I attend quite a few conferences and absolutely HATE carrying around booklets or paper handouts to find out whats going on.

It’s 2010 and I was so pleased about the Internet Week NY App which kept me up to date with everything going on with the conference.

I was so excited and then throughly disappointed at THE NEXT HOPE conference lat July.

You would figure an app designed for a HACKER conference would be slick and chock full of information-it turned out to be poorly designed and altthogh having it installed on my hacked Iphone_ I found myself missing some very interesting panels because  I had to thumb through numerous pages in the conference booklet to find out what was going on-(true story)

Fortunately you can download such interesting discussions as:

A Primer on Neuroscience, Bat Echolocation, and Hacker Bio-inspiration and Hacking Terrorist Networks Logically and Emotionally from Hattorrents.com Thanx guys!

So next week I am heading to Ad:Tech NY and decided to try out the app-

The Free Ad:Tech NY Iphone app does everything it promises-

helps you make the most out of the conference and expo. It features conference sessions by date and track, a list of exhibitors and sponsors, and the ability to select and save your favorites, plus a live Twitter feed. Selecting any listing allows you to view details about the session, speaker, exhibitor, or sponsor.

Download it for free from the app store

Last week I attended a private screening of the HBO Documentary -

SCHMATTA: Rags to Riches to Rags

Ever wonder where the fabric and samples come from for fashion shows?

“schmatta” is the yiddish word for “rag”-

I previously screened this doc with Melissa Davis of TheFatAppleNyc.com and she thought it would be great to screen this in the company of fellow writers, bloggers, fashionistas and tastemakers for the kick off of Mercedes Benz Fashion Week.

The event was held at Wix Lounge-

Wix Lounge: A free work & event space for creatives in NYC, sponsored byWix.com, an online Flash website publishing platform.

and produced by

The Fat Apple : Created by Melissa Davis, began as a site covering  Fashion generally and Plus-Size fashion specifically, Lifestyle and Technology from the perspective of a plus size woman. Currently, The Fat Apple encompasses 3 brands, TheFatAppleNYC.com, TodayInShoes.com andGalleryDates.com. New York and the Big Apple is Bigger than you thought!

Special Thanks to the sponsors of this event-

Thank you Jennifer Sohan from Devi-excellent Indian Cuisine!

Everyone raved about the cauliflower treats-I wouldnt know becaue they disappeared so quickly!-

check them out at http://www.devinyc.com/

Location:
8 East 18th Street (between 5th Ave. & Broadway)
New York, NY 10003
Reservations: (212) 691-1300 or make a reservation at www.OpenTable.com

Yummy Snacks

“The Garment Center is the heart and soul of Midtown Manhattan and the backbone of the fashion industry. This HBO feature documentary, produced by Blowback productions, explores the rise and fall of New York’s fabled schmatta (rag) trade as a microcosm for the economic shocks that have changed our lives. Director Marc Levin’s documentary will get you thinking about why your H&M dress is $10″

DIRECTED BY | Marc Levin
PRODUCED BY | Daphne Pinkerson, Marc Levin
EDITOR/CO-PRODUCER | Richard Lowe
LINE PRODUCER | Kara Rozansky
ASSOCIATE PRODUCER | Karl Hollandt
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER (HBO) | Sheila Nevins
SUPERVISING PRODUCER (HBO) | Nancy Abraham
FIELD PRODUCER | Donovan Leitch
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY | Daniel Levin
ASSISTANT EDITOR | Chris Walker
ORIGINAL MUSIC BY | John Zorn

Snapped in a grocery store in the Bronx

AOL Blogger event drink-BLOG IT TO ME!

vision vodka, liimoncello, fresh basil, fresh muddled lemons, a hint of sugar

Used Jailbreakme.com to free my Iphone 3GS

Diesel Kick Ass Party

More hilarity can be found at The Oatmeal by Matthew Inman

Last weekend I attended The Next Hope (Hackers on Planet Earth) conference, held at the Hotel Pennsylvania in NYC. It is held every 2 years and this is the 4th time I attended since 1998.

This is the badge-

this is the schematic for the badge designed by Travis Goodspeed-

“These badges are active RFID tags which beacon the position of each attendee a few times a second, so that the god damned devil army of lies–by which I mean the Next HOPE badge committee–can track each attendee around the Hotel Pennsylvania.”

There were alot of other cool things to check out such as this USB Typewriter setup and a working EASY button

Here are some topics to some of the talks I attended-

• Circuitbending
• Keeping Your Job While Being a Hacker
• Examining Costs, Benefits, and Economics in Malware and Carding Markets
• Arse Elektronika: Sex, Tech, and the Future of Screw-It-Yourself
• How Hacking is Both the Death and Future of Traditional and Interactive Publishing, Journalism, and the Media
• Reach Out And Touch Face: A Rant About Failing
• Sita Sings the Blues: A Free Culture Success Story

A keynote was scheduled to be given by Julian Assange of Wikileaks , he did not show for obvious reasons, but his partner Jacob Appelbaum and developer of TOR gave a great talk,cover past, present and future developments of the project and showed the much talked about a videotape showing a U.S. Army Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad that killed a dozen people, including two Reuters news staff. for more information check out CollateralMurder.com

I got to ride a Segway (video on that later) and got put on to Etherape!-is a packet sniffer/network traffic monitoring tool, developed for Unix (thank you AngelXIII!)

I met threat analyst and journalist, known as a former grey hat hacker, Adrian Lamo  (we now follow each other on foursquare)

He also informed the authorities of the identity of a US Army Intelligence Specialist who is alleged to be the source of the July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike video leak to Wikileaks.

Which shows guts and balls and I am in his corner no matter what his reputation may now be in the hacker community.

I also enjoyed 2 greats talk and got a pic with Johannes Grenzfurthner

(No-I do not work for @cafebustelo)

He is the founder of monochrom, an internationally acting art and theory group.

I shot an interview with a teacher from The Hacktory, a Philidelphia-based group that promotes the use of technolog in the arts.

(look for that video to be posted soon)

Overall, it was a good time of learning and unlearning.

Note: Most of the videos of the talks can be downloaded at Hattorents.com

On Saturday I attended Creators Project at MILK Studios in NYC, it’s  is a joint venture between Vice and  Intel.

The purpose is to launch a new network dedicated to the celebration of creativity and culture across media all around the world.

xx: A Sculpture of the Album -a unique audio-visual collaboration with video director Saam Farahmand, creates “a 3D physical interpretation” of the band’s debut album, xx,

The sculpture utilises film, light and sound via three specially created audio-visual units (each unit representing one member of the band with a mix of exclusively filmed footage and mixed sound), and every visitor  enjoys  a totally unique experience of xx.

Last week I stopped by the Comixology HQ and met  creators Steve Ellis and David Gallaher, Jake and Taylor from comiXology’s  to celebrate the release of the Red 5 Comics’ graphic novel!
Refreshments were  served, including Dan Holiday’s favorite drink!

(Vodka, Cran and Ginger Ale)

Overall a pretty good time, I even met comic book legend Jim Lee!

I downloaded the digital version of the comic on my Iphone and enjoyed the story and artwork-it is loosely based on 1947 radio show of the same name.

Click here to download the first chapter on Iphone

There were some surprises as you can see from the pic-Stay tuned!

If you don’t have an Iphone-you can check out the entire first chapter online here-

http://www.comixology.com/digital/561/Box-13-1

The complete 124 page Graphic Novel is in stores now!