Google ads Amazon-style products to search results – in a big revenue grab

An interesting update by Google which seems directly targeted at Amazon. These new Product Ads from Google will compete with Amazon’s commission model, and may come down to who has the better search. With billions of dollars in revenue the stakes…   In the early days of Google, users would type in a query, we’d …

High school students create model boats that sail from California to Hawaii

Making a third try at sailing handmade sailboats on a course for Hawaii, students from Regional Occupational Program model-making classes at San Clemente High School launched three new vessels into the Pacific from Capistrano Beach on Tuesday afternoon. Under the supervision of Malcolm Wilson, an instructor in the Capistrano-Laguna Beach ROP, about 75 students in …

Israeli government bans ultra-thin models and photoshop in advertisements

On Monday, March 19, the Israeli parliament passed legislation ubiquitously known in the country as the Photoshop laws. The new regulations on the fashion and advertising industry ban underweight models as determined by Body Mass Index and regulate Photoshop usage in media and advertising. Abroad, the laws have opened new discussion on a government’s right …

New Guinness Record for largest chocolate sculpture – 18,000 pound Mayan temple

A California dessert and pastry school, located in Irvine, has just broken the Guinness World Record for the World’s Largest Chocolate Sculpture: To celebrate our 30th anniversary, Qzina Specialty Foods, has broken a Guinness World Record for building the largest chocolate sculpture. The sculpture models an ancient Mayan temple and weighs 18,239 pounds, far surpassing the previous record set in Italy …

I’m in Vanity Fair and my first surfing photo

I don’t often talk about myself on this blog, but I can’t pass this up. This week I modeled in a geek fashion show (wearing Marc Jacobs) and had my first surfing action-shot. I’m pretty excited about both because the above photo was on the Vanity Fair website and the below photo is from a …

Geeks on-stage modeling clothes – Geek 2 Chic comes to Los Angeles

Confession: Before Geek 2 Chic, I had never been to a runway fashion show. Shocker, right? I’m not totally fashion challenged. I can play dress-up when the occasion arises. But as someone who has ordered over a dozen of the same pair of olive green cargo pants off the internet for the past three years…I’m …

Google Ventures – venture capital funding through data

A fascinating article in Fast Company profiles Google Ventures, the company’s venture capital division. Like everything the search giant does they are aiming big with delusions of changing the entire VC industry with data as the vehicle. They start out with some interesting facts: Despite the mythology that has built up around venture capital, it …