Women War & Peace (& What We Will No Longer Put Up With)

Upon this week’s premiere of Women War & Peace, PBS’ series examining the impact of war on those with the XX chromosome, producer Abigail Disney came to Stanford and the Clayman Institute to talk about the project’s genesis. The question of “what if you looked at war as though women mattered?” led Disney and her team to Liberia (where women stood up against Charles Taylor’s regime en masse, wearing white) and Bosnia (where 16 women boldly testified against army members who set up rape camps), not to mention Afghanistan, Israel, Pakistan, and Colombia. The result is striking, frightening, and…empowering. Watching it will make you refuse to allow women worldwide to continue to be erased from the record–and simultaneously demand more political power.

Countdown to Children’s Creativity Museum Unveiling

When you’ve secured the URL creativity.org, you’d best make great use of it. And the Children’s Creativity Museum (formerly Zeum in SOMA) plans to do so with its upcoming unveiling of a large-scale rebrand and Imagination Lab. Focused on multimedia learning, it will offer design, animation, music, and movie instruction and studios (which Bay Area-ites can participate in for free at next weekend’s re-opening celebration).

I love the imaginative branding that the firm Landor helped develop pro bono with my now-Stanford colleague Joy Wong Daniels. Que colorful.

FoundersCard + Women 2.0 = Startup Savings

Holders of sleek silver FoundersCards the world over share a similar conundrum: stay shush’ed about the savings on business, travel and lifestyle or let others in on the secret. Because Women 2.0 believes in scale, we’re spreading the word about the membership organization with a nice little promo for you.

At $199, joining is a steal and will earn you large percentages off everywhere from Equinox gyms to Apple and international hotels (Barcelona’s Hotel Arts, anyone?). To redeem, visit FoundersCard.com and click on Membership Inquiries. Complete form and enter “FCWMN11″ as the referral code.

Women 2.0 is excited to partner with FoundersCard as the company makes it less expensive for startups to seek out personal and professional services. I recently saved $300 when booking a Virgin Atlantic work flight to Nairobi, meaning my card has already more than paid for itself. While stateside, members can save on networking events like wine tastings and SFBeta and celebrate FoundersCard’s first year in New York on June 8.

Balenciaga, Spain & Modern Style

After the de Young Museum presented Vivienne Westwood’s fantastical work, I was gun shy about seeing another area haute couture show. How could it measure up? Who else could create to that scale? Those shapes?

Thanks to a friend who’s new to the Bay Area, I got back on the high fashion train this week to find that the presentation of Cristóbal Balenciaga’s styles isn’t better–it’s just different. More items–from tunics to gowns and bolero jackets–are presented this time around, and you’ll want to give yourself a while to study the folds and fabrics. The show’s themes were curated by Vogue’s European editor at large Hamish Bowles and include Spanish Art, Regional Dress, the Spanish Court, Religious Life and Ceremony, the Bullfight, and Dance. It was the first time since seeing Ms. V’s work that I went into a museum wishing I could walk out with a bag of goods off the mannequins–Balenciaga’s geometry and craftsmanship are that good.



On Data Openness & Participation

Among the many information discussions at Data 2.0 today, my main takeaways were twofold:

It’s important to focus on citizens’ responsibilities not just as voters, but as information advocates. The conference at UCSF started with a comparison of different cities’ offerings (with SF celebrating census data mashups, NY offering a way to filter the city’s checkbook, and Chicago bringing transparency to government contracts). The core theme? Much of this information wasn’t consolidated with public consumption in mind, and it’s up to citizens to start optimizing it for public usage. more

Giselle Returns

This weekend the San Francisco Ballet opened Giselle, and I’m glad they brought it back to the stage after its local premiere in ’99. While the villager costumes in the first act felt overdone, they made the bride spirits in their white veils that much more striking at the start of the second act. Principal dancer Yuan Yuan Tan is fantastically dynamic to watch as the doomed protagonist, and you can see why she’s been the lead in Swan Lake, Romeo & Juliet, and The Sleeping Beauty among other area performances. You only have until Valentine’s Day to see her in action.

! Women Art Revolution Provides an Education, and Then Some

When I wrote about ! Women Art Revolution last year, I anticipated that artist Lynn Hershman Leeson’s documentary would be an education. Despite writing regularly about women in technology and media, I fall with the majority of Americans who are hard pressed to name a handful of female visual and performance artists (Frida Kahlo and Marina Abramović come immediately to mind, but the exercise prompted by the film wasn’t as simple as I expected).

Forty years of footage of the work of historians, creators and curators were compiled for this feature-length look at Feminist Art premiering this week at Sundance. It was fun to learn about activism I didn’t know about (including that practiced by the Guerilla Girls, creators of flyers like the one at right that called for changes in the composition of major exhibitions); intriguing to consider the future of work like Iranian artist Shirin Neshat (whose film Women Without Men was one of the most intriguing of last year’s festival); and devastating to hear about the violence that many of these women faced. I’m glad that the film will be coming to the San Francisco Film Festival this year and have a slew of friends–women and men–I’ll be taking to it.

FM Authors on Strategic Content at Alt Design Summit

I hit the road with Federated Media Publishing and our partner Clever Girls this week for the Altitude Design Summit, a meeting of design bloggers in Salt Lake City. Last year left me most inspired, as evidenced, and I’m excited about today’s conversations about strategic content sponsorships and determining which metrics matter most. Some of the FM partners presenting include:

Follow the dialogue at #AltSummit.

Photo by Ecofabulous’ Caitlin Bristol.

Reality Is Broken Book Event at Institute for the Future

Thursday’s launch event for “Reality Is Broken,” game researcher Jane McGonigal’s book about how games make us more engaged citizens, looks to be a great follow-up to her TED talk about playing our way to a better world. The Palo Alto “think and do tank” Institute for the Future will play host to the event on the day the book is available on Kindle (not that I’ve been counting down).

The host organization explains how the book for gamers, developers, and those looking to learn “reveals how we can use the lessons of game design to fix what is wrong with the real world” and suggests how “gamers will be able to leverage the collaborative and motivational power of games in their own lives, communities, and businesses.” It will be my read of choice on the way back from a trip to Utah this week.

Well, Welcome Back.

I know, I know. I shouldn’t have left you. I’m back after a batshit crazy December (think TED, writing for GigaOm, and holiday shenanigans) and ready to report for you. To get to it…