The Real Housewives of New York's Ramona Singer's interior design fight

Ramona Singer

The Real Housewives of New York's' Ramona Singer's got a problem with her interior design contractor.

The NY Daily News, reports that Interior Designer Rona Landman says she reportedly "redecorated some of "The Real Housewives of New York's" Ramona Singer's upper East Side pad — is sick and tired of not getting credit (or enough dough, for that matter)" to quote the publication.

But what some is, is at issue. Moreover, Ramona Singer says she paid Rona Landman around $20,000 and has the invoices to prove it. Frankly that much for the Upper East Side is not a lot of money, especially when contracts can be as much as a million dollars.

Ramona Singer said she wanted to help Rona Landman because her work's terrific. Frankly, Singer should have called Christine Smith Associates (CSA), the premier female interior designer and contractor in New York in this blogger's biased view. CSA is sponsoring the Zennie62 coverage of Tech Crunch Disrupt.

But Ramona Singer can take care of that when she returns to New York; according to The Blackbook, Singer's in Africa with the nonprofit Africa Foundation. Both are seeing the new homes built in an undisclosed part of Africa.

Stay tuned.

Los Angeles Events: Academy (AMPAS) has Monday and Wednesday events

The AMPAS Building

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) isn't known for just the Academy Awards, AMPAS has a number of events on a weekly basis and this week is no exception.

On Monday, May 24th at 7:30 PM at The Samuel Goldwyn Theater at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, AMPAS continues the series "Oscar Noir: 1940s Writing Nominees from Hollywood's Dark Side," with the 1944 feature Laura.

Laura, a film starring Gene Tierney, was about a police detective who falls in love with the woman whose murder he's investigating. It will be introduced by Oscar-nominated screenwriter Scott Frank (Out of Sight, Minority Report).

Laura earned five Academy Award nominations, including Actor in a Supporting Role (Clifton Webb), Black - and - White Art Direction (Lyle Wheeler, Leland Fuller; Interior Decoration: Thomas Little) and Directing (Otto Preminger), and took home the Oscar for Black - and - White Cinematography (Joseph LaShelle).

Here's the trailer from Laura:



Tickets for Laura are $5, $3 for Academy Members and students with an ID. The Samuel Goldwyn Theater is at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, CA.

On Wednesday, May 26, at 7 p.m, AMPAS has Oscar nominees The Conscience of Nhem En and Standard Operating Procedure showing as part of its' 28th annual "Contemporary Documentaries" series at the Linwood Dunn Theater in Hollywood.

Admission to all screenings in the series is free.

For more information, call (310) 247-3600 or visit www.oscars.org.

Celtics and Lakers? get ready because Orlando Magic look bad

As I'm writing this blog post, The Boston Celtics are hammering the Orlando Magic 66 to 43 in the 3rd quarter, which means the Celtics are up 23 points.

The Boston Celtics are already ahead two games to none, and part of the reason is that the Orlando Magic just don't look like they want the game.

The Boston Celtics probably feel that they were counted out this year; no one gave them a chance. They're correct about that. Indeed, it even looked like the Cleveland Cavaliers were going to end the Celtics playoff run until someone told the Cavs they could actually beat the Celtics, then they collapsed.

On this, the day of the 30th Anniversary of The Empire Strikes Back, it looks like The Force is with the Boston Celtics. But can they sustain it against the Los Angeles Lakers? Personally, while the Lakers should be the favorite, The Boston Celtics will give them a run for their playoff money.

Google celebrates Pac Man 30th anniversary with icon game: follow-up

Atlanta, GA - Yesterday, Google altered its icon that graces the front of its search page with an online "Google" version of the famous Pac-Man game to celebrate Pac-Man's 30th Anniversary. This blogger made a video-blog of an attempt (well, OK, several attempts) to play the game in the most obvious way: by using the cursor on the screen that's connected to the Apple Mac Book's track pad. This video below:

For reasons that are not logical to this one, it did not work well. In the YouTube video, many video viewers were commenting again and again "use the arrow keys." That was less obvious given my Internet-based orientation, which says that because the game's online and in my face, I should be able to use my cursor. Right?

Well, most commenters were ready with a correction, but a handful were downright psychotic about it, calling me racist names. I banned them - well, OK, not all of them because as a YouTube Partner those comments actually wind up adding to my income from Google. So someone's mental illness can actually work in my favor! Still, the comments were hot and heavy, but I maintain the logical approach is to be able to use the cursor.

The ribbing about my cursor logic went to a higher level this morning during breakfast with my friend Hanna at Atlanta's Flying Biscuit Restaurant at 1655 McClelland. To take an aside for a plug, It was my first time there and in the Candler Park Area of Atlanta, and I loved both. I highly recommend ordering the Smoked Salmon Scramble and the pancakes! (I like putting steak sauce on the grits!)

But I digress.

When I told Hanna about the video and the Pac-Man game, and my approach, she immediately said "Use the arrow keys!" OK, I got the message but then she added some butter to it. "Come on. You're an idiot if you can't figure that out." So the argument was on like Donkey Kong; I restated my point that on an Internet game, one expects to be able to use the cursor to control it, if it's well designed.

And to hammer home my point, I asked our waiter if he saw the game and what controls he used. "The cursor," was his response.

Well, a high-five was given for that answer. But Hanna was having none of our joy: "You're both idiots!," she fired back.

That was one time being an idiot was a cool thing.

I'm not sure if Google intended to cause exchanges like that, but really they should have made the cursor easier to use.

Rock the Casbah!

Anna Chlumsky gets PR for My Girl; don't forget In The Loop

Hollywood's PR Machine is cranked at full force to promote Actress Anna Chlumsky for the DVD release of 1991's My Girl, hailed as Chlumsky's breakout child star roll. In the movie she plays "Vada Sultenfuss" who's what has been described as the "most adorable hypochondriac ever."

My Girl's about the coming of age of a little girl and stars Dan Aykroyd, Jamie Lee Curtis, Macaulay Culkin, in addition to an 11-year-old Anna Chlumsky. Here's a scene from My Girl where Culkin is kissed by Clumsky in a way that can only be called adorable:

Now, Anna Chlumsky's 30 years old and while she's getting massive publicity over the 2010 re-release of My Girl, what's lost is her great role in the British political satire and 2009 Seattle Film Festival Opening Gala Movie In The Loop.

Here Anna Chlumsky, now back into acting after working as a fact checker for Zagat and other jobs because she thought her calling was elsewhere, plays an assistant Liza Weld, for which Anna got a lot of critical acclaim.

Below, Anna talks with Warren Etheredge (who has the camera on himself way too much of the time) about In The Loop at SIFF in 2009:



While My Girl is good, you should see In The Loop, too.

New York interior designer, contractor Christine Smith Associates and Zennie62

Christine Smith Associates

This week promises to be a great one in the history of this blog space as Zennie62 travels to New York City for TechCrunch Disrupt.

The trip is sponsored by New York interior designer and contractor Christine Smith Associates, the premier female contractor and designer in New York City.

Christine Smith Associates is well known among New York's most successful movers and shakers and corporations for excellent interior work on finished spaces, kitchens, bedrooms and closets, and bathrooms.

In 2008, The New York Post Page six took note of Christine Smith Associates' work, when Cindy Adams wrote:

GUYS are around hauling demolition, filling dump trucks, wearing black T-shirts that read "Christine Smith." So who's Christine Smith? A stunning, skinny, befurred, 6-foot blonde with silver buckles on her jeans and waist-length hair. And why's anyone hauling fixtures wearing her shirts? She's this season's contractor du jour. Looking like a model, this lady is demolishing johns, pulling out sinks, building walls and redoing kitchens all over the Upper East Side.

Zennie62 is proud to be associated with and have the prestigious Christine Smith Associates firm as TechCrunch Disrupt trip sponsor, and looks forward to bringing an exciting week to the readers of this space.

Andrew Cuomo running, NYC round-up -- Suzannah B. Troy

I have good and bad news.  Let us start with the good news.  In the smallest and humblest ways, sharing a impromptu birthday celebration with Giuseppi Logan in Tompkins today was wonderful.  That is NYC at it's best.  People thought this jazz great was dead but he is alive and composing and playing.  I rocked the jazz world when I posted a stirring rendition of Begin the Beguine on YouTube.


Today I filmed him celebrating his 74th birthday.


Good news, Andrew Cuomo has finally declared his candidacy for governor and I believe it is a shoe-in but the down side is he is inheriting a mega-mess and corrupted "gov" from Albany to City Hall and New York may be heading towards a depression if we aren't officially in one yet.


Good luck Andrew.


Now for the really bad news.  If you want to stab someone or a couple of people to death than NYC is the place to be and simply say it was self defense.


Do you remember the Jack the Ripper type stabbings of two people in the subway in the West Village and there were no working subway cameras around?  Well the grand jury let the murderer walk because uh, huh, it was self defense!
The reporter from The New York Times does not interview the two victims families so we never hear their side.  The people that were murdered were rude and offensive and thew a bag with bottles but I believe they were murdered and the murderer and  knew what he did and that was why he fled.




 Maybe New York needs to do better recruiting for the District Attorney's office?


 Also remember Keyanna Jones?  If you don't let me introduce her memory.  She was a stunningly beautiful teenage girl.  Please click on the link to see her beautiful smile face.  This beautiful African American girl was in the wrong place at the wrong time,  murdered by a man being teased and harassed by teenagers that exited the bus with him.  Keyanna had nothing what so ever to do with these teenagers. Maybe the news reporters got it wrong but as I understood it, she had no weapon.  Her last words were words of peace and she was murdered because this guy was being harassed by a group of teens  and she happen to walk up to the bus stop with her friend and witnessed the madness pouring out on the street and called for calm and was stabbed to death in the heart!!!! The murderer of a girl more than half of his age walked.


 The mayor talks about guns but look how people are being stabbed to death and walking free. Take a moment and look at Keyanna Jones's beautiful young sweet face...read the story and explain how her murderer walked away clear and free.


My letter in The New York Daily News
Words to the wise

Manhattan: Keyanna Jones, age 15, died speaking pearls of wisdom and peace ("'God takes good ones,'" June 27). Fragile egos and false pride are driving up the murder rate.

Suzannah B. Troy


Yesterday Emonee Williams became another teenage girl to be stabbed to death and in her own home in the Bronx by her Mother's boyfriend who was asked to leave the apartment.

I do not believe he will walk free since he has a record and sometimes grand juries, juries and judges get it right but apparently not soon enough because another beautiful teenage girl died in New York City.  Apparently even staying home doesn't mean your safe.


Andrew Cuomo and anyone currently in office  who is not a lame duck, or too busy stealing tax payer money really needs to step up to the plate calling for "peace on the streets" as well as for Albany to balance their budget which was supposed to be done April 1st.  


Welcome to New York.  

Facebook Privacy: The Word of the Week by NIKKY RANEY

The word of the week is PRIVACY.

(note: all links I include are the most recent links I can find meaning within the past day or so)

It has been a rough week for Facebook, and an even more troubling week for Facebook users. The privacy issues regarding Facebook have gotten so extreme that it made the cover of Time Magazine.

I am torn between feeling anger toward Facebook, or feeling critical of users like me. If Facebook users don't want private information getting out into the internet, then why are we all posting this information on Facebook in the first place?

These privacy issues are so extreme that May 31, 2010 has been dubbed as "Quit Facebook Day" by QuitFacebookDay.com. According to the site there are already over 10 thousand users signed up to quit. The site compares quitting Facebook to quitting smoking:

"Quitting Facebook isn't easy. Facebook is engaging, enjoyable and quite frankly, addictive. Quitting something like Facebook is like quitting smoking. It's hard to stay on the wagon long enough to actually change your habits. Having peer support helps, but the way to quit Facebook is not to start a group on Facebook about leaving Facebook."

Are the Facebook Quitters taking this way too seriously, or are the rest of us not taking it seriously enough?

The Wall Street Journal recently posted and article which confronted Facebook, Myspace, Livejournal, and other social-networking sites for "sending data to advertising companies that could be used to find consumers' names and other personal details."

In my previous blog entry I included many links regarding Facebook privacy as well as the terms of service & Facebook's privacy code, etc. But it is now being said that Facebook may have been breaching its own privacy policy.

WSJ interviews and posts quotes from a "Facebook spokesman." That really doesn't show much credibility, because we don't exactly know WHO this Facebook spokesman is. I will do a blog entry on credible sources & the use of anonymous sources in the near future. I would personally like to know WHO this "Facebook spokesman" is, and why doesn't he want his name to be attached to the quotes he is providing? There are numerous reasons why a source may want anonymity, but the only reasons that I feel are legitimate are if the quotes/information provided could cause the person to lose a job or put the person in danger. Why does WSJ trust this "Facebook spokesman." Why wasn't someone from Facebook who would agree to go on record and have his or her name printed alongside the quote chosen? Anyway, I seem to be getting off track. Although, that does count as PRIVACY. The Facebook spokesman desired the need for PRIVACY, and WSJ allowed him (or HER) to obtain this privacy, which is funny since the interview seems to focus on the LACK OF PRIVACY given to the users. Irony, the Facebook spokespeople desire privacy:

" '"We were recently made aware of one case where if a user takes a specific route on the site, advertisers may see that they clicked on their own profile and then clicked on an ad,' the Facebook spokesman said. 'We fixed this case as soon as we heard about it.' "

Mashable has always been one of my favorites (I even have given Mashable.com its own bookmark on my Safari Bookmarks Bar). Mashable writers have been consistently updating the site with the latest news regarding Facebook privacy. They reasonably posted a survey asking, "Are You Planning on Quitting Facebook? Why?" Since I last checked the poll the majority voted "I like Facebook. I'm staying."

ReclaimPrivacy.org states that their mission is to "promote privacy awareness on Facebook and elsewhere." The site provides a tool that may be used to scan your Facebook privacy settings.

Macworld.com promotes Reclaimprivacy.org, and advocates that the site is credible. Philip Michaels, Macworld.com's executive editor, tested the site on his own Facebook and reassures that Reclaimprivacy.org can be trusted:

"There’s one thing about the ReclaimPrivacy.org tool that struck me as curious: When I scanned my Facebook settings in Firefox, I got the all clear on everything—even the categories still flagged with a yellow Caution label in Safari. My takeaway message? As helpful as the ReclaimPrivacy.org tool is—and it is very helpful—it’s not a silver bullet for every privacy concern you’ll have on Facebook. The best weapon you have is still your own common sense—though a little clarity from Facebook itself would be welcome, too."

I would like to point out that the best point made in the quote above is "The best weapon you have is still your own common sense." Thank you so much for saying this. (I don't know if Philip Michaels will ever read this, but if he does I want to thank him. And I would also like to say that I am in love with my 13" Macbook Pro!)

For those of you who have read my previous post regarding Facebook, and my own personal experiences with Facebook you may be questioning my own common sense. Since I sent the Facebook officials my government issue ID and proof of residency. I trust that, because I sent it to Facebook through an e-mail. I did not post it publicly onto Facebook. I think that the biggest concern is that the information posted on people's Facebook is getting out to the public, whereas I personally trust that the e-mail exchanges between Facebook officials and myself will stay private.

An article on Telegraph.co.uk includes a quote from Mark Zuckerberg from his interview with Time Magazine:

" 'The way that people think about privacy is changing a bit. What people want isn’t complete privacy. It isn’t that they want secrecy. It’s that they want control over what they share and what they don't.Our core belief is that one of the most transformational things in this generation is that there will be more information available.... Even with all the progress that we've made, I think we're much closer to the beginning than the end of the trend.' "

I am not questioning Zuckerberg's credibility. (I am still willing to send you brownies if you let me get the information back from my old Facebook account which you disabled due to my overuse of Facebook. I am sorry, I just really love Facebook. As you can see I have been very good on my new Facebook account, but I would still appreciate obtaining the old information on my other disabled account) I am just wondering how many users Zuckerberg has polled or asked regarding the privacy issues. Is this something he has assumed, or has he reached out to the Facebook users and asked, "Hey, how are you feeling about our privacy policy. You feel safe?" If Zuckerberg has in fact done this, then I am sad that I was not included in the questioning.

I think that the big issue is Facebook users have maybe trusted Facebook a little too much, and shared more than they would have liked to via their Facebook profiles. The advice I can give is this (for people who would like advice for making their Facebook information more private, I have been helping my mother with her Facebook).

Make an e-mail address strictly for Facebook. Go to your Account Settings, and edit your information. You will first add an e-mail address to the one you already use for Facebook. Then once you have confirmed that e-mail address via e-mail you can delete the e-mail address you previously used to log onto your Facebook account and have the new "strictly Facebook" e-mail address as the only e-mail address used for Facebook. This way if any advertisers do somehow obtain your e-mail address, they do not have your PERSONAL e-mail address, only the address that you use to log onto your Facebook account.

Only add people on Facebook that you trust, or create different "lists" or "groups" which customize which friends can see what, etc.

Edit your application's privacy by going to your privacy settings.

The thing about Facebook Privacy is that usually the new features are enabled automatically for everyone's Facebook, and we all need to go in and manually disable the features that allow applications to obtain information, etc.

Don't post things that you don't want people to see, and if you already have -- go through your Facebook profile and delete the things that you don't want posted.

I think the bigger issue is people that are adding their professional acquaintances to Facebook and then posting drunk photos & compromising status updates.

I have personally deleted most of my youtube videos (I had about 45 at one point), and I have tried to delete all the things that I posted back when I was in middle school & high school (including my old blog that I had during high school which I used more as my public diary and less as a blog). There are still traces of me on the internet that I cannot get rid of due to forgetting of passwords and things that I posted elsewhere or that someone else has posted of me, but I think that I am young enough to be able to redeem myself and keep myself in good shape in regards to The Future of Journalism.

So, I think the big lesson here is: Yes, Facebook has done some things that are wrong and have broken the trust with some of its users, but Facebook users should think twice about posting things on the internet that are private in the first place. If you are posting something on the internet that you only want specific people to know, give those people a phone call, tell them in person, send an e-mail, etc. Facebook, Twitter, etc. aren't the only ways to communicate.

This entire issue is worldwide, and I feel like by only posting the articles via USA & UK news sources that I am leaving out the fact that Facebook users are WORLD WIDE, and this privacy issue is affecting all of the users. I was born in the Philippines, raised in America with my Filipino mom and American dad, and I like to pride myself on keeping up with all international news, so I feel obligated to include links to other news sources outside of the US that involve Facebook Privacy. All links are directed to the Facebook Privacy articles both in the US and outside the US. Basically, here is a list of other articles about Facebook Privacy that I didn't talk about in my blog entry:

The Times of India

Irish Times

Montreal Gazette

Stuff.co.nz

PC World

EWeek Europe

Strategy Eye

Privacy. That's the word of the week.

Tune in next Saturday to see the next Word of the Week.

(That is, if there is another word that can outdo the popularity of the word "privacy" for next week, or will we still be dealing with Facebook privacy issues…)

Posting this post onto Zennie62 blog & The Future of Journalism

Blog post written by: Nikky Raney

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions or concerns e-mail me nikkyraney@nikkyraney.com

For Twitter updates, I have recently made my twitter account public.

Bono rushed to hospital + Suzannah B. Troy beats out NYT mag Stieg Larsson

http://suzannahbtroy.blogspot.com/2010/05/bloombergs-goat-sing-stieg-larsson-4th.html

When I made this YouTube about Bloomberg's goat may sing and Stieg Larsson's trilogy plus 1

I had no idea The New York Times magazine was working on the story about Larsson.  See the Sunday New York Times magazine section.

I have written about the 4th book and the battle before and it is public knowledge posted on Stieg Larsson's website but I was ahead of the game and one reason why is Larsson's book focus on corruption, democracy, cowardly sicko bullies of the worst kind although they are all awful and it speaks to me and what is happening right now in NYC.

Now on to the news that U2 lovers all over the world I am sure are far more concerned with and that is Bono was rushed to the hospital in Germany.  He hurt his back during a rehearsal and had to taken in immediately for emergency surgery.

Clearly his loved ones and everyone involved in the tour wanted him healed and back on his feet asap.

Here is the link from The Sun.