The New Yorker, Want Ad: Beautuful Mind:
“The rumor, according to one (unofficial) e-mail: “Oscar-winning producer Brian Grazer (Da Vinci Code, A Beautiful Mind, American Gangster) is looking for a new cultural attaché.” The e-mail explained:
This person would be responsible for keeping Brian abreast of everything that’s going on in the world; politically, culturally, musically. . . . They’re also responsible for finding an interesting person for Brian to meet with every week . . . an astronaut, a journalist, a philosopher, a buddhist monk. . . . There is LOTS of reading for this position! Grazer may ask you to read any book he’s interested in. You’ll probably get to read about 4 or 5 books a week and you may be required to travel with him on his private plane to Hawaii, New York, Europe—teaching him anything he asks you about along the way. . . . You will also be provided with an assistant. . . . Salary is around $150,000 a year. . . . You will be to Grazer what Karl Rove was to Bush.”
(via)
Tags: brian grazer,culture,education
February 6th, 2008 · Comments Off
Kevin Kelly, The Technium:
“When copies are free, you need to sell things which can not be copied.”
Tags: culture,economics,internet,kevin kelly
December 22nd, 2007 · Comments Off
De ijsbaan op het Museumplein te Amsterdam met op de achtergrond het Concertgebouw. Photo: Museumplein, by Sonic Julez
The Independent, Cultural elite does not exist, academics claim:
“The “cultural elite” brought up on opera and the higher arts, which supposedly turns up its nose at anything as vulgar as a pop song or mainstream television, does not exist, according to research published by Oxford University academics.
Researchers have used data from the UK and six other countries to test a theory that people born to posh families absorb only “high culture” while “popular” or “mass” culture is strictly for those from ordinary to humble beginnings.
They found that in truth Billy Elliott – the fictional working-class boy from a northern mining village with a passion for ballet – is not the social freak he might seem to be. Equally, someone with an impressive ancestry and blue blood coursing through his veins is not necessarily any more cultured than the rest of us.”
Read More →
Tags: culture,sociology
December 11th, 2007 · Comments Off
Scientific American, Culture Speeds Up Human Evolution:
“Homo sapiens sapiens has spread across the globe and increased vastly in numbers over the past 50,000 years or so—from an estimated five million in 9000 B.C. to roughly 6.5 billion today. More people means more opportunity for mutations to creep into the basic human genome and new research confirms that in the past 10,000 years a host of changes to everything from digestion to bones has been taking place.
“We found very many human genes undergoing selection,” says anthropologist Gregory Cochran of the University of Utah, a member of the team that analyzed the 3.9 million genes showing the most variation. “Most are very recent, so much so that the rate of human evolution over the past few thousand years is far greater than it has been over the past few million years.”
“We believe that this can be explained by an increase in the strength of selection as people became agriculturalists—a major ecological change—and a vast increase in the number of favorable mutations as agriculture led to increased population size,” he adds.”
Tags: biology,culture,evolution
November 13th, 2007 · Comments Off
TED Talk: Larry Lessig: How creativity is being strangled by the law
“Larry Lessig gets TEDsters to their feet, whooping and whistling, following this elegant presentation of “three stories and an argument.” The Net’s most adored lawyer brings together John Philip Sousa, celestial copyrights, and the “ASCAP cartel” to build a case for creative freedom. He pins down the key shortcomings of our dusty, pre-digital intellectual property laws, and reveals how bad laws beget bad code. Then, in an homage to cutting-edge artistry, he throws in some of the most hilarious remixes you’ve ever seen.”
Tags: copyright,creative commons,culture,internet,keynote,larry lessig,ted,video
July 26th, 2007 · Comments Off
A field study released Monday by the University of North Carolina School of Public Health suggests that Iraqi citizens experience sadness and a sense of loss when relatives, spouses, and even friends perish, emotions that have until recently been identified almost exclusively with Westerners.
The Onion: Study: Iraqis May Experience Sadness When Friends, Relatives Die
Tags: culture,humor,iraq,the onion
February 20th, 2007 · Comments Off
Joel Kotkin: “(…) Yet these triumphs obscure the longer-term developments that continue to reshape metropolitan America. Economic and demographic trends suggest that the future of American urbanism lies not in the elite cities but in younger, more affordable and less self-regarding places.”
Tags: culture,demography,economy,urban,usa
November 16th, 2006 · Comments Off
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“Eind dit jaar of begin volgend jaar gaat de Publieke Omroep Uitzendinggemist ook in MPEG4 (H.264) uitzenden. Handig, want dan komen de omroeparchieven op fatsoenlijke wijze ook beschikbaar voor OSX *kruist vingers*”
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“He has developed something approaching a unified theory of art, which hasn’t won him many fans in the art world but does a surprisingly good job of explaining the relative value of the world’s great paintings.”
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“A band of intellectual brothers is mounting a crusade against belief in God. Are they winning converts, or merely preaching to the choir? “
Tags: art,art market,atheism,culture,economics,nl,uitzending gemist
June 10th, 2006 · Comments Off
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“As Wednesday morning dawned, northern Norway was hit with an impact comparable to the atomic bomb used on Hiroshima.” - Nooit meer slapen.
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“Italian artist Marco Boggio Sella travelled to Burkina Faso in search of people who had never heard about the moon landing. “
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“The rainmaking army uses rockets, artillery and aircraft to sow chemicals and artificially induce rain in times of need, said an official with the bureau’s Department of Forecasting Services and Disaster Mitigation.”
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“Rockets launched with chemicals to trigger rain after huge storm”
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“Contextual integrity ties adequate protection for privacy to norms of specific contexts, demanding that information gathering and dissemination be appropriate to that context and obey the governing norms of distribution within it.”
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“New Scientist has discovered that Pentagon’s National Security Agency, which specialises in eavesdropping and code-breaking, is funding research into the mass harvesting of the information that people post about themselves on social networks.”
Tags: burkina faso,china,cloud seeding,culture,data mining,literature,marco boggio sella,meteorite,moon landing,norway,nsa,privacy,space,w.f. hermans,weather
May 14th, 2006 · Comments Off
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“After three months of clicking and cruising, we have found exemplary Websites from ten very different photographers, each of whom is taking the medium into new areas and new levels of communication.”
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“The talent myth assumes that people make organizations smart. More often than not, it’s the other way around.”
Tags: art,business,culture,enron,managment,mckinsey,photography,psychology,web
May 12th, 2006 · Comments Off
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“The Phoenix 1000 is a 65-meter (213′) personal luxury submarine.”
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“GIANTS FROM TIMES PAST”
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“The BBC has staked a claim to a virtual tropical island where it can stage online music festivals and throw exclusive celebrity parties.”
Tags: bbc,culture,design,giants,second life,submarine,yacht
February 18th, 2006 · Comments Off
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“Hidden Places In The City”
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“Food Landscapes”
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“The Great British Design Quest is a vote to discover the public’s favourite British design icon, organised by the Design Museum and The Culture Show. “
Tags: art,bbc,culture,design,landscape,photography,urban
