I want to see 2012 and I think it would make me feel similar to what Jonathan Harris describes here.

It’s like I can go chase fanciful ideas that probably do have some amount of truth to them but no possible way to know when it may become fact, or keep on living as if undisturbed. If there was concrete knowledge of some imminent disaster would we really change the way we live? Although this kind of thing fascinates me it seems pointless to get seriously concerned about it. It wouldn’t be preventable and we probably couldn’t take enough precautions to make a significant difference in how it impacts us. While it seems naive to go on living nonchalantly there really is not much else to do.

One of my favorite Michael Jackson songs is “You Are Not Alone.” It’s almost tragically poetic that he could write such a beautiful song but not be able to hear his own lyrics. Isolated from the outside world after decades of controversy, it took his death for the country to really show how much they still loved and embraced Michael. But I’m straying from the real topic of this post, as I often do. The point is that everyone needs to be reminded that they are connected. As alone as they feel, there are people out there going through the same thing.

A while ago I stumbled onto this website called “We Feel Fine.” The system searches out blog entries that include the words “I feel (insert emotion),” or “I’m feeling…” When found, it records the full sentence and categorizes it according to the feeling expressed. It then organizes it into an interface with floating tons of particles, each representing a feeling posted in the blogosphere. Things like color, size or shape of the particle indicate the nature of the feeling. When you click on a particle it reveals the full sentence and any information it has about the author. You can also filter the particles by feeling, author’s sex, age, weather or location.

But more that just the random particles careening across the screen, Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar have created six different movements (Madness, Murmurs, Montage, Mobs, Metrics, and Mounds) to categorize and display the information in real time. Basically it’s an infographic  paradise.

During his TED talk, Harris said, “”I think people are very similar, but I also think we have trouble seeing that. As I look around the world, I see a lot of gaps, and I think we all see a lot of gaps. We define ourselves by our gaps: language gaps, ethnicity gaps, age gaps, gender gaps, sexuality gaps, wealth and money gaps, education gaps, religious gaps…but I think that actually despite our gaps, we really have a lot in common.”

Arctic Adventurer: We Feel Fine,
originally uploaded by ocean.flynn.

DRAFT
Photos of Iqaluit cemetery taken October 2002; Uploaded to Flickr, Trawled by wefeelfine, Linked to wordpress, wefeelfine.org

American artist, Jonathan Harris describes his work on his website:

“I make (mostly) online projects that reimagine how we relate to our machines and to each other. I use computer science, statistics, storytelling, and visual art as tools. I believe in technology, but I think we need to make it more human. I believe that the Internet is becoming a planetary meta-organism, but that it is up to us to guide its evolution, and to shape it into a space we actually want to inhabit—one that can understand and honor both the individual human and the human collective, just like real life does (Harris).”

“Sep Kamvar is a consulting professor of Computational Mathematics at Stanford University. His research focuses on data mining and information retrieval in large-scale networks. He also is interested in using large amounts of data and accessible media in the study of human nature through art. [Among his other areas of interest he includes] probabilistic models for classification where there is little labeled data (Sep Kamvar’s blog profile).”

Glossary of Terms

Nonlinearity: “At the beginning of Chapter 5 in Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim finds himself in jail on the planet of Tralfamadore. Billys captors give him some Tralfamadorian books to pass the time, and while Billy can’t read Tralfamadorian, he does notice that the books are laid out in brief clumps of text, separated by stars. “Each clump of symbols is a brief, urgent message — discribing a situation, a scene,” explained one of his captors. “We Tralfamadorians read them all at once, not one after the other. There isn’t any relationship between all the mssages, except that the author has chosen then carefully, so that, when seen all at once, they produce an image of life that is beautiful and surprising and deep. There is no beginning, no middle, no end, no suspense, no moral, no causes, no effects. What we love in our books are the depths of many marvelous moments seen all at one time.” Harris and Kamvar aimed to write Almanac of Human Emotions in the telegraphic, schizophrenic manner of tales from Tralfamadore, where the flying saucers are.”

Open Platforms: “The power of open platforms in enabling the easy generation of consumable content has been demonstrated repeatedly on the internet, not only with the web itself, but also with sub-platforms like Facebook, Flickr, Google Gadgets, among others. I am interested in platforms that easily enable high-quality content creation for developers and provide a straightforward content consumption and navigation experience for users.”

Open Sub-platforms Open Sub-platforms like Facebook, Flickr, Google Gadgets, among others, facilitate the generation-creation of high-quality consumable content while providing easier access and consumption for users.

Timeline

Webliography and Bibliography

http://wp.me/p1TTs-j6

Como disse o cara da Colméia, o Jonathan Harris tá a frente do nosso tempo. E esse projeto é irritantemente foda.

Clique aqui e se delicie com a genialidade desse cara.

O Jonathan Harris abusa do direito de ser foda. Isso aqui não me deixa mentir.

The Internet is causing mass homogenization of human identity, making us all look the same.

We use the same tools and social networks, fitting into the same templates, designed by companies to maximize page views and profits (with some notable exceptions like Craigslist).

Most online experiences are made, like fast food, to be cheap, easy, and addictive: appealing to our hunger for connection but rarely serving up nourishment. Shrink-wrapped junk food experiences are handed to us for free by social media companies, and we swallow them up eagerly, like kids given buckets of candy with ads on all the wrappers.

These experiences are sensitive neither to individual humans nor to the human collective, but only to page views and growth (in a corporate, not personal sense).

It is fitting that these companies call their customers “users”.

As we fill in the same boxes, answer the same questions, and express ourselves in the same generic ways, we might think this convergence of identity is a good thing, leading to some kind of global unity or mass empathy. But true empathy comes not from forcing people all to be the same, but from helping people to appreciate their differences.

Our online tools do a great job at breadth (hundreds of friends, thousands of tweets), but a bad job at depth. We live increasingly superficial lives, reducing our relationships to caricatures and our personalities to billboards, as we speed along at 1,000 miles an hour.

We trade self-reflection for busyness, gorging ourselves on it and drowning in it, without recognizing the violence of that busyness, which we perpetrate against ourselves and at our peril.

For the last 100 years—from letters, to phones, to faxes, to emails, to chats, to texts, to tweets—communication has been getting shorter and faster, but we are approaching a terminal velocity.

I doubt there is a shorter means of communication than the tweet, unless we start to make monosyllabic grunts at each other or communicate silently, brain to brain. Brief gestures of communication can be beautiful, but can also be shallow. So what will happen next? Will we stop at the tweet, or will we bounce back in the other direction, suddenly craving more depth? I’d bet on the latter.

But even if we start to crave more depth, we cannot run away to a more primitive time.

The momentum of technological growth is too strong for us to prevent it from defining our future. Like it or not, our future world will largely be digital.

Instead of fleeing to the forest, we must find the humanity in the machine and learn to love it. If we decide the humanity does not yet exist there in the ways we expect, then we must create it.

THE BANANA SPLITS!

The Banana Splits Show, first airing on U.S. TV from 1968 to 1970, stands as a kids’ TV show like no other.  What words can describe it?  30 minutes of joyous delirium?  Three times the Recommended Average Daily Dosage of 7am Psychedelia for the Under 10s?

Going into world-wide syndication from the early 70s onwards, The Banana Splits remains an icon of childhood experience for Generation X.  Most immediately remembered is the musical number that opened the show, the ‘Banana Splits Theme’, otherwise known as the ‘Tra-La-La Song’.  I’ve not met a Generation X-er who doesn’t join in the chant the instant they catch another hum its infantile ‘nursery rhyme’ lyric.  It’s pure joy.  Nothing else for it, click on the Youtube link below…

The Banana Splits Show is set in a clubhouse that never comes to order, populated by the ever confusticated club chairman ‘Fleagle’ (a beagle), Deep South-accented ‘Drooper’ (a lion), ‘Bingo’ (a hippy-bespectacled chimp and ‘funkiest’ of the group), and last but not least, ‘Snorky’ (a mute elephant and the group’s acknowledged ‘eccentric’).  Aptly for a kid’s show, everything they do is non-threateningly manic.  …Or manically non-threatening – I’m not rightly sure which.  In any case, each member of the Splits is pure benevolence.

One part of the show about which there is something indubitably threatening, however, is Danger Island.  Think Treasure Island on Drugs.  It’s in the classic tradition of the ‘Cliff Hanger’ serials, somehow grotesquely exciting, and none of the actors take it the slightest bit seriously.  (Pay close attention to the pie-fighting ‘natives’ in the following clip: These actors are clearly having the unrestrained time of their lives on camera!)

Like any self-respecting ‘gang’, The Banana Splits have their ‘rival’ gang: ‘The Sour Grapes Bunch’.  This rival gang is never seen but delivers a message every episode via a go-go dancing under-10 year-old, a different girl each time but always called ‘Charlie’.  One time, however, all the Charlies are seen at once, on the occasion of their ensemble performance of ‘Doin’ The Banana Split’ – a knock-out musical effort by a budding new Hollywood tunesmith… You may not recognize him by his voice here but it’s a very young Barry White ripping out a soul-rock gem reminiscent of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Fire’.  (I’m not the only person on the planet who thinks it’s excellent: Listen to a pure audio version of this song at the end of this article…)

I’m still not sure whether I find this performance glorious or worrying.  All I know is, until the moment I first saw it, I was a normal, well-adjusted child…

Jonathan Harris

The Banana Splits was production company Hanna-Barbera’s attempt to merge live-action with animation.  This the show does, punctuated as it is by various rollicking adventure cartoons of the old school (The Three Musketeers, The Arabian Knights – featuring the voice of Jonathan Harris of Doctor Smith fame, Lost in Space).  But the show merges the ‘real’ with the animated on other levels as well: Most of the interior of the Banana Splits clubhouse is merely ‘drawn’ – i.e. a psychedelic Lion sits down on a chair but falls over as the chair is only painted on the wall.

All in all, The Banana Splits isn’t a thing of Brilliance…

It’s a kids’ show of great Sweetness.

Also of perfect Madness.

My sincere thanks to all featured Youtube contributors for helping keep the experience of The Banana Splits alive, also to Foxtel’s Boomerang channel where the show has been aired over the past few years.  Hopefully it still is.

To read another article by Justin, click on the link below…

“What If the Power Failed?” – Today’s Kids and their Virtual Fun.

there is so much to say and share…and so i feel a rather long and winding post coming on…

this past week has been pretty amazing.

nothing out of the ordinary. nothing particularly special.

just amazing.

it started out with my shopping trip on sunday.  i know.  how mundane, and yet, it was the first time i consciously made a shopping list based around all the recipes i’d saved and never tried…[i still owe you guys one, i'll post the spiedini recipe next week!]

anywho, i got some nice bright flowers on sale, that are still alive in the kitchen.  i bought ingredients to make killer meals.  [as of late dinner has been frozen pizzas, bertolli frozen dinners, etc]  i got home, put everything away. made a nice gin martini, put my great grandma’s apron on, kicked off my shoes, and i was in heaven cooking alone, barefoot in the kitchen, with the stones singing to me in the background…

classes are progressing rather well – although sometimes overwhelming, i am keeping on top of things and we are discussing some really interesting topics…all the paperwork is in for grad school.   i really feel that this was a good decision for me, and feel a lot more solid and calm about the decision that i have made  – although was well thought out, i may have double guessed myself for a hot second.

tuesday i went on a search for green paint chips- we’re painting the kitchen, and jazzing it up…can’t wait to get rid of the red cupboards that scream “angryyy!” every time i look at them.

i found this on facebook – it’s been circulating on facebook all week like wildfire…and it makes me laugh.  it apparently is intended to attract young professionals to rva and recruiters are using it to showcase the city and all it has to offer.  it’s pretty ridiculous. in an “i love this city” kind of way.

wednesday, i took a break from the mancave and from schoolwork  to join the crafty ladies for a wee sewing circle.  it was so nice to just kick back and work on projects and gab…and Dawn cooked an amazing cake, which i was so happy to try out… i had a chance to finally unwind catch up with old friends and work on something crafty like my recycled scarflettes.

and in the craft and art world, i am discovering new stuff everyday, which makes me happy…

untitled 11:11 was just interviewed on nolcha.com – i met the designers as fellow students at parsons [paris].  that was a while ago, and it is great to see what wonderful lines they have been producing.  they have been working their asses off it looks like, and you can tell.  i absolutely love the drape of the skirts in their new fall line…picture from untitled’s website

my artsy cousin is back on this coast for a wee bit, and has his blog up and running again, which i am still slowly catching up on.

local artist slash coleman has a blog that i just found via rvablogs and i must thank him for pointing me to this incredible artist i have just now discovered – Jonathan Harris.  he blends his technology savoir-faire with an artist’s mind, and has created some really awesome works…including wefeelfine. right now he’s taking one picture a day for a year and posting it to document his 30th year… spend a couple minutes on his site. i guarantee you’ll get lost in the awesomeness…

tell me…how fabulous was your week?

any new blogs/artists/sites you want to share?

ok…i’m off to finish my awesome week with a wonderful weekend of camping in the shenandoah…xe

I’ve been telling friends about TED for some years now.  The first time I found TED I spent hours there.  Exhausted, I finally dragged myself away and hurriedly e-mailed my friends to prophesy the end of TV before I fell asleep.

But why bother going on like this?  Why not just give you some of my favorites and let you explore on your own.

Start with J.J. Abrams‘ mystery box or maybe one of the two talks by Jonathan Harris and collecting stories.

There’s also Saul Griffith’s kites tapping wind energy, David Pogue on cool phone tricks, Anna Deavere Smith’s American character and Joshua Klein on the intelligence of crows.

All are great!

By the way don’t miss The Whale Hunt and The Universe. Two extraordinary websites by Jonathan Harris.

A Man She Couldn’t Forget  by Kathryn Shay

Harlequin Romance

Clare Boneli has felt like a stranger to herself ever since the night an accident took her memory. The night she made a choice between two very different men.

Both Brady Langston and Jonathan Harris are good men. But their versions of her are so opposite, it’s as if she’s two different people. One man holds her career future and one man seems to hold her heart. Because when she’s with Brady everything feels so true, so right. As she moves closer to the truth about that fateful night, Clare has to choose again. To stick with the life she’s made for herself. Or listen to what her heart’s been trying to tell her…

What a fantastic book. I found myself throughly engrossed by the story in A Man She Couldn’t Forget. As I read, I kept thinking about the television show Samantha Who? and her retrograde amnesia along with the movie Regarding Henry which the book refers to. Ms Shay did a fabulous job of research when it came to her subject matter. Not only about the subject of amnesia but also in regard to the recipes used as Clare cooked.

I liked the character of Clarissa Boneli. As I learned more about her, I truly began to care for her and her life. I hoped that she would continue to be nice and not go back to snubbing her family and friends. I wanted her to continue to pick her home life and what I thought was her ultimate happiness with her friends as opposed to her work and ambitions for a national television show. I liked how Clare was naturally drawn to Brady and how she learns of their friendship.

I thought Brady Langston was a dreamboat. He did everything for Clare after she had amnesia. After I learned how she had treated him previously, I was surprised that he let his love for her show  in everything he did for her. Brady is too good to be true at times. I don’t know how he was able to hold back pushing Clare for a more intimate relationship or pressing his advantage when Jonathan wasn’t around. He not only loved Clare but he was a true friend through the entire story.

I thought Jonathan Harris was true to the character that was written for him. He loved Clare and wanted to do whatever he could to further her career and her life with him. Jonathan is not only rich and handsome but he is privileged and  it shows in all that he does. I think Jonathan’s only fault is that he wants Clarissa to marry him and he doesn’t want to wait for her to regain her memory or share her with anyone.

I found all the character to be fully fleshed out and a vital part of the story whether they were a main character or a minor one. Little Donny Kramer played as important of a role in the story as Lillian or Lucinda. Anna Summers, as Clare’s doctor, is the perfect psychiatrist. As I said before, I could see the amount of research that went into this story.

I enjoyed the references throughout the book about contemporary times. There were references to J K Rowling, Paula Dean and even Wicked. These made the story more relevant for me and the recipes sounded delicious. Ms. Shay states on her livejournel that they are her own family recipes that have been passed down from generation to generation  and can be found on her website. What a generous gift to give all her readers.

I recommend reading this wonderful story about second chances, friends and lovers. I know A Man She Couldn’t Forget is one story that I won’t forget anytime soon.

Screenshot from We Feel Fine

It was only a few days ago that I was revisiting some of Jonathan Harris’s beautiful and fascinating work. My favorite being We Feel Fine.  How apropos to come across this NY Times article yesterday.

Prenez deux artistes designers un peu geek, ajouter à cela des réseaux sociaux et une bonne dose de romantisme, mélangez et vous obtiendrez un petit bijou des temps modernes. C’est le résultat du travail des talentueux Jonathan Harris & Sep Kamvar, artistes et designers émérites, qui présentaient en mai 2008 leur vision de l’amour au Musée d’Art Moderne de New York. Pour eux, l’amour est une forme graphique évoluant de façon autonome grâce aux médias sociaux. Leur travail consiste en la réalisation de fresques graphiques composées de millions de ballons (bleus pour les garçons, roses pour les filles). Chaque ballon étant lui même composé de messages récupérés grâce aux bases de données des profils d’utilisateurs de sites de rencontres du monde entier. Un procédé rendu possible grâce aux données générées avec le online-dating (les réseaux de rencontre online), qui touche plus de 50 millions d’internautes tous les mois.

Voyez plutôt ce que ça donne en vidéo.

Le site Internet http://iwantyoutowantme.org a été créé pour permettre à l’internaute de faire lui-même l’expérience de l’outil.

Jonathan Harris & Sep Kamvar n’en sont pas à leur première réalisation en matière de gestion artistique des bases de données de réseaux sociaux. En effet un de leurs premiers projets online intitulé “We Feel Fine” présentait une carte du monde des sentiments, matérialisé en un nuage de points. Il était possible de savoir ce qu’une cible préalablement définis (selon le sexe, l’âge, le pays, l’année et même la météo du moment) ressentait à un moment T via le recensement de messages postés sur les réseaux sociaux intégrant des mots pouvant caractériser un état d’esprit (peur, joie, excitation, tristesse, amour, déception etc…). Une sorte de baromètre géant des sentiments. A découvrir sur le site We Feel Fine (même si la base n’est plus actualisée, vous pouvez encore faire l’expérience de l’outil), ci-dessous.

Over the last few weeks, I was spending increasingly more time on the TED website looking up talks on design issues. It was then that I came across a few projects, absolutely stunning in breadth, undertaking and purpose, so much so that I thought I’d put it up on the blog.

The first one’s called ‘We Feel Fine’, a joint project by Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar. It plots the emotions of many people from all around the world through diagrammatic and statistical depictions. The design is beautifully simple and easy to understand and can give you a good idea of what’s happening in the lives of people around you. It rounds of the whole attempt by providing interesting and bizarre metrics. You can find the site here and the TED preview here. (Another interesting attempt that runs along the same lines is ‘I Want You To Want Me‘.)

The second one is an even more vast project both in terms of the kind of man power and technology that went into making it and what it hopes to achieve. It’s called the AlloSphere – a large hollow sphere that it is fit with a large host of microcontrollers connected to a supercomputer. What the AlloSphere does is that it generates various designs, constructions, materials and phenomena on an atomic scale which is then projected as a digital image onto the insides of the sphere. A bridge running along a diameter permits up to 20 people at a time to bear witness to breathtaking views that science devoid of creativity cannot hope to present to us at all. Like JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, the director of the Center for Research in Electronic Art Technology (CREATE) at UC Santa Barbara, says: “imagine architects standing in the sphere and seeing microstructures and atoms arranged in space – what if they could come up with a new construction material?” [paraphrased]. Again, here’s where you can find the TED preview.

The last one is a complete revolution in its own right and I think many people will agree when I say it’s the Gapminder by Hans Rosling. The statistics chapter in mathematics you chose to willingly forget while in school because it made you sleep in a snap – Rosling changes all of that by drawing old graphs in new ways. His sports-person commentary also adds to the pace of this lecture as he plots countries and ideas onto digital graph sheets. Find the TED talk here.

What these 3 ideas did was open me up to another idea that world is changing like no other. Like Thomas Friedman puts it, “the world is flat!” He couldn’t have been more right. This world is no longer curved around the edges and you and me are no longer strangers. With Jonathan Harris’ ‘We feel fine’, I’ll know what you’re feeling some 1000 miles away as soon as you know what I’m feeling. Kuchera-Morin’s AlloSphere will open up technology that you and me never thought we could have access to. And before you know it, Hans Rosling will have it up all on a giant graph and tell everyone what we did, what we could have done and how well we did it.

The world is no longer yours or mine, no longer subject to one war in one region amongst one group of people contending for one piece of information.  It has been globalized by just ideas. The world is ours, subject to our war that involves our people contending for the control over all information.

A Man She Couldn’t Forget  by  Kathryn Shay

Harlequin Romance

Clare Boneli has felt like a stranger to herself ever since the night an accident took her memory. The night she made a choice between two very different men.

Both Brady Langston and Jonathan Harris are good men. But their versions of her are so opposite, it-s as if she-s two different people. One man holds her career future and one man seems to hold her heart. Because when she-s with Brady everything feels so true, so right. As she moves closer to the truth about that fateful night, Clare has to choose again. To stick with the life she-s made for herself. Or listen to what her heart-s been trying to tell her…

What a fantastic book. I found myself thoroughly engrossed by the story in A Man She Couldn’t Forget. As I read, I kept thinking about the television show Samantha Who? and her retrograde amnesia along with the movie Regarding Henry which the book refers to. Ms Shay did a fabulous job of research when it came to her subject matter. Not only about the subject of amnesia but also in regard to the recipes used as Clare cooked.

I liked the character of Clarissa Boneli. As I learned more about her, I truly began to care for her and her life. I hoped that she would continue to be nice and not go back to snubbing her family and friends. I wanted her to continue to pick her home life and what I thought was her ultimate happiness with her friends as opposed to her work and ambitions for a national television show. I liked how Clare was naturally drawn to Brady and how she learns of their friendship.

I thought Brady Langston was a dreamboat. He did everything for Clare after she had amnesia. After I learned how she had treated him previously, I was surprised that he let his love for her show  in everything he did for her. Brady is too good to be true at times. I don’t know how he was able to hold back pushing Clare for a more intimate relationship or pressing his advantage when Jonathan wasn’t around. He not only loved Clare but he was a true friend through the entire story.

I thought Jonathan Harris was true to the character that was written for him. He loved Clare and wanted to do whatever he could to further her career and her life with him. Jonathan is not only rich and handsome but he is privileged and  it shows in all that he does. I think Jonathan’s only fault is that he wants Clarissa to marry him and he doesn’t want to wait for her to regain her memory or share her with anyone.

I found all the character to be fully fleshed out and a vital part of the story whether they were a main character or a minor one. Little Donny Kramer played as important of a role in the story as Lillian or Lucinda. Anna Summers, as Clare’s doctor, is the perfect psychiatrist. As I said before, I could see the amount of research that went into this story.

I enjoyed the references throughout the book about contemporary times. There were references to J K Rowling, Paula Dean and even Wicked. These made the story more relevant for me and the recipes sounded delicious. Ms. Shay states on her livejournel that they are her own family recipes that have been passed down from generation to generation  and can be found on her website. What a generous gift to give all her readers.

I recommend reading this wonderful story about second chances, friends and lovers. I know A Man She Couldn’t Forget is one story that I won’t forget anytime soon.

State Senator Jonathan A. Harris (D-West Hartford), the Senate Chairman of the Public Health Committee, today joined in a Senate override of several of Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s recent vetoes, including her killing of a bill which would raise the wages of people who toil cleaning state buildings or otherwise maintaining state property.

House Bill 6502, “An Act Concerning the Standard Wage for Certain Connecticut Workers,” creates a new method for determining the hourly wage and benefits for employees under Connecticut’s standard wage law, which governs compensation for employees of private contractors who do building and property maintenance, property management, and food service work in state buildings. The governor vetoed the bill on July 2.

“If we can’t make an investment to provide health care for the people who clean the bathrooms and sweep the floors in state buildings and who cut the lawns and plow the parking lots of state properties — if we can’t treat them fairly keep them and their families from sliding into the taxpayer-funded HUSKY health care program which costs us more — I say shame on us,” Sen. Harris said. “Fortunately, this legislation benefitted from a bipartisan veto override in the Senate, which recognizes that this is the right thing to do and will save taxpayers in the long run.”

The House overrode Gov. Rell’s veto of HB 6502 on a 106-35 vote; the Senate overrode her veto 30-6, with half of the Republican Senate caucus joining with the Democrats in the veto override.

The 18th annual Symetra Bellevue Family 4th invites to you make the most of the your time at Park leading up to the fireworks.   From picnics to games to music to naps under the warm summer sun, the fun, food and and festive relaxation starts in the early afternoon when the The Bellevue Parks Kids Zone opens at 2 pm.   Here’s the schedule, including the list of performances on the Overlake Hospital Main Stage.  Of course, more information about the event is here.

2009 Tentative Schedule

• 2:00pm – Bellevue Parks Family Fun Zone opens
• 4:40 pm – C-17 Flyover from McChord AFB
• 5:30 pm – Jonathan Harris (Country singer/songwriter)
• 6:00 pm – Meet on-air radio personalities and win prizes at the 106.1 KISS FM and 94.1 KMPS FM tents
• 7:30 pm – Lenny Epps Revue (Dance Hits)
• 8:40 pm – Bellevue Fire and Police Department Honor Guard presentation and placement of the colors
• 8:55 pm – The National Anthem performed by Newport High School students Sarah Espinoza and Bailey Seeker
• 9:30 pm – The 60-piece Bellevue Philharmonic Orchestra takes center stage to present a special Independence Day performance prior to and during the fireworks display
• 10:05 pm – The Eastside’s largest and most spectacular fireworks display!

Ed and Frankie remember the life and career of television icon Guy Williams (Zorro, Lost in Space) along with their guests Antoinette Lane, author of Guy Williams: The Man Behind the Mask, and fellow Guy Williams expert Kathy Gregory:

http://media.podcastingmanager.com/9/3/5/3/3/142636-133539/Media/060209tvc22_2.mp3

Ed Robertson
Co-Host, TV CONFIDENTIAL
Mon-Sat 11pm ET, 8pm PT
Shokus Internet Radio
Every other Tuesday 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Share-a-Vision Radio
www.edrobertson.com
www.tvconfidential.net

Partner in crime pointed out the following video. Another brilliantly simple interface by Jonathan Harris and Sep Kavmar that makes the complex approachable (and useful) and turns data into something beautiful.  Just think.  If data in business was presented in such a simple and engaging way, executives might actually read their own research reports, decisions would be made with a lot more confidence, and interesting opportunities would be a lot more obvious.  What a world.  What an opportunity for guys like Jonathan and Sep.

On another note, it’s been yet another week of entrepreneurial happenings that I can’t talk about on my blog which is making this blog less and less interesting to read. That said, things are happening, opportunities are popping up, invoices are going out, conversations being had about interesting pieces of work that could keep me entertained until the end of the year. From training corporations on how to do innovation themselves to helping clients I like invent new products in interesting places, I’m starting to see how this thing could work.

I feel like writing a blog post about www.wefeelfine.org!

I stumbled across the work of Jonathan Harris today in another blog. He has a very imaginative approach to using information from blogs and the Internet in ever changing technological art work.

I particularly like We Feel Fine, which is a website that scans blogs for sentences containing ‘I feel’ or ‘I am feeling’ and grabs them, works our the mood of the poster, along with any data about the poster that is easily grabbed from the blog (age, gender, location, etc) and stores it for display in one of several inventive ways. It is a bit like a general ’stream of conciousness for the Internet’, and quite humbling to read when you consider that behind each of those statements is a story to be told. It is a fascinating website.

He has a couple of other interesting projects too – Lovelines is a similar project, looking for ‘I love’ or ‘I hate’ and variations inbetween. He has a few others, but some of them seem to have been overtaken with spam (sigh).

This reminds me of the Listening Post project – which at the moment is installed in the Science Museum! I must make a point of visiting and having a look. Here is a YouTube video of it.

Kevin.

Kanske visste du inte att jag har en fotoblogg inspirerad av Jonathan Harris projekt “We feel fine”, som jag för övrigt berättat om och länkat till här i högerspalten. Namnet på bloggen är också titeln från en film med massor av bildsköna kulisser, nämligen Douglas Sirks All That Heaven Allows. Mitt projekt är egentligen bara ett litet test för hur en bildblogg skulle kunna se ut, men jag kan ju ändå lägga upp personliga favoriter där när jag har tid över för’t. Och tid är någonting man tar sig.

allthatheavenallows punkt ordtryck punkt se o äm.