You have until noon on Tuesday to guess it. Country first, then city and/or state. If no one guesses the exact location, proximity counts. Be sure to email entries to VFYWcontest@theatlantic.com. Winner gets a free The View From Your Window book, courtesy of Blurb. Have at it.
Update: We switched out the first photo (from Delft, Netherlands) because of a revealing file name accidentally left it.
Anya Kemenetz profiles TED:
[It is] creating a new Harvard — the first new top-prestige education brand in more than 100 years. Of course TED doesn't look like a regular Ivy League college. It doesn't have any buildings; it doesn't grant degrees. It doesn't have singing groups or secret societies, and as far as I know it hasn't inspired any strange drinking games.
Still, if you were starting a top university today, what would it look like? You would start by gathering the very best minds from around the world, from every discipline. Since we're living in an age of abundant, not scarce, information, you'd curate the lectures carefully, with a focus on the new and original, rather than offer a course on every possible topic. You'd create a sustainable economic model by focusing on technological rather than physical infrastructure, and by getting people of means to pay for a specialized experience. You'd also construct a robust network so people could access resources whenever and from wherever they like, and you'd give them the tools to collaborate beyond the lecture hall. Why not fulfill the university's millennium-old mission by sharing ideas as freely and as widely as possible?
If you did all that, well, you'd have TED.
Reihan concurs:
The success of TED doesn't mean that traditional elite institutions don't have a place. But it provides a very constructive kind of competition. As TED's "mindshare" expands, will will hopefully see more efforts like MIT's OpenCourseWare, if only because elite schools don't want to lose their relevance and their influence. Eventually, the mission of these schools, with their vast resources, will focus more on the wider public than on their own enrolled students, thus delivering more educational bang-for-the-buck. TED is, in a small but important way, teaching educators how to solve the problem of scalability.
They have an enemies list – throughout history. Money quote:
Out of all the gangsters, serial killers, mass murderers, incompetent & crooked politicians, spies, traitors, and ultra left-wing kooks in all of American history — have you ever wondered who the worst of the worst was?
Jimmy Carter is the worst of the worst. Barack Obama is the second worst. Yes, worse than every mass murderer and serial killer in American history. Worse than Dahmer and Manson. Whoever these bloggers are, they are sick. But hey: this is the conservative movement today. It makes the John Birch Society look tame.
Update: for what a sane conservative might suggest, see Bainbridge.
"There’s no denying the elephant in the room. Neither is there any rejoicing over the mosques proposed for Sheepshead Bay, Staten Island and Ground Zero because where there are mosques, there are Muslims, and where there are Muslims, there are problems," – Shavana Abruzzo, New York Post.
It's amazing what can happen when elites indicate that it's legit to stigmatize an entire religion. Mercifully, the president is standing up for core American values.
Stephen Heiner gave up his Blackberry, experienced withdrawals, and eventually acclimated:
We have allowed ourselves to become 24/7 radio beacons. We are always on. Always ready to transmit or receive. There is a nervous habit that the younger generation has of checking their cell phones every 90 seconds or so. Just watch them. They didn’t hear a text message notification, but they are checking their phones just in case. And who knows, one might feel the urge to send a text message because heck, it’s been 30 seconds since one was sent. Watch people in airports, or in the auto repair shop, or on a university campus. There is a constant need to check to see if they are still plugged in. It is a nervous tic that they don’t even know is a tic.
In previous times, when we were more tied to place and limits as a society, people were reached at a specific location. Letters came to homes. Telegrams came to homes. Phone calls were placed… to homes. The cell phone, the harbinger of the always-on internet society, unhooked the anchor of place from communication. And when communication is not limited, is not circumscribed, it becomes unlimited and tyrannous.
A small personal observation. In DC, where I am sequestered in a blog-cave for much of the time, almost all my general communication is virtual. I see my hubby and a few close friends and occasionally bump into people at the Duplex Diner, but that's about it. In Provincetown, the contrast is astounding. I almost never text or phone my friends here. Why? Because I know I will bump into them soon, on Commercial Street or the gym or the beach or the bars or the commissary called Frappo66. From a near-total virtual existence, I go to an almost entirely real one: meeting actual people with bodies and faces and clothes in an unplanned and serendipitous fashion. It's liberating: life in a small town. Yes, there's Grindr and it can be fun. But you notice that it's the visitors who are still communicating virtually until they too succumb to the physical interaction we used to call life.
Another reason to come here. And to stay.
(Video via SwissMiss)
And other disturbing mating habits from insects known as water striders. (Photo: Wiki.)
A reader writes:
I see that you gave the cover of American Taliban a Moore Award nomination. Here are some other possible nominees. Perhaps the fellow who said that the "base of the GOP – aided and abetted by what's left of their elites – want a religious war abroad and at home." Or the guy who said that the GOP's "bigotry trumped their humanity". Or that they hold an "instrumental belief in war as a virtue, in torture as a Machiavellian necessity, in primitive forms of politicized Christianity as a ballast against Islam." No, no … it should definitely be the author of these remarks:
As we watch the GOP become a religious party bent on imposing its religious views on civil society and determined to wage war against Islamic countries as a crusade to prove our own superiority, it feels very Weimar to me.
But what's most Weimar about all of this is the role of the intellectuals in aiding and abetting this ugliness, in the deeply hidden contempt for the democratic West that lies within the neoconservative project. They believe in one thing: war. And they are doing all they can to expand and provoke it.
But seriously, what is being said by that cover that you haven't said in the last week alone?
The difference is in equating them directly with the Taliban and al Qaeda. That equation is as repulsive to me now as it was when Dinesh D'Souza did the same thing to the left. The neocons and the Christianists are deeply dangerous to Western society and global peace, but they are not, emphatically not, the kind of people who stone people to death, murder innocents as a religious duty, and wage war on us every day. To equate American citizens with the enemy is to engage in McCarthyite excess that is as wrong on the left as it is on the right. It's a step too far – and it is empirically false.
Washington, DC, 7.43 am
Today on the Dish, Ezra stayed vigilant on Ross on Prop 8, Republicans stayed sociopathic, Britain followed our lead on civil marriage, and you can find a whole slew of Prop 8 legal reax and predictions here, here, here, here and here.
Lessig defended the left from Gibbs, the Gitmo farce continued, and we had more reactions to McWhorter on race and poverty here and here. We mined Bush's Cordoba connections, and feared Krauthammer's conflations of American Muslims with Al Qaeda. This reader lessened our guilt about email attachments, Jamelle Bouie and others begged to differ with Yglesias on the economic crisis for college grads, and Chait waxed poetic on Pete Wehner's unintentional poetry.
The Pope disappointed, prison rape proliferated, and we got a lesson on living in color photography. The Dish delved into a later withdrawal from Afghanistan and one reader's perspective of Iran's Green movement was vindicated.
San Francisco stole McDonald's toys from children, Congressman Gohmert invented "terror babies," and Kinsley almost changed his mind on Packer. VFYW here, MHB here, FOTD here, and the coolest bike accessory you don't own here.
Ayn Rand ruled the playground, James Franco smoked the hot stoner celeb competition, and love conquered all in Iowa.
Thursday on the Dish, a majority of Americans supported gay marriage. Andrew responded to the poll, while readers snickered over the shape of the graph (and this one too). But Glenn Beck jumped on board, Rush Limbaugh honored the sanctity of marriage with his fourth, and Andrew replied to Ross on celibacy, monogamy, and the importance of integration, echoed by this reader's choice of home vs. security.
The base of the GOP was debased, a reader scoffed at the fight over the Mosque and over the confederate flag, and Liz Cheney made Bush look good. Andrew urged Obama to take the Tory line of attack; Damon Root justified the 14th amendment via supply and demand; and one reader contested that Bagram isn't that big. Islam-bashing didn't abate; immigrants were kidnapped; we debated torture, both at home and in Iran; and Dachau was once this idyllic field.
We heard kudos for TBD.com, learned what keeps poverty at bay, and readers responded to the unemployment chart of the day. The dream of libertarian parking reached San Francisco; Manning's suppressed sexual identity could have driven him to Wikileaks; and Mark Kleiman overhauled the war on drugs, but couldn't change the absurdity of this punishment.
Pedestrian signs never looked so fun; a shirtless Conan stayed mysterious; and the bubble of Bush-era tax cuts were visualized here. Newborn pandas FOTD here, rural VFYW here, dogs wiping their bums MHB here, and creepy ad watch here. Yglesias nominee here and here, Moore award here, and Malkin nominee here.
Email attachments polluted the earth, we pondered puppy mortality,and even monkeys grew tiny beards.
Wednesday on the Dish, Ross embarked on a response to Prop 8 (the Dish's is forthcoming), which Andrew addressed from behind enemy lines. Vaughn Walker may not be gay; the case's video and document evidence went public; Newt lived a double life; and two countries with legalized gay marriage now straddle the U.S.
Andrew looked again at the pain of war, at the evil of the Taliban, and at what it is to suffer alone, while this reader took a different road.
On the Cordoba Mosque, Hitch mustered outrage, Pamela Geller bullied the MTA, and Chris Mohney took the absurdity of it all and ran with it. The recession was kinder to college graduates; Leonhardt's insights reverberated around the web; and Nate Silver suggested a tax on the super rich. We dished on the Gibbs/ Left fiasco, readers defended lifetime appointees to the Supreme Court, and police ducked cameras.
Kristol spawned a spawn of a spawn named Ben Quayle, the worst of the oil spill may be yet to come, and the insanity of immigration reform has just begun. We caught the scariest storm in Helsinki ever here, snacks hidden in beards here, prospects for Hillary in 2012 here, and the delusions of a Palinite blogger here. FOTD here, VFYW here, and a simply stunning MHB here.
Facebook stayed juvenile, black teenagers dominated Twitter, and we apologized to every Jewish kid out there who wants to be Lebron.
Tuesday on the Dish, Fox News' Mr Gutfeld promised Cordoba Mosque a new neighbor– a gay bar that Andrew named this. Ben Smith gathered the 2012 candidate reactions to the Mosque, Gawker rocked out to the worst Anti-Manhattan Mosque anthem, and Andrew feared for the worst.
A top cadet at West Point resigned over DADT; blowback on Ross' column continued; and Andrew and a reader agreed: names mean something, and sometimes they mean more than politics. Asian-Americans outmarried, a Florida candidate offended, and we debated tax cuts, the budget and accountability here, here, and here. Gates whittled the military down but images of maimed Afghan children reminded us of the moral dilemma we're in. On the ground, Spencer Ackerman doesn't think we're leaving anytime soon.
For your philosophy fix, Andrew sketched the Oakeshott-Strauss divide between modernity and a past that will never return, and reconciled how he can support Reagan in the 1980s and Obama today.
Andrew's Bravo debut ended up on the cutting room floor, but he rejoiced over this kind of reader email. Other readers waxed realistic about weddings, your FOTD here, MHB here, VFYW here and contest #10 winner here.
And of course, we dissected the Palin eye-roll. Our readers reamed her, we discovered the not-so drag queen theater teacher only directed Hedwig, and Conservatives4Palin.com admitted words don't mean anything, anyways. She might be allowed to go fishing, though.
Monday on the Dish, Andrew reached for dignity amidst the divine, in response to Ross on Prop 8. The war over the Cordoba Mosque ignited, with repercussions for the ADL, and hypocrisy from the Wiesenthal Center, while freedom continued to reign quietly at the Pentagon. Beinart missed Bush while Goldblog's open letter urged him to step up, a new study showed mosques deter terrorism and even Thomas Jefferson weighed in from the grave.
Nate Silver joined the pile-on of Paul Ryan, with more sparring from all sides. Angle failed on civil rights, and Fox News finally featured a real conservative on the program, Ted Olson. Cantor got owned on accounting, readers reacted to Ariely's medical labels, and we remembered Nagasaki. The Iraq fiasco continued; the settlements unsettled Andrew; we peered into the government pensions; and the gulf got hit again.
Palin was gone fishing, but one Alaskan teacher wouldn't let her off the hook, neither would readers.Che graphics got the boot, Maggie got the Malkin award, Wikileaks went through the wringer, and Rand Paul worshipped Aqua Buddha with bong hits.
Humans beat computers; the web beat television, and Basil Marceaux beat the internet. The history of tipping here, the rationale of first impressions here, brain-eating discourses here. VFYW here, MHB here, FOTD here, and Nigeria and Cameroon bonded over beer.
— Z.P.
Same-sex couple Kristen Orbin (L) and Teresa Rowe embrace as they wait to hear a decision on whether same-sex marriages will be allowed to resume in California on August 12, 2010 in San Francisco. California Supreme court Judge Vaughn Walker lifted a stay on same-sex marriages in the state just over one week after his ruling that Prop 8 was unconstitutional. Marriages will be allowed to resume on August 18. By Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.
The Dish 
