“Brock Enright is notorious in the US as the man who performs ‘bespoke executive kidnappings’ for $1,500 a time. He’s persona non grata with the NYPD, fantasy salesman to the stars, and now he’s opened his first London exhibition with a performance-art extravaganza starring his own mother and the Easter bunny. ‘In what I do there is a lot of smoke and mirrors.’ He works at the edge of truth and fiction.”
Blog
Researcher Find Ancient Building By Using Google
An Italian researcher has discovered an ancient villa by looking at satellite maps doenloaded from Google. “Luca Mori was looking at Google Earth images of the region around his town of Sorbolo, near Parma, when he noticed a shaded oval area more than 500 metres (1,640ft) long, which marked the path of an ancient river.”
Russia’s Stolen Art Problem
Russian police are searching for more than 48,000 stolen works of art. “The missing pieces of artwork include pictures, icons, sculptures, metalwork, gems, military decorations, vintage armor, and rare books. Some of them were stolen from museums and churches, but most from private houses. The biggest challenge is to track down pieces that have been smuggled out of the country, investigators said.”
Milwaukee Art Dealer Accuse Of Fraud
“Once-eminent Milwaukee art dealer Michael H. Lord has been charged with stealing about $180,000 from an old friend by buying artwork on the friend’s behalf and then selling it to Major League Baseball commissioner Allan H. “Bud” Selig and his wife, and keeping the proceeds.”
Authors Sue Google Over Book Copying
The 8000-member Authors Guild has sued Google to block it from copying books in big libraries. “The lawsuit asked the court to block Google from copying the books so the authors would not suffer irreparable harm by being deprived of the right to control reproduction of their works. It sought class-action status on behalf of anyone or any entity with a copyright to a literary work at the University of Michigan library.”
Jobs: Resist Those Greedy Recording Companies
Apple chief Steve Jobs says recording companies are getting greedy and want to raise the price of online music. “We’re trying to compete with piracy, we’re trying to pull people away from piracy and say ‘you can buy these songs legally for a fair price’. But if the price goes up a lot, they’ll go back to piracy. Then everybody loses.”
Montreal’s Cultural Malaise
Is Montreal starving its cultural life? “Montrealers love to mock Toronto’s obsession with becoming a ‘world-class’ city, but they also hate to acknowledge signs that their city is being left behind. Montreal had access to the same kind of funding, and what did it use the money for? New pipes and sewers. The big capital projects in Montreal these days are a pair of hospitals and several academic buildings. Like the sewers, they’re needed, but they’re also draining money away from the city’s cultural base.”
NPR Doubles Audience In Six Years
National Public Radio has doubled its audience to 26 million in six years. “While the radio world has contracted in upon itself through consolidated ownership and copycat formats, public radio has only become more distinct, important and valuable. It looms ever larger on the U.S. dial simply as guardian of its niche. It’s expanding its news operation at a time when most others are cutting back. It’s in the midst of a $15 million, three-year plan to add 45 staffers and open new bureaus, including one in West Africa. But more important, listen to an NPR program for 30 seconds and you know you’re listening to NPR.”
Darwin, Doubts, And Desires
Why are Americans still debating evolution almost 150 years after Darwin posited it? “A scientific-religious issue is being argued in courts and school boards, as if they ever could settle one’s faith in God or what hominid line led to homo sapiens. Which is why Americans are still fighting about this while the rest of the scientific world has moved on. In this political struggle, Darwinians have relied on the courts to bar the unconstitutional use of tax money to teach religion. But in doing so, they have fueled widespread (and often Southern, regional) resentments against “elitist experts” and “activist judges.” Creationists, meanwhile, tend to appeal to school boards and the public, knowing they can sway a popular vote.
The Order We Want To Impose On Randomness
Okay, so you love the shuffle music feature on your MP3 player. But, like many people, you’ve grown to suspect that the shuffle isn’t very random at all. Turns out it’s difficult “for a PC, which is designed to do things in predictable ways, to generate a string of numbers that are statistically random. Try as they might to compile a list of numbers at random, computers frequently spit out digits that have discernible patterns to them.” The problem, it turns out, isn’t that the programs aren’t randomizing my playlists. They are. But our expectations of randomness are statistically inconsistent.