Tumblr just sold to Yahoo for $1.1 billion. We visited their offices a while back to see how they do what they do and it was pretty impressive.

In light of the big news and since Tumblr said they aren't planning any major changes like a big office move, we thought you might want to take a look inside the office that just got Yahoo to shell out almost $1.1 billion in cash.

Tumblr recently sold to Yahoo for $1.1 billion. Marissa Mayer announced it (on her Tumblr) in classic Tumblr form.

The Tumblr office is on E 21 St. and that building in the background is actually home to Business Insider.

Tumblr splits its office between two floors. The top one is where most of the staff works.

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New York startups are proving that Silicon Valley isn't the only place where monstrous tech companies can be made.

In the past twelve months, three tech companies in the New York area have exited for more than $1 billion.

Connecticut-based Indeed, a job search site with a big Manhattan presence, was acquired by Japanese company Recruit Co. Ltd. for an estimated $1 billion. Travel search site Kayak went public then was acquired by Priceline for $1.8 billion.

Now Tumblr, a true New York City company, has been acquired by Yahoo for $1.1 billion in an all-cash deal. It's staying in New York post-acquisition, so the talent won't be departing for Silicon Valley.

Other recent, sizeable New York exits include Buddy Media, which was acquired by Salesforce for ~ $690 million and OMGPOP, which Zynga purchased for a ~ $200 million. 

The exits mean more capital to spawn companies and retain talent in New York. Tumblr was the result of an exit its founder, David Karp, was a part of in 2006. He was Head of Product for UrbanBaby when CNET acquired it and he used the capital to launch Davidville, a hub for his creative projects.

Tumblr won't be the last big exit New York sees either. Other valuable companies that are growing quickly include 3D printing company Makerbot and project funding site, Kickstarter.

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Instead of Gap T-shirts and old jean shorts, New York's elite parents are turning to personal shoppers and designer duds for their child's summer camp wardrobe, according to Crain's New York.

"Camp is a tremendous business for us," Barry Cohen, a partner in popular tween store Lester's, told Crain's. "There is a real style to camp now. It's a competitive world, and you've got to keep up with your friends."

Lester's started selling camp merchandise eight years ago, and told Crain's they now employ 15 buyers who focus on products for summer camp. Some of the products include C&C California tees and True Religion jeans, which can cost over $100 for a pair of pants.

The price of all this monogrammed designer gear means parents could be blowing as much as  $2,500 to outfit their kids just for the summer, Crain's reports.

Sleepaway summer camps have substantially grown in status and popularity in recent years. It's not uncommon for elite summer retreats to cost parents more than $10,000 and offer activities like fencing, climbing walls, and zip lines.

Sources also told Crain's that some families are even paying "camp advisers" to help them decide which camp is the best fit for their child. The camp advisers help families set up visits and research the different camps, and can charge up to 20% of the camp's tuition for their services.

SEE ALSO: Send Your Kid To One Of These 18 Absurdly Expensive Summer Camps

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TripAdvisor just released the results of its 2013 Travelers’ Choice Destinations winners.

Millions of TripAdvisor users voted on their favorite destinations around the world, as well as their favorite destinations in the U.S.

Paris took the top spot on the World Destinations list, trumping New York City (#2) and London (#3).

Unsurprisingly, New York City topped the list of American destinations for the second year in a row.

“New York City continues to be an attractive draw for people from all around the world," NYC& Company’s CEO George Fertitta said. "The city’s unique energy, excitement and diversity are all reasons why visitors are continually drawn to the five boroughs year after year.”

See what other American cities made the list.

#25 Houston, TX

#24 Naples, FL

#23 Palm Springs, CA

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A week after his plan to revitalize the New York City taxi system was blocked, Mayor Michael Bloomberg reportedly accosted an NYC taxi boss in a private club and told him he would "destroy your f--k-ng industry."

According to a new report in theNew York Post, Bloomberg was at Madison Square Garden’s private 1879 Club for a Knicks playoff game when he was approached by Taxi Club Management CEO Gene Friedman.

“I saw Bloomberg and his security there in the club, so I went over and said, ‘Tell me what is going on with the Taxi of Tomorrow?’” Freidman told the Post.

“He turns to me, and said, ‘Come January 1st, when I am out of office, I am going to destroy your f---ing industry.’"

If the account of the story is true (the Post claims to have another witness to the incident), it would seem the Mayor is angry over the failure of his "Taxi of Tomorrow" plan, which was blocked by a State Supreme Court judge last week.

Bloomberg's plan — the first major redesign of the NYC taxi system since the Checker cab, the New York Times reports — would have seen NYC's taxis replaced with Nissan NV200s featuring transparent roof panels and “lower-annoyance” horns.

The plan was blocked as it violated a New York City provision that requires a hybrid option. Friedman was one of many in the taxi industry who fought the plan. According to a profile from 2010, Friedman owns roughly 700 taxi medallions— over 5 percent of NYC's total and worth around $542.5 million at the time.

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Some critics have pointed to New York State’s new gun control law as chilling in its scope and intent.

But new allegations coming from sheriffs may add to the outcry, as some authorities maintain that Gov. Andrew Cuomo pushed local sheriffs to stop publicly speaking out against the SAFE Act, the gun-control law he signed in January.

One source, in fact, told a local outlet that the governor threatened sheriffs’ jobs if they don’t comply.

Law enforcement officials were reportedly summonsed to Albany last month, where they met with the governor about the contentious issue. It’s no secret that sheriffs have come out to publicly oppose the law, sharing their concerns with the public at large. But during the meeting at the capitol, Cuomo allegedly asked them to stop being so vocal.

“The governor was of the opinion that the sheriffs around the state should not be interjecting their personal opinions in reference to the law,” Chemung County Sheriff Christopher Moss told the Times Union.

Cuomo’s comments to authorities, though, about not publicly speaking out against the bill may have crossed beyond simply recommending silence — at least according to one anonymous source. The Times Union has more:

One person briefed on the meeting said Cuomo threatened to remove sheriffs from office, a little-used power afforded the state’s chief executive under the state constitution. Moss would not confirm this. He did say the meeting was heated at times, but overall he described it as “cordial.”

[Sheriffs' Association Executive Director Peter] Kehoe did not return calls, and Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi declined to comment. An administration official, speaking anonymously because he was not authorized to discuss a private meeting, “strongly” denied Cuomo had threatened to remove any sheriff.

Regardless of what was said at the meeting, the Sheriffs’ Association has joined other politicians in filing an amicus curiae brief that would support a federal challenge to the gun control law. Rather than protesting the measure, itself, Sheriff John York of Livingston County said that the main issue is that the state’s resident’s did not have input on its contents and how it was enacted. So it is more the method through which it was passed that is in question.

Following the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the SAFE Act was passed and signed by Cuomo. As National Review notes, “Parts of the bill have needed modification because they were unclear or impossible to comply with. The new law put strict limits on the size of magazines in addition to broadening the definition of an assault weapon, a class which is banned.”

Some sheriffs have said that they will not enforce the law. With Cuomo welcoming any legal challenges, it appears the battle over gun control in New York State is just beginning. 

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NEW YORK (AP) — A company that promised sightseer tours to the Bronx that included a New York City "ghetto" has stopped the bus rides under protest from an outraged neighborhood.

Real Bronx Tours, which took mostly European tourists from Manhattan to see life in the South Bronx "from a safe distance," issued a statement this week saying it would immediately cease all tours there.

Three times a week, the $45 ride took visitors past food-pantry lines, a housing project and a park a guide described as a pickpocket hangout.

Tourists were told they'd get a look at the Bronx that reflects one of the darkest chapters of the city's history, the 1970s and '80s, when the tour website said "this borough was notorious for drugs, gangs, crime and murders."

The Bronx lost hundreds of buildings to fires intentionally set by landlords to collect insurance money, hence the phrase, "the Bronx is burning."

But residents say the tours are a misrepresentation of the area where former Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor lived in as children.

"Those days are over, the Bronx is being rebuilt, it's rising again," said Bronx resident and Grammy-nominated musician Bobby Sanabria.

On Monday, Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. and City Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito sent an open letter to the company owner, Michael Myers, saying they were "sickened by the despicable way" the borough was being portrayed to outsiders.

"We strongly urge you to stop profiting off of a tour that misrepresents the Bronx as a haven for poverty and crime, while mocking everything from our landmarks to the less fortunate members of our community who are availing themselves of food assistance programs."

The tour company did not respond to calls and emails requesting comment. It was not clear whether they would resume any of their tours. And by Thursday, the website of the company was no longer accessible.

Other companies in the city still offer regular guided trips to the Bronx.

Three weeks ago, NYC & Company, the city's tourism bureau, launched a promotion of the South Bronx as "one of our safest, most exciting boroughs," with highlights including Art Deco architecture and the Yankees.

Real Bronx Tours has been booted from the bureau's membership list as a result of the language they've been using, NYC & Company spokeswoman Kimberly Spell said.

Elena Martinez, an anthropologist and Bronx resident, offers visitors walks through the same neighborhood that was on Real Bronx Tours' itinerary.

The human struggles on these still gritty streets have produced urban styles and sounds copied around the world, from hip hop music and outdoor murals to clothing.

"Many young Europeans come here as a pilgrimage," Martinez said. "This was the incubator for hip-hop, salsa, jazz, Afro-Cuban music, R&B."

She points to theaters, lavish dance halls and clubs where salsa came alive, along with some of the biggest names in music. Sanabria, a famed drummer, says he comes from a borough "that has an incredible, majestic music culture."

And although many of the buildings now house stores and offices, or were demolished or burned down, new ones mingle with restored historic ones "and people are helping to bring the neighborhood back," Martinez said.

"We've had enough of the gawkers who come to ghettoize us," says Al Quinones, caretaker of a community park that features a garden with fruit trees and a stone outdoor amphitheater. "Their timing was bad. The Bronx is not burning, not now! Now, it's resurgence."

On the door to his shack on the grounds is a sign that reads: "Don't dump on the Bronx."

Sanabria, Martinez and other Bronx residents are meeting Friday to kick-start a counter-campaign to what they call the Bronx's "negative image."

They've calling their action "Bronx Rising."

SEE ALSO: The Jersey Shore Wants You Back This Summer >

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Grand St. might just be the hippest, most exclusive New York startup we've ever seen.

It's a curated, super-thoughtful, new gadget flash-sale site that's currently waiting-list-only for new customers — and it just closed a $1.3 million investment round. 

The boutique offers new products to members every other day. But, if you want to grab a product you have to move fast, the goods are only sold over the course of a week.

Imagine the Wirecutter hooked up with Gdgt, while Gilt watched, you'd have Grand St. (If you don't know what any of those sites are you should check them out, but still, keep reading.)

Grand St.'s products have included the MindWave Mobile (a headset that lets you control a toy helicopter just by thinking), unique high-tech watches like the Nooka, the Lapka, a set of environmental smart sensors that let you measure how organic your apple is, and a handful of break-out Kickstarter products.

Grand St. was started by three young, ambitious, and focused individuals. Joe Lallouz and Aaron Henshaw, both co-founders and application engineers; and Y-Combinator alum Amanda Peyton, who is the CEO. The trio has since expanded its operation bringing on four other staff who all keep the young but well-oiled gadget machine running.

Grand St. isn't just bridging the gap between the average consumer and the latest tech, its also, "creating an outlet that is educational for the everyday consumer," Lallouz says.

Grand St. is unique in that it tests each gadget it sells, the length of time varies by product but can sometimes last weeks. The curation process is also rigorous but Grand St.'s merchant partners are delighted with the site because the start-up can convey the gadgets capabilities sometimes even better than the people who made it.

The gadget lovers initially imagined creating something like Jarvis, the futuristic butler in the popular Iron Man, films but the feat proved a little too ambitious. "We started talking to a lot of our friends who worked in hardware, and essentially realized that we'd need tens of millions of dollars to really make [Jarvis] a reality," Peyton says. Instead of venturing into a hardware start up, the three decided to sell the best hardware they could get their hands on, and Grand St. was born.

Lallouz further explains Grand St.'s vision: 

...the tech-obsessed and geekier, individuals are still involved and very active in our community, but for them [Grand St.] is more or less about discovering new things. Which is great, they can go to one place where they can discover all these new things.

But we're also about educating the mainstream consumers. We're both filling the void where traditional brick and mortar stores that exist now are falling flat, as well as helping the producers and makers do a better job creating editorial content, and creating photos and videos and consumable media.

Although still in a invitation-only beta mode, Grand St.'s data suggests its user base is very diverse, "it's not only geeky people, audiophiles or the bike-obsessed...the factor that really brings people in and ties the audience together is people who are interested in new technology presented in a digestible and understandable way," Peyton said.

You may be wondering how Grand St.'s business model works and how it makes money, "we envision a liquid inventory model where we buy a certain number of products and sell through them. If we see that we're selling a lot of a particular item we'll place a second order. We take a traditional retail margin on the products," Peyton explains. "We buy directly from the manufacturer."

Grand St. is planning on opening up the site to everyone this summer, "for us, the whole invite-only period was really about testing a couple assumptions about our business model and how we wanted it to work. It also allowed us to test copy, and making sure the experience is great for our consumers. We want to make sure we have enough inventory, we want to make sure people don't come to a site that has nothing on it," Lallouz said.

Check out Grand St. and sign up for the waitlist, you just might find your new favorite toy.

SEE ALSO: Looking For Better Things To Do? Ditch The Yelp App And Use Sosh Instead >

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Last year, IAC bought New York-based pay-per-call advertising business Felix.

As part of the reportedly $30 million acquisition, IAC rented Felix a new office in Times Square. Felix CEO Brent Metz passed along some photos of the new space.

Felix was previously part of Yext, a business listings startup. When Yext sold Felix, we noted that Felix was responsible for ~90% of Yext's profits.

Metz couldn't share any stats on the state of the business since Felix is a part of publicly traded IAC. He did say the office IAC bought has room for 250 employees, even though Felix currently has 100 on staff, suggesting there's room for big growth.

Felix didn't move into IAC's iconic Frank Gehry designed headquarters, because according to Metz, there wasn't room. While IAC has a cool looking building, this is probably for the best.

Felix's new office building has a basketball court, and their office has a giant outdoor space.

Felix's headquarters are in the old New York Times building, which is at 43rd street and eighth avenue.

The building's marble lobby, with high ceilings.

The building's 11th floor has a full basketball court and Felix gets dedicated access to it one night a week. The rest of the time it has to sign up to use it.

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Those complaining about the recent spate of cold weather and rain in New York will likely get their due this weekend, when the mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions are hit with a three-day heat wave.

The upcoming hot spell will bring sweltering temperatures in the 90s to NYC, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. beginning on Wednesday and lasting through the weekend, according to AccuWeather. It will also be humid.

New Yorkers should expect at least one day of hot weather from Thursday through Saturday, and perhaps consider delaying that 10-mile jog through Brooklyn until next week. 

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Parts of Times Square, New York City, were cordoned off this morning due to reports of a suspicious package.

Shimon Prokupecz, a producer with WNBC-TV, reports that the NYPD has since given the all clear and the area is being reopened.

Police activity was centered near the Thomson Reuters building at 3 Times Square, and a number of Reuters employees tweeted images from the scene:

42nd and 7th blocked, police activity twitter.com/AntDeRosa/stat…

— Anthony De Rosa (@AntDeRosa) May 29, 2013

Scene from above: 42nd between 7th and 8th shut down by police, investigating suspicious package twitter.com/AntDeRosa/stat…

— Anthony De Rosa (@AntDeRosa) May 29, 2013

Hmm. 42nd St closed between 7th and 8th twitter.com/LaurenYoung/st…

— Lauren Young (@LaurenYoung) May 29, 2013

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From a small room in a Pakistan house, the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) was shaken to its core in 2011.

Within the data seized from Osama bin Laden's Abbottabad compound was the al Qaeda plan to blow up oil tankers in U.S. waters to create an “extreme economic crisis.”

Protecting tankers at home is part of what the USCG does, and faced with a fixed amount of resources and a growing threat, it got innovative.

The USCG looked to game theorists — mathematicians who specialize in a unique brand of numerical models — to help them do more with less resources.

The result was the Port Resilience Operational / Tactical Enforcement to Combat Terrorism (PROTECT) Model. PROTECT is the real reason millions of New Yorkers feel safe riding the Staten Island Ferry each year, and ship captains and crews traveling through feel secure.

It is why cruise line passengers never have to worry about their ship going down in a fiery wad of metal and overpriced booze, the target of a terrorist strike no one saw coming.

We spent the day with Coast Guard Sector New York as they patrolled the ferries, ships, and the sensitive infrastructure around the city of New York to understand just how it all works.

This is what we saw.

In order to appreciate what a beautiful target a Staten Island Ferry actually is, it helps to think like a terrorist.

The largest ferry carries more passengers than the newest and biggest cruise ships.

Sinking just one could put up to 4,500 people into the waters of New York Harbor, and undermine the entire city's sense of security.

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The New York Fire Department was called to the scene in Howard Beach, Queens today after reports of a fire and a possible explosion at a private home on 84th street.

Pix11 reports that the home was damaged in "what may have been a gas explosion," though the exact cause of the incident is still unknown. The building was being renovated under the city's free scheme for buildings damaged by Hurricane Sandy and NBC New York reports that city documents show the building was undergoing "gas to gas direct replacement."

CBS 2 reports that two people were injured, while Josh Eineger of Eyewitness News reports at least one person was injured seriously — a woman who had suffered burns. 

WABC-TV's Eyewitness News has a live feed of the fire, which is appears to be extinguished at the time of writing.

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One of the greatest sights in New York City is upon us again: Manhattanhenge!

The beautiful sight seen above happens when the city's grid lines up with the location of the sunset.

Tonight is the night to witness the sun setting between the city's iconic buildings, now that the skies have finally cleared up. Last year's Manhattan henge was a total bust, with cloudy skies obstructing the view. 2011 was pretty nice though.

If the clouds stay away tonight, New Yorkers should be able to look off to the West, through 14th, 23rd, 34th, 42nd, 57th, and several streets adjacent to them, and see the sun set through the city's iconic buildings at around 8:15 pm EDT.

Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium at New York's American Museum of Natural History, coined the name Manhattanhenge as a play on Stonehenge, an ancient rock-slab structure in England.

During the summer solstice at Stonehenge, the sun aligns and creates views so stunning that the fleeting sight has convinced some scholars that astronomy must have been important to Stonehenge's creators.

This all seems to tickle Tyson, who wonders if our city's grid will inspire similar awe on a post on the museum's website:

What will future civilizations think of Manhattan Island when they dig it up and find a carefully laid out network of streets and avenues? Surely the grid would be presumed to have astronomical significance.

Manhattanhenge only comes twice a year, but don't fret if you miss it (or the clouds roll in), since the next alignment will come again in just a couple months, on July 12 at 8:23 pm EDT.

SEE ALSO: RARE PLANETARY ALIGNMENT: Check Out Photos Showing Venus, Jupiter, And Mercury

SEE ALSO: Follow Business Insider: Science On Facebook >

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Tumblr was New York City's first $1 billion exit since DoubleClick sold to Google in 2007. But it won't be the last.

A number of other startups in New York have become huge businesses, expected to exit for at least $1 billion. Others probably won't get the billion-dollar acquisitions they're hoping for, but they'll still sell for boatloads of cash.

Then there are startups that aren't worth $1 billion yet, but we bet they will be soon. They're innovative and growing quickly, with high margins, and they're tackling big markets.

10gen develops an open source database, MongoDB, that's used by Fortune 500 companies.

What it is: 10gen is the developer of MongoDB, an open source database used by many Fortune 500 companies. 10gen also offers support and training for MongoDB clients.

Estimated Value: $550 million as of its financing last year.

Total funding: $73.4 million

Location: New York, N.Y.

More Info: About 10gen

CEO: Max Schireson

Investors: Union Square Ventures, Flybridge Capital Partners, Sequoia Capital, New Enterprise Associates

*Disclosure: Dwight Merriman and Kevin Ryan are co-chairmen of 10gen. They are also co-founders of Business Insider.

Everyday Health provides health solutions via a portfolio of websites and 20 mobile apps; it's been eying an IPO for a few years.

What it is: Everyday Health is a provider of online health solutions. It generates much of its revenue ($160-175 million as of March 2012) via subscriptions and advertising. Its CEO said generating $1 billion in revenue was in sight last year, and it has been eyeing an IPO for a few years.

Estimated Value: $650 Million

Total funding: $153 million

Location: New York, N.Y.

More Info: About Everyday Health

CEO: Benjamin Wolin

Investors: Foundation Capital, NeoCarta Ventures, Revolution, Rho Ventures, Scale Venture Partners, Village Ventures

Etsy is an e-commerce site for individuals selling homemade goods that doubled its valuation last year.

What it is: E-commerce site for homemade crafts and small businesses. It raised $40 million at a ~$700 million valuation in May 2012.

Estimated Value:$600-700 million as of its fundraise in 2012.

Total funding: $91.7 million

Location: Brooklyn, N.Y.

More Info:About Etsy

CEO: Chad Dickerson

Investors: Caterina Fake, Stewart Butterfield, Joshua Schachter, Albert Wenger, Union Square Ventures, Accel Partners, Hubert Burda Media, Index Ventures

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Seven people have been taken to the hospital with after a major gas explosion at Nyack college, the Nyack Fire Department tells CBS New York.

None of the injuries are life-threatening.

Earlier officials said multiple people were believed to have been trapped in the school's Sky Island Lodge, but officials tell CBS that everyone who was inside at the time of the blast has been accounted for.

Windows and the door of the two-story stone building were blown out by the force of the blast.

Nyack is a private, evangelical, liberal arts college affiliated with the Christian and Missionary Alliance with a 2011 enrollment of 3,305.

BREAKING: 5 students inside #Nyack College building when gas line exploded. 1 elderly woman injured. Strong smell of gas in air @newsdayny

— Sarah Armaghan (@ArmaghanS) June 4, 2013

BREAKING PHOTO: Emergency crews treating woman after explosion at Nyack College in NY. twitter.com/ArmaghanS/stat… - @armaghans

— NewsBreaker (@NewsBreaker) June 4, 2013

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New York City is a fantastic place to live--I've been here all my life.  I wouldn't want to live anywhere else.

That being said, it isn't necessarily the easiest place to live, but it's worth it.  

That's why I get excited when companies in my industry create businesses that improve the living experience of being here.  The mobile phone has the potential to be incredibly transformative for the lives of NYC residents.

So when the city government seems to be bending over backwards to make tech companies want to start and grow their businesses here, conducting business here might be another story.  Companies that make people's lives easier, should they run into entrenched Big Apple interests like housing and transport, aren't finding that NYC is as easy a place to offer their services to NYC residents.

Remember the on again, off again Uber and Halio taxi fiasco?  Hailing a ride using your phone in NYC has had more hiccups, false starts, and court filings than you can shake a Citibike at, and I'm sure it's likely to continue.  Ride sharing service SideCar was recently the target of a NYC police sting that resulted in two cars being impounded--cars belonging to drivers in their network offering rides to people. 

Gone are the days of stepping out onto the road and offering up a thumb, because what you might get back from the city is a finger.  

Government served an incredibly important role regulating ground transportation in the past.  Oversight prevents outer borough price gauging on behalf of car services and abuse of unsuspecting tourists who don't realize that LGA is closer to the city than you think.  

But do we need government playing the same exact role when loosely constructed networks can serve that same purpose.  A bad Uber or Sidecar driver will never get another ride--and user side data can instruct people what they should expect to pay before they get a ride.  It's not an accident that Uber drivers are some of the friendliest, nicest folks you'll ever get a ride with--they're working for stars!  

Technology can also redeploy assets quicker than government can regulate licenses.  If one particular area is being underserved, drivers on new networks can swoop in because of the economic opportunity to service customers.  Apps can attract drivers to areas they wouldn't otherwise cruise through.

It's better for drivers, too.  It makes getting your next pickup more efficient, and the user experience around taxi tipping has been shown to increase gratuities by nearly double.

That's why I faceplant when New York City seems to be the toughest place for all of these new services to operate.  It's embarrassing for us as a tech community.  We're supposed to be startup friendly, but the startups that want to come here and offer life improving services to the community can't operate freely.  

It's even worse when it comes to housing and hotels.  New York City has some of the highest average hotel costs in the world--and it's clogging up the free flow of entrepreneurs, startups and talent in the tech community.  If a kid out of Carnegie Mellon majoring in computer science wants to come and check out the Big Apple for a week, it will cost her a lot more than two bits to stay here.  

Enter Airbnb.  It's undoubtedly the number one form of lodging for NYC tech entrepreneurs heading out west to pitch for venture capital--and for founders and startup professionals to come here to work on deals with clients and other companies when they come here.  It makes NYC stays a lot easier.  

Yet, in a misguided attempt to crack down on poor quality short term hotels, the city passed a law effectively banning Airbnb unless the resident is in the apartment.  Instead, they limited the number of reasonable options.  I'm sure there were some really awful hell holes being offered up for cheap--but transparency is the solution, not bathwater tossing.  On a network like Airbnb, just like in the taxi situation, bad suppliers can't make revenue--and everyone has the incentive to offer a better service.  If anything, the city should be encouraging people to use Airbnb--because it effectively outsources the impossible oversight job of checking on the safety and cleanliness of every last lodging space in the city on a regular basis.  You can try to fight the illegal hotels, or you could encourage consumers to use options that have ratings, photos, and reviews in trusted communities.

The other problem with the city's Airbnb regulation is that a lot of people use Airbnb to make living in NYC affordable.  They'll shack up with a friend for a bit to defray the cost of expensive rent.  I know more than one NYC startup founder who keeps their business going because they essentially get their housing paid for by sleeping in the office or with family every so often. 

It's kind of ironic, too, that Airbnb helped people find housing during Hurricane Sandy, yet this new regulation returns the favor with a good swift kick in the teeth.

NYC is a difficult place to be a legislator at all--so many competing interests.  It's impossible to please everyone--but it does seem like we're a more difficult, more regulation intense place to conduct business than in other cities.   If that's the case for startup companies--that they're going to be less able to run their businesses here than in other places, what impact is that going to have for company creation here?  How many fewer ribbon cuttings will NYC's next Mayor be able to to attend for SF businesses opening up here if it's just a pain in the neck to offer up services that SF residents always seem to get first?

The hurdles that companies like Uber and Airbnb have had to go through in NYC are an embarrassment to our startup community.  Being on the forefront of digital innovation here doesn't just mean wifi and it doesn't just mean apps hackathons.  If the city's goal is to "help the world’s greatest city become the world’s most innovative city through online and mobile technologies that help citizens and enhance the quality of services", we need to be a place where regulation promotes new and more transparent business models, not stifles them with a ton of protectionist red tape.

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Yesterday, I tweeted in defense of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's decision to cancel of the Access to the Region's Core project -- the $10 billion plan to build a new rail tunnel under the Hudson River and a new terminal 120 feet below Herald Square in Midtown Manhattan.

The project was overly expensive and the terminal, in particular, was unnecessary -- New York Penn Station, which currently receives trains from New Jersey, has plenty of platforms, they're just used inefficiently today. We could much more cheaply build a new tunnel to serve the existing station.

Duncan Black accepts my premise, but says we should have built the tunnel anyway:

The choice is between increasing rail capacity into New York with an imperfect too expensive plan, or doing nothing at all anytime soon. We spend all kinds of money to do stupid destructive things that at best do nothing useful for us, so we should be willing to support spending all kinds of money on nice things when the opportunities present themselves.

This is the terrible result of Republican disengagement from efforts to optimize policy. Republicans aren't interested in coming up with smarter, more efficient ways to build rail infrastructure. So Democrats fear that if they don't defend wasteful, ill-conceived rail projects, they won't get any at all.

And this dynamic isn't limited to infrastructure. It also applies, for example, to the Rube Goldberg mess that is Obamacare, which Republicans aren't interested in improving and Democrats feel they can't be seen to criticize.

Republicans ought to be providing a healthy skepticism about government projects -- attention to cost-effectiveness, awareness of opportunity cost, recognition that sometimes government actions produce unintended consequences. But a healthy skeptic sometimes conducts those evaluations and still says "yes" -- which is why people take him seriously when he says "no." Republicans have shifted from skepticism to pure obstinacy, fighting at every turn against government solutions, which is why their (sometimes perfectly valid) critiques of government action lack credibility.

Republicans ought to own the issue of American uncompetitiveness on infrastructure costs. They should seize on a report out today from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, about how America's regulations on rolling stock prevent us from using the same kinds of train cars that European countries do. Our trains have to be custom-designed and heavy, which makes them more expensive, less efficient and less reliable. This is dumb and we should fix it.

But Republicans aren't interested in building better rail projects -- they just don't want to build them at all. Christie hasn't made a priority of building a smarter, cheaper Hudson tunnel to replace ARC; instead, he's widening the New Jersey Turnpike. And when conservatives raise good criticisms of American infrastructure practices like CEI's, liberals often don't take them seriously, because they see conservatives as concern trolls.

It's depressing. But it's also one of the reasons I remain a Republican. By becoming the stupid party, Republicans have made Democrats stupider, too. If we're going to have smarter debates on infrastructure and everything else, we will need two smart political parties to participate in them.

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One of London's most famous real estate developers has listed his triplex penthouse in New York's Plaza Hotel for $59 million, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Christian Candy — who last year paid $25.9 million for the unit — is flipping the pad for more than double the price after redecorating it with his own design company Candy & Candy, according to WSJ.

The home, which is located on the 19th, 20th, and 21st floors of the iconic hotel, is listed with Brown Harris Stevens realtor Kyle Blackmon. It has uninterrupted views of Central Park and New York's skyline.

With over 6,000 square feet of space and a 230-square-foot balcony that looks out over Central Park, the penthouse is quite extravagant.

If the penthouse sells at its astronomical asking price, it would be a record for the Plaza Hotel, according to WSJ, surpassing the previous record purchase of $48 million for two adjacent condos in 2011.

Candy is best known as the developer of London's One Hyde Park, the world's most expensive apartment building.

See a few interior pictures of the stunning listing below.

SEE ALSO: This Monaco Penthouse Concept Could Hit The Market For $280 Million

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Land Rover North America has teamed up with Architectural Digest and the New York-based design firm Hollwich Kushner (HWKN) to create a one-of-a-kind public art installation, inspired by the aluminum body of the 2013 Range Rover vehicle.

The installation was placed on display in New York City’s Meatpacking District.

The public art installation, titled Climbing Up and created by HWKN founders Matthias Hollwich and Marc Kushner, incorporate many of the same aluminum materials that make up the 2013 Range Rover vehicle, and features the vehicle through an evocative, interactive experience.

“This spectacular public art installation speaks to the physical properties of high-strength aluminum, as well as the design aesthetic of the 2013 Range Rover and we’re excited to see how it draws attention and discussion to our next generation Range Rover,” said Kim McCullough, Brand Vice President, Land Rover North America.

Utilizing aluminum rivet-bonds, the installation’s design is tied to the 2013 Range Rover vehicle’s form, picking up on three distinct lines that define the vehicle’s design. In developing the installation, HWKN used a series of plates to create a triangulated structure spine that supports the car, which will rest at a dramatic angle. The effect, say Hollwich and Kushner, is that the car will seemingly be in motion even as it sits atop the structure.

“We were inspired by the assembly, form and performance of the 2013 Range Rover and that dictated everything we did,” Hollwich said.

“The design of the vehicle itself is so rooted in architecture, and we wanted to translate that DNA into our installation,” Kushner said. “At the same time, we wanted to convey how strong – yet light – the all-aluminum vehicle structure is.”

Land Rover’s media buying agency, Mindshare, teamed the luxury automotive brand up with Architectural Digest who had the relationship with HWKN. The architectural firm then collaborated with partners Neverstop, an experiential agency, and Acer, a Toronto-based fabricator charged with the installation’s construction, to create the structure that was unveiled on June 6 at the intersection of 9 Avenue and West 14 Street in Manhattan.

SEE ALSO: We Took The 2013 Range Rover Off-Roading In The Utah Desert

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