Rick Webb dot net

God I love this movie. Psyched to see it in the 1993 exhibit. (at New Museum)

Nick Cave is aging just fine. (at Beacon Theatre)

lizstless posted a photo:

“There is not a single moment of shock or freshness on Delta Machine, and it’s enormously frustrating to hear what was once a band of futurists so deeply mired in resisting change.”

- Depeche Mode: Delta Machine | Album Reviews | Pitchfork

thisistheverge:

Amazon to acquire Goodreads, a social network for book recommendations

Well! Amazon will acquire book recommendation site and readers’ social network Goodreads, according to an Amazon press release issued Thursday.

Oh my god I am so excited about this. As an avid Kindle reader and obsessive Goodreads user, I AM SO EXCITED about the two being integrated. It will literally save me something like a 100 hours this year. 

“Film executives really liked his script but told him “it has the burden of not being a sequel.” Whedon found this a depressing commentary on the fact that Hollywood is falling apart, and this decay is actually happening at an increasing rate”

- Joss Whedon’s Biggest Setbacks (And How They Could Help Make S.H.I.E.L.D. Better)

bigcrush:

This sh**’s official, y’guys. (#tbt -2nd grade computer lab)

We still have that computer over at the Secret Clubhouse if you wanna come visit and use those mad Lisa skills. 

“A Boston Globe poll earlier this week showed he remained immensely popular and that he would trounce the only major candidate, City Councilor John Connolly, who had announced his candidacy regardless of the mayor’s decision. The poll affirmed the finding of previous polls — that more than half of the city’s constituents had met the mayor personally, an astounding feat for the chief executive of a major American city.”

-

Menino to End Long Run as Boston Mayor - NYTimes.com

I count myself as one of them. Mumbles, you will be missed. 

Record store day. 

“Fantastically funny, fresh and utterly relatable, Brooklyn Girls by Gemma Burgess is the first novel in her brand new series about five twenty-something friends—Pia, Angie, Julia, Coco and Madeleine—sharing a brownstone in hip, downtown Brooklyn, and discovering the ups and downs and ins and outs of their “semi-adult” lives. The first story belongs to sophisticated, spoiled, and stylish Pia, who finds herself completely unemployed, unemployable, and broke. So what is a recent grad with an art history degree and an unfortunate history of Facebook topless photos to do? Start a food truck business of course! Pia takes on the surprisingly cutthroat Brooklyn world of hybrid lettuce growers, artisanal yogurt makers and homemade butter producers to start SkinnyWheels—all while dealing with hipster bees, one-night-stands, heartbreak, parental fury, wild parties, revenge, jail, loan sharks, playboys, karaoke, true love, and one adorable pink food truck.”

-

The Amazon description of an actual book that will be released on July 2nd. (via noraleah)

What.

(via caro)

This really makes me wish my days of ironic bad novel reading weren’t over. 

strle:

I find it surreally delightful that Hizzonor Mayor Bloomberg, myself, and some random toddler are the three humans pictured in this two page print spread about internet famous pets from the Daily News. Definitely a next level life achievement to be a part of this special club.

Love U forever TommyPom!!!

“A developed country isn’t a place where the poor have cars. It’s where the rich use public transportation.”

-

Gustavo Petro, Mayor of Bogota

(h/t @gusseting )

“If you think about it, it’s a near-perfect metaphor for the culture writ large: They literally can’t imagine the future. And if the people creating the future — by voting with their (many) dollars, by funding the arts (or not), and by driving local demand, not to mention by creating and managing the products and companies we’ve all come to rely on so much — can’t imagine the future, we’re all in trouble”

- The Bacon-Wrapped Economy | Feature | Oakland, Berkeley & Bay Area News & Arts Coverage

courtenaybird:

Tumblr has today quietly ticked over the 100 million blog mark, with those blogs containing some 44.6 billion posts… This marks significant growth over the last year, of somewhere around 50 million blogs since April of 2012, when it crossed 50 million for the first time. 

(via The Next Web)

“Currently Obsessed with: Circa, the news app.
Editors curate the most important news stories of the day and break them down into basic points, quotes, and imagery. The stories are formatted simply for phone viewing. Says Morin, “It is the highest-quality news in the world right now.””

- Path’s Dave Morin on Circa, Mailbox, and the Secret App He Invented to Talk to His Assistant | Vanity Fair

My gig is up at Tumblr! It’s been an amazing 10 months but at the end of March I will be wrapping up my six month consulting project there. What a great time.  It’s been a straight up dream of mine to work at a company like that, and the amount I learned was insane. I feel pretty good about where they’re at now. The business side of the company was like 4 people when I got there, and now it’s around 40! Insane!

People keep asking me what I’m doing next, which is funny because before everyone kept saying I was doing way too much. But it’s a fun time of spring brain cleaning to write it all down, so if you’re curious, this is how I am planning for my year to go down if all goes well. 

• I am going to finish my ad books. It grew into two books - one about agencies and one about the economics and history of advertising, and it’s changing landscape. I am negotiating with my agent about whether that’s actually one or two books. I may have accidentally written three total. I don’t know. This is the first order of business - divide, finish, sell, each one, one by one. 
• I may do one or two of those myself with the new publishing company I am starting with a couple friends. More on that later. 
• I went to SXSW (just sat-tuesday.) & Coachella (hopefully for the last time). 
• I am then going to finish my first novel, which is about 80% done. It is not particularly good so far, but it has potential and I need to complete it, and have been adding some great note snippets the last ten months that I want to finish. 
• I am going to get the Secret Clubhouse in better financial shape. It’s profitable, but barely. I need to finish the website - we did some great spring cleaning this weekend and shot the photos. We have about 8 free desks still, so if you are interested, let me know.
• If (no! when!) I get all of that done, I am going to finish my second novel, or at least start working on it again, because it is AWESOME. Honest. 
• I am still working with Pedro over at Quotidian Ventures as a venture partner doing early stage investments. It is a good time. If you have an early stage tech startup, we’d love to hear from you. 
• I am still working with Rick Boyko, Brian Collins, Steve Hayden, Bob Scarpelli and the rest of the Leadership Collective on unlocking executive potential within organizations.  
• I am going to keep working with Helayne over at the VCU Brandcenter on their digital and executive education components as a board member. 
• I’ll be continuing doing some consulting and a ton of advising. Mostly the relationships I already have in place: Percolate, Nestio, Small Girls PR, Sherpaa, and some others not out in the public. I’m not opposed to a new client or two, but I’m thinking I’m a bit done with the full time for a while. Project based is best. Drop a line if you have something AMAZING. 
• I am going to get married in August, and I am doing the wedding planning - take that, traditional gender roles. Then. HONEYMOON. No idea where. 

Whenever I rattle off this list, people always seem to impatiently wait through it to see if I’m going to work at or start another “startup.” I *do* have something in my head, something I’ve shared with a few of you through the last year, and it’s generally been regarded as too ambitious or impossible etc. etc. And I am so not the clichéd perfect person to do it. But all of that generally makes it even more compelling to me, and I’ve not been able to shake it loose. I will probably dabble with it through the rest of this year, bugging people to be advisory board members, honing the pitch, asking a few VCs where I need to be for them to be interested in it in the future, etc. I’m still not 100% sold, and I have so much to get off of my plate this year, as you can see, that I have some time before I can fully focus. But yes, if you’re looking for a secret fun entrepreneurial story, and the clubhouse isn’t enough for you, there’s a thing brewing. 

Onward! Spring is here!

There’s a birdsnest outside Secret Clubhouse (at Secret Clubhouse)

lizstless posted a photo:

“My next encounter with Cyprus happened in June 2011. A non-governmental organisation approached me with what at first seemed an bizarre request. They were holding a conference in London on reunifying Cyprus. Would I be interested delivering a presentation on asset-backed securities?
Unlike the first Cyprus invitation, this time I was clueless. I protested that I knew very little about the tortured history of the divided island – and even if I did, why were ABS relevant? Don’t worry, the organisers said, sending me a briefing note for me to prepare from.
The NGO document explained how plans to reunify the island had foundered on the question of how to compensate Turks or Greeks who had lost land during the partition of the island 40 years ago, without evicting the current occupants of their property. One idea being floated was for certificates to be given to the original owners of the land, linked to their revenues and value. These certificates could be bundled together and securitised, raising cash from investors which could be used to develop the land for tourism. By financial alchemy, that would boost the value of the certificates enough to persuade both sides to sign up to a deal.
Then I understood why the NGO had approached me. They want to bring about the reunification of Cyprus using a structured product.”

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Cyprus, land of the structured product | Nick Dunbar (via felixsalmon)

This is amazing. 

laughingsquid:

Heard•NY Project Brings Nick Cave’s Giant Horse Sculptures to Dance at NYC’s Grand Central Terminal

You’d think that the two Nick Caves could coordinate a little bit. I mean, if this was any week than the week that Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds were in town, I would have assumed that it was the artist Nick Cave. But this week? I got a teeny bit excited before I realized.