SF renames Bush St – aptly

So this rippled through the Interwebs today but I had actually stumbled upon it rather organically (or, ignorantly, as the case happened to be) and got a huge kick out of it – perhaps greater than if I had seen it online first then sought it out after – the beauty of a perfectly-executed stunt!

I was on my way to an appointment after watching the new Pres be sworn in this morning. Of course I was very excited, but also running a little late. As I biked quickly up the hill toward my appointment on Bush Street, I squinted toward the street sign to see if I’d met my destination (I don’t know this part of town well so was trying to get my bearings). I wasn’t wearing my glasses, either, but I swore – and as I got closer – did it really say? It looks like… OBAMA St!!

I stopped my bike at the corner and pointed toward a sign, exclaiming to a random man. English wasn’t his first language, so it took a second for us to get on the same page, then we smiled at each other, laughed and went our separate ways. It was beautiful. I snapped a photo on my phone and posted to Twitter.

 

Obama Street (at Hyde St), SF

After my appointment, I saw some students snapping photos but no one knew at the time who had executed this stunt. It was fun, though, watching people react to it – drivers honking, yelling, pedestrians smiling, snapping pics, etc. So super cool.

A friend of mine IMd me once I got back to my desk to inform that it was the work of Laughing Squid – how appropriate!

Well done, guys! This thoroughly made my morning. :)

~Jes

UPDATE: Apparently I assumed this was done by Laughing Squid, however just learned that a group called Survival Research Laboratories (they have a Wikipedia page) was behind the stunt. Thanks, Derek, for the tip! http://sfcitizen.com/blog/2009/01/20/survival-research-labs-changes-bush-street-to-obama-street/

Dear G-mail, thanks for halting my drunk e-mailing

This week, Google introduced Mail Goggles. They announced it on the official blog. Here’s what it does:

“When you enable Mail Goggles, it will check that you’re really sure you want to send that late night Friday email. And what better way to check than by making you solve a few simple math problems after you click send to verify you’re in the right state of mind?”

This is a really good example of a company doing something that plays to people’s amusement and interest…which resulted in some widespread press coverage. My only problem is that I don’t know how well I’d fair at the math problems while I’m stone cold sober.

For you text messagers, try LG’s cell phone with a breathalyzer installed, as told in the CNET post.

Umm...let me open my iPhone calculator app