THE ROCK GOES GREENAfter one of our editors got herself on the unofficial listserv of all the middle-aged graffiti artists who shaped the Chicago graffitI scene in the ’80s, she’s learned lots of useless gossip but finally something useful: eco-friendly spray paint. Chicago graffiti artists are going green. (Maybe they were inspired by last week’s issue?) The buzz is over a new eco-friendly spray paint made with organic pigmentation and natural resins, rather than lead, and packaged and labeled with recycled materials. American graffiti artist Caleb Aero founded the eco-friendly spray paint company Blubber Colors and has already painted the Berlin wall with the new paint to celebrate the 20th anniversary of its fall. To all those who plan on painting The Rock: Consider Blubber Colors. The environment (and your brain cells) do not appreciate the extra lead.
LUPE VISITS… BUT DOESN’T SINGFirst of all, Lupe Fiasco was here? Secondly, why was Lupe here? The back story: Wednesday night, the Center for Student Involvement sponsored “The History Channel: The People Speak College Tour” to promote a new documentary airing on the History Channel in December. To promote the documentary based on Howard Zinn’s books, Michael Ealy, an actor in the TV show “Sleeper Cell,” and hip hop artist Lupe Fiasco both performed a reading in Leverone on Wednesday. Lupe read from “The War on Vietnam,” the first civil rights movement protest of the Vietnam War, printed in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party’s newsletter. Mr. Fiasco, we just wish you’d used your vocal chops for “Superstar” or “Daydreamin'” in addition to the reading. The Center for Student Involvement not only called NUIT and Edge Audio, but also the designer of Leverone to make sure your acoustics were up to par. Sounds concert-ready to us.
SECURITY CAMERA HIDE-AND-SEEKSince the sexual abuse incident that happened at the Technological Institute earlier this week caught us all off guard, we investigated video surveillance on campus. We all know there’s a “Rock Cam,” but what else? Turns out all residential buildings – plus Ryan Field - have cameras, but especially inside academic buildings, cameras are scarce, says Merrill Silverman, director of university security systems. Of the 250 security cameras on the Evanston campus, every single one feeds into the “campus-wide video network” run by University Police. UP did not choose locations for every single one of those cameras, though. Some of the individual schools have installed them, but we’re guessing that might be more to protect pricey equipment rather than students. “There are some cameras that monitor many places at once,” Silverman says. “There are two cameras on the roof of Tech that monitor many of the surrounding buildings.” All these cameras are “state of the art,” he says, and do well in “low-light situations.” And they’re all fewer than three years old – some only months old. Too bad they don’t have the time or enough staff to watch the screens live, even though they’re all trained to do it. Generally, the only time they watch is after something’s already happened. Does this calm your nerves?
