If the postal service gets its way, you could be getting a lot more of this. (courtesy of Flickr user Domiriel under Creative Commons license)

The United States Postal Service (USPS) announced on November 15th that they lost over $5 billion last fiscal year, due to the continuing downward trend in first-class mail. To cope, the USPS is trying to increase the volume of commercial mail in the system — what many would call “junk mail”. They plan to do this, in part, by exempting heavier commercial mail from the postal rate increase that’s scheduled to go into effect on January 22, 2012.

In a statement, Paul Vogel, president and chief marketing/sales officer for the agency, said that the initiative will “[give] companies expanded opportunities to advertise new services and products to their customers as part of bill and statement mailings.” But a recent survey I conducted shows that many customers already get a great deal of junk mail.

Most survey respondents don’t get very much mail per week: less than five items. But those that get more get a lot more:

And those who get more than 15 pieces say that most of it is commercial mail:

The agency’s efforts to increase commercial mail volumes flies in the face of many companies’ efforts to promote paperless billing, particularly via bill aggregation portals like Manilla. But it hasn’t stopped them from trying to convince businesses that paper mail is better because it’s more secure. Check out this recent television advertisement from the USPS.

The City of New York’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is in the midst of rebuilding the Gowanus Canal’s wastewater pumping station at the north end of the waterway. The station pulls fresh water from Buttermilk Channel, near Governor’s Island, into the closed-ended canal in order to circulate water.

“It’s basically a toilet tank for the Gowanus,” said Butler Street landlord Rick Rehak, 41. Rehak owns a building next door to the pumping station site, and says he’ll be glad when construction is finished. “When it’s all done, it’ll be great — in the meantime, it’s a train wreck,” he said.

The sponge park concept uses landscape planning to slow, retain, and filter water runoff into the canal. (Illustration: dlandstudio)

The pumping station project coincides with another city initiative for the area, the Gowanus Canal Sponge Park. Envisioned by dlandstudio as a way to beautify the canal while reducing contaminated runoff, the work is set to be completed in spring 2012, according to the Carroll Gardens Patch.

The Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) designated the 7,500 foot long Gowanus as a federal Superfund cleanup site in 2010, according to the New York Daily News, though little work has been done to remediate over 100 years of pollution in the waterway. The EPA has identified at least nine companies that are ultimately responsible for cleaning up former industrial sites along the canal, as well as the waterway itself, which contains PCBs, coal tar wastes, heavy metals and volatile organics, according to agency documents.

Here is a slideshow of the canal in its current, unimproved state.

That’s one curious aspect of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which is trying to deal with the crush of donations from the month-old movement. According to Pete Dutro, 36, an NYU finance student and member of the Occupy Wall Street finance committee, over $100,000 has been raised since the occupation started on Sept. 17. But the movement is struggling with the overwhelming volume of donors that have overloaded the online donation system.

Read more at City Limits.

First-time café owner Josh Rubin has opened Whisk Bakery Café at the corner of Newkirk Avenue and Westminster Road, just east of Coney Island Avenue and directly across from P.S. 217. The café held its grand opening party on Sept. 17 in conjunction with local artists’ association Flatbush Art Studio Tour (FAST). FAST’s paintings, photographs and even a wooden sculpture remain on the cafe walls for another month.

Read more at the Brooklyn Eagle.

Here are a few photographs of the canal and the surrounding areas.

Former home of the National Packing Box Factory, one of many industries that used to line the canal.

An oil slick seen through a 3rd Ave. fence.

Carroll Street bridge over the Gowanus.

The Gowanus seen from the Carroll Street bridge.

A somewhat incongruous front door on a residence in the Gowanus area.

Narrative Science isn’t the only company in this space. Automated Insights (a company that recently scored $4 million in additional financing and changed its name from StatSheet — could it be because they wanted to use “AI” as their company logo?) has also developed technology that creates “long & short form articles, headlines & summaries written entirely by software, that derive insight from data.”

It’s clear that software like this works best for data-heavy content. And in the aforementioned CJR interview, the founder states that special algorithms for style and tone had to be created; something feasible for data-driven sports and business articles with a consistent tone, but perhaps not that easy for news articles. On Twitter, one user commented that automated content does not equal understanding:

People Don’t Want Charts, They Want Answers. http://t.co/oeCfxZDa. Narrative Science doesn't do #dataviz, but creates #BI #strataconf

September 20, 2011 2:13 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@LawrenceHecht

Lawrence Hecht

Software like this could also be used for mischief. For example, web content farms like eHow could quickly increase the amount of “content” that’s hosted on their sites, solely for the purpose of selling more ads (something they’ve been criticized for previously).

What do you think? Do you think robot-written journalism has a place in the newsroom?

Buried deep within it are several provisions that seemingly have little to do with job creation. Here are three of them:

1. Establishing an “Infrastructure Bank”

What is it: President Obama wants to spend $10 billion to create a new infrastructure bank, the American Infrastructure Financing Authority (AIFA). AIFA would provide loans for infrastructure projects.

How likely is it to create jobs: New civil service jobs would be created as part of AIFA, but beyond that, there are no guarantees. It could be years before candidate projects make their way through the approval process.

2. Permanently Giving the FCC Authority to Auction Wireless Spectrum

What is it: Section 275 grants the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) permanent authority to auction wireless spectrum, something it can only do now until September 2012.

How likely is it to create jobs: Spectrum auctions could generate $12 billion for the government, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The government is presumably hoping that buyers will create new wireless services, eventually generating new engineering jobs.

3. Establishment of Public Safety Broadband Network

What is it: Section 281 would create a new government agency to create a “public safety broadband network“. It would be a nationwide wireless network to replace the various FM radio frequencies used by emergency responders.

How likely is it to create jobs: Establishing the agency would create additional civil service jobs, but further job gains would be dependent upon private sector companies, and could again be years off.

These are perhaps admirable long-term initiatives. But they are unlikely to create jobs quickly outside of the civil service, and will likely earn the wrath of Republicans.

Chris "The Dutchess" Walton shows off her Guinness-world-record-winning fingernails.

There’s a new Guinness world record holder — though her feat is neither one of strength nor endurance.

Chris “The Dutchess” Walton, 45, of Las Vegas, Nev., has just been certified as having the longest fingernails in the world. Walton’s nails, which she has been growing for 18 years, total 19 feet 9 inches, about the height of an average giraffe. Her nails on each hand range in length from 1 foot 3 inches to 3 feet.

She tries not to let her long nails get in the way of her daily routine. She can even use a smartphone to send text messages. However, in a few areas of her life, she has had to make adjustments, particularly in choosing and modifying her clothes. “I acclimate the clothes to me… I’ll take the seam out,” she said, explaining that many people just assume she struggles every day to put a top on. Asked how she does the dishes, she laughed and said, “I have grandkids now so I have earned the right not to do dishes.”

Walton explained that she didn’t set out looking to break a world record. “[It’s] like you think about love – you go looking for it and you can’t find it. So if I was probably thinking about it, it probably wouldn’t have happened,” she said.

Unlike the previous record holder, Walton did not control the shape of her nails, preferring to let them grow out naturally. They resemble wild branches rather than a symmetrical work of art. She paints them gold, using several bottles of nail polish in the process, and also applies an acrylic base to keep them strong.

Walton said that most people have a positive reaction towards her nails. Many don’t even notice them until she starts gesturing. “A lot of people accept differences; if they don’t, you have to wonder how they deal with people who might have something like this normally,” she said.

The previous world record holder for longest fingernails was Lee Redmond, 70, a grandmother from Salt Lake City, Utah. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, Redmond, who spent 30 years growing out her fingernails, lost the record in 2009 after being ejected from her vehicle in a four-car pileup in Holladay, Utah.

Walton is one of 4,000 new and updated record holders in the 2012 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records, which is being released on Sept. 15. The company, a division of Canadian grocery and media conglomerate Jim Pattison Group, is also branching out into the digital arena. They currently produce several Guinness World Records iPhone applications and plan to launch an e-book version in November.

New York State Senator Ruben Diaz, Sr., gathers with other local politicians to denounce the gun violence that injured three on Monday, August 29, 2011.

Politicians gathered two days after the shooting of two preschool girls in the South Bronx neighborhood of West Farms to decry the violence and call for stronger gun control laws. But local residents said that endemic problems in the community require longer-term solutions, and cannot be solved merely through legislation or enforcement.

In a prepared statement, Democratic Assemblyman Peter M. Rivera said, “Quite simply, strict gun control laws in this State are necessary.” Rivera, a former NYPD detective, called on Republican Assembly members to join him in enacting stronger legislation. Other area politicians, including New York State Senator Ruben Diaz and Community Board District Manager Ivine Galarza, echoed his remarks, emphasizing the need for an increased culture of respect.

While politicians hope that the incident at East 181^st Street & Daly Avenue will be a turning point for the area, many long-time residents do not share that optimism. Some said that the endemic problems in the community run far deeper and require long-term solutions to gangs, drugs, and prostitution.

A security guard in the complex of seven low-rise apartment buildings where the shooting took place described a drug trade that has flourished during the five years he has been employed by CDC Security. Latchman Perumal said he is not armed and is therefore reluctant to confront suspicious individuals in his building. “All I can do is write a report,” he said.

Meanwhile, Jeannette Bocanegra, 44, a local resident and community activist, pointed down East 180^th Street and deplored the lack of hangout spaces for teens, stating that bored youths get involved in gangs and drugs. “Pharmacy, fruit market, Chinese food, nail salon, beauty salon, liquor store – do you see any place for kids?” she said. She blames the lack of community facilities for the fact that her son, 15, turned to crime and is currently in prison for robbery.

Bocanegra, a mother of six, attributed the shooting to teens who let their tempers get out of control. She felt that the incident could have been avoided if there was someone in the community – a parent, a neighbor, or a trusted mentor – to counsel the suspect into thinking before acting. “Do you think they meant to shoot those kids?” she asked. She pointed to the fact that the suspect, Luis Moore, turned himself into police voluntarily as evidence that his actions were simply an adrenaline-fuelled escalation and something he will regret.

According to statistics provided by the NYPD’s CompStat system, crime in the 48^th Precinct is down 22% since 2001. However, that belies seasonal differences in the crime rate. Many area residents including Mary Archer, who lives around the corner from the shooting, said that winter is pretty quiet in the area, but that there is a definite spike in the summer. She also said that the area is marginally better than when she moved to it in the 1970s. “There were people laid out dead in the streets,” she said, describing victims of gun crime.

Eddie Hernando and Paul Sandeep running Faith's Halal Food outside Madison Square Garden

Despite the economic downturn affecting many Manhattan street vendors, Paul Sandeep, 25, and Eddie Hernando, 42, have caught a lucky break at 8th Ave. and 34th St.: the lunchtime influx of construction workers from the massive Madison Square Garden renovation project.

Sandeep and Hernando, who operate Faith’s Halal Food from a tiny, overheated cart across the street from Penn Station, say that they haven’t noticed the impact of the economy at all. “We previously had a truck but have spent seven months with this,” Sandeep said, noting that the city’s crackdown on parked food trucks has actually benefited their business. During their lunch break, construction workers line the sidewalk halfway down 34th St., mostly eating take-out food from boxy styrofoam containers purchased from one of the many vendors dotting the street.

Shah, 52, a newsstand vendor in Midtown, helping a customer.

Other vendors in Midtown, however, have not been so lucky. Shah, 52, from India (who declined to provide his last name), runs a newsstand at the corner of 8th Ave. and 35th St. and decried a 50% decline in sales. “It’s very down,” Shah said, noting that despite his Midtown location, 80% of his sales come from locals and not from tourists. In particular, he said, with the price of a package of cigarettes hitting $13.00, many patrons are choosing to buy cigarettes individually — something he does not sell. “They’re not smoking less,” he said, but being more judicious about controlling their budget.