In The News

TechCrunch digs local startup SnipSnap's new features

TechCrunch Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Philadelphia-based startup SnipSnap's new features get some holiday-time props from megablog TechCrunch. Their eponymous coupon clipping mobile app has gotten significantly better.

But first, the biggest change. SnipSnap 2.0 takes what social elements were present in the original and expands on them greatly — unlike before, new users are asked to create accounts and can link them with Facebook or Twitter to connect with other coupon-conscious friends. From there, those users can also select their interests from a list so SnipSnap can provide them with some starter coupons — apparently, new users of SnipSnap wouldn’t know what do once they installed the app, and the starter coupons were intended to help them a get a feel for using it. Smart.

Original source: TechCrunch
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Fabricating and coworking at The Factory in Collingswood, NJ

CollingswoodPatch Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Tom Marchetty and his team are creating a mecca for creative types in the old Collingswood Theater in Collingswood, NJ. When complete, "The Factory" will feature tools for woodworking, jewelry-making, ceramics, metalworking and other DIY ventures. Locals can either rent studio space or pay a monthly rate to use the over $200,000 worth of equiptment.

"So I started thinking, what if I put all of this equipment into a location for people that don’t have a garage or basement? They don’t have a place to build and create, and now they can come here and actually make their dreams into reality.
“That’s why I call it The Factory," [Marchetty] said. "We produce and make whatever we want. Anything you want to make or build, you can do it here.”

Original Source: CollingswoodPatch
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The New York Times notes a lack of diversity in school lit

The New York Times Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Many young latino readers are noticing a dearth of diverse protagonists in available books. The New York Times visits a Philadelphia-area school to examine this issue.

At Bayard Taylor Elementary in Philadelphia, a school where three-quarters of the students are Latino, Kimberly Blake, a third-grade bilingual teacher, said she struggles to find books about Latino children that are “about normal, everyday people.” The few that are available tend to focus on stereotypes of migrant workers or on special holidays. “Our students look the way they look every single day of the year,” Ms. Blake said, “not just on Cinco de Mayo or Puerto Rican Day.”

Original source: The New York Times

Read the full story here.

Business Journal names "The Philadelphia 100"

Philadelphia Business Journal Tuesday, December 11, 2012

The Philadelphia Business Journal releases their list of the region's fastest growing private companies. The list includes 50 first-time companies.

M. Therese Flaherty, director of the Wharton Small Business Development Center, said that after years of recession pressure on company growth rates, local entrepreneurs are finally seeing things return to normal. During the recession, growth rates at the bottom of the 100 were close to zero. This year, the No. 100 company achieved 56 percent growth, near the historic norm.

Original source: Philadelphia Business Journal
For the full story click here.

CHOP's innovative treatment for Leukemia shows tremendous promise

The New York Times Tuesday, December 11, 2012

The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) used a disabled form the AIDS virus to treat a young girl's leukemia. The results have been remarkable for 7-year-old Emma Whitehead and her family, and constitute a major breakthrough in the treatment of cancer. Doctors hope the new treatment, developed at the University of Pennsylvania, will eventually replace bone-marrow transplantation.

The treatment very nearly killed her. But she emerged from it cancer-free, and about seven months later is still in complete remission. She is the first child and one of the first humans ever in whom new techniques have achieved a long-sought goal — giving a patient’s own immune system the lasting ability to fight cancer.

Original Source: The New York Times
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The Wall Street Journal celebrates Rosenbach Museum & Library

The Wall Street Journal Tuesday, December 04, 2012

The Wall Street Journal highlights the Rosenbach Library & Museum, an amazing private collection of books and manuscripts located on a gorgeous, out-of-the-way street near Rittenhouse Square. Gems include the manuscript of James Joyce's Ulysses, early editions of Chaucer and a huge collection Maurice Sendak's paintings, illustrations and editions (including original drawings of Where the Wild Things Are and In the Night Kitchen).

To handle scholarly materials, the Rosenbach requires not the usual white gloves demanded by other libraries but a good old-fashioned hand-washing (latex can do more damage to delicate paper than clean, oil-free hands). I couldn't resist asking to see and touch one piece that stopped my heart and brought tears to my professorial eyes. It was the manuscript whose purchase got A.S.W. Rosenbach started on the final, and greatest, chapter of his buying career. In London in 1885 Sotheby's had sold at auction the manuscripts of six letters of John Keats. Oscar Wilde, enraged by the salacious intermingling of art and commerce, wrote a protest sonnet. Thirty-five years later, at Manhattan's Anderson Galleries, Rosenbach bought the poet's penultimate letter to Fanny Brawne, his fiancée, dated July 5, 1820, before his departure for Italy, where he died of tuberculosis seven months later. The great poet was also a typical, temperamental 24-year-old young man who, finding his girlfriend flirting with his roommate, wrote to her with envy, jealousy, rage and sadness, "I will resent my heart having been made a football."

Original Source: The Wall Street Journal
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Report details big population bump in Center City

The Daily News Tuesday, December 04, 2012

Thanks to national trends and an increasing urban vitality, Center City is experiencing a big population increase. According to a report released last Tuesday by the Center City District and Central Philadelphia Development Corp., the population of "greater Center City" rose 10.2 percent from 2000-2010.

Philadelphia now has the third-largest downtown population among American cities (behind New York and Chicago), the report notes. That trend boosted both the volume and price of residential sales and rentals, and spurred more construction and renovation, the report shows.

Original Source: The Daily News
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Who vandalized the beloved Dox Thrash mural?

The Atlantic Cities Tuesday, December 04, 2012

An iconic mural of artist Dox Thrash, located in western North Philadelphia, was recently destroyed. The Atlantic Cities investigates.

The Thrash mural, located on the side of an abandoned house at 2442 Cecil B. Moore Avenue, depicted the artist working in his studio in a style mirroring his own beloved carborundum process. Eric Okdeh and Calvin Jones painted it in 2001 to coincide with a Thrash exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Later, it became part of MAP's public tour of 47 murals that “uniquely capture the rich African American experience in Philadelphia,” featuring a podcast narrated by none other than ?uestlove. So why did it mysteriously disappear?

Original Source: The Atlantic Cities
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Update: New Vision for South Broad announces a decision

PlanPhilly Tuesday, December 04, 2012

As Flying Kite detailed back in late November, Avenue of the Arts, Inc. (AAI) partnered with the Pennsylvania Horicultural Society (PHS) to launch a "New Vision for South Broad Street" competition. The goal was to continue the thoroughfare's original purpose as an arts and entertainment district but with a modern take. Ten architectural and landscape firms submitted ideas, and four were chosen as finalists. Now the list has been narrowed once again.

A judging panel, overseen by Avenue of the Arts, Inc. (AAI) Chairman Dianne Semingson, has chosen Bohlin Cywinski Jackson and Jonathan Alderson Landscape Architects, Inc., to participate in Phase II of the “New Vision for South Broad Street” Request for Proposal (RFP) project. The two teams, selected from four finalists (the other two were LRSLA Studio and Cairone & Kaupp, Inc.) are charged with pushing forward a program to reinvigorate South Broad Street from City Hall to Washington Avenue.

The two firms will present refined proposals in early 2013 and one winner will be selected.

Original Source: PlanPhilly
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Plans for city land bank take shape

The Philadelphia Inquirer Tuesday, December 04, 2012

Plans are beginning to take shape for a Philadelphia land bank, a development that would make it easier for the city to deal with vacant and blighted properites. Council is likely to start considering the bill in the new year.

The rest of the properties are in private hands—about 17,000 of them are tax delinquent, according to a 2010 consultant's report. In many cases, the properties have been vacant so long the listed owners are dead or virtually impossible to find.

Anyone wanting to assemble vacant parcels—developers, nonprofits, and even neighbors who want to start a community garden—have to navigate the maze of ownership.

About a decade ago, Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia needed three years to assemble 20 parcels in the 1800 block of North 18th Street—a project that eventually yielded 14 new houses.

Original Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer
For the full story, click here.

Business Insider admires Philly's murals

Business Insider Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Business Insider takes a self-guided tour of Philadelphia's Mural Mile and walks away impressed. Their slideshow offers a great run-down of some of the city's most visible public art pieces.

The program has grown into a thriving network of muralists, youth, local businesses, and Philadelphia residents all seeking to add more beauty to the City of Brotherly Love. More than 3,000 murals have now been painted all around the city, and many more are in progress. We've heard some incredible praise for the program, so we decided to go see it in person. We took the self-guided walking tour of Mural Mile in the Center City neighborhood, and thought it was astounding.

Original Source: Business Insider
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Salon's Williams pens a post-marathon ode to Philly

Salon Tuesday, November 27, 2012

After Hurricane Sandy caused the cancellation of the New York City Marathon, Philadelphia's race stepped up and offered spots to some of the displaced runners. Erstwhile Philadelphian Mary Elizabeth Williams (running in the midst of treatment for cancer) sends the city a sincere thanks.

In retrospect, I should have expected nothing less from a city whose very name means brotherly love. Besides, I knew how much Philly could give. I’d gone to school there; I’d forged some of the best and most enduring relationships of my life there. I had returned, again and again over the years, to see my friends and to eat soft pretzels and to introduce my children to the city’s charms. Yet on Sunday, Philadelphia gave me – and nearly 1,500 other New York marathon runners – something new. It gave us welcome and warmth and refuge after one of the darkest experiences in the Big Apple’s history, just by letting us pound its streets.

Original Source: Salon
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Foobooz names Philly's top 50 bars

Foobooz Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Local food-centric blog Foobooz releases its annual list of the city's best bars. It's no surpise that the top ten are dominated by spots with serious beer programs—top-shelf suds have become Philly's calling card. Pub & Kitchen takes top honors, up from no. 10 last year.

If you want to be number one on the Foobooz Top 50 Bars list you had better bring it every day. And Pub & Kitchen does just that, with excellent food, a well curated beverage program plus excellent and dare we say, attractive service.

Source: Foobooz
Check out the full list here.

Grantland loves Philly-centric 'Silver Linings Playbook'

Grantland Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Silver Linings Playbook, the Philly-centric new film that puts Eagles fans front-and-center, continues to garner nationwide praise. The movie is based on a novel Matthew Quick, a former Haddonfield Memorial High teacher. Grantland reserves special praise for the movie's perspective on sports fandom.

The ways in which Pat, in his pitiable mix of out-of-control rage and deranged optimism, is a product of his struggling underdog city and the maddening football franchise that it hosts will probably be obvious to most readers of this site and lost on a solid percentage of non-sports fans who go see the movie. You have to know Philly, know the Eagles to really get it, how each of these characters is simultaneously badly scarred and up for more punishment. Silver Linings Playbook is a few different movies at once, but one of those movies is about the complicated interplay between a city's sports teams and a city's citizens, the way that over time the two start resembling one another.

Original source: Grantland
Read the complete story here.

Green City, Clean Waters earns praise post-Sandy

Huffington Post Tuesday, November 13, 2012

The Huffington Post's Mark Tercek gives props to the Philadelphia Water Department's pro-active stormwater management program, which should help mitigate damage in future storms.

Like many cities, Philadelphia has been battling a problem with stormwater management. During heavy storms, water running off rooftops and roads overwhelms the city's aging sewer systems, dumping unsanitary water into local waterways and basements, and -- as we saw in New York City -- overwhelming power sub-stations and other critical infrastructure. Stormwater problems and the resulting sewer overflows are a major source of river pollution around Philadelphia, and elsewhere around the world.

Philadelphia's "Green City, Clean Waters" program tackles this problem by replacing impervious grey infrastructure with natural alternatives: green roofs; blue roofs that hold large quantities of water for long periods of time; tree-lined streets and side walk planters; new and restored wetlands; rain gardens; porous pavement; and creek-side restoration. These green areas either absorb water or help it to flow at a more manageable rate rather than water hitting concrete and racing to the sewage system.

Original source: Huffington Post
Read the full story here.