Official Richart Ruddie Blog - Internet Entrepreneur

Rich Ruddie Reputation Management Co Expert Witness Services

I occasionally get asked by clients who are working with their attorneys suffering through a defamation lawsuit. The question that comes up when looking at my resume is if I can provide them with work as an expert witness to showcase damages that they suffered from online or offline defamation and slander. These detailed reports if hired or retained are not typical of a service sold through The Reputation Management Company or any profile defender style service.

It's a very concierge style service where we have to go through and see what's been done to damage your reputation and what effects to your bottom line. From there a detailed overview of the damages and the cost to hire a reputation management expert or agency to get things all cleaned up are delivered in the final package. It's delivered like an attorney or law firm would deliver services based on an hourly retainer or via an hourly project.

There is a website that specializes in marketing expert witnesses for all of the different needs one may have when going to trial or to present to a judge, jury, defenses attorneys, etc... My profile on there can be found here: https://www.expertpages.com/united-states/fort-lauderdale/expert/richart-ruddie if you'd like more information on retaining an expert witness for your lawsuit. 

The Expert Pages site is one of the oldest sites on the world wide web online since 1995.

What makes a great city?

Having local art shows, live theater, concerts, family festivals, food trucks, car shows, unique restaurants, and more activities are the things that I would look for when rating a city. It's nice when a city has a style of architecture it's known for. Whether it's Bay Windows in San Francisco or Art Deco in South Beach these little things that distinguish a city along with well known landmarks can make a big difference on a great city versus a mediocre.

Having both local alliances that help put on events as well as private and motivated companies that work on getting permits and building out events really makes a difference. I remember when I was growing up in Baltimore and going to a kite festival, The Maryland State Fair, The Enchanted Forest and Renaissance festivals.

I hope that other Florida entrepreneurs that are also part of the FLVEC  connect to put together great events that make a lasting impact on the residents and visitors in their area. Fort Lauderdale has been burgeoning with new great restaurants and events happening in and around the Las Olas area. I've compiled a list of activities, museums, attractions, and things to see in South Florida from Palm Beach, Broward, and Miami-Dade counties.

If there are additional items that you recommend find me @ Richart Ruddie on Linkedin, Twitter, or Facebook and send me a message with your suggestion.

Walk Las Olas

Morikama Japanese Museum

Rusty Pelican Restaurant

Mai Kai Polynesian Restaurant

Everglades Park

Atlantic Avenue

Vizcaya Museum

Coral Castle

Ann Norton Sculpture Garden

Venetian Pool

Fairchild Botanical Gardens

Kampoong Garden

Coco Walk + Coconut Grove

Cornell Art Museum

Nova Museum of Art

Boca Raton Beach Club & Resort

Norton Museum of Art

Perez Art Museum

Superblue Miami

Design District + ICA Museum

Wynwood Walls

Walk Key Biscayne Lighthouse and Eat on the Water

Walk Brickell Key

History Museum of Miami

Bass Museum

Wolfsonion Museum

Museum of Contemporary Art

Jewish Museum of Florida

Shops at Merrick Prk

UM Lowe Art Museum

Mizner Park

City Place + Clematis

Worth Avenue

South Pointe Park

Lincoln Road

Mermaid Lunch or Dinner on Ft. Lauderdale Beach

Water Taxi

Murder Mystery Dinner

Local Cuban or Peruvian Cooking Class

Upper Buena Vista

Boat Rental

Miami Japanese Garden

Joia Beach & Deck @ Island Gardens

Astroworld Disaster Happened in 1991

While reading my newsletter for things that happened in this current week in the 1980's and 1990's I came across something that had a resemblence to the Travis Scott tragedy in Houston, Texas earlier this year. At City College there was a celebrity basketball game that Heavy D and Puff Daddy helped to put on. As a large crowd thought they were getting shut out they started to storm the doors and 8 people sadly died.

The attorney that Puff Daddy hired was Kenneth Meiselas who would be the person if I was Travis Scott and Live Nation that I'd want to handle for a potential criminal case given how well Puff spoke in court according to this New York Times piece showcasing the horrors of the day and remorse for what happened. No charges were filed against Sean Combs or the promoters and it's something that I never knew about till today: https://www.nytimes.com/1998/03/24/nyregion/rap-producer-testifies-on-fatal-stampede-at-city-college.html

 

-Richart Ruddie

The Beverly Hills of Florida is...

Listening to the Over My Dead Body podcast in season 1 episode 1 they talk about Benton Hills in Tallahassee, Florida which is where the wealthy Florida State University staff and locals live outside of the campus. As the area is rather sleepy and quiet compared to South Florida. As Dan and Wendy Cohen discussed their life in Tally and how the Adelson family was a part of their life that led to the famous lawyer being murdered. None the less they mentioned that the sign for Benton Hills is modeled after the Beverly Hills, California sign as you can see below.

So while they have the Beverly Hills sign and it may be the nicest area off of I-10. The closest thing to Beverly Hills in the state is actually Palm Beach Florida. It's the rich playground and has a street called Worth Avenue that is on par with Rodeo drive with almost all the same shops. The biggest difference is that Palm Beach is seasonal and BH is more of a year round place to live.

The real estate prices on both coasts have similar price per square foot.

Fort Lauderdale & Miami Restaurants in Both Locations

There are a lot of similarities between Broward and Dade county. As popular restaurants are successful in one city they tend to trickle down or up to the other city. Here are some common South Florida restaurants that are not major chains that have locations in both Fort Lauderdale & Miami with the original location listed first below.

1) Bodega - South Beach | Bodega Fort Lauderdale
2) Pura Vida - Miami | Pura Vida Fort Lauderdale
3) Tap 42 Fort Lauderdale | Tap 42 Avenutra/Midtown/Coral Gables
4) American Social - Fort Lauderdale | American Social Brickell
5) Planta - South Beach | Planta Fort Lauderdale (Coming soon)
6. Baires Grill - Sunny Isles | Baires Grill Fort Lauderdale (Coming Soon)

7. Coya Taco Wynwood | Coya Taco Fort Lauderdale

8. Bombay Darbar - Coral Gables | Las Olas

9. Doc B's Fort Lauderdale | Doc B's Coral Gables

10. Trulucks Fort Lauderdale | Trulucks Brickell

11. The Wharf Miami | The Wharf Fort Lauderdale - While not quite a restaurant it is a bar with food trucks with two locations.

We used to have SuViche in Fort Lauderdale but that has since closed and is being replaced with Coyo Taco. Chains such as Capital Grille, Outback Steakhouse, Mortons, Ruth's Chris, Fogo De Chao, Miami Subs/Miami Grill, Pollo Tropical all have numerous locations up and down South Florida with Mastros having only one location in Fort Lauderdale and a lease recently signed to open a second location in Brickell.

Only 45 International Tourists Have Visited Bali This Year - Not FAKE NEWS

With a 10 day quarantine and no flights into Denpasur directly it has been very hard to get into Bali this past year. With the airport just re-opening 2 months ago and flights only coming from the very polluted city of Jakarta it's not been the most easy place to visit. With the stats below you must ask yourself is this real? The answer is yes. Only 45 tourists as of October 14th visited Bali this past year. So how did 45 people even get there? Well by private Yacht.

# of international tourists Bali received in 2019 6.2 million

# of international tourists Bali received in 2020 1.05 million

# of international tourists Bali received in 2021 45

Really 45 tourists came to Bali? Is this fake news? A scam? Misinformation? NO. It's real but if Omicron doesnt take off and there isn't a new variant we would expect to see this number jump dramatically in 2022 for the Indonesian Island that I love so much. The only question is will they drop the $300 visa fee and other quarantine restrictions that have hindered tourism now that the airport is re-open?

If you can't afford expensive things it may no longer be a problem in the future

So if you can't afford to buy a fine painting or an asset as a whole in the past you had to find joint investors or raise money. Now with the decentralized future we may be able to purchase things as a group using decentralized autonomous organizations (DAO) and other creative financing mechanisms. Like people who think it's crazy that we used to have pay per text message or pay extra to make a long distance call that was outside of our region or even area code we one day may be shocked that we couldn't raise money via a DAO in the past to purchase something. Here is a excerpt from a recent VC Letter with places where you can engage in fractionalized ownership. Why it matters High-quality assets tend to have above average returns. Problem Most of us can't afford to buy fine art, an entire commercial building, or a billion dollar company. Solution Fractionalization democratizes ownership. Don't have millions for a Rembrandt or a Monaco condo? No problem. Buy shares instead. Players Platforms: Fractional.art: Buy, sell, and mint fractions of NFTs. Royal: Buy ownership in songs directly from artists. Republic: Invest in startups, real estate, and crypto projects. FranShares: Earn cash flow from franchises without operating. Pacasso: Buy shares in a second home. Tokenized assets: House of Tiara: A CryptoPunk bought by Crypto Cookout. ConstitutionDAO: An attempt to buy a copy of the US Constitution. CryptoPunk #7171: A fractionalized hoodie punk. Trippy Apedog: A pair of NFTs from BAYC and BAKC. DAOs: WhaleShark: DAO with a token backed by NFTs. Crypto Cookout: A group that pooled funds to buy several CryptoPunks. PleasrDAO: The group behind iconic NFT purchases. CityDAO: An experiment in decentralized land ownership. So in a way buying ownership in the above may be like buying stock in a company and saying that you own a piece of Apple or Tesla.

Ponzi Scheme Fraudster Bernie Madoff Had A Botero In His Apartment

On the CNBC Show Bernie Madoff: His Life and Crimes they show photos from his New York City apartment and in a brief shot for half a second you can see a Colombian Sculpture from Fernando Botero. I was unable from a brief Google search to see what other art including the Botero Statue that Madoff had acquired through his financial scheme. When Sotheby's or Christies has a big auction they dont typically reveal when a famous piece comes from Death, Divorce, or Taxes. The same held true I can imagine from Bernie Madoff's Botero statue. If you know where the statue is currently I'd be curious to know. Drop me a line pretty please.

Art Basel 2021 Review

With only the Aqua Art Fair and Pulse (now called Volta) were unable to setup this year. All else was back to normal with the exception of some shows asking for proof of vaccination and asking that you put on a mask to enter the fair. Once inside there was a 65/35 spread of no masks to masks. Scope seemed to be the most popular on social media posts but was one of my least favorite shows this year.

I noticed in 2019 there was a strong showing from Okuda at Scope but saw only 2 pieces from him this year. Other major galleries seemed to not make it but were filled in with local South Florida and Miami galleries. Red Dot & Spectrum which I wasn't able to get to until Saturday was a packed house and had a massive amount of booths second only to Basel Convention Center & Art Miami/Context. The artists were mostly under represented artists or contemporary artist prints.

The best shows this year? Art Basel & Art Miami take the cake. If you only have time to go to two fairs take 2-4 hours (depending on how you peruse) and visit Art Miami/Contest and Art Basel at the Miami Beach Convention Center. I found a beautiful double sided Picasso that's peaked my interest along with Javier Calleja & George Condo Paintings.

Untitled Art Fair was the first fair to open and I attended on Monday for the preview (if you can do the previews and art a serious art collector this is the way to go before the crowds pile up). Untilted has an artist Bradley Hart out of Canada who uses bubble wrap as part of his paintings and creates two pieces out of one when he removes the bubble wrap and you get an abstract piece. Pinta Miami was an easy access as was NADA but I was left unimpressed this year. If there were events for Satellite Art Fair and Art Now I was unable to make them.

One thing I did notice was NFT Drops and parties were all the rage. Maybe because us in the crypto community like to rage and party or because there's been a lot of potential with the way NFTs are going.

P.S. I also was told that if you have a VIP Basel pass that you can gain access to the other fairs.

From Marc Spiegler Global Director of Art Basel Miami had this to say:


"Art Basel Miami Beach 2021 attracted over 60,000 visitors, once again proving to be a vibrant meeting place for the international artworld. The show drew a particularly strong turnout of both established and new private collectors, from over 72 countries, as well as leading cultural institutions. They include: The Met, Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, Whitney Musuem of American Art, New Museum, Tate Americas Foundation, Walker Art Center, MOCA Los Angeles, ICA Boston, Blanton Museum of Art, Nasher Museum of Art, Serpentine Gallery from UK, SAHA from Turkey, Museo Tamayo and MUAC from Mexico, Tel Aviv Museum of Art from Israel, and Palais de Lomé from Togo."

There's an Art Basel in March of 2022 in Hong Kong but due to the quarantine restrictions I won't be attending as you'll have to quarantine 21 days upon arrival so that turns the 4 day fair into a 25 day venture. I'll add some photos when I get a chance.

-Richart Ruddie Art Enthusiast