3
POPSHome prices drop 15.3% year over year I began watching this whole mess play out in about 2004, and was aghast as prices continued to fly out of control. By the end of 2005, the housing fever was breaking and the "housing boom" was being seen for the bubble it was. Now, to look at the chart of prices even for the so-far relatively insulated New York, there's no mistaking which direction prices are headed. Not only that, it's heading ever faster in that direction. This "record" of 15.3% year over year drop won't stand very long. I'd be very surprised if we don't break it next month.
3
POPSNYTimes Skewers "The Love Guru" Wow - this is one of the most damning reviews of a popular movie I've ever read. Everything I've seen of "The Love Guru" looks like complete dreck, and I'm a pretty big Mike Meyers fan, dating back to the "So I Married and Ax Murderer" days. The Times really gives it to him here - I'm surprised to see them go so far in panning it, it must be even worse than I expected.
7
POPSHousing Price data I didn't realize this data was made publicly available. Very interesting to see exactly how the market is performing in various cities.
3
POPSWashy Ad Jeffy - Presidential mnemonic song Jonathan Coulton just put up another great song - aside from being a great mnemonic device, it's also a catchy little tune. I've never learned the Presidents, I'm going to use this to finally memorize them :)
5
POPSJonathan Coulton plays the Brooklyn Ikea opening If you don't already know Jonathan Coulton, go take a listen at http://jonathancoulton.com His song "Ikea" is a fantastic parody / send up / love letter to the swedish flat-pack furniture giant, and apparently they had him play it at the opening of the store in Red Hook! Awesome.
6
POPSUnemployment jumps the most since 1986 I was wondering what sent the market tumbling. The bigger news for me is that oil is up almost $10 in two days. That's huge! I woke up this morning and said "what's going on?!"
4
POPSMan caught climbing NYTimes building I've got friends who work in that building, I wonder if they saw him! All things considered, with the ladder-like bars that go in front of the windows there, I don't know if this was that much of a challenge.
8
POPSTasty tasty electronics Some of the folks I collaborate with at NYCResistor have been making some awesome electronic inspired pastries. We had cupcakes the other day and now there was a full sized cake. Awesome!
15
POPSDollars for Oil is now Euros for Oil The opening of the Iranian Oil Bourse (which coincidentally happened to be delayed by a bunch of internet cables being severed underwater) trades in Euros. That means that the world no longer has to get dollars first to buy oil, and could continue to have a drastic effect on the value of the dollar.
4
POPSHousing troubles go global The boom went around the world, it's no surprise that the bubble is following it. What surprises me is that it seems to catch everyone off-guard.
10
POPSGrains Gone Wild With food prices rising quickly and a grain crisis looming, the end of cheap food may indeed be here. From a personal point of view, I know several people near the poverty line who are really feeling the pinch now between oil prices (gas, heating oil, etc) and rising food prices.
6
POPSOutstanding interview with Steve Jobs Fortune's got an incredible interview with Apple's Steve Jobs in this month's issue. Each page had something clipworthy, so I've just grabbed from the first. The source is well worth reading through.
8
POPSDramatic Lemur Forget Dramatic Hampster - this little guy has REALLY got dramatic down pat!
4
POPSTexter - fast abbreviation substitution If you find yourself answering many emails the same way, or need to paste in a complex bit of HTML over and over, this could be extremely helpful. {{Communicatrix}} also suggested that I look at TextExpander for the same function on Mac
1
POPSFinal Fantasy 13 Trailer I can't believe how amazing this looks. If this is the actual gameplay, this may be the first real reason to own a PS3
6
POPSFacebook CEO - Major overhaul of App platform coming From everything I've heard so far (mostly from scoble's Qik videos from Davos and this post, but also a few other rumbings), Facebook is working hard to make the App platform less spammy, and to enable developers to build deeper, more powerful apps which really extend Facebook's functionality. If they really go the "google androiod" route with this, and allow developers to build apps which users can swap out (think superwall, but actually in place of the stock "wall" app) this could shape up to be a great year for FB. It's also good to hear Robert echo some of the things that I felt when meeting Mark - he's an extremely humble, shy, interesting person, who's genuinely geeking out about this stuff at work every day. With someone that passionate about the future of the net and what they're building at FB, I'm pretty confident that good things are yet to come.
5
POPSWik.is - free wiki hosting + google integration I'm checking out free wiki hosting services, and will definitely have to give this one a look. I love mediawiki and would just host that myself, but I've seen far too many wikis crumble in the face of massive spam attacks. A hosted solution means someone else is working on the spam problem as well.
0
POPSRowling sues H.P. Lexicon, and why she's wrong. This is an excellent piece from slate that sums up in one sentence why J.K. will lose this lawsuit. "She has confused the adaptations of a work, which she does own, with discussion of her work, which she doesn't." That says it all. Allowing copyright and trademark concerns to silence discussion of a literary work (or any element of our culture) would be a disaster for free speech. As Ron once said, "She needs to sort out her priorities."
2
POPSHow to check Iowa Caucus results I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this. I'm definitely not as educated as I should be about it, but it seems that It's a shame that in these days of ubiquitous connectivity and mass media we still rely on an antiquated primary system to decide who gets to run.
5
POPSPersonal nuclear reactors? These things are hot! I'm still not sure if these things are real or not - I'm going to have to do a bit more research. If they are safe, economical, and at least environmentally justifiable, it could make for an interesting few decades.
2
Clips
Latest Pops
Latest Comments
Most Pops
Tags
Print
Save
Turn on live update