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This seems quite a positive thing. Weird what some people have to say about it though.
comment posted at 11:49 AM on Mar-18-04

Magnatune. A non-evil music label.
comment posted at 9:12 AM on Mar-18-04

Becky Burgwin exposes the extreme right wing agenda. A bit shrill, but harsh rhetoric for harsh times.
comment posted at 12:05 PM on Mar-16-04

The Museum of Bad Art
comment posted at 9:49 AM on Mar-15-04

A precious, limited resource. 10 African countries want more water from the Nile. The Nile just doesn't have enough to satisfy their wants and needs. Can there be a solution to this problem short of war?
comment posted at 3:12 PM on Mar-13-04

Busking around the world in 80 days. Wait a minute... busking? Can you really make a living off of playing music in the street? Yup. Well, maybe not.
comment posted at 7:32 AM on Mar-10-04

NOT COMING TO A THEATER NEAR YOU - Great film site. Best part is the review section with pages of commentary on all sorts of splendid, taboo, controversial, or plainly difficult to discuss, and potentially unwatchable yet ambitious cinema. And also some others (with, of course, the usual suspects) My only complaint is some of the reviews spoil the actual ending of the films instead of discuss them very objectively, but that's the Internet for you. Still a fine fine site, I say. More reviews from the site found here.
comment posted at 7:43 AM on Mar-10-04

Ugly Stickers and their "dark origins". (via tui)
comment posted at 12:47 PM on Mar-8-04
comment posted at 1:14 PM on Mar-8-04

All songs sound better when performed on a ukulele.
comment posted at 7:21 AM on Mar-8-04

Gouge away / you can gouge away / stay all day / if you want to / chained to the pillars / a 3-day party / i break the walls / and kill us all / with holy fingers
comment posted at 11:59 AM on Mar-4-04

The Russian cup of tea is a marvelous triumph of quality over schedule. It is also remarkably similar to the way the Turks make tea.
comment posted at 12:14 PM on Mar-2-04

Beyond Compare: Women Photographers On Beauty "An international photography exhibit from Dove that aims to inspire dialogue, move beyond stereotypes and challenge women to question their definition of beauty."
(Flash, mostly safe for work)
comment posted at 1:48 PM on Mar-1-04
comment posted at 2:01 PM on Mar-1-04

Seeing the World Sideways: Prunella Clough. 'A private individual who chose to remain out of the limelight and yet was admired so highly by her peers, Prunella Clough, like Edward Burra, lived to paint. Her technique is masterly, her subject matter everyday in origin, her method idiosyncratic, the results atmospheric. She worked with her skill, not her ego, saying: "I like to paint a small thing edgily." '
Online gallery here.
comment posted at 1:58 PM on Mar-1-04

The Prohibition Party. Wow, these guys could do some serious damage to the presidential election of, say, the 4-H Chapter of North Dakota.
comment posted at 2:56 PM on Feb-29-04

It's not quite fresh, according to mainstream reviewers polled by Rotten Tomatoes. But Christian Bloggers feel very differently. As one reports, I went into the movie expecting to be moved, but never to the extent that I actually was. But both sides seems to agree the R rating should be taken very seriously.
comment posted at 7:13 AM on Feb-27-04

Birth of a Nation: one of the most controversial films in american history. The film "...was banned in more than a dozen localities (and furthermore has been the most banned film in American history) because of its white supremacist sympathies, racist stereotypes, and glorification of the Ku Klux Klan..." Sex, Sin, and Blasphemy,Marjorie Heins. Given the recent controversy over Gibson's film, where do we draw the line between freedom of expression and censorship? when are these debates influenced by politcal agenda rather than sincere concern?
comment posted at 8:38 AM on Feb-26-04

The vertical nature of New York City has long helped define its image, with families stacked on top of each other and penthouse apartments reaching the clouds. But for generations, tens of thousands of people have made do with another New York reality - the basement apartment - and they literally climb out of the ground to enter the city that is always on top of them. As mentioned in literature, personal ads--and soon to be the penthouse of urban worker housing everywhere.
comment posted at 8:02 AM on Feb-26-04

"The next thing I knew, his heavy, boneless hand was hot on my thigh." That's the money shot from this article in which Naomi Wolf, author of "The Beauty Myth" and former adviser to Al Gore on alpha male matters, decides 20 years later to accuse ailing Harold Bloom of sexually harassing her at Yale, when she was a senior. Why now? A stunt to put herself in the news? Or perhaps to breathe new life into a moribund city magazine. (While I'm at it, here's Google on the phrase: "boneless hand." Not alpha male at all).
comment posted at 7:00 AM on Feb-25-04

This commercial for Nutrigrain is disturbing & hilarious. Link eggregiously lifted from blort.
comment posted at 10:44 AM on Feb-23-04

Secret Pentagon report warns climate change "could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy..." The report, ordered by an influential Pentagon advisor but covered up by US defense chiefs for months, warns that it might be too late to prevent future disasters, such as violent storms that may make large parts of the Netherlands uninhabitable. Climate change, the report says, "should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US national security concern..."
comment posted at 11:06 AM on Feb-23-04

DRUMMERWORLD: The DrumSolo Collection - from Steve Gadd to Dave Weckl. [via codemode.org]
comment posted at 6:53 AM on Feb-20-04

Is Alex Ross Trying Too Hard To Be Eclectic? It's a great article but, imho, a few false notes are struck here and there. Can you love classical and popular music at the same time? Classical types always like the same popular stuff (Dylan and Pink Floyd, of course) and popular types always like the same classical stuff (Wagner, Puccini, Mahler) but somehow the suspicion remains that one's heart can't be in two places at once. There's something ingratiating and icky about attempts to pretend "it's all music". It isn't, is it? Also, God forgive me, 20 is way too late to start listening to Pop.
comment posted at 7:14 AM on Feb-20-04
comment posted at 8:33 AM on Feb-20-04
comment posted at 2:07 PM on Feb-20-04

DJ Danger Mouse has been making waves recently with his Grey Album that cross-pollinates the music of The Beatles' classic White Album with the lyrics and delivery of Jay-Z's recent swan song, the Black Album. The results? "One of the more interesting pirate mashups ever done." (Pitchfork). "Most ambitious remix." (Village Voice). "As fun as it is daring." (Boston Globe). "Ultimate remix record." (Rolling Stone). Not surprisingly, EMI is far from amused by the unsanctioned and unapproved project and the limited release will no longer be distributed. So, download it now (or check out these Real Player samples).
comment posted at 11:54 AM on Feb-18-04
comment posted at 1:30 PM on Feb-18-04

A very good tribute from the Guardian regarding the life and legacy of philosopher-comedian Bill Hicks.

It is compelling and significant that the final words on Hicks's last record, Rant In E-Minor, are a prayer: "Lift me up out of this illusion, Lord. Heal my perception, so that I may know only reality."
comment posted at 8:11 AM on Feb-17-04
comment posted at 9:40 AM on Feb-17-04
comment posted at 11:24 AM on Feb-17-04

24 hour garage people HEY KIDS ! check out this happening place that plays the sonic flower grooves of the sixties 24/7 !
comment posted at 10:29 AM on Feb-2-04

It has been said that reality is all about perspective -- a camera is a pinhole view of the world that frequently filters out much of the story. With that in mind, check out this video of the familiar "I have a scream" speech by Dean. I'm no Dean supporter, but from down in the trenches it doesn't look nearly as bad as it played on TV. Obviously the video you've seen on the news has the best part and the audience noise turned down, but from this vantage point, the speech almost seems appropriate for the crowd and the moment (but was still a lapse in judgement to forget cameras were rolling). I hope this isn't too subtle of a point -- forget all the politics involved -- this is a fascinating look at a familiar scene that was looped for the past week, but from an entirely different perspective and a different story emerges. [via Vidiot]
comment posted at 7:58 AM on Jan-30-04

A.J. Liebling; H.L.Mencken; E.B.White: Are The Great American Prose Stylists Long Dead And Gone? Perhaps it helps to have two initials. In any case, Gore Vidal apart, I'm afraid sheer opinionated and passionate prose, backed up by knowledge of the world, unorthodox views and uplifting prose that is simultaneously workmanlike and deliciously readable is a thing of the past in American journalism. Sameness; political correctness and sensitivity have all had their deleterious, neutering effect. Are there any exceptions?
comment posted at 8:04 AM on Jan-30-04

The DOD Wargames Abrupt Climate Change: Turning inward, the U.S. effectively seeks to build a fortress around itself to preserve resources. Borders are strengthened to hold back starving immigrants from Mexico, South America, and the Caribbean islands—waves of boat people pose especially grim problems...As the planet's carrying capacity shrinks, an ancient pattern reemerges: the eruption of desperate, all-out wars over food, water, and energy supplies. Wars over resources were the norm until about three centuries ago. When such conflicts broke out, 25% of a population's adult males usually died. As abrupt climate change hits home, warfare may again come to define human life.
comment posted at 9:22 AM on Jan-29-04

CBGB Photographic History. Includes one of the coolest Ramones photos I've ever seen. (One or two of the thumbnails are probably NSFW, but they're small, so unless you're really paranoid, I wouldn't be too concerned about it). (via things magazine)
comment posted at 9:33 AM on Jan-29-04

Live and let dye?! Hair dyeing causes non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, especially in cases of repetitive dyeing over years, especially with darker colors.

This might sound trivial, until the names of some potential victims are mentioned. Jacqueline Kennedy Onasis, Joey Ramone, Louis Malle, Charles Lindbergh, King Hussein of Jordan, Paul Tsongas, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, William Casey, Roger Maris, Mickey Mantle, Steve Reeves, and Mr. T. (Shaddup, foo! I'm in remission!) Not that any of them would ever dye their hair, of course.
comment posted at 4:15 PM on Jan-25-04

you think it's been a cold winter in the north east this year?
"For those of us living around the edge of the N. Atlantic Ocean, we may be planning for climate scenarios of global warming that are opposite to what might actually occur."
comment posted at 12:09 PM on Jan-22-04

Political and social commentary from the human potential left. I really can't describe this, but it isn't your father's poli-sci website.
comment posted at 8:08 AM on Jan-22-04

No future for you...
John Lydon, aka Johnny Rotten to appear on a reality TV show. What's next? Cruse ships promoting themselves using songs about junkies?
comment posted at 12:20 PM on Jan-20-04
comment posted at 12:22 PM on Jan-20-04

"In Memory of Martin Luther King" [Flash.] The words are excerpted from King's 1967 speech, "Why I am Opposed to the War in Vietnam."
comment posted at 1:10 PM on Jan-19-04

America has had periods of single-party dominance before. It happened under FDR's New Deal, in the Republican 1920s and in the early 19th-century "Era of Good Feeling." But if President Bush is re-elected, we will be close to a tipping point of fundamental change in the political system itself. The United States could become a nation in which the dominant party rules for a prolonged period, marginalizes a token opposition and is extremely difficult to dislodge because democracy itself is rigged. This would be unprecedented in U.S. history.
     In past single-party eras, the majority party earned its preeminence with broad popular support. Today the electorate remains closely divided, and actually prefers more Democratic policy positions than Republican ones. Yet the drift toward an engineered one-party Republican state has aroused little press scrutiny or widespread popular protest.    America as a One-Party State
comment posted at 11:43 AM on Jan-19-04

Books I Did Not Read This Year: For novelty or perhaps for gleeful one-downmanship, Kieran at Crooked Timber shares a list of books he did not read in 2003. Literary guilt is hardly new, but some argue our neuroses about unread books grows as our distractions multiply. Of course, this attitude (besides bordering on criticism of the glib, "pop lite" type) usually comes part and parcel with the common complaint that paper culture is dead. And one could easily make a distinction between neurotic englit-geek Guilt and the casual reader's mere missed opportunity. Without rehashing either of those discussions, what are the (presumably) best books (or any pieces of art) you didn't consume in 2003?
comment posted at 2:41 PM on Jan-17-04
comment posted at 3:45 PM on Jan-17-04

Which is the best type of writer to cover a nine person campaign that lasts two years? A novelist of course. Only a novelist can come up with the sort of obvious truths that reporters can't or aren't allowed to write. Like, "I've met Sharpton before and I can say with full confidence the man is a liar, an opportunist, and a swine." The other candidates on Gore's endorsement, "Fuck fat fucking Al shit fucking Gore." Or Kucinich's campaign, "Just before I go to sleep I ask myself, Why not love your fellow man, why not peace on earth? ... And the answer occurs to me immediately—because the other guy wants to rape your women and kill your children." Stephen Elliott, four time novelist and card shark, is on the campaign.
comment posted at 7:37 AM on Jan-17-04

Dazzling, full-color shots of people long since dead, landscapes long since paved, and an empire long since overthrown.
A pre-WW I process for creating color image projections meets Photoshop®
comment posted at 7:29 AM on Jan-16-04

Creative Class War: How the GOP's anti-elitism could ruin America's economy. This is an interesting and troubling article by Richard Florida on the possible flight of the American "Creative Class." [Via WorldChanging.]
comment posted at 6:31 AM on Jan-15-04
comment posted at 7:57 AM on Jan-15-04
comment posted at 11:52 AM on Jan-15-04