There were a wide variety of questions and stories to come out of the audience and presenters that night, but one of the most memorable was Whitman’s anecdote about Lady Gaga’s connection to The Beatles in EchoNest’s data store. (I should reiterate Whitman’s statement that Echo Nest does not provide actual recommendations but simply aggregates data and provides it to partners for them to act on it as they please.)

According to Whitman, the Echo Nest received an inquiry one morning from one of its partners because their Lady Gaga page was starting to show an extremely strong relationship with The Beatles. Then they started receiving even more calls as all of their partners started waking up and noticing the same changes in the relationship data. The Beatles are already an extremely hard problem for music recommendations so the connection isn’t unbelievable, but the overnight nature of its appearance?

A brief investigation revealed that Lady Gaga had been interviewed the previous day and made a comparison between herself and John Lennon – although Whitman didn’t specify I’m assuming it was her comment about fearing a “John Lennon-style death.” The web’s unnaturally healthy gossip blog ecosystem went into overdrive and the comments were recycled ad infinitum. Relational mappings were strengthened, and music consumers around the web found themselves presented with the unlikely pairing of Paparazzi and Hello Goodbye.








What if the machine was just a step ahead of its builders though? Watching these videos, I think both Gaga and The Beatles look pretty into their costumes. Maybe if The Echo Nest starts taking into account visual analysis of live performances they can find a few more such data points that will tie these two back together again?

Groovehoops provided hoola hoops for the dance “floor”, Kostume Kult gave out costumes to kids, and there were sculptures and active installations all over the island. My only real regret? I failed to hit the mini-golf course. Maybe next year.

Full set of pictures here.

There’s also another piece by him (I’m pretty sure) in Williamsburg on the outside of Roebling Tea Room. And in case you’re wondering what his process is…

About 5 days ago I received my order of this.

And then 2 days ago this dropped.

Too much Sigur Ros? No such thing.

I’m sure the public agency sponsoring this ad had its heart in the right place. My issue is with this being a pretty poor ascending triad, and in this case “pretty poor” is a bloodless euphemism for “grossly misconstructed.” No little boy really wants to eat his vegetables and no little boy wants to do his homework. He’ll (hopefully) understand the importance of these both at some point in his future, but until then the truth remains jammed away in some unused crevice of his conscience.

So do we really want public advertisements comparing respect towards women with carrot sticks and problem sets? In this itemized list, all three collapse into a pile of healthy obligations ignored in pursuit of teenage rebellion. Maybe I’m overestimating the impact of some poorly designed, publicly financed ad campaigns on 3rd Street, but this is probably the exact wrong comparison to draw.