Some time after 9/11 the New York City MTA created a new campaign to encourage citizens to report suspicious activity in the city’s subways. The tag line is “If You See Something, Say Something.” (as seen below… Spanish style).

Recently, the MTA has papered the subways with a new ad that celebrates the fact that, in 2007, 1,944 people saw something and said something.

That’s it? Only 1,944?

The subway ridership in New York is 1.5 billion… per year. 4.9 million per week.

This leads me to believe that the Stop Snitchin’ campaign has officially crossed over.

I mean, I alone have witnessed 1,000 incidents that could have warranted a call to 311… but I ain’t no snitch.

I just got around to reading Jonathan Lethem’s truly inspired piece entitled The Ecstasy of Influence in the February Issue of Harpers Magazine. The piece explores plagiarism and influence in art. It is a must read. I really like what Lethem is doing with his own art. He isn’t merely philosophizing on copyright, he is walking the walk. Check out his Promiscuous Materials project where he has given non-exclusive rights to various stories and music lyrics for a dollar. He also recently decided to give a free option to the film rights for his latest book You don’t love me yet to one lucky filmaker.

A Conversation at the Grownup Table, as Imagined at the Kids’ Table

MOM: Pass the wine, please. I want to become crazy.

DAD: O.K.

GRANDMOTHER: Did you see the politics? It made me angry.

DAD: Me, too. When it was over, I had sex.

UNCLE: I’m having sex right now.

DAD: We all are.

MOM: Let’s talk about which kid I like the best.

DAD: (laughing) You know, but you won’t tell.

MOM: If they ask me again, I might tell.

FRIEND FROM WORK: Hey, guess what! My voice is pretty loud!

DAD: (laughing) There are actual monsters in the world, but when my kids ask I pretend like there aren’t.

MOM: I’m angry! I’m angry all of a sudden!

DAD: I’m angry, too! We’re angry at each other!

MOM: Now everything is fine.

DAD: We just saw the PG-13 movie. It was so good.

MOM: There was a big sex.

FRIEND FROM WORK: I am the loudest! I am the loudest!

(Everybody laughs.)

MOM: I had a lot of wine, and now I’m crazy!

GRANDFATHER: Hey, do you guys know what God looks like?

ALL: Yes.

GRANDFATHER: Don’t tell the kids.

“How College Kids Imagine the United States Government” and “A Day at UNICEF Headquarters, as I Imagined It in Third Grade” can been viewed at the New Yorker.

So says the New York Times. I don’t make much of this. Living without a spouse doesn’t mean not married or never married. I was fascinated by this stat though:

“The proportion of married people, especially among younger age groups, has been declining for decades. Between 1950 and 2000, the share of women 15-to-24 who were married plummeted to 16 percent, from 42 percent. Among 25-to-34-year-olds, the proportion dropped to 58 percent, from 82 percent.” (Italics mine)

I have been having a ton of fun over at Long Bets. The purpose of Long Bets is to improve long-term thinking.

Someone makes a prediction. Once the prediction is on the website someone can make a wager that the prediction will not come true. The subject of the prediction or bet must be societally or scientifically important. Predictors and bettors must provide an argument explaining why the subject of their prediction is important and why they think they will be proved right. The wagers are held in an escrow account and are payable to the a charity of the winner’s choice. The list of predictors and bettors is a who’s who of big brains.

For instance, one of my favorite bets is between Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google) and Craig Mundie (CTO of Microsoft).

Craig believes that by 2030, commercial passengers will routinely fly in pilotless planes. Eric decidely disagrees. You can read their arguments here.

Long Bets is a project of the Long Now Foundation which was founded by, among others, Brian Eno (who coined the term).

The Long Now Foundation was established in 1996 and hopes to “provide counterpoint to today’s ‘faster/cheaper’ mind set and promote ’slower/better’ thinking. [They] hope to creatively foster responsibility in the framework of the next 10,000 years.”

I read a fantastic article by Eno wherein he came up with the idea of the Long Now. I can’t put my finger on it now. Here it is.

Two quotes from Paul Graham’s essential essay What You Can’t Say.

One:

“In every period of history, there seem to have been labels that got applied to statements to shoot them down before anyone had a chance to ask if they were true or not. “Blasphemy”, “sacrilege”, and “heresy” were such labels for a good part of western history, as in more recent times “indecent”, “improper”, and “unamerican” have been. By now these labels have lost their sting. They always do. By now they’re mostly used ironically. But in their time, they had real force… In any period, it should be easy to figure out what such labels are, simply by looking at what people call ideas they disagree with besides untrue. When a politician says his opponent is mistaken, that’s a straightforward criticism, but when he attacks a statement as “divisive” or “racially insensitive” instead of arguing that it’s false, we should start paying attention.” (emphasis mine)

Two:

“How do we get at these ideas? By the following thought experiment. Imagine a kind of latter-day Conrad character who has worked for a time as a mercenary in Africa, for a time as a doctor in Nepal, for a time as the manager of a nightclub in Miami. The specifics don’t matter– just someone who has seen a lot. Now imagine comparing what’s inside this guy’s head with what’s inside the head of a well-behaved sixteen year old girl from the suburbs. What does he think that would shock her? He knows the world; she knows, or at least embodies, present taboos. Subtract one from the other, and the result is what we can’t say.”

Update: Graham has a follow up to this piece.

I was going to link to this archive of old cereal boxes cause it is totally awesome. But I thought a few of the boxes deserved to be highlighted.

Apparently Native American, Mexican, Chinese and Black folks didn’t eat cereal back in the day:

Jose The Monkey

Apparently his name is SoHi

“Rick Shaw Inside!”

The chopsticks are awesome

These cats didn’t even get names…

No comment…

A rip-snortin’ cereal, a rootin’ tootin’ snack?

two quick thoughts, inspired by a listening of doc watson’s wabash cannonball:

(1) law schools ought to organize music “class”. remember back in elementary school when every other day you’d get together with your friends and just go sing some songs for an hour? maybe even get to play a tamborine or — if it were a special day — the drums? wabash cannonball is one of the songs we’d sing. my musical talent is still as undeveloped as it was when i’s 8, but i’m sure people have progressed, making the possibility for wild rides into the musical unknown likely. anyway, it’d be a morale booster, and esp. nice around this time of year.

(2) based on an unscientific survey, i posit that the more “folsky” and “down-home” a type of music is, the more likely it is for the following feature to be present in songs: The inclusion of multiple artists, in addition to the main artist, who are referenced by name and allowed to play a part of the song on their own. For ex, in Wabash Cannonball, doc watson says, “Get ‘em, Earl”, as Earl Scruggs is allowed to do a little solo on the fiddle. Cf. Hip-hop, which is also a “folsky” and “down-home” type of music and does the exact same thing.

I signed up for flavorpill’s weekly email of “all things hip in NYC.” I assumed I would get it once and ditch it. I was pleasantly surprised. The events they pub are eclectic, often cheap, and on almost every occassion, ones I would have otherwise missed. They add true value and I literally trust that they won’t let me miss anything important. I would pay for this email. . . By the way, The Manchurian Candidate is showing at the Film Forum from Friday to Sunday.