Archives
U.S. Currency to Get a Modern Look
After extensive public debate, Jacob Lew, Secretary of the Treasury, announced that Harriet Tubman will replace President Andrew Jackson on the front of the $20 bill and the reverses of the $5 and $10 will also be redesigned to include several other notable women in U.S. history. The History of Paper Currency The Secretary of […]
April 25, 2016
Audiophiles Gather at AXPONA in Chicago
AXPONA (Audio Expo North America), the high-end consumer audio show held last weekend at the Westin O’Hare in Rosemont, Il, is one of the best events of the year for audiophiles. While this is only one of about a dozen national high end audio shows, it is one of the more popular shows for audiophile […]
April 18, 2016
Synergistic Research Grounding Block
Synergistic Research has become a market leader of innovative audiophile products. While teaks of all kinds find no shortage of skeptics, the Grounding Block from Synergistic Research is a tweak based on solid science and it works. It has always been known that a well-grounded audio system has a lower noise floor than one where […]
April 11, 2016
Laura Poitras at the Whitney Museum
Laura Poitras has her first solo exhibition, Astro Noise at the Whitney Museum. The exhibit features immersive works of art that address the viewer with the scope of the mass surveillance by the National Security Agency using materials from Eric Snowden. The title of the work, Astro Noise, is a reference to whistleblower Eric Snowden’s […]
April 5, 2016
Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee Welcomes Two New Members
Steve Roach and Dennis B. Tucker recently joined the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC). Both members have backgrounds in journalism — Roach is editor-at-large for Coin World, while Tucker is the publisher of Whitman Publishing Company. The eleven-member CCAC play a vital role in U.S. Mint’s operations. It provides recommendations to the Secretary of the […]
March 28, 2016
Boys Town Commemorative Coin Set is a First
At its March meeting in Washington DC, the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC) considered the designs for a three coin set—gold $5, silver $1, and clad $1/2 dollar—to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary of Boys Town. It was the first time that obverses and reverses were paired by artist for presentation to the committee. Instead […]
March 21, 2016
The Haitian Mango is in Season
The Haitian mango is in season—early March until the end of May. Mango ice cream does not taste like the mangoes you buy in the grocery store. That’s because the mangoes sold all year in supermarkets come from Ecuador or Peru. The taste of Mango’s memorialized in ice cream is grafted from the Haitian mango, […]
March 14, 2016
Ethernet EMI Filter for Better Digital Audio
DJM electronics has made the first Ethernet noise filter that might be helpful for an audio signal. It is called the GigaFOILv3 Ethernet Filter and it is currently priced at $1,000. It is commonly accepted that EMI causes Noise in power cables. When that power is used for audio, noise adversely affects the quality […]
March 7, 2016
Trip Advisor Names Grace Bay World’s Best Beach
The whole world now knows what anyone who has ever been to Turks & Caicos has always known: Grace Bay beach on the island of Providenciales is the number one best beach in the world. While Grace Bay is regularly named one of Trip Advisor’s Travelers’ Choice Beaches, this is the first time it topped […]
February 29, 2016
How the Bill of Rights Became Law
“The Bill of Rights: The Fight to Secure America’s Liberties” by Carol Berkin, Simon & Schuster, 2015 If you read only one book about the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, known collectively as the Bill of Rights, read Carol Berkin’s The Bill of Rights: The Fight to Secure America’s Liberties. In just 271 pages, […]
February 22, 2016