tchnlgy

Meet PastMapper, a San Francisco-Centric Foursquare App From 1966

Bored of the same bars and restaurants that you've been checking into ever since Steve Jobs empowered you to more efficiently ignore your surroundings?  Want to be able to knowledgeably reminiscence about how much cooler the Mission was back when The Sycamore was still Happy Club and Jello Biafra hadn't gentrified the hood yet?  Well, now you can.

Meet PastMapper, a new, very much beta location-based check-in app that allows you to share where you'd be eating and drinking if this was 1966.

While the concept might sound silly, it's actually a fun app to play with, if only to learn how much more silly bar names were before RFK was shot.  For example, 24th was lined with bars such as Bucket O'Suds, Green Lantern Tavern, Pop's Clubhouse, Chip's and Big Ed's, Valencia was home to a joint called “Cozy Tavern,” 22nd and Mission had a bar “Mission Carousel”, and the corner of 21st and South Van Ness was “Bubble Club.”  Plus, there was apparently a restaurant on top of the US Bank Building (“Towers Restaurant”), The Napper Tandy used to sell donuts and The Jelly Donut used to serve booze, and seemingly every corner of the neighborhood had a bar on it.

Basically, surprise!, shit is way different now!

As previously mentioned, the app is a little rough around the edges—you cannot browse the history outside your GPS range (for example, I'd have to walk to Bender's to find out what Bender's used to be), and data is currently limited to 1966.  However, Brad Thompson, the app's developer, tells us he's “got data being made ready right now for 1976, 1953, and 1914.” All that data will be made available when it's ready, and he'll be expanding the database to the East Bay soon.

[PastMapper]

"Hello, I'm a Mac." "And I'm San Francisco."

Hyperbolically large consumer electronics company Apple's decision not to seek EPEAT certification for it's computer products precludes the City of San Francisco from ordering new Apple products for city employees.

Wait, what?

EPEAT or the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool is a standards group funded by the EPA. Basically, they score consumer electronic devices on their impact on the environment. Municipalities all over the country have instituted rules that say that city agencies must purchase devices that are certified by EPEAT. This is easier than tasking each individual employee to research and purchase an environmentally safe product.

Apple currently has 39 EPEAT certified computers, monitors and devices. As they focus more and more on designing thinner, lighter, better, faster devices, it is less likely that the materials they need to use will fall under EPEAT's standards. As such, they've asked EPEAT to stop listing Apple products all together.

This lead to city officials with the San Francisco Department of Environment to announce that they will be sending letters to all 50 city agencies informing them that “Apple products no longer qualify for purchase with city funds.” It's not impossible for a city employee to get a non EPEAT product, it's just incredibly difficult. If someone decides they really need a Mac, they can apply for a waiver.

Now, with that said, this is sort of a non-issue because, according to a recent report, only 2% of city computers are from Apple and only affects future purchases.

"Instagram: The Beer" Coming to San Francisco!

Rarely do we here at Uptown Almanac get truly excited about a new product being sold in San Francisco, but rarely is such a product “the most hipster beer in the world.”

Oh yes.  Starting this month, Churchkey Can Co., the new beer from Entourage mega-hunk Adrian Grenier and “some dude who used to work at Nike,” will “rollout” to the Bay Area following a couple months of intense product incubation in the drunk and rainy cities of Portland and Seattle.

However, its appeal isn't coming from its association with actors, its army of Facebook and Zynga executive investors, nor its nice, instagrammy script title font on the side of every steal can.  Rather, it's gaining steam in the tech press because everyone is clamoring for its hot new vintage 1930s-era can design that requires you to open the lid with a primitive tool known as a “church key”.

“Church key?,” you ask?  Well, here's a promotional video teaching all you “dumb young fucks” how to open a real beer:

Of course, even to the most casual observer, this looks extremely similar to Miller Lite's latest gimmick, in which you “crack open your brew” with Very Manly Objects like wrenches, shark teeth, fishing lure, dice, and the reservoir tip of a filled condom:

Miller Lite's competing product aside, this new old product is going to fuck up the beer industry as we know it.  Just read this objective press release posted on TechCrunch about TechCrunch's investment in the product:

After a short beer tasting hosted by CrunchFund founder and former TechCrunch editor Michael Arrington, the obvious first question asked by Siegler, who is also an investor in the company through CrunchFund, was about why there is a beer company at Disrupt and why tech investors are interested in investing in a beer company. Churchkey, Siegler noted, had one of the best pitch decks he had ever seen. Investing in Churchkey, he said, was an easy choice because it has the potential to disrupt the beer industry with its new design.

So get ready, San Francisco.  You best be freeing up some room on your carabiner for some church keys.

Dancing Robot Has Better Dolores Park DJ Judgment Than Most Humans

When I first saw this Beat Robot, I feared he'd be yet another burnout blasting weird electropop dubstep skrill ex-girlfriend stuff.  Wrong!  Not only does he have a sterling finish, but this robot is programmed to listen to Cake! Fuck! I haven't listened to Fashion Nugget in forever.  I think I still have a tape of that pleasantly stupid album somewhere…

Anyway, this rad rockin' robot is both Twitter and Geocities-equiped, should you want to follow this young robot's journey through San Francisco.

Now, your Moment of Zen:

[Photo by Athlex]

Pages