Jelly Belly has four food scientists who concoct the 100+ flavors of jelly bean to match the original subject as closely as possible. At tasting sessions the candidate beans are sampled alongside the fruit, food, drink that they intend to mimic (presumably “barf” flavor was tested slightly differently). I doubt I was the first or only person to suggest pomegranate as a new flavor, but it is enlightening to see how much care they took to perfect it: “the group taste-tested juices and fruit from different regions, climates, and providers.” Perhaps all that research was parlayed into the pomegranate cosmos in their new cocktail flavor line.

“Max Headroom” the 1987-1988 TV series is being released on DVD and The New York Times takes the opportunity to review it from the perspective of 2010, including a pithy quote from William Gibson.  Movie theaters were a thing of the past in the Headroom future and television was the ruling media, with no World Wide Web in sight.  The 1987 Times review of the first episode seems rather jaded, perhaps tired already of the commercialization of television that the episode itself blatantly skewers with the 3 second “blipverts” that have the unfortunate side effect of killing some people. There’s no mention of cyberpunk or references to “Bladerunner” back then. An earlier 1985 review of the Cinemax series where Max Headroom served as host of an interview show takes note of the video effects but not much else. A 1986 review mentions “Bladerunner” because Rutger Hauer is a guest, but, again, the only innovation mention is that of the Max effects. New Coke anyone?

Officially, Andrew Haines is Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts‘ associate conservator, furniture and frame conservation. He’s the house framer. Before a painting goes on display, Haines will decide if the frame needs repair or replacement. A frame may be swapped from a similar sized painting in the museum’s collection or purchased from a frame dealer. In some cases Haines will make the frame himself.  He has catalogued 4,300 of the 6,000 frames in the museum so far. He’s an artist himself, painting landscapes of houses and buildings.

Seasoned New Yorkers may overlook the uniqueness of the objects holding down the top papers at newstands, but for Harley Spiller those paperweights are a family affair. His parents operated the Mortimer Spiller Company in Buffalo, manufacturers of cast-iron paperweights.  And he wrote his MA thesis, all 25,000 words of it, on these functional objects.  The New York Times published a slide show of a few of the many paperweights Spiller’s father collected over the years. Like many mundane, everyday items, they are an overlooked chronicle of cultural change and industrial design. Harley Spiller is a collector himself of many things. I mentioned his Chinese restaurant menu collection here back in 2005 and I’m sure he’ll show up here again one day.

It’s a sheet glass with its own primate marketing blitz. Corning’s Gorilla Glass, invented in 1964 as Chemcor, fulfilled its goal of being a glass as strong as steel. Here’s the explanation from Dr. Donnell Walton, senior applications engineer at Corning of how chemical tempering strengthens the glass:

When you chemically temper a glass, you immerse it in a salt bath and you stuff larger ions in all the surfaces and put them all under compression. What’s unique about Gorilla Glass is that because of its inherent composition, it can allow those larger ions to penetrate the surface more deeply to increase the compression tolerance and tolerate deeper scratches. The compression pushes a flaw back. It’s harder to break from a deeper scratch.

Chemcor languished as cheaper alternatives appeared for its targeted appplications of car windshields and sunglasses. Then LCDs became popular and Corning is now a top supplier of glass for laptops and flatscreen TVs. Someone remembered Chemcor and it was dusted off, tweaked, given a new name and publicity campaign. Gorilla Glass “has been designed into more than 100 models by 19 major brands.” Only a few of them allow Corning to talk about it. Apple’s not on that list  (those who have cracked their iPhones may be wondering) but Motorola’s Droid is.  With this recent little PR buzz (it has its own Facebook page), Corning is poising Gorilla Glass for the touchscreen revolution and beyond. Star Trek IV fans have already taken note of its “aluminum-composite composition” in relation to Scotty’s “transparent aluminum” whale tank (though the U.S. military want to claim that reference with their aluminum oxynitride transparent armor). Now if  our gadgets can also be sealed off from laundry, rain, and bathroom incidents, we klutzes will be all set.

The First Baptist Church in Brattleboro, Vermont made the newswire rounds late last year for putting its treasured Tiffany window up for sale to the highest bidder. Short of funds, the church opted to let go of its  Louis Comfort Tiffany signed stained-glass image of St. John the Divine in order to help keep its homeless shelter open.  In June this year, colored panes replaced the window which sold for $85,000 to a collector who is starting a stained glass museum in Illinois.  The closest offer to that was from a group, including Michael Eisner, who offered $47,500 to keep the window in the church.

When I picked up my friend Jen (hi Jen!) at Seattle’s King Street Station in early July, there was a tantalizing square opening in the dropped ceiling that revealed a portion of the ornate plasterwork far above us.  I didn’t have long to wait to see the full results. A week later the 1,600 ceiling tiles were removed and photos published of  the results.  I can only imagine the reactions in 1963 when the original ornaments and lighting were removed and covered. Did most people pronounce the new drop tiles, flourescent lighting and plastic laminate modern and lovely?

Major orchestras around the country have several positions for musicans open. These seats tend to stay unfilled for long periods of time for several reasons. It’s cheaper to pay a substitute than hire a permanent replacement so there’s no financial incentive to hire quickly. There have been several musical director transitions and outgoing directors will let their successors fill the spots. And the multiple steps of the audition process combined with the busy schedules of the committee and director make for lengthy selections.  It’s nice to know there are well paying (six figures!) jobs for classical musicians out there, if only they could just get hired.

With the resignation of Helen Thomas, the coveted front row, center seat in the White House Briefing Room had several suitors from other rows.  Here’s the now outdated chart for reference.  NPR had advocacy groups pushing for a move.  Fox News and Bloomberg News also lobbied for the seat.  The White House Correspondents Association solved the problem by moving first row Associated Press over into Thomas’ old seat and promoting second row Fox and third row NPR up a row.  The NPR advocates are at least content that Fox didn’t get the center seat.

I’d always assumed there were regulations about advertising liquor on TV in the United States, but there aren’t any federal laws about it.  The absence of hard liquor commercials was self-policed by the National Association of Broadcasters as part of their voluntary code.  In applying to the FCC for new stations and acquisitions, owners would simply state they would comply with the NAB code, which bound them to the hard liquor restriction.  However, the code was dropped in the 1980s.  We were left with the alcohol companies’ own voluntary code that went away in the 1990s.  Now the remaining restrictions are around not advertising during children’s programming and showing safe drinking in the ads.  Networks and local stations often have their own policies about whether they’ll accept liquor ads and when they’ll show them. Figuring out how this may be applied (or not) to the new Internet age of media delivery is left as an exercise for the reader.