Thanks to the Facebook IPO, one lucky early investor may finally be able to buy that $50 million Tribeca townhouse he always wanted. A West Coast-based Facebook insider has flown to New York twice to look at 144 Duane Street, the massive $49.5 million property listed with Prudential Douglas Elliman brokers Matthew Gulker and John Musso, the New York Post reports. What insider could it be, we wondered? After a brief Facebook and Twitter search, we’re putting our money on Matt Cohler, who tweeted an Instagram photo from New York on April 28, then followed up with a highly-suspicious May 10 tweet, “My soul may belong to New York, but my heart belongs to San Francisco.” But then again, Drop.io founder and former New Yorker ... Continue reading →
The whole town is abuzz right now with talk of “Ideal Pole,” the show that Norwegian strongman Bjarne Melgaard curated at the Lower East Side gallery Ramiken Crucible. Why? Because there are two young white tigers, Sonia and Tanya, there for the next few days. They’re very cute—and a little bit scary. The pair are supposed to be modeling a number of tiger collars made by the Bushwick designer Ms. Fitz, but as she explained in a brief e-mail interview, that didn’t work quite work out as planned. Gallerist: The project is just wild. How did you come to work with Mr. Melgaard? Ms. Fitz: I had been intrigued by Bjarne’s work since I heard about his Aids Roulette performance, and I worked with his ... Continue reading →
I was breastfed until I was 4 years old. Or 5, maybe. My mother has always been fuzzy on the exact math. I choose to go with 4, because as it is, people tend to look so shocked that I’m afraid their lower jaws might actually fracture were I to add a full year to my tenure suckling on what I reportedly liked to call “nippy.” As you might imagine, this information became humiliating to me right around the time I sprouted my own breasts (sixth grade or seventh grade, depending on which breast you want to date from—they were Irish twins). It didn’t help that my mother, a childbirth education teacher, liked to brag about it to her equally liberal-minded friends and colleagues. But ... Continue reading →
Barry Diller used to run a broadcast network. Now, plaintiffs say, he’s about to run them into the ground. Mr. Diller The sun was still setting when The Observer rounded the corner under The High Line for IAC’s Internet Week closing party, co-hosted by Aereo, a provocative new startup that will allow users to view broadcast content on their computers, smartphones and tablets. Off the drab West Side Highway, the Frank Gehry-designed building shimmered like a landing dock for a space ship–as if the top could twist off and whir its way into the atmosphere. Will Arnett and Wilmer Valderrama walked the red carpet. Dolled-up in pale pink, Allison Williams (the Miranda to Lena Dunham’s Carrie) took Barry Diller’s elbow as she navigated the crowd. ... Continue reading →
Last Friday, as his brainchild company went public, Mark Zuckerberg’s face filled the multistory video screen adorning the Times Square Reuters building, his image a grinning, pasty vision of triumph—little brother as Big Brother. In the 30 seconds after the bell rang at the NASDAQ exchange, more than 80 million shares were traded, and with the IPO (really the night before, when the underwriting banks bought the stock from Facebook), Mr. Zuckerberg made $25 B. But he wasn’t making any money off me. I joined Facebook in 2007, back when you still had to identify your school to become a member. Carefully curated pics were promptly uploaded to my profile, and soon I was scrutinizing my future college classmates, accepting friend requests with bright-eyed, bushy-tailed ... Continue reading →
Mr. Blodget loves puppies on websites. Loves 'em. We tried to find a picture of Mr. Blodget with a puppy but could not. Guys, Henry Blodget is mad entertaining. He is especially entertaining when he gets going on the subject of new media and its best/worst practices. The man charged into his mid-morning TechCrunch Disrupt panel on the matter with guns blazing, apparently ready to defend to the death “linkbait” and whatever else you might want to take issue with, by God. Of course, he had reason to come ready to rumble. Joining Mr. Blodget on the stage were TechCrunch’s Alexia Tsotsis, BuzzFeed’s Jonah Peretti, and Techmeme founder Gabe Rivera. An illustrative moment: Ms. Tsotsis asked the panelists what they see as new media worst ... Continue reading →
