Scrambling for a Halloween costume?

credit: www.techcrunch.com

what's hot / what's not

what's hot:

The new Dali exhibition at LACMA. Who wants to go to Live Jazz Fridays?
The 3.99 Store in Westwood. (On Westwood Blvd)
Pinot Noir.

what's not:

Karl Dorrell - UCLA Football Coach.
The unbearable heat in SoCal this week.
Merlot.

wishes and Facebook.

I wish the washer and dryer in my complex took debit cards.

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The Economist has a relatively critical article on Facebook this week.

"But unlike other networks, social networks lose value once they go beyond a certain size. “The value of a social network is defined not only by who's on it, but by who's excluded,” says Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley forecaster. Despite their name, therefore, they do not benefit from the network effect. Already, social networks such as “aSmallWorld”, an exclusive site for the rich and famous, are proliferating. Such networks recognise that people want to hobnob with a chosen few, not to be spammed by random friend-requests.

This suggests that the future of social networking will not be one big social graph but instead myriad small communities on the internet to replicate the millions that exist offline. No single company, therefore, can capture the social graph. Ning, a fast-growing company with offices directly across the street from Facebook in Palo Alto, is built around this idea. It lets users build their own social networks for each circle of friends."

Food for thought.

wow.

I caught this in the Journal earlier this summer. A conversation with my roommate reminded of me of this article, and I decided that I had to share it with ya'll.

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Is This Man Cheating on His Wife?

Alexandra Alter on the toll one man's virtual marriage is taking on his real one and what researchers are discovering about the surprising power of synthetic identity.

By ALEXANDRA ALTER
August 10, 2007; Page W1

On a scorching July afternoon, as the temperature creeps toward 118 degrees in a quiet suburb east of Phoenix, Ric Hoogestraat sits at his computer with the blinds drawn, smoking a cigarette. While his wife, Sue, watches television in the living room, Mr. Hoogestraat chats online with what appears on the screen to be a tall, slim redhead.

He's never met the woman outside of the computer world of Second Life, a well-chronicled digital fantasyland with more than eight million registered "residents" who get jobs, attend concerts and date other users. He's never so much as spoken to her on the telephone. But their relationship has taken on curiously real dimensions. They own two dogs, pay a mortgage together and spend hours shopping at the mall and taking long motorcycle rides. This May, when Mr. Hoogestraat, 53, needed real-life surgery, the redhead cheered him up with a private island that cost her $120,000 in the virtual world's currency, or about $480 in real-world dollars. Their bond is so strong that three months ago, Mr. Hoogestraat asked Janet Spielman, the 38-year-old Canadian woman who controls the redhead, to become his virtual wife.

Ric Hoogestraat's avatar, Dutch Hoorenbeek

The woman he's legally wed to is not amused. "It's really devastating," says Sue Hoogestraat, 58, an export agent for a shipping company, who has been married to Mr. Hoogestraat for seven months. "You try to talk to someone or bring them a drink, and they'll be having sex with a cartoon."

[CONTINUES HERE: http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB118670164592393622.html]

hectic oakland music

enjoy.

back back back

I got back from my backpacking trip to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji and was expected to hit the ground running with school. More on the trip later.

First things first. Someone needs to give Ryan Gosling his second Oscar nomination for Lars and the Real Girl. His performance was characterized by understated, subtle genius. This was better than his Half-Nelson performance. Go watch it.

Second. I am very excited for Radiohead's new album - In Rainbows. I am also very interested in seeing how the band's "Pay-as-much-as-you-want-to" works out.

Third. If you love Wes Anderson, then go watch Darjeeling Limited. You won't be disappointed.