Manhattan in the early nineties, captured on what must have at the time been an unusually high-def camera.
The uploader of this incredible archival B-roll footage said to be of New York in 1993 says they captured it off of “a D-Theater HD DVHS Demo Tape by techmoan.com.
It's pretty incredible.
I miss this NYC.
In 2015, a deep investigative report from Inside Climate News revealed that as early as 1977, Exxonmobil knew that it was destroying the planet with CO2 emissions, and its response to that fact was to gin up a decades-long disinformation campaign aimed at sowing expensive doubt about the subject, even as it grew more certain of its facts. Read the rest
Apparently July 17 is National Tattoo Day (it's also my birthday, which means I spend it offline, not paying attention to the internet); to celebrate, the NYPL rounded up a gallery of its workers' literary tattoos. Read the rest
Days after an appeals court panel ordered the unsealing of thousands of pages of documents from one of the civil suits arising from billionaire Jeffrey Epstein's secret sweetheart plea bargain that allowed him to escape any serious penalties for years of alleged trafficking and raping of young teens, he has been arrested by the FBI-NYPD Crimes Against Children Task Force and now faces charges related to dozens of sex offenses against young girls. Read the rest
Comedian, activist, and former late-night TV host Jon Stewart spoke on Capitol Hill today about getting health care and benefits for 9-11 first responders. Read the rest
In 2015, California enacted groundbreaking privacy legislation and in 2018, the state took up the matter again with even tougher rules that have been fought tooth-and-nail by Big Tech companies, many of whom are headquartered in the state. Read the rest
There isn't single county in the nation where a minimum-wage worker can afford to rent a two-bedroom home; and although LA has the worst homelessness crisis in the country, New York state is catching up, with homelessness growing by 46% since the financial crisis -- the fastest rate in the nation. Read the rest
Back in September 2018, the state of New York ordered Charter to leave: the company had made a bunch of promises about investing in high-speed broadband for New Yorkers as a condition of approval for its acquisition of Time Warner Cable, and then it lied like crazy, defrauding the state and attracting a $172.4M penalty (the largest penalty ever paid by a US ISP); since then, the company has been begging New York state to commute its death sentence and give it another chance. Read the rest
Update: See below for important corrections to this story
"Fruit Belt" is a 150-year-old predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo that has faced a series of systemic hurdles, each worsening the next, with the latest being the erasure of its very name, with the Big Tech platforms unilaterally renaming the area "Medical Park." Read the rest
Back in 2016, a "reputation management" company called Profile Defenders was caught forging court orders in order to get complaints about its clients removed from the site Pissed Consumer. This was a monumentally stupid thing to do, as judges are consistently unamused with people who forge their signatures. Read the rest
Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) on Friday ordered two New York state agencies to investigate reports that Facebook could have access to a lot more of your personal data, if you're a smartphone user, than anyone realized before. Read the rest
Whether you love them or hate them, rideshares like Uber and Lyft have become a daily part of life for millions of New Yorkers. These app-based services make it easy to pay for your ride, but while the privacy cost isn’t always as clear, it’s about to get a lot larger. These apps have tracked our movements since they launched, but as of this month, the Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) started tracking us too. Read the rest
After the 2020 census, the nation's electoral districts will be redrawn and it's a widely accepted fact that New York City will lose a seat, despite its growth since the 2010 census. Read the rest
The Tappan Zee will meet its maker on Saturday as New York state contractors plan to blow up what's left of the 63-year-old bridge. Replaced by the Governor Mario M. Cuomo Bridge in 2017, the iconic Tappan Zee will be loaded up with explosives and sent to a watery grave in the Hudson River. The steel will be recovered by a marine salvage team. Restaurants and businesses in the area are planning watch parties for Saturday morning, including the “Dim-Sum-struction of the Tappan Zee Bridge," and "The Big Bang Brunch." Several New York news outlets plan to carry the detonation live.
Lyndhurst, local restaurants host Tappan Zee Bridge farewell, specials on Saturday (lohud.com) (Photo: Brett Weinstein/Wikimedia Commons) Read the rest
In October 2017, Syracuse cops arrested Torrence Jackson with a small amount of marijuana and accused him of hiding drugs in his rectum (the officers say they saw him shift in his seat and concluded that he'd put drugs up his butt). They took him to St Joseph's Hospital where he was nonconsensually X-rayed; when that revealed no drugs, officers told doctors to force sedation on Jackson and then put a tube and camera up his rectum. Read the rest
