Amnesty’s Syria Ads Prove Humankind Can Be Worse Than Natural Disasters
Amnesty International is known for its provocative ads for human rights. In its campaign for the freedom and democracy of Syria, war zones where housing and huge blocks of land are destroyed have been depicted in ads.
What Comes After TV?
A mobile-storytelling platform called Quibi has loomed on the content horizon, promising that, when its app launches this spring, it will be a home to a huge library of short-form shows made specifically for your phone. But Snapchat has been operating in that space for years. It’s harder than you’d think.
How We’ll Forget John Lennon
The report, “The universal decay of collective memory and attention,” concludes that people and things are kept alive through “oral communication” from about five to 30 years. They then pass into written and online records, where they experience a slower, longer decline.
Secret Life Of An Anonymous Speechwriter To The Stars
I write speeches for people who can barely read their scripts because public speaking makes them nervous. The words that do not matter when I speak for myself are amplified when I put them in the mouths of others. Because as anyone knows, it’s not just the words that matter. It’s who says them, and when, and how.
The Danger Of Befriending Celebrities
Meryl Streep doesn’t call me every week to go bowling. In fact, she doesn’t call me at all. And that’s a good thing. I honestly can’t recommend becoming friends with celebrities, especially if you’re a long-running journalist like I am. It simply will not lead to a Hollywood ending.
In Travel Journalism, After Every Disaster Comes “The Perfect Time To Visit”
When tourists go away, vacations become a gesture of financial support. And we’re told that a tourism economy relishes every dollar that does come. But what big little lies do we tell ourselves when PR companies spin a local disaster into a travel opportunity?
Copenhagen Commuters Get A Big, Slithering Surprise
Forget snakes on a plane. Copenhagen has snakes, really big ones, on a bus. Crushing the entire bus, in fact. Bates Y&R art director Peder Schack squeezed the award-winning idea out of his brain to “make the most possible impact for a very small budget.”
How Netflix Turned Bill Clinton’s Impeachment Into A Growth Hack
The reason we might all be using Netflix today could have a lot to do with a marketing stunt involving the grand jury testimony that got Bill Clinton impeached. Netflix’s wild bet on political scandal succeeded in almost every single way a story like this possibly could.
Carlsberg Beer, Niels Bohr, And The Infinite Pilsner Pipeline That Wasn’t
Carlsberg gifted Niels Bohr, the famous Danish physicist, a home complete with a pipeline that pumped fresh beer directly into his residence. It’s a great story and one that has been reported on by publications such as Forbes and The Guardian. The only problem with the story is that it isn’t entirely true.
How Instagram Killed The It Girl
In a world of constant self-surveillance and curation, we may never see the Parises, the Nicoles, the Taras in the way we once did. The It Girl exists within the moral grey areas of life, but with the existence of social media, such grey areas no longer exist for her to live in – everything is now black and white, good or bad.
Behind The Scenes At Rotten Tomatoes
Humans, not algorithms, determine those ubiquitous scores. The Tomatometer is run by a team of “curators” who read just about every known review from a gigantic pool of approved critics, then decide if each is positive or negative. Once a movie has five reviews, it is Tomatometer-eligible.
How Wikipedia’s Volunteers Became The Web’s Best Weapon Against Misinformation
Twenty years after it sputtered onto the web, it’s now a de facto pillar in our fact-checking infrastructure. Its pages often top Google search and feed the knowledge panels that appear at the top of those results. Big Tech’s own efforts to stop misinformation also rely upon Wikipedia.
Blackfishing: ‘Black Is Cool, Unless You’re Actually Black’
From Kim Kardashian to Selena Gomez, the perceived trend for wanting to appear black shows no sign of slowing down. “It’s about picking and choosing common black traits and characteristics for one’s benefit, while we continue to face discrimination on a day to day basis.”
Mikhail Gorbachev’s Pizza Hut Thanksgiving Miracle
Since his involuntary retirement, former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has raised money for worthy causes, attempted to make a comeback in Russian politics, and, notoriously, made an advertisement for Pizza Hut.
The New Mind Control
The internet has spawned subtle forms of influence that can flip elections and manipulate everything we say, think and do. Most of the vacuous thoughts and intense feelings our teenagers experience from morning till night are carefully orchestrated by highly skilled marketing professionals working in our fashion and entertainment industries.
The First State-Approved North Korean Novel In English
“Friend” by Paek Namnyong was first published in 1988 in North Korea where it became a bestseller and a television series. Thirty years later, Friend has become the first state-sanctioned North Korean novel to be published in English. It is, most surprisingly, a novel about love, marriage, and divorce.
How The Views Of A Few Can Determine A Country’s Fate
Some of the latest research shows us that one reason for the polarisation we see today comes down to a few, incredibly influential minorities. For better or worse, small but incredibly influential groups can change the course of political debate. But is this leading us to hold more polarised views?
These Pics Are Composed Of As Many Pixels As There Are Animals Still Alive In These Species
A brilliant 2008 campaign by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has been resurfacing. The campaign, called WWF Japan – Population by pixel, was created by the agency Hakuhodo C&D / Tokyo. Inspired by their work, Imgurian JJSmooth44 made a follow-up to their project and it’s just as powerful as the original.
Online Streaming: Television’s Looming Car Crash
As the distribution model for entertainment is remade, a revolutionary ardour has seized the industry: the choice is to win the streaming battle against the likes of Netflix, or face commercial oblivion. The immediate result has been clear: more television than ever before. There were 496 scripted TV shows made in the US last year, more than double the 216 series released in 2010.
The World Through The Eyes Of The US
There is always that one country on America’s collective conscious. After looking at 741,681 section front headlines of The New York Times, Russell Goldenberg found out which countries around the world have preoccupied Americans the most each month since 1900.
The Rise And Fall Of Facts
Because fact-checking these days is primarily the domain of legacy print publications, it retains that sheen of legitimacy and seriousness. To fact check is to assure readers, writers, and editors that great care is being taken.