general

This blog was listed as a "best NY art blog" by Mapcidy with the following statement:

The transition from print to virtual is one that is happening across the world, propelled mostly by the younger generations. Fewer people are reading newspapers and magazines, turning instead to blogs. The news is more of-the-minute; often real time. There is less accountability or standards of accuracy, but people are more eager for news than for truth anyway. Certainly the New York Times is keeping a watchful eye on the Huffington Post, and US Weekly has to be less than thrilled with Dlisted and Perez. The art world, however, lags slightly behind this trend. Most people still turn to that bible of all things arty - Artforum - for thought-provoking discussion. Art tends to be less about real-time reporting since it develops at a slower pace than one of Sienna Miller's relationships, and stays relevant for longer than one news cycle. Yet, young artists are all about the immediate, and the virtual, and they aren't going hungry. At least not mentally - I can't speak for their stomachs. For those of you who don't touch paper anymore, there are some good art blogs out there. Here is a list I have culled from some of the best art schools in NYC. These kids know what is hot and who to listen to, so I am passing their wisdom on to you. And so I give you the MFA student's virtual guide to NY's art scene.

This blog is honored and will try to keep things entertaining and straight shooting. It's gratifying to still be read after turning off comments a year and a half ago, a move which annoyed some people. It's still nice to wake up in the morning and not have to read someone accusing me of bad motives on my own page.

1. A Wolf Calls a Wolf
2. The All-Together Playing-Card Operation
3. Hunt Down the Counterfeiter!
4. When the Seventh Bridge Falls
5. Beware the Time Machine!
6. The Emerald's Secret
7. Let's Catch Lupin and Go to Europe
8. Operation Jewel Snatch
9. Lupin Caught in a Trap
10. Keep an Eye on the Beauty Contest
11. Which of the Third Generation Will Win!
12. Catch the Phony Lupin!
13. Rescue the Tomboy!
14. The First Move Wins Computer Operation!
15. The Great Gold Showdown!

(IMDb)

Have heard some variation of this somewhat xenophobic theory about a Chinese Marshall Plan before, but am not cynical enough to have imagined the U.S. Marshall Plan in the 1940s was primarily about creating markets for a postwar over-capacity of American goods, sorry:

What’s interesting to see in this story [about Chinese input into US bailout plans last fall], especially the top where the Chinese leaders give American institutions a well-deserved tongue lashing, is the way the Chinese fail to see that they’ve already had the benefit of their investment in American mortgage-backed securities. In fact, the recycling of Chinese profits into American mortgage debt is beginning to look like a 21st Century Marshall plan gone awry.

By investing in the US, the Chinese primed a consumption pump that created demand for their goods. That demand absorbed the huge number of workers coming to the cities over the last decade and accelerated China’s growth. In other words, the Chinese encouraged and enabled the irresponsibility of American households because it created demand for their goods.

After World War 2, the US faced a crisis of productive over-capacity. The solution was to send a lot of money to Europe that would then be used to buy American goods. In the case of the original Marshall plan, the sorry state of post-war Europe gave the plan a humanitarian glint. But that shouldn’t mask the real value of the Marshall plan or its intent.

Flash forward fifty years and you have China eager to raise the standard of living at home. Only this time, North Americans are tapped out, not because of a devastating war but because of devasting dotcom bubble bursting. There’s no way to dress this one up as the good guys coming to the aid of their fallen cousins.

That’s a shame. I don’t know what the final accounting was on the Marshall plan loans. I’d be curious to know. But in reading these stories, I’m beginning to think the Chinese are being a little disingenuous when they keep demanding that their investment in US securities be safeguarded.

Didn't realize AOL pulled the plug on its blogs and some other hosted services at the end of last year. (Had a link to something on a "hometown blog" and read the abrupt notice of cancellation of all such blogs). Here AOL tries to solicit some good natured holiday humor and gets an earful from users:

Before there were "blogs" there was AOL Journals. People were more real there and not just blurting out worthless opinions like on the other blogging sites. AOL pictures was not only a good way to share your pictures, but was also a great fail-safe to store your invaluable pictures should your computer just up and die. These were quality services that, in my opinion, were unmatched by any other website or online community. AOL used to be a name you could trust. Now they just seem so shady...informing people (if you even get the "memo")... with less than a months notice...that they no longer will have a certain service. And the alternatives we have? Photoworks sucks! Blogger isn't as personal as Hometown was. Give me a break!

Regarding Jeff Sisson's online project "Bodega List," the following exchange took place at Rhizome.org:

Comment by Tom Moody
January 21, 2009 1:08 am
I think this is a good idea... My fear with a project like this is that its "success" is defined as getting reblogged by Rhizome and We Make Money Not Art and then it gradually falls apart. Remember Street Meme? An Eyebeam-launched crowdsourcing project where people identified graffiti tags out on the street and there was some kind of ranking system. The system was never completely functional and the creators lost interest in I think less than a year. But it didn't matter because the main tech art portal/aggregator sites all gave it the big thumbs up. I'd like to see the Bodega project become a popular NYC institution, loved outside the tech art ghetto and enduring for many years, a real urban resource celebrating these non-chain store, practically invisible but vital institutions, so prove my gloomy prognosis wrong.

Comment by Brian Droitcour
January 22, 2009 2:30 pm
A bodega is something you search for with your feet, not the internet. If you need a bodega you just walk down the street until you find one. What makes this idea interesting to the "tech art ghetto" is its absurd nonfunctionality, its joke about the internet as an out-of-control database that catalogs things that don't need to be cataloged. The project starts to look misguided and silly if you inject it with a social conscience by saying it celebrates "practically invisible but vital institutions." They're only invisible if you never leave your computer to go outside.

Comment by Tom Moody
January 28, 2009 11:00 am
It's refreshing to be criticized for having a social conscience, since I'm usually "insulting artists" by being apolitical. My point is once you have your little moment of absurd non-functionality it's on to the next project. I was imagining absurd non-functionality on a rather grander scale, with lots of New Yorkers actually participating in this thing. I believe something could be an urban resource and still kind of a joke. We-love-bodegas-but-not-really.