Brooklyn is showing off it’s coolness once again…

ART BROOKLYN starts up tonight for a three day run in DUMBO. It’s mission? “An art fair without precedent, Art Brooklyn is the first fair of its kind to be held in Brooklyn, NY. The intention of the fair is to promote and support Brooklyn as a cultural bellwether of artistic endeavor that influences artistic practice the world over. Open to artists and galleries alike at all levels of practice, Art Brooklyn recovers the standard of an art fair as a platform for presenting the best work by living artists.”

So if you don’t feel like making the treck into Manhattan to rubb shoulders with the Armory show crowd, head on over to DUMBO for a three day event featuring  over seventy gallery exhibitors!

PUBLIC HOURS (Admission is Free except to special events)
Thursday, Friday & Saturday, 3 - 5 March, Noon to 10 pm
Sunday, 6 March, Noon to 6 pm
OPENING NIGHT PARTY
Thursday, 3 March, 2011, 10:00 pm to 4 am

Full schedule can be found on Verge Brooklyn Art

A few years ago I starting to think, why can’t I click on a show, commercial, or product on my TV and find out more information about it?  Why can’t I find out the location/venue where that scene was shot? I guess we don’t  have the technology yet…

Nowadays everywhere I go I hear  Social Media, Facebook, Twitter, Transmedia, E-Commerce, Google, Apple, Frontend, Backend, Data, Cookies, Venture Capital, Facebook, Cisco, DVR, Facebook blah blah blah,

 All I think of is what comes next? Well where is my ClickTV? Why can’t I tag things on my TV? Wouldn’t that be good business? Why can’t I click on the new tidestick ad and then download consumer comments about the product (good and bad)?

Someone’s got to be working on this somewhere…If not, I’ll head up the project and you can fund it. How does that sound? I think as long as it can be turned on and off, the user/consumer experience will change for the better. Get it when you want it, ClickTV. I better go google and see if that name is already copyrighted…

What’s the difference between a good idea and a monster idea? When I first started this little blog of mine one of my first posts was dedicated to a book called Caffiene for the Creative Mind.  A book filled with 250 exercises to help get those creative juices flowing on a daily basis. As a follow-up to Caffiene for the Creative Mind, auhtor Stefan Mumaw gives us Chasing the Monster Idea , which helps us figure out how to determine whether or not our great idea is indeed a “Monster” of an idea. 

Chasing the Monster Idea in it’s essense is a seven-question process for gauging the potential of your ideas. Based on real-world campaigns and insider anecdotes from some of the world’s most prominent marketing minds and ad agencies, Stefan presents seven questions for determining whether you’ve got the potential for a truly explosive idea or the makings of a fizzling yawner.

You can download the first chapter as a PDF then decide if it’s a GOOD IDEA to invest in the future and possibilities of your ideas.

Back in June 2010, the New York Times published an article about 75 silent films, previously thought lost, that have been discovered in New Zealand and are being restored through the efforts of the National Film Preservation Foundation.  The film blog Ferdy on Films is now hosting their second blog-a-thon to raise money for film preseravation: For The Love of Film Noir .

This year, the Film Noir Foundation is their special valentine, and Ferdy on Films will be rasing funds for a very special film: The Sound of Fury, aka Try and Get Me (1950), with blacklisted director Cy Endfield at the helm, and starring Lloyd Bridges and Frank Lovejoy. Accorind to their Ferdy on Films, a nitrate print of the film will be restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive, using a reference print from Martin Scorsese’s personal collection to guide them and fill in any blanks. Paramount Pictures, which now owns the film, has agreed to help fund the restoration, but this only gets them half way there. This is where you can help them by donated to this worthy cause. Of course if you would rather save your donation money for Cancer, I won’t look down on you for that.

According to the good people of PA,  Punxsutawney Phil DID SEE his shadow today. While most of the country has been blanketed by wintery storms, I hope Punxsutawney Phil dose not let us all down.

To celebrate Ferbruary, I’d like to remind you all that it  HOT CHOCOLATE MONTH at City Bakery and PANCAKE MONTH at CLINTON ST BAKERY 

This week kicks off BAM’s monthly Eat, Drink & Be Literary series with authors such as Elizabeth Stout, Jennifer Eagan and Edward Ablee. What a lovely treat to sip wine, eat and be read to! tickets are $50 includes tax and tip. Not a bad night out, although I’ll have to do my own series at at home as my sallary doesnt’ afford me the extra cash to throw around.

Additional info and schedule via BAM’s website.

With all that’s going on with the bike lanes in NYC and the “crack down”  it’s good to know somone is looking out for the cyclists. Tonight Billy Hurricane (cyclists & bar owner) would like to appreciate you and your bike by getting you all liqured up and giving out prizes for most gnarly bike attire. So head on down to 25 Avenue B . Between 2nd & 3rd Streets for your free booze. I’m glad someone appreacites us.

Please for the love of everyone, don’t drink and bike. Bike safe(er).

What are you in the  mood to do tonight? Bowling? Live concerts? Avant garde performances? Knitting? You name the activity you can probably find it, especially in Brooklyn. Not only can you find it but most likely you will find it paired with beer, wine and food. Would you really want it any other way?

Straight from Oklahama to Brooklyn comes Mabel’s Smoke House.  Opening today, featuring “super simple roadside BBQ of the South. 4 meats & 5 sides.” All recipes are secret family recipes from Grandma Mabel.

While the great debate as to who does the best BBQ will go on forever, I have no doubt that if you add music to the  menu like Mabel’s promises that the BBQ will be even better. Cause just eating out is boring. Your brisket, pulled pork and slaw need to be paired with some honkey tonk music or roller skating servers or live circus acts. While those last two may not be at Mabel’s I won’t be suprised if I see that coming anytime soon.

Congrats to Mabel’s on their Grand Opening. I look forward to eating you soon.

Very few things get me as excite as a good idea. I’d like to applaud the folks at Grand Opening for mixing business with pleasure. Not only can I get behind their mission “create interactive stores and events that get public attention and engage the community” but with their ever changing listing of events I may become a regular.

GO as they like to refer to themselves as is at first a place of business, focusing on communication and design. They took over the store front next store and made it into a community space where they host an array of events such as Lowe East Side Film Festival, An “an interactive dinner” hosted by Vicky and and Lysander and Ping Pong. Their listing of events and happenings is quite  impressive. Love the creativity, effective use of space and business model.  You can even get married there in their “chapel” or see a “drive in movie”.

photo from Grand Opening's website

Now the question is which one of these events/experiences do I try first?

Hmmmmmm

They have upped their search by creating the first Google Science Fair Experiment this time focusing on youth 13 - 18 years of age. Google is looking for the brightest young minds from around the world to submit their ideas that are relevant to the world today. What if they are relevant to the world of tomorrow?

Forget Invention Convention.

Hello Google! Rules are here.