{ James Rosenquist, Pink Condition, 1996 | Beverly Hills Cop, 1984 }

There are more real estate agents than actual houses for sale in the United States.

Any given day, you’re likely to see about half a million homes for sale, and there are 1.5 million members of the National Association of Realtors.

{ NPR | Continue reading }

images { Jerry Lewis, The Ladies Man, 1961 | Georges Perec, La vie mode d’emploi, 1978 }

{ Ora-ïto, Gucci Villa, 1999 | Kleindienst, Floating Seahorse villa, 2015 }

{ Ormond Gigli, Girls in the Windows, New York, 1960 |Jean-Paul Goude, Chanel Egoiste commercial, 1990 }

Many New Yorkers are familiar with the iconic Waldorf Astoria, which sits on Park Avenue. But they might be surprised to learn that this is the second iteration of the luxury hotel. The original was located along Manhattan’s fashionable Fifth Avenue, and the structure took up the entire block between 33rd and 34th streets. But in late November 1929 — after the stock market had crashed and the slow slide into the Great Depression began — workers began demolishing it. […] The demolition of the old hotel, completed by the winter of 1930, made way for the construction of the ultimate expression of the city’s architectural ambitions: the Empire State Building.

{ CNN | Continue reading }

The original hotel started as two hotels on Fifth Avenue built by feuding relatives. The first hotel, the 13-story, 450-room Waldorf Hotel, designed by Henry Janeway Hardenbergh in the German Renaissance style, was opened on March 13, 1893, at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 33rd Street, on the site where millionaire developer William Waldorf Astor had his mansion. […]

On November 1, 1897, John Jacob Astor IV opened the 17-story Astoria Hotel on an adjacent site, and leased it to Boldt. The hotels were initially built as two separate structures, but Boldt planned the Astoria so it could be connected to the Waldorf by an alley. Peacock Alley was constructed to connect the two buildings,[21] and the hotel subsequently became known as the “Waldorf-Astoria”, the largest hotel in the world at the time.

{ Wikipedia | Continue reading }

{ Maurizio Cattelan, Comedian, 2020 — An Artist Just Ate One of Maurizio Cattelan’s $120,000 Bananas Off the Wall in Miami | Yoko Ono, Apple, 1966 — Apple was first displayed in a London gallery in 1966. It was here that Yoko Ono met John Lennon for the first time. “You know, he didn’t say anything. He just grabbed the apple and had a bite in it.” }

A man who had just bought an $8 million island off of Key West was arrested Saturday for participating in what police described as a scheme to steal $300 in household items from Kmart.

Officials at Kmart called Key West police April 5 after they say Andrew Francis Lippi, 59, had purchased several items, including a Keurig coffee maker and light bulbs, and returned the original boxes for a refund. But police say the boxes were stuffed with other items. For example, store officials said a basketball was inside the Keurig box. […]

The Miami Herald reports Lippi bought Thompson Island, which had been the home to the family of philanthropist Edward B. Knight. Lippi also owns the “Real World” house in Key West, where MTV shot its 17th season in 2006. […]

Lippi told the Herald the theft allegation is “complicated” and he’d rather not talk about it.

{ CBS News | Continue reading }

images { Grant Wood, American Gothic, 1930 | Dexter, Episode 7, Season 6 }

Revising things makes people think they are better, absent objective improvement. We refer to this phenomenon as the revision bias. […]

We propose that the fact that revisions typically are intended to be improvements over their originals gives rise to an overgeneralized heuristic that revisions necessarily are improvements over their originals. Yet, as any author responding to editorial reviews knows, not every revision turns out better than before. […]

Things that are objectively unchanged (or even made worse) in the revision process may nonetheless be adopted, so long as observers believe they possess a “revised” version.

{ Harvard Business School | PDF }

images { Sculpture by Yoan Capote | Barbara Kruger-annotated photo of Eliot Spitzer for New York magazine, 2008 }

Brothers Vincenzo and Giacomo Barbato named their clothing brand “Steve Jobs” in 2012 after learning that Apple had not trademarked his name. […]

The Barbatos designed a logo that resembles Apple’s own, choosing the letter “J” with a bite taken out of the side. Apple, of course, sued the two brothers for using Jobs’ name and a logo that mimics the Apple logo. In 2014, the European Union’s Intellectual Property Office ruled in favor of the Barbatos and rejected Apple’s trademark opposition. […]

While the Barbatos currently produce bags, t-shirts, jeans, and other clothing and fashion items […] they plan to produce electronic devices under the Steve Jobs brand.

{ Mac Rumors | Continue reading }

art { Left: Ellsworth Kelly, Nine Squares, 1977 | Right: Damien Hirst, Myristyl Acetate, 2005 }

{ Yves Klein, Monochrome jaune sans titre (M 8), 1957 | Roy Lichtenstein, Yellow brushstroke I, 1965 }

Google Brain has created two artificial intelligences that evolved their own cryptographic algorithm to protect their messages from a third AI, which was trying to evolve its own method to crack the AI-generated crypto. The study was a success: the first two AIs learnt how to communicate securely from scratch.

{ Ars Technica | Continue reading }

images { American Apparel ad, Vice magazine, 2008 | Richard Prince, Untitled, 2012-14 }

unrelated { This Year, You Can Wear A ‘Vagina Mask’ For Halloween | Thanks Tim }

Monozygotic twins are considered being genetically identical, therefore they cannot be differentiated using standard forensic DNA testing. Here we describe how identification of extremely rare mutations by ultra-deep next generation sequencing can solve such cases. We sequenced DNA from sperm samples of two twins and from a blood sample of the child of one twin. Bioinformatics analysis revealed five single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) present in the twin father and the child, but not in the twin uncle.

Our results give experimental evidence for the hypothesis that rare mutations will occur early after the human blastocyst has split into two, the origin of twins, and that such mutations will be carried on into somatic tissue and the germline. The method provides a solution to solve paternity and forensic cases involving monozygotic twins as alleged fathers or originators of DNA traces.

{ FSI Genetics }

{ Bert Stern, Vogue, April 1962 | Stella Artois ad, 2010 }

{ DNA tests prove your close friends are probably distant relatives }

images { 1 | 2 }

{ 1 | 2 }

{ Westinghouse demonstrates an electric razor using x-ray technology, May 1941 | Helmut Newton, Van Cleef + Arpels Diamond Necklace X-Ray, Paris 1979 }

{ Graham Reznick, I can See You, 2008 | Asger Carlsen, 2011 }

{ I can See You, 2008, poster }

{ Left: Chris Cunningham, Rubber Johnny, 2005 | Right: Asger Carlsen: “I have a lot of respect for Cunningham’s work and I like rubber Johnny. But I also had a big fascination for Francis Bacon while I was doing the first Hester image.” }

Did you know that around 85% of humans only breathe out of one nostril at a time? This fact may surprise you, but even more remarkable is the following: our body follows a pattern and switches from breathing out of one nostril to the other in a cyclical way. Typically, every four hours it switches from left to right, or right to left.

{ United Academics | Continue reading }

images { John Stezaker, The Voyeur, 1979 | 2 }

{ 1 | 2 }

{ John Kacere | Aaron McElroy }