The Bancroft Library unveils a new 1906 San Francisco Earthquake site featuring a really cool clickable map that features photos from each section of town. Haight Street didn't look too bad, but just down the road, City Hall was leveled. The exhibit offers a guide to the event that look place nearly 100 years ago.
posted by mathowie on Jan 14, 2006 - 20 comments

The idea behind the Parking art project is pretty simple: once you throw some coins in the meter, you can do pretty much anything with a parking space, right? Rebar decided to try converting some vehicle space into a community space, by laying sod, adding benches and a tree, then letting people enjoy the space for a few hours. [via treehugger]
posted by mathowie on Dec 17, 2005 - 32 comments

Graffiti Archaeology Pretty cool flash app that lets you view photos of the same walls in San Francisco over time, as the many layers of graffiti accumulate. To anyone that has ever ridden the Caltrain, a lot of these walls should look familiar.
posted by mathowie on Dec 20, 2003 - 6 comments

What does Wille Brown's staff know that we don't? Apparently, Mayor Brown got a warning 8 hours before the attack, and is still in SF because he heeded their advice. What did they know and how did they know it?
posted by mathowie on Sep 13, 2001 - 19 comments

San Francisco Muni to consider naming stations after advertisers. If you've been in SF (or any major US city) recently, you've probably noticed the buses covered with ads inside and out, the two stadiums named after corporations (all US stadiums seem to be now), and subway platforms coated in billboards. Now, they're considering selling the names of each station off to the highest bidder. Is this going too far or should a city do anything to make a buck? (I'm reminded of the book Generation X where the author jokes about rampant advertising, and how one day you'll ask your friend what time it is, and he'll simply say "Pepsi")
posted by mathowie on Jan 23, 2001 - 40 comments

Here's a nice survey of geographic location of domain name ownership. I was surprised to see that people in Los Angeles own more domains than San Francisco, but I assume the researcher didn't lump all the Silicon Valley cities together to get that number. I'm sure a "Bay Area" grouping would be number one. Of the .com, .org, and .net addresses, the US still leads the world with 2/3 of all addresses in that domainspace, so I guess the web will continue to be American-centric for some time.
posted by mathowie on Feb 14, 2000 - 1 comment

The San Francisco Examiner is up for sale? I didn't even know this. I'm surprised no dotcoms have swooped in to buy the dead trees media. Apparently, they need a buyer very soon, or the paper will merge with the SF Chronicle. Will SF become yet another one-newspaper city? Sad...
posted by mathowie on Jan 29, 2000 - 1 comment

Salon is running a piece on how the internet has ruined San Francisco. I have to say I agree 100%. I've lived in Southern California all my life and S.F. has historically been a much cooler, mellower place that I looked forward to visiting. But over the past couple of years, I've found myself travelling up there once every couple months, and every time I go it's busier, more crowded, and everyone is in a bigger hurry. For me, the mystique of S.F. is totally gone. The dotcom riches have ruined the place. [found at Camworld]
posted by mathowie on Oct 28, 1999 - 0 comments