the man now in that job speaks to his troops without making it a public spectacle.

”

- Clyde Haberman, “My Dear Americans, New Yorkers, Brooklynites, Park Bench Users”

I’m sure painters will now be clamoring to paint the walls of startups for stock. It’s a...

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:40:00 -0500

I’m sure painters will now be clamoring to paint the walls of startups for stock. It’s a pretty good proposition, considering that the worst case scenario is losing out on a few thousand dollars that would have been paid in cash and the upside is hundreds of millions of dollars…

The graffiti artist who took Facebook stock instead of cash for painting the walls of the social network’s first headquarters made a smart bet. The shares owned by the artist, David Choe, are expected to be worth upward of $200 million when Facebook stock trades publicly later this year.

"But many close to the company say that Facebook is aiming for a far greater offering that would..."

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:24:10 -0500

“But many close to the company say that Facebook is aiming for a far greater offering that would value it near $100 billion. At that lofty valuation, Facebook would be much bigger than many longer-established American companies, including Abbott Labs, Caterpillar, Kraft Foods, Goldman Sachs and Ford Motor.”

- Evelyn M. Rusli, “Facebook Files for an I.P.O.

"The truth is, the Republican Establishment all but ceded control of the party, or at least the..."

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 23:55:00 -0500

“The truth is, the Republican Establishment all but ceded control of the party, or at least the public face of the party, to Fox News (and Rush Limbaugh) in January, 2009. Party leaders, demoralized by John McCain’s electoral landslide defeat, faded into the background and obediently followed Fox News’ often-hysterical lead as Rupert Murdoch’s cable channel unveiled an unprecedented effort to demonize and delegitimize the newly elected president. (In the Fox-led world, it’s conventional wisdom that Obama’s a foreign, race-baiting Marxist who undermines Israel and is determined to destroy the American way of life.)”

- Eric Boehlert, “How Fox News Is Destroying The Republican Party”

"Even though the data around productivity has proved pretty remorseless, humans have found the..."

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 14:56:32 -0500

“Even though the data around productivity has proved pretty remorseless, humans have found the message hard to accept. It seems so logical that two units of work will produce twice the output. Logical but wrong. The critical measure of work isn’t and never should be input but output. What matters isn’t how many hours your team puts in, but the quality and quantity of work they produce.”

- The Truth About Sleep & Productivity | Inc.com (via infoneer-pulse)

Elevator (Taken with Instagram at Manhattan Municipal Building)

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 21:11:53 -0500

Elevator (Taken with Instagram at Manhattan Municipal Building)

The Hartford Courant's editorial board doesn't mince words on Mr. "I Might Have Tacos": "Mayor Joseph Maturo is an idiot."

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 11:27:47 -0500

The Hartford Courant's editorial board doesn't mince words on Mr. "I Might Have Tacos": "Mayor Joseph Maturo is an idiot.":

shortformblog:

For those who are wondering why the East Haven Police Department is out of control, one possible answer is that Mayor Joseph Maturo is an idiot.

What other possible explanation is there for Mr. Maturo’s comments Tuesday night following the arrest of four East Haven police officers for violating, often brutally, the civil rights of Latinos? A New York television reporter asked Mr. Maturo what he was doing for the Latino community. (See the interview, by all means, at http://www.courant.com.) A moderately sentient public official in such a circumstance might say that he planned to meet with leaders of the community to apologize for the officers’ behavior and ask them to join him in making changes to prevent such unacceptable conduct.

Mr. Maturo responded by saying that he that he might go home and have tacos for dinner. He then rambled on with marginal coherence about other ethnic groups, mentioning his own Italian heritage (“I might have spaghetti”). We would bet that Italian Americans who’ve seen the video cringed.

In case you missed the video, here it is over here. (Thanks Matt)

The main headline on The Drudge Report reads, “Gingrich...

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:24:00 -0500

The main headline on The Drudge Report reads, “Gingrich repeatedly insulted Reagan” citing an example of him accusing Reagan of causing America’s “decay.”

On the scale of Republican taboos, profaning the name of the “great” Reagan is probably considered tantamount to, if not worse than, profaning the name of God himself.

Looks like Romney has some fresh new ammo.

Amusing map that gets at NYC’s brand of provincialism,...

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 22:57:00 -0500

Amusing map that gets at NYC’s brand of provincialism, which goes something like this:

“The City” is the center of the world and the only place worth living in (well, maybe, Paris or London, but…). The rest of America consists of backwater hinterlands inhabited by uncultured, simple people—the likes of whom roam around Times Square in droves with oversized sweatshirts.