“An experiment from major authors including Neil Gaiman and Cory Doctorow, which allows readers to pay the price of their choice for a collection of ebooks, has shattered all expectations, racking up sales of more than $1.1m (£700,000) in under two weeks.”
Tag: 10.23.12
Radical Islamist Rebels Declare War On Music In Northern Mali
“When a rabble of different Islamist groups took control of the region in April there were fears that its rich culture would suffer. But no one imagined that music would almost cease to exist – not in Mali, a country that has become internationally renowned for its sound.”
Glitzy Skyscrapers Are Turning Mecca Into Dubai-With-Pilgrims
It’s the world’s second-tallest tower, with a clockface visible 30 km away and searchlights shooting 10 km into the sky, featuring hotel suites costing up to $7,000 a night during the Hajj, all perched atop a massive high-end shopping mall and directly overlooking Islam’s holiest site. The Abraj al-Bait is the mammoth anchor of a slew of luxury slabs going up all over Mecca – towers for which the historic parts of the city are being razed.
Why Don’t Bollywood Films Get Marketed In English? They Don’t Even Translate The Titles!
“[This] tiny, simple tweak could do so much to extend their reach beyond Hindi speakers. The studios bother to subtitle their films for export – presumably for second-generation immigrants with a shaky grasp of the mother tongue, and curious foreigners – so why not extend the effort to some of the overall marketing as well?”
Free To Be You And Me After 40 Years: Why Marlo Thomas Had To Create It
The now-classic children’s album’s driving force remembers, in 1971, searching for books for her 3-year-old niece – and finding only (what now seem to us) rigid gender stereotypes. “My god, she thought. This is what she’s going to be reading. This is all there is for her to read. What am I going to do? Then she thought: I’ve got to make something that will obliterate this.”
Free To Be You And Me After 40 Years: How Marlo Thomas Got It Made From Scratch
Back in 1972, there were no mainstream songs or stories telling little girls that they could be pilots as well as stewardesses or athletes as well as cheerleaders – let alone telling boys that it could be okay to cry. Record labels and publishers weren’t eager to make such content, either. Fortunately, Thomas was determined – and she knew lots of famous people who could help.
Will Art.sy Crack The Online Art Market?
“People have been trying to sell art online for more than a decade, with little success. Art.sy is the most sophisticated attempt yet, and its team of art world veterans has a better chance than its predecessors of cracking open the cottage industry that the art market remains.”
Publishing Industry In Trouble? Uh… No
“For all the complexities that publishing faces, the notion that books are somehow less of a factor in the cultural or information ecosystem of our time doesn’t hold up to the evidence.”
Paul Allen, Billionaire Art Collector
“This legendary nerd (although Allen bridles at a “pocket protector” image) is also an artsy who spends a fair part of his $15 billion fortune on cultural goods–both as treats for himself and for others.”
How Unemployment Affected The Creative Class
“Even after controlling for all those things, the analysis found that having a creative class job dramatically reduced a person’s chance of being unemployed over the course of the crisis.”