August 25, 2001
Consumable
Brand new conspicuous consumerism without the pain in your wallet!Now introducing grubbyShop, the premiere shop on the internet showcasing the grubbyWares product line. Get them while they are still in stock!
Lego movies
Man, I don't know if this is cool or not.There are whole sites dedicated to this.
August 24, 2001
Fight the Man!
For all of those who hate paying bills to the Telcos and to out of state Meta-Nationals for web access, here is an interesting way around it.Basically you use the copper lines inherit in each home and connect one end to an ISP and the other to a switch/router/wireless device and boom...community wide cooperative web access.
When art and life combine
Remember that movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger? The Running Man from 1987? The cliche that history repeats itself is true to form.August 21, 2001
Study
I have an exam tomorrow. It is open book. I just collected my notes. I think I'm done studying.
Design Ethics
Today I was asked by a close friend why the 'grubby looks so much like my professional site.
"I thought you were separating the whole thing from the professional site. Why would you design it to look the same when you are making them different? Why not have separate sites with separate and original designs? Seems like you are contradicting your goals..."
Wow.
The only thing I could say was that I was lazy (which I am), I don't have that much free time, and that the old design was ugly. Then I thought about it, and I think I am not doing anything wrong, ethically/philosophically. The other site serves as a clearinghouse for my professional life, while grubbykid is the portal to my personal life. They are closely intertwined, but a degree of separation was needed. I didn't want a prospective client/employer/relative to see the other site and see me say shit, piss, fsck, etc. I wanted to be able to stand on my soapbox and wail on the Life, the Universe and Everything. Either way, Grubbykid.com is only given out to few, so I can still wail at the world.
The design is a linear extrapolation of the professional; one mirrors the other, much like my life. The mission of one differs with the other. Their design has the same embryo. Call them fraternal twins. Either way, I have designed them very simply, so that the content is highlighted.
I could see that the design of the professional site will diverge soon with the personal: I want to create a data-base driven site at the other site to house the MBs of images I am taking, and as a resource to young architects. But all in good time, for now I am content.
Conveyor
On the road again, and we see the power of the great agrarian power that Thomas Jefferson spoke of.
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Flag of Convenience
Wake up
Yes you, John Q. Public. Days of big brother are here. The war is being lost on all fronts. You need to help. Knowledge is power, and the price of liberty is being ever vigilant.
Think these are just clich�s? Think America is great? Well it is, but the oligarchies are fencing us in. By means of law, software, judiciary, and police. But worst of all offenders is a little idea that was born in France around the 1500's: the corporation. Now I'm not against all corporations. They are an efficient way to channel capital and resources toward a common goal. My soon to be boss is incorporated. It helps protect his personal assets from being seized, so his three children can go to college.
What I am talking about is a relatively new form of corporation: the trans- and meta-nationals. These are the biotechnology, production, drug, auto, software, and media entities that have been created in the last 20-30 years. During the age of the "Robber Barons" (or Captains of Industry - depending if you were winning) huge corporations were formed, both horizontally and vertically. The Sherman Anti-Trust Act ruled this act of creating huge economies of scale, unconstitutional. More importantly, this law wasn't put to actual use for about 25-30 years to break up the Rockefeller monopolies; before this it was a tool of the monopolies to act as a leverage point to enter into new markets.
Now we have corporations that trans- (as in cross) boarders of states (nations). This is not a problem per see, but the huge economies of scale that these trans-nationals dwarf the GNP of all but the 13 richest states. When a trans-national can bend multiple countries into spheres of influence (a parallel to trans-national power is found in China preceding and after the Boxer Rebellion) the effects are disastrous. With the advent of Meta-nationals, corporations of even larger economies of scale, horizontal and vertical structures, and Flag of Convenience ambitions, the threat to individual liberty is at stake. With Meta-Corporations changing states to as fast as we change styles, all in search of a better deal, this creates huge economic ripples in the local economy.
Today trans- and Meta-National Corporations are bending their spheres of influence to their will. The DMCA, WIPO Treaty, the presidency are all working to ensure that the "free market" is free for those in power now (not as in beer). International law, with no judicial, democratic and oversight is being drafted in the States and in the EU. The idea that we can just move to Canada or some other port of call is no longer true. The Trans- and Meta-Nationals have already beaten us there.
Solution:
- Ever present vigilance
- Civil Disobedience
- Non-violent protest
- PAC's
- Democratic uprisings
Will it be solved:
No, unless john Q. Public can't drink Frappucino, pay at the pump, or by something at gap.
And until I can't do that also.
August 19, 2001
The creative web will not die
Some have stated there is no money to be had on the Internet. I say good. The Internet is not the next market to be dominated by large corporations panning their homogenous goods to all in the name of international free trade. No matter how much capital wants to conquer the Internet, artists will carve out their enclaves and rally around ideals such as rust-boy, anamorph and powazek.</ soapbox>
FOJM - 003
I always have to eat a $.50 bag Doritos when I'm at school late at night. I don't know if it's just the act of eating the little tortilla chips is what is appealing to me. Or is it that you have to wipe/lick off your fingers after eating a bag of cool ranch because they are all gunked up. Either way those little blue bags of enrichment get me though an all night Charette. Thank you frito-lay!
FOJM - 002
Because of my profession (architecture) we get to take field trips to each site we build on. We were visiting an old textile factory in the heart of downtown Cincinnati. Across the street is one of the many surface parking lots in the area. I think the ratio is one parking lot for every building. This new Passat caught my eye, and I had to take a picture.
Do you think I look fat?
Crosley Tower
Crosley Tower, largest slip form concrete tower in Ohio.
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Power Line
Power lines are the most ignoble and beautiful objects in the city.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party - Keith
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Toga Party
The toga party…the pictures speak for themselves.
Redesign, reajuste, nouvelle conception!To bring
Redesign, reajuste, nouvelle conception!
To bring grubbykid.com in-line with her sister site, we officially announce the opening of v2.0!
Some of the changes are cosmetic. As you can see we have retired the scarlet and gray theme for the slicker blue-gray and white. We have opened the doors to Still Life a collection of images from my life that will be updated often. I can say this for certain, because I have a new digital camera, and I love to use it. Some of the changes are less obvious. Thanks to Noah Grey and his fabulous blog script greymatter, I can now syndicate and archive my thoughts on the fly. This was an intermediate step between manual archiving and a full out mySQL/PHP solution. In the future, I suspect I will be going this direction, but not now.
On the way:
Random images from my past that appear on certain pages
AvantGo channel (for those who would REALLY want to read what I have) - but this is more of a "wow...look what I can do" sort of improvement.
Migration of past articles and thoughts.
General back-end ease of use.
That's about it, thanks for coming!