“Almost everything we humans do collectively spawns an emergent phenomenon. … Economies, governments and the media are all emergent phenomena – like an ant colony. They follow new and complicated rules that often cannot be derived from the behavior of the parts that make them up. They are real and have immense power over us, but they are not human or humanlike, even though they arise from human activities.”
Tag: 04.24.15
Two Tiny European ‘News Sites’ Hack Facebook For Viral News With Just One Problem – It’s Fiction
“One of CEN’s specialities – as with the naked Russians – is to offer its clients a story to accompany a particularly compelling image.”
How I Survived A Public Shaming Over A Silly Mistake
“When a Web site broke the news on April 3 that, instead of posting an Internet link to an article about writing legal briefs, I had inadvertently sent my law school students a link to a porn site, I thought I could never recover. (And if you’re hoping to find out here how that happened, among the many possibilities that have been raised by gleeful commentators, I’m sorry to tell you you’re going to be disappointed.)”
A Slice Of Americana: The (Extremely Sweary) Deranged Sorority Girl Email Cantata
“While waiting for things to get going, composers near my chair were debating just how Calianno would manage to set ‘cunt punt’ anyway.”
What Happens When Dudes Have To Go On Point For A Ballet
“The women in the company have given us a few tips. But mostly they find it very amusing.”
Making Good Theatre, Political Or Not, For Actors With Disabilities
“The £3m, three-year Unlimited initiative aims to give venues a choice of work and stop them from, as Verrent put it, ‘programming shit, and the first piece of work that they came across with a wheelchair and a guide dog in it.'”
An Art Critic Skewers The MoMA Björk Show, In Verse Akin To The Vapid Audio Guide
“The girl continues, step by step,
the critic girl, girl critic
listening to the audio guide, with its stories that are free, so free —
free of context, free of facts, free even of the lava girl’s name,
a lava girl, in the shadow of 50, still being described as a ‘girl.'”
Cai Guo-Qiang Explains What’s Missing In Contemporary Chinese Art
“The first few times the Chinese contemporary artist Cai Guo-Qiang tried to make gunpowder drawings, his art caught on fire—literally. His early method involved hanging blank canvases and oil paintings on the wall and throwing rocket fireworks at them.”
The Convention Where Hollywood Woos The Theaters
“Unlike, say, Comic-Con, movie fans are not invited. Instead, theater owners from around the world come to see everything from the latest projectors, new food items to sell alongside the popcorn, and of course, the movies themselves.”
A Principal Dancer Moves On – To Conflict Resolution
“‘As a performer, you create situations from the inside,’ [Dana Caspersen] said. ‘Now I’m interested in looking more broadly at bigger structures: How do our actions shape our world, and how does the world shape our actions?'”