Archive for October, 2009

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Fairey and FairUse

October 28, 2009

Use, unfortunately, is an anagram of &;sue&;.

Charlotte Allen makes some good points about Shepherd Fairey&;s &;expropriation&; of the image he used to &;create&; the now-ubiquitous red-white-and-blue Barack Obama image.  (She also credits Photo District News, which has clearly been on the case.) And Fairey  hasn&;t helped his own case by lying to his attorneys about which image he used, or by his  15 arrests for graffitti. He probably should have asked for permission, or if he&;s made any money on the use of Manny Garcia&;s photo, pay something to Garcia and the AP (which I&;m sure is why the AP is suing, rather than &;the principle of the thing.)  Speaking as a writer whose work has been used without permission or payment,  I certainly sympathize. But the reality is that artists over time have stood on the shoulders of others, &;borrowing&; work to make something new. My favorite &;borrowing&; is Mona Gorilla, by Rick Meyerowitz, which I &;borrow&; below.  (I will take down these images if asked, but I use them to make a point&;and to create something new, this blog post, for which, alas, I do not get paid.)

I&;ve &;borrowed&; myself from press releases for news stories.  &;I used to be a writer, now I&;m a cut-and-paster,&;  I joke. My least favorite borrowing? Peter Benchley&;s Jaws&;modernizing Moby Dick for the money.

Tags:Barack-Obama-poster, , fair-use, Jaws, Moby-Dick, Mona-Gorilla, Shepherd-Fairey Posted in AP, | Leave a Comment &;

Axl Rose onDiversity

October 27, 2009

October 25 I went to the U2 show at LA&;s Rose Bowl.  It can be summed up in two words: hypnotic and inspirational. But when Slash took the stage with the Black Eyed Peas, it reminded me of the Rolling Stones/Guns n&; Roses concert I attended exactly 20 years ago, October 18, 1989 at LA&;s historic Coliseum. Axl Rose could probably be described as the anti-Bono, and he wasn&;t exactly auditioning for the part of UN Goodwill Ambassador, played unofficially by AIDS-fighter Bono and officially by Angelina Jolie.

In fact as soon as Rose took the stage he offered this impassioned defense of himself and his song &;One in a Million&; against criticism that he was a racist, just because it was about &;police and niggers and immigrants and faggots.&; &;I don&;t give a goddamn fuck what color you fucking are, as long as you&;re ain&;t no goddamn thief drug selling piece of shit. &;I used the word fucking nigger but that don&;t mean every black man is a fucking nigger, that means if you go downtown and some fucking asshole wants to charge you fifteen dollars for free parking kick him in the fuckin nuts. &;I don&;t give a shit about gay people either but I don&;t need some faggot trying to rape me. &;Immigrants? I don&;t care what goddamn fucking country you&;re from, you&;re in America just act like it. &;You want to call me a racist shove your head up your fucking ass. Either the audio cut out early, or my aging memory is going, but I remember his stirring conclusion: &;Anyone who thinks I hate niggers can suck my dick.&;

Tags:angelina-jolie, Axel-Rose, axl-rose, Bono, Guns'n'Roses, LA-Colisseum, memorable-LA-concerts, Rolling-Stones, Slash, U2, U2-Rose-Bowl Posted in Los-Angeles, Music | 1 Comment &;

Gay Undergoes Successful GroinSurgery

October 27, 2009

Yep, definitely the Headline of the Week.  But at least it appears that the American Family Association&;s OneNewsNow has not only given world-class runner Tyson &;Homosexual&; Gay his name back, but is actually using the word &;gay&; and &;hate crimes&; together.

Tags:American-Family-Association, Tyson-Gay, Tyson-Homosexual Posted in Sex and Society, Sports | Leave a Comment &;

Music forGuantanamo

October 22, 2009

I wonder if the Pink song the government used to torture inmates was &;Dear Mr. President.&;  Nahhh&; And which is worse torture, the Barney song or Neil Diamond? As for Bruce Springsteen, what could be a greater perversion than blasting Empty Sky, from The Rising? I want a kiss from your lips I want an eye for an eye I woke up this morning to the empty sky&;.

Tags:9-11, Bruce-Springsteen, Dear-Mr.-President, Guantanamo, music-for-torture, Pink, torture Posted in 9-11, Music, Politics, war-on-terror | Leave a Comment &;

The Dodgers and theNavy

October 22, 2009

Now that the Dodgers have gone down the drain, again, I can share my highlight of their season. OK, it&;s a fat guy&;s delight, but my son and I enjoyed sitting in the All-You-Can-Eat right field section for the first game of the National League Championship Series at Dodger Stadium. Getting to our seats was a bit difficult, not because larger-than-life LA characters were blocking the aisle, but because a huge group of sailors and Marines were lined up outside the entrance. They held up their burden and made a gateway for us. Later, they unfurled the flag they brought.

My dad was in the Navy.  My mother lived in a Brooklyn apartment building and frequently saw Dodgers Pee Wee Reese and Ed Head, who lived there too.  My son wants a jersey, to honor Jackie Robinson (and the Dodgers who broke the color line.) Just wait til next year.

Tags:Dodger-Stadium, Dodgers, giant-flag, Jackie-Robinson, Los-Angeles-Dodgers Posted in Los-Angeles, Sports | Leave a Comment &;

Columbia Cuts Environmental JournalismProgram

October 21, 2009

Is the force of gravity finally hitting journalism schools?  Unbelievably, as newspapers and magazines make cut after cut (incidentally also hurting freelancers like me) journalism school enrollment keeps going up. I understand the romance of journalism, but what are these people thinking?

Now one of these pricey programs has bitten the dust.   The Columbia School of Journalism announced the &;suspension&; of the two-year, $89,000 environmental journalism program.  The program directors &;cited falling employment in the field, the rising costs of education, and a lack of financial aid for students.&; The program actually sounds quite valuable, offering graduates two master&;s degrees, one in environmental science, the other in journalism. These would be ideal tools to investigate critical issues of our time, like global warming, carbon emissions, rainforest deforestation, the decline of the fisheries and the persistence of radiation from the Cold War, just to name some &;top of the head&; topics.  Graduates could also take on the appalling anti-science movement of groups like the anti-vaccination crowd. Unfortunately,  in the Darwinian struggle for news outlets to survive,  only two of 9 recent program graduates have gotten journalism jobs.  Meanwhile,  &;many newspapers with reputations for strong coverage&;from the Sacramento Bee to the Columbus Dispatch, have let go of talented specialists.&;  Of course, if Rush Limbaugh had his way, there might be an opening at the New York Times.

Tags:anti-vaxers, environmental-journalism, journalism-schools, New-York-Times, Rush-Limbaugh Posted in death-of-magazines, death-of-newspapers, investigative-journalism, Journalism | Leave a Comment &;

Playboy Lied About MargeSimpson

October 20, 2009

Save your pennies at the newsstand, if you can find one.  Marge is not on the cover of my subscription copy of the November issue.  Pneumatic Alina Puscau is, in leather.

Only Marge&;s name is on the cover of my copy, despite this publicity shot.

She&;s inside, posed rather chastely in nylons and garters, and in the fake centerfold, posed with the inevitable stack &;o donuts. Her turnoffs: Slim men who work out regularly and take care of their bodies&; My turnoffs: Dying magazines that don&;t tell the truth in their publicity stunts, relentless cross-promotion with an equally aging TV show (&;Watch The Devil Wears Nada, Sunday November 15!&;), credulous news outlets that will print anything.

Tags:Alina-Puscau, death-of-magazines, Marge-Simpson-nude, Playboy Posted in death-of-magazines, publicity-stunts, Secrets of Men's Magazines, Sex and Society, Simpsons | Leave a Comment &;

LA Times Flunks CopyeditingTest

October 15, 2009

A September 25 story in the  LA Times noted that DNA evidence  showed that a suspect who spent five months in jail was not guilty.  In the print edition, the Times wrote:

The victim told police that her attacker licked her naval area&;But the state&;s crime lab found that the only DNA consistent with saliva in the woman&;s naval area belonged to her. All together now&;naval means having to do with the navy.   Innie or outie, navel refers to your bellybutton. I know&;it passed the spell check.  But not the intelligence test&;or the copyediting one. Update: the Times fixed it in the online version.  So never mind&;

Tags:death-of-copyediting, death-of-newspapers, wrong-word-usage Posted in Journalism | Leave a Comment &;

Time Capsule of a More ProsperousEra

October 15, 2009

Cleaning out my office I found some &;sacred artifacts of the past&;,  as Leonard Cohen sang in another context (about the loss of the  &;naked man and woman&;).

What did I find?  I found a Family Computing Magazine from 1999, talking about the best computer and printer to buy, how to set up your home office, fight viruses, etc.  At the time, people would pay $2.99 for a magazine that would impart such wisdom.  And writers and editors would actually get paid for their expertise in technology.

I used to say, &;If you can write about tech, you&;ll always eat.  You may not want to live, but you&;ll always eat.&;

No more.

In a related development, I found a NY Times classified ad page that had no less than ten (10) columns offering editorial jobs, from managing editor, puzzle editor, editorial/idea shaper, reporter, development editor, producer editor at Times Mirror  for hunting and fishing websites, music editors, editorial assistants, and even a copyeditor!

Rather than save these depressing time capsules, I tossed them.

The paperless era appears to be the payless era as well.  As Everybody knows&;

Tags:copyediting, death-of-journalism, death-of-print, Leonard-Cohen Posted in Journalism, technology-and-its-discontents, technology-journalism | Leave a Comment &;

Ford Fusion Hybrid, InternationalSupercar

October 9, 2009

Ford has been much in the news.  Unlike the other Big 3 automakers, it didn&;t take government money and hasn&;t been as painfully mismanaged or dismembered as Chrysler or General Motors, which no longer builds excitement.  Ford has retired debt, reached an agreement with the UAW and seen its stock more than quadruple in the past few months. What&;s missing from the equation? Cars.  But Ford&;s comeback, to be successful, depends on building cars people want to buy.   Like the Ford Fusion Hybrid.  Which I watched hungrily at its launch at the 2008 LA Auto Show, and which I plunked down my hard earned money to buy six months ago. I call mine &;international supercar&; because it&;s an American Ford, is a 5-seater based on the Mazda 6, is assembled in Mexico and includes a Japanese gas/electric hybrid system and navigation system. After six months, I hardly see it, as my wife has decided it&;s her favorite car of all time.  She loves the heated leather seats, the Sync Bluetooth handsfree phone system, the hard drive where Patti Smith and Bruce Springsteen reside&;and most of all, the 36.8 miles per gallon we&;ve averaged on gas over the 6500 miles we&;ve driven the car.  Doesn&;t hurt that a friend says our silver Fusion &;looks like a Lexus.&;  Or that my wife looks good in it, either. One of my favorite features is that it goes up to 45 mph on electric power alone, so I can be crusing Ventura Boulevard in stealth mode. It runs on regular gas, too, unlike our Lincoln Aviator, which greedily (13 miles per gallon) drinks only premium. As a techie I love all the electrical gadgets, from blind spot detection to being able to pick a restaurant or a cheap gas station (as if I needed one) on the screen or command it via Blackberry.  It&;s basically a voice-operated computer on wheels&;without Microsoft&;s &;blue screen of death&; so far. I&;ve had my disagreements with Pulitzer Prize winner Dan Neil of the LA Times.  But not when he says of the Fusion, &;Wait, so somebody invented the car of the future and didn&;t tell us?&;  

Tags:Ford, Ford-Fusion, Ford-Fusion-hybrid, hybrid-cars Posted in Automobiles, technology | 1 Comment &;

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