TheSportsTrap
How vain it is to sit down to write when you haven't stood up to live?
“Finding Portland”
An absolutely remarkable time-lapse project by Uncage the Soul capturing the subtle beauty of this great city. A little blurb penned by their team about the vid~
Filmed in Portland and the Columbia Gorge, “Finding Portland” gives a new perspective to the City of Roses. From a season opening Portland Timbers soccer game, to the top of the Fremont Bridge, to an aerial shot of Oneonta Gorge, “Finding Portland” tells the story of a city and its many faces.
Comprised of over 300,000 photographs shot in March and April, and including 50 unique locations, it gives an intimate view of the city through cutting edge time-lapse techniques. We’re excited to share it, and some behind-the-scenes photos, with you right here!
Liz Lufkin is Trapit’s New Chief Content Officer
In the technology world, this is comparable to acquiring CP3. Welcome, Liz!
We are extremely pleased to announce the hire of Liz Lufkin as our new Chief Content Officer. Liz previously served as Vice President at Yahoo for Front Page Programming and is an accomplished journalist, and a pioneer in content optimization and personalization technology.
While at Yahoo, Liz supervised all front page programming and content, attracting over 170 million users per month. She also pioneered development of Yahoo’s content optimization and personalization technology and grew editorial performance over 300% since 2006, driving more than 1 billion clicks a month to the Yahoo media network (News, Sports, Finance, Entertainment, Celebrity, Lifestyle).
Liz brings a wealth of experience and expertise that will help lead and shape Trapit’s overall content strategy and next phase of development.
Check out what Peter Kafka of AllThingsD has to say on Liz’s hire here.
Trapit to Launch iPad App
Hey All,
I work for an awesome company, Trapit. We are launching our iPad App in the near future. Here is a snippet from our corporate blog (don’t forget to follow/bookmark!)
In response to overwhelming user requests, we’re getting ready to drop an iPad app. It is going to be rad.
Make sure you’re one of the first to see it by signing up for email notification. To get on the list head on over to our homepage (logged in users will need to logout) and look for the sign up button in the upper left corner.
(In case you missed it)…introducing, The Suicide Coaster!
A colleague of mine sent this article my way, published a few months ago regarding the controversial debate of doctor assisted suicide. Thinking outside the box is one thing—I consider this innovation thinking outside of the BALLPARK.
Rather than basic, traditional euthanasia, Julijonas Urbonas envisions a method in which one can take their own life as
…an intellectual and artful departure from the world…
Keeping talking…sounds way more epic than morphine binging already.
Imagine strapping yourself into this kind of roller coaster seat, pictured above. Can you imagine the suspense? For three minutes straight, you’ll make the 1/3 mile climb (1,600 feet ~ that’s over five football fields!):
“Click-click-click-click-click-click” Up, up, up, up, up. Straight up. In fact, during the three-minute ride, two of the minutes are dedicated to the elevation-defying climb alone.
I imagine you see the light at the precipice—that moment where the hands of time come to a standstill before the indecipherable free-fall. Cue the Tom Petty.
The gravitational force is what kills you. 10 G’s blasting your entire existence. This is one coaster I’d put my hands up on. Described to me at the office as “just barely enough to get you to pass out, where your blood pools to your extremities.” (I liked the artsy explanation much more)
Here’s where the plot thickens. Urbonas describes the agonizingly slow climb as a method to challenge the rider’s decision making:
The rider has a few minutes to contemplate his decision and his life in retrospect. He would find enough time to adapt to the height and get through a series of imaginary fatal falls, while realizing that the objects on the ground are getting smaller…The slightest movement of the car would trigger intense heart-beating and goosebumps and most importantly it would test your decision. Therefore the very top of the tower is an ideal place to give the very last word.
Damn. As if that isn’t intense enough. The rider—THEN—is forced to be the trigger man himself/herself. At 1,600 feet, the coaster makes the rider hit the “FALL” button. Wait, wait—before you slam down on that easy button!
Perspective:
- Africa’s highest tribal burial site is 1,600 feet high!
- That’s approximately over 262 average humans stacked on top of one another
- Nearly three Space Needles
- Hirer than the antenna spire of the Empire State Building
- Slightly shorter than the tallest wave in the history of mankind.
- IT’s FREAKING HIGH!
- Higher than Bob Marley singing with this eyes closed.
Now that the riders have weighed these pressing thoughts, they can either slam that button down and plummet to a loop-de-loop death, or hit the other button? I imagine it says something along the lines of “get me the hell out of here…but, slowly.”
This raises another radical thought in my mind. Imagine that prisoner on Death Row, —the proclaimed loon convicted of mass-murder, the guy who swears he’ll die with his unresolved innocence—imagine him in line for Texas-style capital punishment. Can a human remain stubborn moments before his annihilation? Why hold a poker face with no chips left in the stack? How to get him to spill his guts; how to con the truth out of him? Forget psychoactive truth serum, shut down the Guantanamo dog pound and tear up that tactical Abu Ghraib list. Send this guy or gal—innocent until proven guilty—up the damn coaster ramp and wire/mike ‘em up for either a humane confession…or the platform/stage to exclaim a last-second “F-U” to society
(Or an apology?)
OK, that is a bit much. I’ll stick to my non-innovative ways for now.
Not trying to get too political on this subject, but I’ve always personally believed a human should have the right to “play God” under the right circumstances. Isn’t it somewhat playing God for us humans to say “we know what you are feeling” to those enduring severe pain on their stiff death beds. Aren’t we playing God enough already when we hook up wires and implement advanced medicine to prolong that person’s unnatural life expectancy in this heavenly world? If we are going to draw a line at all, why does this line continue contorting, stretching, shifting?
What those circumstances actually are is a debate that will continue to dilly-dally on likely for the rest of my lifetime, despite what my home state Oregon believes about dignity and one’s inalienable rights. However, I believe pushing the limits of fear is the perfect way to lift up each and every layer of a life decision that is certainly far more complex than a “LIVE” or “DIE” button. If one is going to have a moment of clarity, it’s not happening in the vulnerable state of a one-window-shared-room-hospital-compound. If you are authentically religious—regardless which sect you follow—can’t we agree that a person about to make that decision might as well be closer to God when doing so? Give them a chance to speak and listen to an element of truth on the highest stage possible. Isn’t it true—the only thing man fears more than death, is public speaking? The audience of fear—our all-time most intimidating critic—is always the one jotting the speech. We know this, it’s a universal axiom.
Regardless how crazy this idea sounds—If I could come up with a name for it, I’d call it “The Continental Divide.”
But who am I to explain what it’s all about, hear it from the visionary himself here.
-Geoff
Geoff Ziemer
Life is a short hop. Charge it or get benched
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