Saturday Night Videos

Placebo // Loud Like Love (feat. Bret Easton Ellis) from Saman Kesh on Vimeo.

COMING UP FOR AIR from Finisterre on Vimeo.

I Like It When You're Gone from Rosanna Wan on Vimeo.

TODAY: A Short Documentary Film from Phillip Montgomery on Vimeo.

Project Skyborn - short film from Marko Slavnic on Vimeo.

VOICE OVER (English subtitles) from Kamel Films on Vimeo.

Keys N Krates - Treat Me Right from Ohji on Vimeo.

Shugo Tokumaru / Katachi from Kijek / Adamski on Vimeo.

HUD Over reaching in Westchester County in New York. Marin is next

Marin entered a similar HUD agreement and will be building hundreds of low income units concentrated in Marinwood/Lucas Valley. Robert Astorino was re-elected in a landslide victory in Westchester on November 5, 2013 by taking leadership stance against HUD.. Local politicians take notice. Victories are achieved by standing up for your citizens.

Silvestri: The Great PDA Debate Part II

The Great PDA Debate - Part II

Posted by Bob Silvestri , March 11, 2014 at 10:40 AM

The Win Cup Project in Corte Madera

Read The Great PDA Debate - Part I

When Marin County prepared its Housing Element and proposed how much multifamily development should occur in the future, they adopted the "default density” offered by state law.

The default density for Marin is 30 units per acre. Adopting the default density alleviates the County's need to do any kind of study or research to support what actual density might be required to fulfill their obligations under their Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA) quota. In other words, if a city or county has a lot of potential building sites available, they could argue that even a density of 10 units per acre would fulfill the RHNA quota. This would mean that building lower densities would be justified in their area and HCD would probably have to accept that if the total RHNA was addressed adequately.

This is essentially what Mill Valley and Novato did. They produced their own analysis to prove that they had plenty of development and rezoning opportunities available to satisfy their RHNA numbers, at lower than 30 units per acre. Accepting the default density for the Housing Element, as the County did, is the lazy man's way to do it.

The recent Marin IJ Voice by Sharon Rushton does an excellent job of explaining all this. And as noted by Glen Campora, Assistant Deputy Director of HCD, in his letter of March 18, 2013 to the Novato Homeowners Association:

“Flexibility was increased in 2004 when Government Code Section 65583.2(c)(3) was amended to provide all jurisdictions the option to adopt the applicable statutory default density deemed appropriate for a rural, suburban, or urban jurisdiction to accommodate housing for lower-income households. “

“In updating its housing element, Novato has the flexibility to choose to (1) provide an appropriate analysis demonstrating how its adopted densities can accommodate development of housing affordable to lower income households or (2) adopt the default density of 30 units per acre.”

This flexibility is quite broad and is particularly important because Marin is presently mis-classified as an “urban” area by HCD, rather than being classified correctly as “rural” and “suburban.” So the efforts by our BOS and County staff, on our behalf, were really needed when the County

Friday Night Music

How the NSA Plans to Infect ‘Millions’ of Computers with Malware

How the NSA Plans to Infect ‘Millions’ of Computers with Malware

By Ryan Gallagher and Glenn Greenwald 12 Mar 2014, 9:19 AM EDT 525

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One presentation outlines how the NSA performs “industrial-scale exploitation” of computer networks across the world.

Top-secret documents reveal that the National Security Agency is dramatically expanding its ability to covertly hack into computers on a mass scale by using automated systems that reduce the level of human oversight in the process.

The classified files – provided previously by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden – contain new details about groundbreaking surveillance technology the agency has developed to infect potentially millions of computers worldwide with malware “implants.” The clandestine initiative enables the NSA to break into targeted computers and to siphon out data from foreign Internet and phone networks.

The covert infrastructure that supports the hacking efforts operates from the agency’s headquarters in Fort Meade, Maryland, and from eavesdropping bases in the United Kingdom and Japan. GCHQ, the British intelligence agency, appears to have played an integral role in helping to develop the implants tactic.

In some cases the NSA has masqueraded as a fake Facebook server, using the social media site as a launching pad to infect a target’s computer and exfiltrate files from a hard drive. In others, it has sent out spam emails laced with the malware, which can be tailored to covertly record audio from a computer’s microphone and take snapshots with its webcam. The hacking systems have also enabled the NSA to launch cyberattacks by corrupting and disrupting file downloads or denying access to websites.

The implants being deployed were once reserved for a few hundred hard-to-reach targets, whose communications could not be monitored through traditional wiretaps. But the documents analyzed by The Intercept show how the NSA has aggressively accelerated its hacking initiatives in the past decade by computerizing some processes previously handled by humans. The automated system – codenamed TURBINE – is designed to “allow the current implant network to scale to large size (millions of implants) by creating a system that does automated control implants by groups instead of individually.”

In a top-secret presentation, dated August 2009, the NSA describes a pre-programmed part of the covert infrastructure called the “Expert System,” which is designed to operate “like the brain.” The system manages the applications and functions of the implants and “decides” what tools they need to best extract data from infected machines.

Mikko Hypponen, an expert in malware who serves as chief research officer at the Finnish security firm F-Secure, calls the revelations “disturbing.” The NSA’s surveillance techniques, he warns, could inadvertently be undermining the security of the Internet.

“When they deploy malware on systems,” Hypponen says, “they potentially create new vulnerabilities in these systems, making them more vulnerable for attacks by third parties.”
Hypponen believes that governments could arguably justify using malware in a small number of targeted cases against adversaries. But millions of malware implants being deployed by the NSA as part of an automated process, he says, would be “out of control.”

“That would definitely not be proportionate,” Hypponen says. “It couldn’t possibly be targeted and named. It sounds like wholesale infection and wholesale surveillance.”

The NSA declined to answer questions about its deployment of implants, pointing to a new presidential policy directive announced by President Obama. “As the president made clear on 17 January,” the agency said in a statement, “signals intelligence shall be collected exclusively where there is a foreign intelligence or counterintelligence purpose to support national and departmental missions, and not for any other purposes.”

“Owning the Net”

The NSA began rapidly escalating its hacking efforts a decade ago. In 2004, according to secret internal records, the agency was managing a small network of only 100 to 150 implants. But over the next six to eight years, as an elite unit called Tailored Access Operations (TAO) recruited new hackers and developed new malware tools, the number of implants soared to tens of thousands.

To penetrate foreign computer networks and monitor communications that it did not have access to through other means, the NSA wanted to go beyond the limits of traditional signals intelligence, or SIGINT, the agency’s term for the interception of electronic communications. Instead, it sought to broaden “active” surveillance methods – tactics designed to directly infiltrate a target’s computers or network devices.

The Great PDA Debate - Part I

Posted by Bob Silvestri , March 11, 2014 at 03:22 PM

On February 25th the Marin County Board of Supervisors held a public hearing about whether or not to remove the Priority Development Area (PDA) in the Strawberry neighborhood. A PDA is a land use designation that a city or county can assign to indicate a desire for high density growth in that location.

The hearing was led by Kate Sears, the Supervisor for the Strawberry district, who lectured the public in chatty, schoolmarm tones through an ever-present grin that seemed oblivious to the community’s need for her to at least emotionally acknowledge the seriousness of the issue before them.

As the Grateful Dead song Truckin goes," You've got two good eyes but you still don't see.."  Supervisor Kate Sears refused to put the Strawberry PDA on the Board of Supervisor's agenda for 14 consecutive meetings despite hundreds citizen requests. She is seen here at the Feb 25, 2014 meeting. She expressed disappointment that it could not have been made smaller and blamed the public for misinformation.

For months Ms. Sears had tried to dismiss, deflect and derail the need for such a hearing. At first she tried to divide and conquer by refusing to attend any large community meetings: she would only meet with small groups to diffuse dissent. But her attempts didn’t work. She had ignored requests to put the topic on the agenda of the weekly BOS meetings for 14 consecutive weeks, but the public wouldn’t let up. She had even tried to shift the decision’s responsibility to entirely different agency, the Transportation Authority of Marin, but to no avail. Her curious obstructionist tactics only fanned the flames. By now her constituents were fully informed and actively engaged in making their opinions known.

And so it began.

After a variety of somewhat long winded, defensive and off topic remarks by most of the Supervisors it was time for a presentation by Community Development Director, Brian Crawford.

Mr. Crawford’s staff report was ostensibly about the history, locations and ramifications of PDAs in Marin, but it ended up being a good deal of confusing disinformation and “planner- speak” gibberish (see video here: Item 16). But as innocuous as his report may have seemed, it was in some ways one of the more important things that occurred at the meeting because it touched on, or perhaps more appropriately failed to touch on, larger issues we are facing about PDAs.

No Wonder Everyone Is So Confused

The urbane, highly paid Brian Crawford, explains to the Board of Supervisors and the hundreds of Citizens about the Highway 101 PDA Corridor that was "volunteered" by the Community.  Despite the intense protest of residents, Smart Growth and Plan Bay Area boosters claim that we must urbanize Marin.

Mr. Crawford showed the Board a map of the County’s Priority Development Areas. On it, it showed that the entire north-south corridor within a half mile of highway 101 was designated as the “Highway 101 PDA Corridor” (indicated by hash marks).  Mr. Crawford went on to explain that the County had “volunteered” this entire swath of land as a PDA back in 2006 and 2007, during the Pre-Plan Bay Area “Focus” sessions led by ABAG. He then noted that in 2010 to 2011 the BOS had voted to confirm this PDA designation for the 101 corridor and to include what the map called “Transit Neighborhoods,” which included the Strawberry PDA.

Oddly, his presentation and charts made it sound as if (1) the county had the authority to dictate land use for property that was located within other cities in Marin, and (2) that everything within a half like of highway 101 was a PDA, as defined by Plan Bay Area.
This, of course, is completely wrong.

The areas noted as Transit Neighborhoods were in fact the only actual PDAs.  But the map was still incorrect because the outlines of the areas noted as Transit Neighborhoods did not correspond accurately to the areas of the actual PDAs noted in the County’s Housing Element. In places like Marin City, for example, this is significant because his map showed County Housing Authority-owned projects, like Golden Gate Village, as being in a PDA, which it is not.

Why the map was presented at all remains a mystery.

However, predictably, not a single Supervisor raised an eyebrow or seemed to care enough to question his misstatements even though they should have all known that the County’s Housing Element only recognized a few remaining areas as actual PDAs: Strawberry, Marin City and California Park (Marinwood and the Tam/Almonte area having already been removed).

But okay, so the map was wrong. What’s the big deal?

Some Backstory

The ABAG Focus sessions that Brian Crawford referred to happened prior to the passage of Senate Bill 375 in September of 2008. SB375 was the legislation that made the terms “Priority Development Area” (PDA) and “Transit Priority Project Area” (TPA) meaningful legal terms and connected them to federal and state transportation funding. That funding was the primary argument the BOS had been making as to why the Strawberry PDA should remain.

Following the passage of SB375, our metropolitan planning organization (ABAG and MTC) had to craft a “Sustainable Communities Strategy,” which became a known as Plan Bay Area. Plan Bay Area was not adopted until June of 2013. 

Whatever the County might have done prior to the adoption of Plan Bay Area was not officially connected to federal and state transportation funding that Plan Bay Area brought with it targeted for PDAs.  

It’s important to also know that it was SB375 that clearly defined the state’s intention of promoting and incentivizing zoning changes for high density transit oriented development (TOD). SB375 and Plan Bay Area make it emphatically clear (in fact it’s pretty much their sole purpose) that 80 percent of the TOD that occurs is targeted for

Supervisor Susan Adams Welcomes Gang Members to Marin County Fair

See the full June, 18, 2013 Board of Supervisors meeting here
See the Marin IJ story here

Susan Adams:

” Be very certain and very clear we are not saying gang members are not invited to the fair. Everybody is welcome to the fair.

I  think the message is to whoever gang members are out there.  Come to our fair.  Leave your insignias at home and enjoy it like everybody else and the public in a wonderful setting.  And that’s my hope.  I think we have had that experience with our past fairs and I will be looking for that report sooner than later.”

Is this how Susan Adams is approaching the problems 

with Marinwood Village and Dixie Schools? 

Hope?

Don't Wear Your Colors to the Fair.

Cool Temporary Shelters for the Homeless.

Collapsible woven refugee shelters powered by the sun

• Em

More than 40 million people worldwide have been displaced from their homes and left to find shelter in strange lands. Maybe they find a tarp, or a tent, but their quality of life almost always remains dismal. To close this gap in need, Jordanian-Canadian architect and designer Abeer Seikaly designed a new kind of shelter.  One that allows refugees to rebuild their lives with dignity.

Seikaly, now living in Amman, Jordan is well poised to design a dwelling for refugees given that her ancestors in Jordan probably toggled between nomadic and sheltered life in the desert for centuries.

“The movement of people across the earth led to the discovery of new territories as well as the creation of new communities among strangers forming towns, cities, and nations,” writes Seikaly in her design brief. ”Navigating this duality between exploration and settlement, movement and stillness is a fundamental essence of what it means to be human.”
Related: Stackable shelters by Exo 
But today, a great deal of migration is no longer voluntary, as wars and climate change force people out of their homes – often with very little money. The collapsible woven shelters, which are conceptual but proven to work, would allow these people to carry their homes with them.

Comprised of a structural woven fabric that “blurs the distinction between structure and fabric,” the shelter expands to create a private enclosure and contracts “for mobility.” It also comes with some fundamental amenities required by modern people, including water and renewable electricity.
Related: IKEA’s flatpack homes for refugees get a reluctant OK frLebanonom 
The outer solar-powered skin absorbs solar energy that is then converted into usable electricity, while the inner skin provides pockets for storage – particularly at the lower half of the shelters. And a water storage tank on the top of the tent allows people to take quick showers. Water rises to the storage tank via a thermosiphoning system and a drainage system ensures that the tent is not flooded.

Well ventilated and lit, the shelter opens up in the summer and huddles down during cold winters. But most importantly, it allows refugees to have some semblance of security, some semblance of home.

“This lightweight, mobile, structural fabric could potentially close the gap between need and desire as people metaphorically weave their lives back together, physically weaving their built environment into a place both new and familiar, transient and rooted, private and connected,” says Seikaly.

“In this space, the refugees find a place to pause from their turbulent worlds, a place to weave the tapestry of their new lives. They weave their shelter into home.”
 Designboom

 See more at: http://www.greenprophet.com/2014/03/collapsible-woven-refugee-shelters-powered-by-the-sun/#sthash.7aixW3Xx.dpuf

Wouldn't this look nice in San Rafael?

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This video comes to me from Janis Maras: Rare Earth blog post that she writes for the Marin IJ
See her comments HERE

An Animation of the High Flyover , Corte Mazilla and Once upon a time in Marinwood-Lucas Valley

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Separated at Birth? Susan Adams and Queen Victoria

Susan Adams surveys the crowd at the Board of Supervisors meeting to remove the Strawberry PDA on March 25, 2014
Learn how she used her influence to delay the Toxic Waste cleanup at Marinwood Village HERE

Queen Victoria of England in 1877
Learn more about her HERE

A group of designers from London's Royal College of Art have created what might be the creepiest survey of public space.

Francesco Tacchini, Julinka Ebhardt, and Will Yates-Johnson wanted to explore "transitional public spaces," like stairs, tunnels, and elevators through acoustics.

What they came up with is Space Replay, a dark floating ball that records and echos eerie footsteps and conversations. The hovering orb is actually a latex balloon filled helium and electronic components that handle sound. The sphere, which weighs about 4.2 ounces, naturally follows the air currents caused by anything that moves past it.

Watch the spooky thing go in this video.