Tag: 02.25.06

How To Insert Your Network Into A Race War

America’s Armenian immigrant community was thrilled last month when PBS announced that it would air a documentary detailing the Armenian genocide of World War I. But since scheduling the showing, PBS has bowed to pressure from the Turkish government, which has always denied the genocide, agreeing to follow the documentary with a “panel discussion including people who dispute that genocide occurred.”

Courting The Studio Exec

When Paramount Pictures acquired DreamWorks Studios recently, it found itself in need of a new executive to run the company, and went straight to Stacey Snider, head of Universal Pictures. Ordinarily, this is the type of thing that might be kept hush-hush. But this is Hollywood, where rumors are stock in trade, and the Snider sweepstakes are now officially on.

Museums Strike Back On Antiquities

“Over the last decade the benign image of the antiquities collector has given way to a far more sinister one. Once cast as generous lenders and donors — the lifeblood of American museums — such collectors are now seen as central cogs in a conspiracy to move artifacts looted from foreign soil into museum display cases… Museum officials argue that the public has forgotten why collectors are so important and, by implication, what museums are all about. To make their position clear, they have drawn up new ethical guidelines for loans of antiquities that vigorously defend the museum-collector relationship.”

Court Ruling Might Undermine Google Book Project

A court ruling last week might undermine Google’s case to be able to digitize books. The judge said “Google’s use of thumbnail-sized reproductions in its image search program violated the copyright of Perfect 10, a publisher of X-rated magazines and Web sites, because it undermined that company’s ability to license those images for sale to mobile phone users.”

Did Brown Steal Da Vinci Code Plot?

Dan Brown, whose “Da Vinci Code” has become the bestselling hardback adult novel of all time, has been accused of stealing his plot for the book from a non-fiction work called The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail. If they win, the plaintiffs “will seek an injunction preventing further infringement of their copyright. In theory, this could bar Random House from publishing Brown’s book, which has sold more than 40 million copies, and even threaten the British release of the £53m film adaptation, starring Tom Hanks.”