more images god of carnage actress

someone requested more snapshots of tasmin greig. i prefer the ones already posted, but here are a couple of more of her taken after a ‘god of carnage’ performance in london. the english language debut recently opened in the city and stars greig, janet mcteer and ralph fiennes along with that guy from ‘fever pitch.’ no not the jimmy fallon version. but the colin firth version. christopher hampton (dangerous liaisons) translated the play into english from the original french.

a zine symposium in east london

here are some additional images from the london zine symposium i attended 27 april. i will always have a soft spot in my heart for zines as this is how i cut my teeth writing back in the day. my ex-san francisco roomie used to play risk every week with the maximumrocknroll staff in the 90s. but that may have ended after the owner died. i can’t remember. the 90s. now we’re in the naughties.

god of carnage photos tamsin greig and janet mcteer

here are some photos of the actresses tamsin greig and janet mcteer signing autographs by the stage door saturday, following the 26 april performance of yasmina reza’s ‘god of carnage,’ which opened last month in london. as previously mentioned, neither ken stott nor ralph fiennes bothered to come out. but perhaps it had something to do with the theatre being in the middle of boyz town.

newsweek and the first family

i’ve been trying to watch these videos on newsweek about the first family. everytime i get to the bit about teaching and jenna bush speaking it breaks off and loads the reverend wright video. hopefully they’ll fix that shortly. i like the clip on children’s books.

i seem to recall having seen far more stories about the first family while bill clinton was president. what was up with that. to tell you the truth, laura bush and the bush twins are well liked. and people even like dubya as a person if they don’t actually agree with him with the disaster that is iraq.

jenna bush has got girl power

we like jenna bush for being her own person. she bucked the bush system by attending the university of texas at austin, has done time doing international charitable work, teaches at a public school and has written a book. now she’s proved that she’s got her own mind when it comes to picking candidates. couldn’t you just imagine her saying ‘john mccain? uweee, he’s old!’

london zine symposium

devoted to the DIY (do it yourself) spirit, the london zine symposium pulled in a nice little crowd. during the event you could pick up some cool zines and back issues of classic titles from publications like the baffler and maximumrocknroll. zine and comic makers gathered to share their publications and know how. workshops include information on screenprinting. and a variety of films were screened as well. this all took place in east london off brick lane which is sort of like the silverlake of los angeles or the kreuzberg district of berlin.

yasmina reza continues her courtship with london audiences

‘god of carnage’ opened in london last month. the play, written by yasmina reza, who wrote the oft performed ‘art,’ was translated by christopher (dangerous liasons) hampton. it’s directed by matthew warchus whose ‘lord of the rings’ debacle is set to close shortly. i’m sure it wasn’t his fault. frodo as theatre. hmmm.

ralph fiennes, janet mcteer, tamsin greig and ken stott all put in great turns. overall the oddly funny play, which manages to simultaenously be politically correct yet incorrect, is just short of fabulous. it was like watching that french film about the strange life of the bourgeoise that everyone who has ever taken an introductory film course has been forced to watch.

the play, which takes place at the gielgud theatre in london, features 2 sets of parents who get together to discuss a fight between their children. the one act play which goes on for about 2 hours (more or less) fell short on one or two occassions. the bits about saving dafur and how 8 year old sudanese children with guns makes one realize that one kid hitting another with a stick is trivial stuff… well, it is a spiessig concern. and between george clooney and angelina jolie and now yasmina reza and christopher hampton hitting us over the head again and again with dafur and all the horrible things happening in africa (which btw, is actually making a great leap forward with the help of the chinese government). well, it makes me want to puke just as tasmin greig did on stage.

janet mcteer, who won a golden globe for something or another, and tasmin greig were sports enough to grace the audience with their presence afterwards to sign a few autographs and pose for a few photos. pictures of both are forthcoming. the women were able to quickly change and come out and greet a few people. yet the men weren’t. funny that.

editor in chief telegraph media group talks digital future

will lewis, editor-in-chief of the london based telegraph media group has a global perspective. according to lewis, the media organization boasts 17 million unique users of those users only 6 million are based in the uk. the question is are these daily users, or monthly users? this wasn’t actually specified. the lecture was held at the london based city university, where lewis attended journalism school. although the event was announced in time out london, the majority of questions accepted were from students. i and others attempted to approach lewis during the recption after the event, but his handler kept steering him clear of non-students. i soon regretted having not simply worn a name tagewith merely my name and not my affiliation.

hillary hopes to become the energizer bunny

hillary clinton eeked out a 9 point win over barack obama in pennsylvania. 54% to 46%. but ultimately, she merely gained 13 more delegates. while daily she loses more superdelegates.

st. george’s day

i’m in london at the moment. i arrived on st. george’s day. whomever he is, these days he is more known for the red cross (the cross of st. george) on a white background, which is the flag of england and the emblem for the english football team. and today you could walk through trafalgar square experience the celebration. i took a few photos.

richard quest caught with meth in new york city

richard quest, a british national who works for cnn international and hosts shows such as cnn business traveller was arrested in central park friday at around 3am.

peaches geldof looks for five finger discount

bob geldof can probably barely support himself from the royalties from the old boom town rats albums. but the man who famously whined his way through the track ‘i don’t like sundays’ (or was it ‘i don’t like mondays’) might need to reach out to his international friends so his daughter peaches can afford a 500 pound dress or any dress for that matter at the shop victim fashion and any other shop on carnaby street in london. the alleged thief took the 500 pound dress back 2 hours after suffering a winona ryder moment.

abc gets lost in stephanopoulos land in presidential debate

as i’m an expat, i rely on cspan to watch the presidential debates. so i don’t necessarily have the same complaints that loads of bloggers have about the debates. although i did find it curious that abc did cut to a commercial after both hillary clinton and barack obama finished their opening statements. but as i watched the re-run on c-span, it just merely cuts away and then returns to the program.

i’m not sure why it’s taken some people this long to recall that george stephanopoulos worked on the initial bill clinton election campaign back in the 90s and served as spokesman for the first couple of years. ex-clintonites abound in the media both directly and indirectly. case in point, james rubin, who recently contributed an opinion piece to the financial times is married to cnn chief international correspondent, christiane amanpour.

i would like to know why george stephanopoulos couldn’t ask hillary clinton about her telephone conversation with bill richardson. but it is true that no new policy issues were brought up and that charles gibson and stephanopoulos and the producers at abc could’ve done a better job for the american people.

here’s dee dee meyers, ex bill clinton press secretary whose book about how women should rule during the democratic primary coincidentally came out during the middle of primary season.

j.k. rowling and the crying librarian

the tale of the harry potter lexicon begins with a librarian with potter-esque glasses who once ran a harry potter lexicon website. now that he’s decided to let it graduate to print form, j.k. rowling, who once actually presented the aforementioned librarian with an award is mad as hell and won’t take it anymore. especially now that her books have been officially labeled gibberish. let the harry potter backlash (finally) begin.

angela merkel power suit by day princess by night

angela merkel got caught on camera in oslo at the opera dressed more like a bavarian than the former frumpy minister she used to be when she clung to her straight out of east germany, pageboy haircut. but the real question is, why is this a story. is this just a downtime for german rags? isn’t there a war going on somewhere?

newspapers experience second worst ad revenue decline in 50 years

as more and more people migrate to the internet and more and more people have begun locating alternative channels for information, ad revenue for newspapers (both print and online) continue to tumble. at the moment , the new york times is hurting from the shake out.

body shop owner cut kids out of will

not only did the owner of the body shop, anita roddick sell her p.c. shops to a very un p.c. cosmetic company, she apparently didn’t leave her kids one cent. so i guess now british society will have to take care of her penniless children when they hit old age or if they every become unemployed, etc. way to stick it to society.

the bbc hogs the internet

internet service provider, tiscali, is up-in-arms in the uk. apparently, the bbc’s decision to launch their new iplayer and make archive and current television programs available to uk citizens is having a global impact. it’s slowing down the internet. and isps like tiscali want the bbc to fork over money to pay for all the extra bandwidth their programs are eatting up.

once upon a time, when a company like AOL was merely an isp and not a ‘media company,’ it used to be able to charge customers based on useage, this looked like the part of the internet phenomenon that would be the most lucurative. but as companies like earthlink started to charge monthly rates, forcing AOL to do the same, the isp business model has come to resemble that of a charity or the public service area.

the new service offered by the bbc has been available since christmas and is only for uk citizens as the fees they pay for having a telly is how the channel is funded. too bad. i would’ve liked to have had the opportunity to watch the east enders during the martin kemp years.

michelle obama addresses elitism on colbert report

here’s the video link.

hillary clinton grabs the issues loses the audience

hillary clinton spoke at the capital conference luncheon on april 15. tax day. and the speech was somewhat taxing. but not completely. a journalists from a buffalo based paper questioned hillary about the 200K jobs she promised upstate new york during her last senatorial election campaign. and asked how she would address the economic crises in the u.s. her marathon 15 minute answer never fully addressed the bit about upstate new york. i do agree with her that more apprenticeships should be created for young people who aren’t into going to college (or can’t afford it). but one has to wonder why when hillary was ‘co-president’ and the u.s. had a 100B surplus and high poll numbers, this wasn’t addressed in the 90s?

but it is clear that hillary has a firm grasp of the details of issues. at least that’s true if you’re not sitting in front of wikipedia, aren’t fully equipped with google, or have access to archive video footage from cbs while she’s speaking. but yesterday, after having sat in a room filled with eager listeners who work in the newspaper industry, i was amazed at how quickly the level of excitment dissipated about 10 minutes into her speech. was her speech any more boring than the one either john mccain or barack obama gave the previous day? no, not really.

‘me thinks’ hillary suffers from the gordon brown sydrome. the present uk prime minister, gordon brown, and the leader of the tory party, david cameron, were to have duked it out for the PM seat last fall but gordon brown got cold feet and decided not to call an election when david cameron and the conservative party’s poll numbers shot up 9 points after cameron delivered this fabulous 60 minute speech without assistance of either notes or a telepromoter. cameron, who was barely out of diapers while hillary and bill were co-presidenting the u.s. of a, still has the infintely more seasoned gordon brown quaking in his boots.

berlusconi is back in the game

the only constant in italy is seemingly that silvio berlusconi will always make a comeback. the media billionaire, who is able to oversaturate the airwaves with whatever message he chooses, is now back as head of state. at 71, he could supply john mccain with a wonderful argument as to why he’s not too old to run a country. the combination of the rubbish crisis and the realization by italians that the spainish economy had overtaken italy’s, contributed to the failure of romano prodi’s short lived government.

mccain and obama speak at associated press events

john mccain was a special guest at the associated press annual meeting this morning in washington dc. the event was packed full of journalists and newspaper executives from the capital conference.

during the talk, mccain acknowledged that the u.s. is in a recession. he talked about race and equality in the u.s., saying the military is a glowing example of the kind of positive results that can be achieved in this area.

the ap moderators asked mccain about the age issue. the moderators, who brought sprinkled dunkin’ donuts and coffee for mccain, also quizzed him about the shield law bill that is making its way through congress, which could affect freedom of the press. he said if the law were to be put up for a vote, as it is now, he would vote for it. but unfortunately, he did not present a detailed rundown of what the bill currently looks like.

mccain was pressed on roe v. wade in terms of using it as a litmus test for future court appointees. he ducked the question repeatedly and even tried to duck it by saying “i’m not ducking your question.”

barack obama spoke at the luncheon, in which the moderator, toward the end slipped up and had a mitt romney moment, calling osama bin laden ‘obama bin laden.’ there was a bit of a hush through out the packed room and some nervous laughter. obama brushed the whole thing off with a self-referential joke.

apparently this was the first sold out luncheon ap has hosted in its 160 year history. the place was packed with journalists all of whom paid $75 for a ticket. security was well in effect or the obama event, a stark contrast to the mccain event whereby convention attendees just sort of made their way in.

while standing in line for the obama event, waiting to go through the security check, i overheard a two men speaking behind me talking about john mccain and the possibility of his running with condi rice. they both agreed that a mccain-rice ticket would be an unstoppable force.

retouch clinton photo and politico

okay. so after what 19 or 20 debates, we have seen hillary clinton. and somehow, for whatever reason, i have a problem with this picture of hillary clinton that appears on policitco today. it’s like the digital treatment madonna allegedly got during post-production of her cowboy hat totting “music” video some years back.

capital conference. yes newspapers can attract tweens

attended a couple of panel discusions about the internet and audience fragmentation. one of which focused on change and how to harness it. the long and the short of this workshop was that you basically should channel forward and embrace the ‘good enough’ is ‘good enough for now’ idea. and that it is more important to be fast and not to waste your time himming and hawing. completely understandable. youtube, which was non-existant 2 years ago, has been quite instrumental in the 2008 presidential election. it could be one reason why barack obama has been able to raise infintely more money on the internet than both john mccain and hillary clinton combined. youtube.com/barackobamadotcom has a button on its page which allows you to watch videos _and_ donate money.

the thing i like about american conferences or american anything, except most hillary, bill, chelsea, or sometimes even obama events, is that everything ultimately gets a positive spin. yes, sales and circ figures for newpapers and magazines suck. but as i learned in the audience fragmentation program where the likes of a v.p. from gannett and a lackey from yahoo turned up, ultimately there’s hope. it was pointed out that maybe the newspaper industry should look at how major league baseball has turned around their ownline offerings, or take a page out of the austrian playbook. the media company vorarlberg has been able to attrack teens to its web offerings via creative content development. apparently 90% of 14 -19 year olds in austria read their newspapers perhaps because their online properties have emblazoned the brand into their heads.

Trends From Abroad for the Newspaper Industry

what can the u.s. newspaper industry learn from their international counterparts? this was discussed during the nexpo educational programs as part of the capital conference called “anything overseas.” the panel discussion featured martha stone with the paris based world association of newspapers, jim chisholm with imedia advisory services, based in the uk and rick edomonds from the poynter institute based in st. petersburg florida. the event was moderated by joel rochon of the tucson citizen.

the panel acknowledged the cold hard facts regarding the global industry. basically, revenues have fallen dramatically for virtually every publishing group worldwide from axel springer in germany to the australian arm of news corportaion. while the washington post has had some success, primarily due to their purchase of educational publisher kaplan on the advise of warren buffet, who sits on their board.

the overall focus was the importance of mobile telephones and offering integrated as well as contextual content. jim chisholm noted that in 2007, the new york times had 500,000 mobile page views in a particular month while that number has jumped to 14million in 2008. an austrian publisher (whose name i didn’t really catch) depends on a lot of user generated content in an innovative way. case-in-point, the company allows users to sms all his neighbors if he notices there’s an accident or an abundance of traffic in the area, then his neighbors are informed and have the option of travelling a different route.

martha stone, an american expat, based in france, repeatedly emphasized the importance of ‘the long tail,’ coined wired editor, chris anderson. she gave a well informed, highly detailed powerpoint presentation discussing the 4 big trends in successful global media strategies. the primary drawback to her talk was the absence of time to dwell on more points for an extended period of time.

rick edmonds talked about the success of various publishers in scandinavia and the success the norwegian publisher NordJyske Medier has had by completely integrating their content which was echoed by stone as well.

according to edmonds, subsidies are generally available for newspapers in countries such as sweden and norway. in his opinion this could be true because morning newspapers still play a critical role in daily discussions in places like sweden.

the consensus amongst the panel is that the mood in europe, regarding the newspaper industry, is more upbeat than in the u.s. and that mobiles are the next big thing, although they’ve been the next big thing for quite a while.

i’m not wholly convinced that offering more content to ka-zillions of different highly specialized audiences is the way forward or the newspaper industry. the primary problem is that people under 40 are used to getting information for free.

the captial conference kicked off today, bringing together the newspaper association of america, nexpo, and asne under the same tent in washington dc. topics on the agenda for the week include content management, goin green, building an audience in a fragmented world and evolving digital media. within the conference is the associated press’ annual meeting. the organization will host a luncheon on monday at which barack obama will speak. john mccain turns up earlier the same day for the ap meeting. while hillary clinton will speak at a nexpo event the following day.

perhaps during the event, barack obama will clarify what he meant by bitter people. i don’t think this is an elitist statement. and most poor people, if they are honest with themselves as impoverished university students do from time-to-time, the majority would confess to being bitter about their prospects in society.

i had hoped to attend at least a couple of function opening day, but due to the lateness of british airways, this just was not possible. the airline recently opened a new terminal. the infamous terminal 5, where naomi campbell had an air rage incident last week. as i snaked through the security cue in london, i noticed a sign which essentially said, ‘don’t assualt our employees, they’re people too.’ or something to that effect. i could only think that perhaps the sign is a thinly veiled reference to naomi.

politico thinks peter beinart is a left of center journalist

lemme think. peter beinart, a senior fellow a the council on foreign relations (which counts angelina jolie as a member) and an editor at large for the the new republic that would make him a lefty, right. but he also has a video show on NRO –the national review online, called “what’s your problem.” so is he reallyleft of center? or one of those third way democrats?

if you want it all you have to pay for it

americans, on average, instinctively distrust government when it comes to managing money. many secretly believe that every tax dollar that goes into the u.s. coffers is yet another dollar that’s going to be mismanaged. but if the u.s. wants anything remotely resembling universal healthcare, somebody has to pay for it. a new article on der spiegel (in english) addresses this issue which tugs at both sides of the american brain. if americans want solid infrastructure, sturdy bridges, and wants to move toward a greener future, somebody has to fork over the dough for it. or should the u.s. just keep printing more dollars so the currency can continue its free-fall and let inflation get out of control?

yet another uneven handed sentence

is race an issue when it comes to sentencing? well, just ask the barbie bandits. some people get 10 years probabtion and others 15 years in the slammer for the same crime. the naacp is seeking a probe on the sentencing.

rob lowe and wife sues ex-nanny

the former west wing star, according to austin statesman suing his ex-nanny for spreading secrets and lies. wasn’t that a mike leigh film? its not clear who she shared things with. but according to the article, she had a non-disclosure agreement. but i would like to know what is the point in suing a nanny for $1M. its quite obvious she (or he) doesn’t have a cool mill, otherwise the person wouldn’t be, you know, working as a glorified servant.

mark penn pushed or jumped

when i read the article on the wall street journal that hillary clinton strategist and master pollster, mark penn had gone to colombia to talk about helping the government lobby for a free trade agreement, i thought okay. so he’s for free trade. as are most republicans. the problem is, mark penn is (or rather was) running the campaign of a democrat (see hillary clinton). and while we know that the clintons secretly lead the left wing of the republican party (see mitt romney and his healthcare program in MA), at the moment, hillary clinton is trying persuade the democratic party that she really is one of them. so although bill clinton famously signed the NAFTA treaty in the 90s, which really is not the reason why the economy sucks in the rustbelt, and the u.s. really is part of south america, mark penn had to go.

clintons donate money to charity via their own foundations

the clintons released their tax records just after april fool’s day. in the past 8 years since hillary rodham clinton became a senator and bill clinton a private citizen, the dynamic duo have earned a whopping $109 million. according to the new york times, all of their charitable donatioins have gone to the clinton foundations, the bulk of which as of the last return filed in 2006, has not been distriubted. according to the washington post many of the companies and individuals who have funded hillary’s presidential campaign have also provided bill clinton with hefty speaking fees.

martin luther king died 40 years ago today

remember back in january, when hillary clinton dissed martin luther king, jr and robert f. kennedy (who died 40 years ago this june) to praise lyndon b. johnson, of all people. during the course of her tirade, she got ted kennedy so hopping mad that the whole kennedy clan that matters (ted, caroline, and ethel. forget rfk, jr, the recovering addict turned environmentalist who threw his um-hum, weight behind hrc.)

it should be noted that hillary clinton and john mccain are taking part in an event to honor martin luther king. it should also be noted that last year, along with pbs, the congressional black caucus hosted debates for both the democratic and republican candidates. if i remember correctly, all the dems turned up, but rudy, mccain, and romney couldn’t be bothered to put in an appearance. but ron paul and mike huckabee both gave very impressive performances.

naomi campbell and terminal 5

the nightmare that is called travelling in europe is having to fly out of london heathrow’s new terminal. flights repeatedly cancelled, bags lost. if you look at the homepage for british airways, you will find a large banner ad with the words We’re Sorry prominently displayed. naomi campbell reportedly lost it yesterday while trying to fly to los angeles.

ruling in germany on data law helps bind music companies

the RIAA has been tormenting music fans since 2000, when it was instrumental in shutting down napster 1.0. now-a-days, the worldwide industry (country-by-country), spends its time trolling the filesharing sites, collecting IP address and dates and times and names of tracks being downloaded. the next step for these companies used to be that they would go through the police who would then obtain your phone records. in germany, the german music federation funds the trolls.

but apparently german courts have determined that the role of the police is to tackle serious crime not to snoop for the music industry. last month, a german court ruled that the police can only get data from telephone companies to uncover serious crimes.

mcnasty yucks it up with david letterman

on april 1, mccain and david letterman alternately took the piss out of each other.