photo by Flickr user Jaxonista

Real-life superheroes may be this year’s Hollywood darling, but Michigan has had their very own masked vigilante, Captain Jackson for years. The Captain has been patrolling the streets of Downtown Jackson since 1999, spreading his message of civic duty while keeping an eye out for crooks and super-villains. He keeps a website with a schedule of community appearances, safety tips, and even a roster of his allied costume heroes, The Crimefighter Corps. Always ahead of the curve, Captain Jackson has been maintaining a blog since May 2000 called The Captain’s Corner with brilliant entries such as, CALLING ALL GOOD DEED DOERS!, BEING AWARE, and HOW TO BE A CRIMEFIGHTER. In addition, the blog features ground chuck-centric recipes in a section called “Cooking with the Captain”.

Captain Jackson’s career ran into a snag in 2004 when he was charged with “impaired driving”. The local newspaper subsequently ran an article about the incident and published the Captains real life identity. The toll that the  media coverage took on our hero is best outlined in the blog entry, ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.  After a two-year hiatus, it seemed that he was back in active-duty at community events and online. In the past year though, there seems to be little to report on this masked man, but we may not have seen the last of Michigan’s own, Captain Jackson.

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Muralist Mona Caron (left) working in the Tenderloin with project manager Lisa Ruth Elliot. Photo: Nick Kasimatis.

I once rode the J-Church in San Francisco with my friend, the muralist Mona Caron. When you ride that train, there’s a brief moment where you can see the tail end of Mona’s first public artwork, the Duboce Bikeway Mural, and as she and I passed we chatted about that project — how she did it, where the funding came from, etc. When the other passengers overheard our conversation, realizing she was the artist behind this epic work, the entire car spontaneously burst into applause.

A detail from Windows Into the Tenderloin. Photo: Mona Caron.

For the people that live near or pass Mona’s murals on a regular basis, her work is a gift that keeps on giving. In part that’s due to her technical virtuosity, which puts her in the company of the very best of the mural tradition in this or any country. She has a rare mastery of perspective, anatomy, rendering and color that gives her work an undeniable authenticity as art, that makes you stand up and take notice. But I think the real pleasure people have in her murals, and the thing that brings them back to view and enjoy them again and again, is the radical utopian vision that animates her art.

You can see that utopianism in her newest mural, Windows Into the Tenderloin, which Mona will be dedicating at a party Friday afternoon:

MURAL DEDICATION EVENT
Friday, March 5th, 3:30pm
Corner of Jones & Golden Gate
Everyone welcome!

Located on the corner of Jones and Golden Gate in the heart of the Tenderloin, the piece is an honest picture of the neighborhood, created in part through hours of community input, and enlivened by portraits of the local characters that Mona has befriended over the year and a half she has been working on it.

Photographer unknown.

Photo: Mona Caron.

Photo: Mona Caron.

Photo: Mona Caron.

The finished work uses virtuoso trompe-l’oeil to open windows on the social life of the area, expressing in art the deep social bonds that always exist, even in the most devastated community. Mona doesn’t sugarcoat a tough situation, but she reminds us that in the Tenderloin, just like anywhere else, good things as well as bad things are happening. Crime, drug use and poverty make life more difficult, but social life goes on —people laugh and talk and eat together, raising children and watching out for each other in countless ways.

Elsewhere in the mural, she peels away huge swaths of wall to reveal the natural ecology that stubbornly refuses to die, even as the urban environment masks it, paves it over.

Photo: Mona Caron.

Mona’s work is epic, but it calls our attention back to the little details, the small signs that life continues, refusing to be crushed or defeated, even in the face of poverty, urban decay, racism, environmental degradation. We can call that vision utopian, but it’s also just a fact, a truth that we all know but that is so rarely spoken aloud.

Thanks, Mona, for this great gift to our city and the world!

Check out more of Mona’s amazing murals and artwork on her website: monacaron.com.

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(To donate to the Save Defenestration fund, go here. S’ cool, we’ll wait for you to come back.)

Perched on the corner of Sixth and Howard Street and San Francisco, a ruined building provides a magical moment for anyone who thinks to look up. Queen Anne tables gallop off the roof, sideshow murals decorate the ground floor, table lamps light the window ledges, and a sofa makes its bid for freedom. Built by world-renown artist Brian Goggin plus a hoard of volunteers thirteen years ago, Defenestration, this famous example of dedicated whimsy, was only meant to last a year.

Housed in the defunct and decaying Hugo Hotel, Defenestration is to undergo some massive renovation to keep pace with the gentrifying neighborhood. Brian Goggin, artist and the piece’s originator, explains:

The building is owned by the city, but they wanted to tear it down in January. My friend Jeremy Sugarman, brother Patrick Goggin and I negotiated with the Redevelopment agency and the local neighborhood council to keep it up. The Redevelopment Agency agreed provided I make the piece safe and restore it or remove it by the end of April. We have made it safe by removing all the pieces that needed serious structural repair. It is looking sparse and wounded. It needs to have many pieces completely rebuilt. To reach the work to remove and replace it we need equipment – boom lifts and cranes. This takes time, labor and money. But we can raise the money and the resources if it is important to enough of us.

Defenestration began its official existence with every music maker and dreamer of dreams in the greater Bay Area and beyond come out to celebrate this emblem of joy and teamwork. The party was so colossal and so quintessentially San Francisco that people still talk about it.

Tour buses stop for it, outlets all over the world write about it, it was made by a community, and now it needs the community’s help once more.

We figure that a world famous, huge-scale art piece that is the centerpiece of a recovering neighborhood, built largely by volunteers and roundly supported by a city that really does know how, would certainly be important enough, indeed.

John Law, Suicide Club member, Cacophony Society architect, and co-founder of Burning Man, has this to say about Defenestration:

“Defenestration is the best. Brian Goggin turned a rambling, spacious, partially wrecked four story residential hotel building into ART. Not only ART, but a f**king tourist attraction, to boot. You can almost separate humanity into the proverbial two kinds of people: those who “get” the piece, and those who don’t. Those who “get it” are basically everyone. What I’m trying to say is that Brian did the nearly impossible: he made FINE ART that ALL people could appreciate.

On top of creating a brilliant piece of sculpture, he ALSO buffaloed pretty much everyone in town at the time into helping him throw the greatest street party that I remember in over thirty years in this town as the opener for the piece. The gypsies, punks, goths, machine art kids, ravers, hippies, “serious art types”, art fags, pranksters, rocket scientists, burners (this was before the pathetic appellation “burner” was in popular use), city politicos, business owners and pretty much everyone else came out for the party. Many of them helped put it on. The organizing crew got permits to hang the pieces on the building, close Howard St. for the show and have aerial and fire performances right there in broad daylight in South of Market. Try to do that now.

In 13 years Defenestration has become synonymous with San Francisco to many. Along with the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower, The Cliff House, ChinaTown and Lombard Street, Defenestration is on the tour bus routes and is on display daily as a gift to both locals and visitors to our grand and kooky town.

If there is any plan to convince the Powers That Be to retain this wonderful, goofy, grand sculpture as part of whatever development eventually engulfs the corner of 6th & Howard, we should support it whole heartedly. The facades of several historically important buildings in town have been preserved and incorporated into the new structures that were built within their shells. They could perform a similar engineering feet with Defenestration.

In the mean time, let’s do what we can to support Brian in restoring the piece as the final fate of the building is debated by the City and developers.”

Defenestration is more than just rebellious furniture tacked to a wall. It’s a true icon, a symbol of what we do in this city and what a group of genuinely dedicated and excited individuals can be capable of, given the right impetus. It’s a living, breathing piece of history, something tourist and native alike can marvel at. Stories of its construction abound, from the trapeze artists suspended out the window on opening day to tales of fondly remembered mishap. Eva Galperin, now of the EFF, remembers being a high school student working in the interior:

“My most poignant memory of working on Defenestration – I was working on helping to clear out the building, to get all the plaster dust out. We were having lunch on the roof, and I had forgotten something downstairs. So I come barreling down the stairs, covered in plaster dust, only to realize that there is a 2×4 across the stairs, and I don’t duck *quite* fast enough. Giant scar across my back. I came home, covered in plaster dust still, and across my back the plaster dust was pink. I did, in fact, suffer for my art.”

This author remembers Miss Galperin in class sometime after the incident, bragging about the injury and declaring it the coolest one she had gotten to that point and we should all really come down and see this amazing thing they were building.

Michael Michael, also known as Danger Ranger, co-founder of BurningMan, Cacophonist and raconteur, comments:

Defenestration was one of the first large-scale art projects in San Francisco produced by voluntary collaboration. Many challenges had to be overcome to bring this brilliant idea into reality. Assembling a variety of old furniture and then modifying it into whimsical shapes, clearing massive amounts of debris from an old and long-abandoned building, installing supporting frameworks and lighting, all required heroic effort.

During the several months of installation, there was a convergence of colorful characters from all over the country and the labyrinthian interior of the building itself became a temporary colony of artists working all hours. Donated food and supplies appeared each day to fuel the hard-working crew. This historic project attracted a bunch of unique and creative individuals into what became a community effort that has had lasting effect.

And the incredible block party and circus held at the completion of the project is a legendary event remembered by many.”

Chicken John, showman and erstwhile mayoral candidate, apparently became intoxicated upon hearing the news of Defenestration’s potential demise. When asked for a comment, this is what we could make out:

“Defenestration is the most valuable asset. . .beacon of tolerance and whimsy. . .keeping the idea of San Francisco as a city of Art and Innovation. . . .overflowing with possibility. . . championing unconventional thinking. . .embracing function as form. . .perverted f*ing furniture getting away with murder. . . they move you know. . .a genuine cornerstone of truth in a world gone mad. . .if it was a girl I’d marry it. . . can’t let civic treasure slip away. . . demand you commit to its long life. . .city of arts and innovation. . .the dog loved it. . . doom and cold. . . emptiness. . .pigeons. . .”

We over here at LaughingSquid did the math, and figured that if 10% of the population of San Francisco proper gave $1.00, Defenestration would rise again to amaze and delight. Skip one hour of metered parking in SF! Buy one coffee one size down! Go through your couch to repair the one in the window! All donation are tax deductible through the very generous machinations of the Black Rock Art Foundation, with a handy dandy Defenestration Donation Page available for all your donating needs.

In Addition, the 1:AM gallery is hosting a fundraiser and admiration party
to help raise funds:

Please join us on Friday, March 5th, from 6-10 pm for a very special opening/fundraising event at the 1:AM Gallery, on the corner of 6th and Howard Streets. The gallery will host a month-long exhibit celebrating Defenestration, including examples of restoration work in progress and artwork for sale. All proceeds from the event and exhibit go directly to the restoration project. Visit www.1AMSF.com for more information and updates. The exhibit will run through April 2, 2010.

If you weren’t around the first time, donate – time, money, and energy. Contribute some senseless beauty to an uptight world. Forward the donation site around. Be active, if this is something you think is wonderful, because when we win and the piece is beautiful again, you can tell people to look up when you pass, and you will be able to say “That there, that art piece over there, I did that, we did that, all of us.”

photos by Florencia Alemán

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guest post by Aaron Muszalski

photo by Audrey Penven

Talk about subcultural mashups!

Newly-opened SOMA coffeeshop Wicked Grounds has created a unique space for itself at the intersection of two highly-fetishized San Francisco lifestyles, coffee drinking and BDSM. Calling itself a “Kinky Café and Boutique” Wicked Grounds offers gourmet food and drinks – including coffee from the acclaimed Ritual Roasters – alongside a selection of fetish toys and accessories. The café also serves as a gallery space, displaying fine erotic photography and painting, and hosts a diverse variety of special events. They even hosted a live Kink.com porn shoot. Keeping the café open the whole time, of course.

Located at the corner of 8th and Folsom (home to the infamous Folsom Street Fair, in the heart of SF’s leather and fetish scene) and open until 2am on Friday and Saturday, Wicked Grounds has quickly become a favored haunt for kinky and kink-curious coffee lovers alike. With a clientele that runs the gamut from Daddies and Dommes to bloggers and Web entrepreneurs, Wicked Grounds is a uniquely San Franciscan third place; sort of a Perpignan Railway Station for the black leather and laptop set.

photo by Audrey Penven

Despite their growing popularity, Wicked Grounds is currently in need of community support to offset unexpected expenses that they incurred trying to open, San Francisco being an often ridiculously bureaucratic city when it comes to permitting and licensing. You can help by making a donation, dropping in for a latte or spreading the word on twitter, Google or Yelp. All donors will receive a gift package, including a limited edition coloring book signed by noted fetish artist Suzanne Rachel Forbes.

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Oakland Local is a new non-profit community resource for news and information about Oakland, CA that was recently launched by Susan Mernit.

Our site combines original investigative and feature reporting with community news and information about Oakland non-profit organizations, community groups and engaged citizens.

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guest post by Todd Lappin (Telstar Logistics)

photo by Todd Lappin (Telstar Logistics)

Uh-oh. Sad news comes via Sfgirlbybay that the monthly flea market held at the former Alameda Naval Air Station has been cancelled for November… and it’s not clear when (or if) the sprawling event will resume.

According to the flea market’s official website, “Proceedings have been commenced for the voluntary dissolution of Antiques By The Bay, Inc. As a result the show scheduled for Nov 1, 2009 will not take place.” Apparently there’s litigation underway between the partners who organize the flea market. Ew.

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guest post by Josh Ellingson

Alexis Amann & Jonathan Burstein “Don’t Give Up The Ship”

San Francisco Arts Commission’s Community Arts & Education Program (CAE) worked with local businesses in San Francisco to turn storefronts along Market St. between 5th and 8th Streets into temporary art installations. Last night’s “Art in Storefronts – Central Market” reception was teeming with an unlikely mix of art enthusiasts, street musicians, pan-handlers, and giddy teenaged girls (Teen-sensation “Boys Like Girls” was playing next door at the Warfield). Here are some of my photos:

Liz Maher “No One Seems to Care That I Want Roots”

Bayly & Miller “Find Yourself in Natural History”

Phillip Hua “Consider It”

Drone Dungeon Collective

More photos are available in my Flickr set.

The Central Market exhibition runs until January 31st, 2010. The Bayview hosts “Art in Storefronts” starting October 30th and The Mission District jumps on starting November 20th. More information on all of these events can be found at the SF Arts Commission website.

photo by Josh Ellingson

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guest post by Violet Blue

Comedy is truth: While some of us scratch our heads and wonder how an environment for jobs like “social media guru” and pay-per-Tweet advertising can exist, others create scathingly brilliant and hilarious videos about an environment that is so very ripe for parody. As of today, no one’s done it better than Markham Nolan and his public service announcement video The Social Media Guru. It’s also a promo for Xtranormal Beta, text-to-video moviemaking software that we hope will be available for Mac users sooner than later. Still, the truth hurts. Telling us he’ll gladly give us a special offer for advice on our Twitter accounts (translation: “I’ll sit on your Facebook and whack you up the Twitter. Financially.”) Nolan peels back the rich tapestry of bullshit and delivers line after line of painfully familiar, nonsensical promises that the douchiest of exploitative social media consultants seem to be offering. We OH, and we weep.

We hope you watch this video and learn many ways to monetize your Twitter followers.

via edrabbit

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guest post by Burstein!

The hackerspace Noisebridge is one of San Francisco’s cultural and artistic gems. Its members have contributed a wide variety of art, hacks and local culture.

Noisebridge is a space for sharing, creation, collaboration, research, development, mentoring, and of course, learning. Noisebridge is also more than a physical space, it’s a community with roots extending around the world. We help people build neat and awesome things.

On Friday, October 2nd, these über-makers and geeks are having an open house for their one year anniversary that will show off what they have done and can do. This alone is worth the price of admission, which is free. Things to see include:

The Brain Machine (which you can learn to make at noisebridge)

A Compass Vibro-Anklet (which you can learn to make at noisebridge)

A Makerbot Robot (which can be used at noisebridge)

Also at the event will be the Reverse Engineering Bar with only the geekiest of drinks and music by DIY-band Corpus Callosum and Cally McMorrow, circuit bender of legend.

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guest post by Violet Blue

photo by Scott Beale

In a completely non-ironic and potentially exciting move, KQED and the University of California, Berkeley School of Journalism have snatched $5 million in kindling to start the Bay Area News Project. The money is being fronted by the Hellman Family Foundation to create online (and sideline print) media outlets as a “nonprofit, nonpartisan publicly supported news organization.” The first post on their fledgling Twitter account (@bayareanewsproject) announces that they’ve joined forces with the New York Times and the rumor is that it’ll be basically a New York Times West. The veritable Grey Lady herself said — one day after the NYT’s involvement was announced — opines that it’ll be “the largest and most ambitious of dozens of similar local news operations that have cropped up around the country.”

The venture is set to launch next year, which is really just around the corner in old media time, and to get a good sense of what the various people involved have to say about the scope and intention of the next possible Chron/Gate/Examiner killer, there’s a lot to be gleaned in KQED’s roundtable audio interview from Friday. Forum’s recent episode with host Dave Iverson The Future of News? is worth a listen. The topic of local news coverage here in the heart of technology (and the Hollywood of tech) is nothing if not a morbid topic, and there have been many contenders for the title they’re going to be more than a few rounds in the ring for. They’re hiring for freelancers right now (email: jobs at bayareanewsproject dot org). Although on Iverson’s show, when directly asked by a caller self-identified as a journalist, they said there would be compensation but were not transparent about any pay scale. I guess we’ll have to wait until they choose a name for more details (BANP is a temporary title). But they do tell us that distribution will be through a website, mobile applications, KQED will funnel them through radio and television dissemination, and they’re “exploring” print options with the NYT.

On the show, guests (and members of BANP) include Carl Hall, former representative of the SF Chronicle’s newsroom and commercial departments; Jeff Clarke, president and CEO of KQED; Neil Henry, professor and dean of the UC Berkeley’s J-school and author of 2007’s “American Carnival: Journalism Under Siege in an Age of New Media”; Noelle Leca, chair of the board of directors of KQED; and Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. In all it looks to be a very exciting venture, and we’ve been waiting for that local news wake-up call for decades — after all, we really should be leading the world in a revolution for combining democratized reportage and cutting edge technology. But instead most of us just gnash our teeth, watch the lag, read SFist, SF Appeal and SFBG while going elsewhere for… everything else.

Bay Area News Project is nothing if not ambitious. Will they really be the shock troops for journalism’s revolution as they hope? I’m reminded of when GETV was invited as citizen journalists to the 2006 San Francisco International Film Festival in a groundbreaking step to incorporate indie media with mainstream media. Only to discover in our on-the-spot interview with Graham Leggat that while courting us — no: in fact, bloggers and web TV reporters like us were not going to be granted equal access. Bait and switch, or perhaps yet another case of misunderstanding the medium. In the KQED Forum show, they tell us that BANP wants to “engage, listen, communicate with one another… with professional heart for news gathering and dissemination.” While also bantering that unlike citizen journalism, “truth” is at the heart of professional journalism, hence their preference for pro over citizen reportage — a sentiment many of us might find dismaying, at odds with our experience, and simply old fashioned.

Well, we can take heart that KQED’s Noelle Leca can be quoted as saying (at 37:35, in case we need it later) that Bay Area News Project “is a risk taking venture.” We certainly hope so. And Lillian Hellman was a very interesting and cool woman. BANP, whatever it will be called, could be just the kick in the [body part] that is needed, not just locally but nationally or even internationally. And that would be something to finally be proud of, indeed.

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guest post by Laszlo Thoth

There’s an unusual sign in the window of the former Nob Hill See’s Candies of 1519 Polk Street. Landlord, horse farmer, fountain parker, and “911 Bounty Hunter” John Jenkel explains that the San Francisco candy maker has been evicted due to their contribution to the “Enron-sponsored” 9/11 attacks. The eviction notice places the candy company in a plot involving Warren Buffet.

photo by Laszlo Thoth

Confused? I was too, but I think I’ve figured it out:

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Back in 1997 and 1998 our friend Warrior Girl organized the epic 24 Hour Community Spacewalk through San Francisco’s Mission District. Since then she’s taken it to Los Angeles and now she’s bringing The 24 Hour Community Spacewalk to the streets of Detroit from noon on June 13th through noon June 14th.

The 24 Hour Community Spacewalk is a twenty-four hour long creative adventure. It takes place in a participating area of a city and incorporates the local community, artists, restaurants, non-profits, and churches. The Spacewalk festival begins at noon in a designated location with a collective event. Then, with program and map in hand, Spacewalkers begin their own odyssey. Spacewalks conclude with another collective event in a particular location with the focus on contributions, for example, in-kind donations by restaurants to feed the local needy, or cleaning the streets, where needed. The Spacewalk creates an opportunity for individuals to work, create, collaborate, organize and celebrate as a community team. It encourages the individual to take on the responsibility for their own ideas and how they can interact within and affect their community.

See the Spacewalk website and Facebook group for more info on how to participate.

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In an effort to create awareness of the “invisible” homeless population in Dusseldorf, Germany, local filmmakers projected video of a street scene on a homeless man making him appear transparent.

via Urban Prankster

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guest post by Mike Monteiro

If you enjoy your comic book buying experience replete with an angry, curmudgeonly, yet somehow charming store owner in a space that’s floor to ceiling newsprint in several states of ‘vintage’ than you’ll love Al’s Comics. You’re almost guaranteed to be yelled at for touching a comic the wrong way. Or bringing a drink in the store. Or asking him how Superman cuts his hair. In other words; it’s perfect.

Unfortunately, Al’s has run into some hard times as have many book store owners. With bills piled higher than this week’s comic stack he’s finding it hard to stay afloat. Being that he’s a community fixture, the community has come together to give him a leg up.

This Sunday, March 22nd there will be a Benefit for Al’s Comics at Cellspace located at 2050 Bryant Street in San Francisco.

5pm to midnight. Kids can hang out until 7pm, when the liquor starts flowing.

Pay what you can.

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guest post by Violet Blue

Above is Ely Kim’s truly awesome “Boombox: 100 days, 100 songs, 100 locations, 100 dances” — one of the three videos Jason Schultz (Dir Samuelson Law & Technology Clinic, UC Berkeley) used in his South By SouthWest Interactive 2009 panel New Threats to New Media: Fair Use On Trial. Of the many excellent panels and core conversations at SXSWi ‘09, Shultz’s stood out as one of the most exciting, unforgettable and still talked about sessions at the convention.

That’s not the only thing that left us stirred and excited: We also truly loved a couple of the packed, standing room only core conversations. Like the provocative and informative How Not To Be Evil (Even By Accident) with Danny O’Brien and Eva Galperin (both from the EFF). Also remarkable and highly valuable was the packed Therapy 2.0: Mental Health for Geeks with Dr. Keely Kolmes (professional website) and Thomas Roche. See also: the Therapy 2.0 wiki here. Don’t get me wrong: there was some pure, tiresome, self-congratulatory crap on the schedule; but the value, when found, was extremely high.

But it was the Fair Use on Trial panel that had the dynamic format, high energy, conflict and controversy that made us remember why it’s worth traveling to see this always-evolving conference. For the panel, Schultz picked Stanford’s Julie Ahrens (one of Shepard Fairey’s lawyers); her polar opposite lawyer Ben Sheffner (Fox Media, the McCain presidential campaign); and film artist Kelly Nyks.

Then Schultz set up a really exciting format: first he’d show us an Internet video where fair use was in question. Next, he’d ask the audience for a quick show of hands — was this fair use or not? No nitty gritty definition or dissection, just our initial gut reactions to the video. Fast! Schultz then gave each lawyer three minutes apiece to argue their case (and they were at odds each time). After the arguments, then Schultz would quickly ask the room again — was the video fair use, or not? Then he’d ask if anyone changed their minds. Every time, people did. Jason would then ask one of the people who’d switched to tell us the reason they switched, and only 30 seconds to sum it up for the room. It was the Fair Use Experiment. We watched three videos total, and the Q/A after was on fire.

It was intense, fast-paced and sparked conversations that continued — well, we’re still having them. One of the other videos Schultz showed was “The Films of Stanley Kubrick“. What do you think? Are either of the videos in this post fair use, or not? This slide was our guide.

* More images from the panel are here.

photo by Violet Blue

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guest post by Hugh D’Andrade

You don’t know what you’ve got till you’ve gone.

I was never a big fan of the Mr. Pickle sign just down street from my workplace — it’s big, it’s neon green, it’s garish as all hell. But now that Mr. Pickle has been stolen, I’m distraught. What will become of our native San Franciscan culture if quirky, imaginative signage like Mr. Pickle can be so easily plucked from the city streets and made to disappear without a trace?

My co-workers at EFF say Mr. Pickle has the best sandwiches in the neighborhood (though being gluten-intolerant, I can’t confirm this). The owners would like their sign back. If you have any information, please help Mr. Pickle find his way home!

via Mission Mission

photo by Todd Lappin (Telstar Logistics)

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guest post by Chicken John

So our friend Hollis Hawthorne (who’s part of the bicycle dance team The Bay Area Dérailleurs) falls off a motorcycle in India while exploring the planet. Hits her head and tumbles into a coma. Sad. Scary. Mom flies over, hospitals, information gets passed around… and this thing happens. I’ve seen it before. It’s amazing. Activation. People activate. It’s almost like a hive mind thing. It’s like: boom. All business. Someone found a program at Stanford Medical Center for head injuries that she qualifies for. The program is free. Hollis has no medical insurance. So we just needed to get her from India to Stanford. She would ride in an air ambulance.

$150,000 meter on that cab ride. So fundraising started on Monday.

Today we are somewhere between $60 and $70 thousand dollars.

Huh?

We have collected over a thousand donations from $1 to $5,000. It’s incredible. But that’s not the juiciest part. We contacted the Motorcycle Association. Someone knew someone that was part of that group. Someone else was the ex-boyfriend of the lobbyist of the Head Injury Association. Someone from Senator Dianne Finesteins office called asking if we need a jet that Bank of America’s has jets and are looking for good press… maybe they can donate. Knows a guy. In our small community, we were able to find plane people, doctors, lawyers, lobbyists, immigration people, fundraisers… on and on. I’ve got the cell phone of the #7 guy at Paypal. There isn’t anyone we don’t have access to. Really.

Hollis cast the chains of her respirator aside yesterday, and today is banging out 24 breaths a minute. She forgot how to breathe for a bit. Hopefully in a minute, she’ll remember to wake up. Stretch her legs. Complain about the food. (is hospital food in India terrible? Can that even be possible?) We are all hopeful. She’s young, strong. Did a lotta yoga and all that crap. I think that stuff matters.

It’s just an inspiring and amazing thing to watch unfold. It’s like basic Chaos… possibility turning into actual with no blueprint. And the most beautiful part is that it’s all action and people and emails and donations and 7 fundraisers to be booked and shows and dinners and art auctions and blogs and facebook and mailing lists and on and on and on and on……. all happening whilst this delicate little flower just lays sleeping. A slightly Elven look to her… you could almost see pointy ears tucking out from her hat. Trucks being loaded and unloaded, banks changing money, DJ’s blaring that awful music, artists feverishly applying paint to canvas, the stages being set up, the bloggers ticking away on their laptops in a café, signs being painted, people standing in front of the benefit shows smoking, 20 million phone calls… all this chaos in a million different directions costing billions and billions of calories, and in the center: this peaceful creature. Snoring.

To donate something to Hollis to reach the $150,000 goal to bring her home, or to check in on her, please visit the blog that has been set up:

friendsofhollis.blogspot.com

Or write something here in the comment section. Thanks to everyone who kicked down. It’s really just amazing.

And I’d like to leave you with this:

“The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.”

Friedrich Nietzsche

UPDATE: “This just in, if you give today before 6:00, a donor known only as Mr. Dragon will match your donation… up to $3,000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Please put “Dragon match” in your donation note field… Thank you, Mr. Dragon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Please add your donations to the comments, so we can keep trackk. At this rate, Hollis will be home for dinner on Monday!!!!!!!!!!!!!

photo by unknown

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In these times of economic hardship, it’s important that we gather together our nearest and dearest and make a concerted effort to support the things that really matter.

This of course means robots that serve cocktails.

Austria’s RoboExotica made its maiden foray into US territory last spring, with their first annual RoboExotic-US, a screamingly successful conference and meditation on the human-machine interface in the form of the cocktail robot.

A good time was had by all, at least according to those who actually remember the event.

The plan is to bring the whole shebang back this year for a West Coast tour (Maker Faire, RoboGames, and of course another RoboExoticUS).

For this mission of mercy and philosophical understanding to come to fruition, RoboexoticUS needs YOUR HELP! They have set up a pledge page on Pledgie to gently entreat you to send in your pennies to aid the robots’ journey across the ocean.

Donate a buck or two, and reap the rewards when they arrive triumphant through the gates of SFO, slinging rum, insults, fire, beer and the satisfaction in knowing that if it’s done right, science can really hurt the next day.

See Previously: Roboexotica USA Photos & Video

Thanks Scott Beale for the photo of El Espanol Borracho!

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guest post by Jackson West

While Keith Olbermann and other newsy types love Twitter because it saves them from having to send reporters or camera crews out for obligatory “man on the street” comments (not to mention gossips who may or may not have contributed to Valleywag and were constantly surprised at what people felt was appropriate to post publicly in an easily archived and searchable format), there are socially responsible uses for the short-message service. Case in point: The phlebotimists at Blood Centers of the Pacific and the Social Media Club are hosting a Blood Drive Tweetup on Tuesday, March 3rd at the Elephant and Castle pub in downtown San Francisco.  Anyone who donates some of their precious bodily fluids will get a voucher for a free hamburger and a legitimate excuse to take a nap.  Do good, get fed, and score some well-deserved @ reply props — what’s not to like?

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- David Lynch Confirms Twitter Account

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Our friends at the DNA Lounge in San Francisco are having a tough time with the The California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control who appear to be trying to force them out of business. The club’s owner, open source pioneer Jamie Zawinski has been documenting this issue on the DNA Lounge blog. They are currently seeking donations for their Legal Defense Fund and have setup a Save DNA Lounge page on Facebook.

The California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control is trying to put DNA Lounge out of business! They are accusing the club of “running a disorderly house injurious to the public welfare and morals”, and are trying to permanently revoke our liquor license. If they succeed, the club will close.

UPDATE: Violet Blue wrote about the DNA situation in her San Francisco Chronicle column.

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