Which State Experienced More Earthquakes in 2014 Than California?

Image: inquisitr.com

Bloomberg's Barry Ritholtz provides a useful selection of daily news stories. This morning, he posted an article that originally appeared in revealnews.org about US earthquake incidences in 2014. Now, one would speculate that the Vegas odds would be strongest on California as the state with the highest number of reported seismic episodes. Well, sometimes the odds makers get snookered. According to the revealnews.org story, the unlikely leader for last year was Oklahoma. In fact, the OK State experienced three times the number of earthquakes -- 253! -- as did the Golden State.

The data gave rise to an immediate suspicion that fracking encouraged Oklahoma's alarmingly high tremor rate. That speculation withers in its inability to prove that the frackers are fracking with the environment. However, I suppose it's fair to say that there's a whole lot of shakin' goin' on in the OK State.

Les Paul's "Black Beauty" Guitar on Auction Block

Les Paul's "Black Beauty"
(Image: Tina Feinberg/The New York Times)

The world of guitar players and instrument makers has its own legacy, understandings, and concepts of value. From that perspective, the guitar community offers a refreshing change of pace from algorithm proselytizers' relentless triumphalism.

The upcoming auction of Les Paul's "Black Beauty" guitar is a case in point. You don't have to know the nuances of musical instruments to appreciate this as an important moment in our shared musical journey. Paul's invention irrevocably, and positively, changed the course of popular music.

The auction and the background of "Black Beauty's" creation is wonderful to read. I won't spoil it here;  just enjoy the linked article. The original report comes from The New York Times; the Seattle Times picked it up and that's where I found the story.

Can Artists Afford to Live and Work in New York?

Over the weekend, my wife and I attended an artist's opening in a culture-conscious New Jersey suburb of New York. The inexpensive exhibition area, with its awkward geometry, odd seating area, and marble-like floors, felt out of sync with the contemporary preference for airy, raw spaces. Doors of psychologists' offices and small-time consultancies alternated with the art work on the walls. The lighting, surprisingly, helped the art work's better qualities emerge without struggle.

Hmmm...was the space suitable for the event? The gallerist and artist made the best of the situation. However, the setting was far from ideal, and that's being generous.

The artist's and the gallerist's minimal financial resources most likely dictated the venue selection. It's hardly an unusual scenario for a visual artist. More and more painters, sculptors, photographers, and hybrid artists (e.g., the "multi-media" crowd) find themselves in locations as far from New York's big-time as Earth is from Jupiter. They will find better spaces at prices they can actually, maybe afford in fly-over states than they would in the American art capitals.

Alan Feuer
(Image: Twitter)

New York Times writer Alan Feuer precisely considered this point in his December 2014 defense "They Say Art Is Dead in New York. They're Wrong.":

You hear a lot these days about Detroit, New Orleans, Minneapolis -- fresh new meccas where the rent is cheap and the cops don't hassle you, man. They have that vibe, people say, that edge that New York used to have. There's a real community think going on.

But then, the community in New York, especially in the D.I.Y. arts underground, is pretty robust...

The problem with Feuer's approach is few can afford to stick around for the "robust" activity. A quick look at Lena Dunham Brooklyn shows art-centric neighborhoods rapidly transforming into playgrounds for the affluent. Where are less than prosperous artists going to go? Some painters I know are seriously considering moving their studios to neighborhoods adjacent to Kennedy Airport. That's Siberia.

The one-percenter art world just doesn't care about this issue. (Neither does "the voice of my generation" Ms. Dunham, who was born into the one-percent world.) The elite believes it is the only art world that counts. The remaining ninety-nine percent can eat cake, or move to some grim, distant metropolis. The message from New York's art world power brokers is a blunt one: If you don't have the money, take your artistic ambitions elsewhere.

Tyler Brule
(Image: Wikipedia)

Interestingly, the Canadian journalist Tyler Brule offered a similar observation in his recent Financial Times piece about Montreal:

For the moment Montreal remains an interesting place because a depressed economy allows creativity to flourish (think Berlin) as low rents mean it's easier to try out a new retail concept or start a restaurant.

You could easily add the art community to the mise en scene Brule depicted. The catch is whether such low-rent communities are sustainable without the attention and the sanction of the art capitals and their influential mandarins. How do scattered artists maintain, explore, and expand the energy and ideas that inform their activities? If social media were the answer, why do so many visual artists show up in the flesh in New York or London?

Once upon a time, New York was rightfully considered a place where artistic endeavor was encouraged and valued. Struggle toward achievement, recognition, and reward was accepted as part of the deal. The outsourcing of creative activity to the lower-rent provinces or a capital's outer fringes reduces artists' opportunities for impact, growth, and ferment. Little good can emerge from that "brain drain" scenario, and no number of quasi-exile art openings can change that outlook.

Charlie Hebdou Attack Compels Paris to Restrict Street Filming of Action Movies

Interior of Paris' Gare du Nord,
near which Jason Bourne in The Bourne Identity
began his Parisian car escape.
(Image: Wikipedia)

New York residents are accustomed to seeing its neighborhoods turned into backdrops for film and television productions. However, the Big Apple is not the only city so blessed by studio and directorial preference. Paris' charming rues, boulevards, and avenues, along with its iconic structures, also appear with increasing frequency in feature-length feature films and television series.

Alas, one consequence of the Charlie Hebdou and Paris kosher supermarket massacres is increased sensitivity toward violence in the City of Light. As a result, according to a BBC report, Parisian authorities have significantly restricted movie and television productions' shooting (no pun intended) of action sequences in the city itself. The BBC story noted that one municipal concern was the possible confusion between actors and dangerous, armed impostors. Ironically, the blurred line between simulated violence and the real thing has become too grave a risk for the French capital to tolerate on its streets.

K-Cup Maker's DRM Strategy Roasts Keurig

Keurig 2.0
(Image: keurig.com)

It wasn't so long ago that K-cups didn't exist. Then, someone at Green Mountain Coffee, which owns the Keurig (i.e., K-cup) brand, invented the plastic, portion-controlled items that have since become ubiquitous. The original Keurig coffee maker was a sensational commercial hit, although coffee purists found its ground offerings produced colorless, degraded coffee drinking experiences.

Well, Keurig's success eventually found imitators who created K-cup clones. Since Keurig used its inexpensive coffee makers as bait to make money on its high-margin coffee, the K-cup knock-offs were a most unwelcome development for Green Mountain.

According to an article in theverge.com, the firm's solution was Keurig 2.0. While touting the new gadget's ability to provide greater volume variety, the machine's "advanced scanning system" only accepted DRM-compliant K-cups! Nothing else would work in the machines, including K-cups manufactured for Keurig's 1.0 coffee makers.

Apparently, consumers have gone ballistic over 2.0's restrictions. The ultimate boycott would be to dump ecologically unsound plastic cups and their coffee maker enablers. Call it coffee making 3.0.

Hollywood, Kodak Near Deal to Save Movie Film

The virtues of using digital "film" versus shooting with film-film continue to concern movie makers and fine art photographers. Each point of view has its merits. However, it appeared digital would ultimately survive, simply because firms were discontinuing the manufacture of roll film (e.g., 35 mm film).

That dynamic has slowed a bit in the movie industry, thanks to the efforts of major directors such as Quentin Tarantino. They believe movies shot on film offer a rich visual experience that digital means cannot effectively duplicate or supersede. (I agree with the directors' position.) These influential voices have helped bring about a deal between Kodak and major Hollywood studios regarding the continued manufacture of film stock.

According to a story by Sam Byford in theverge.com, LA's major players and Kodak have okayed a supply agreement that would ensure motion picture film stock well into the future. (Please, no jokes about the length of a Hollywood "future.") For anyone who has experienced movies the way they were meant to be seen, this is very welcome news.

Harper Lee's Second Novel

Harper Lee
(Image: abcnews.go.com)

The news that Harper Lee has given permission to publish her second novel was generally cheered. However, the details, as outlined in Publishers Weekly and elsewhere, are frankly not that exciting. Ms. Lee's publisher, ironically named Harper (as in the Rupert Murdoch-owned HarperCollins), provided a unsurprisingly gushing statement of joyous support for the author's assent. Given that To Kill a Mockingbird has a lifetime sale of over 40 million printed copies (and counting), you would be joyous, too. The book is practically de rigueur in American school curricula, ensuring massive sales year after year after year.

To her credit, Ms. Lee resisted e-book's siren song for years. Her right of refusal probably drove HarperCollins' financial analysts crazy. She finally conceded, purportedly so that more readers would have access to her work.

With all due respect to the author, I wish Lee had not released her second book. She should rest on her laurels, as she wisely did for the past half-century.

Rex Ryan Keeps Wife, Changes Tattoos

Image: web.yesnetwork.com

Pro football coach Rex Ryan recently faced an identity crisis. Last month, he became top banana of the Buffalo Bills. The problem was that Mr. Ryan's body included a tattoo of Mrs. Ryan wearing the uniform of a quarterback who once played for the team Ryan formerly coached. Rex and his brain trust quickly concluded that fans in Buffalo and western New York would not be enchanted if he sported a tattoo featuring their downstate rival.

The quick-thinking Mr. Ryan decided that a visit to a tattoo parlor near the site of this year's Super Bowl game was just the place to set matters straight. According to a Wall Street Journal report summarized in nj.com, Ryan changed the tattoo from New York Jet green to Buffalo Bills blue. He kept the missus on his skin, while the quarterback...well, let's just say his contract was not renewed.