Malcolm Gladwell and The Secret of Success

in Books | November 20th, 2008

Mal­colm Glad­well, the author of The Tip­ping Point and Blink, has a new book out. And it’s almost guar­an­teed to be anoth­er best­seller. Out­liers: The Sto­ry of Suc­cess takes on an idea at the cen­ter of Amer­i­can mythol­o­gy, the con­cept of the “self-made man.” For Glad­well, suc­cess sto­ries aren’t large­ly the prod­uct of smarts and hard work, as we’re repeat­ed­ly told. More often, they’re “the prod­uct of hid­den advan­tages and extra­or­di­nary oppor­tu­ni­ties and cul­tur­al lega­cies that allow [suc­cess­ful indi­vid­u­als] to learn and work hard.” And, as you’ll hear in this inter­view (iTunes — Feed — Web Site), good tim­ing (includ­ing the month and decade of your birth), cir­cum­stance, and luck also play a fair­ly impor­tant role. You can buy the new book in print here, or down­load the audio book from Audi­ble for as lit­tle as $7.49.

As a quick aside, The Leonard Lopate show (where we found this inter­view) appears in our Ideas & Cul­ture Pod­cast col­lec­tion, which you think­ing types might enjoy.

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Hitler’s Real Estate Downfall

in Comedy, Current Affairs | November 20th, 2008

What hap­pens when you take the 2004, Acad­e­my award-nom­i­nat­ed Ger­man film Der Unter­gang (The Down­fall) and turn it into a spoof? Here, the “down­fall” is all about the decline of the hous­ing mar­ket, and how Hitler becomes just anoth­er man with a home under water. There are some clas­sic lines here, par­tic­u­lar­ly if you looked to buy a home in recent years. Thanks Bob for the tip.

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Monty Python Channel Launches on YouTube

in Comedy | November 19th, 2008

The Mon­ty Python Chan­nel on YouTube was launched with these words:

“For three years you YouTu­bers have been rip­ping us off, tak­ing tens of thou­sands of our videos and putting them up on YouTube… We know who you are … we know where you live … and we could come after you in ways too hor­ri­ble to men­tion…” “But being the extra­or­di­nar­i­ly nice chaps we are, we’ve fig­ured out a bet­ter way to get our own back. It’s time to take mat­ters in our own hands by launch­ing our very own Mon­ty Python chan­nel on YouTube.”

The videos are offered in high qual­i­ty, straight from the Mon­ty Python vault. Down the road, you’ll get a com­pre­hen­sive, well orga­nized col­lec­tion. Below, we’ve added one of the videos that you’ll find in the mix, the clas­sic Mon­ty Python bit, “Every Sperm is Sacred.” And we’ve also added the Python chan­nel (if you don’t object) to our col­lec­tion: Intel­li­gent Life at YouTube: 80 Cul­tur­al Video Col­lec­tions. 

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Google Brings Massive LIFE Photo Archive to The Web

in Art | November 18th, 2008

A good days for fans of open cul­ture: Google is bring­ing the mas­sive LIFE pho­to archive online. 2 mil­lion pho­tos are already uploaded, and anoth­er 8 mil­lion will be com­ing online soon. The cur­rent archive moves from The Amer­i­can Civ­il War to present, and it includes a large num­ber of pho­tos nev­er seen before. Here’s one of MLK Jr, anoth­er of Pablo Picas­so, and then one of FDR. All of these images will be added to Google Image Search, but if you want to peruse the col­lec­tion, you can sim­ply access it here. You can also read more about this ambi­tious under­tak­ing on Google’s cor­po­rate blog.

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Revisiting the Depression in The Grapes of Wrath (The Film)

in Film | November 18th, 2008

Over at The New York Times, film crit­ic A.O. Scott revis­its John Ford’s 1940 film based on John Stein­beck­’s clas­sic nov­el about the Great Depres­sion. Putting fore­clo­sures and eco­nom­ic strain front and cen­ter, it’s sud­den­ly a film for our age.  Scot­t’s video seg­ment runs about three min­utes, fea­tures footage from the film itself, and takes a look at Hen­ry Fon­da’s lead­ing role. Have a look.

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Einstein the Talking Parrot

in Random | November 17th, 2008

No com­men­tary real­ly need­ed. Just watch. Filed under “Ran­dom” and added to our YouTube playlist.

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Fire Ants Create a Living Lifeboat in the Amazon

in Science, Video - Science | November 13th, 2008

Yet fur­ther proof that ants are end­less­ly fas­ci­nat­ing, and, on a relat­ed note, see our ear­li­er piece: Cen­tral Intel­li­gence: From Ants to the Web.

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Vintage Nabokov

in Literature, Video - Arts & Culture | November 12th, 2008

Tak­en from a French tele­vi­sion pro­gram, this vin­tage clip fea­tures Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) read­ing from Loli­ta and reveal­ing his list of the most impor­tant nov­els of the 20th cen­tu­ry, among oth­er things. Nabokov speaks in Eng­lish here. So don’t let the ini­tial French throw you off. We’ve added this gem to our YouTube playlist.

Loli­ta, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue tak­ing a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

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Oxford Scholars Name Top Ten Irritating Phrases

in Random | November 11th, 2008

What are some of the most annoy­ing phras­es in the Eng­lish lan­guage? In a new forth­com­ing book, A Damp Squid: The Eng­lish Lan­guage Laid Bare, Oxford researchers list the com­mon phras­es that we use incor­rect­ly or just all too exces­sive­ly. Here’s the list (and if you have your own dis­liked expres­sions, list them below in the com­ments).

1 — At the end of the day
2 — Fair­ly unique
3 — I per­son­al­ly
4 — At this moment in time
5 — With all due respect
6 — Absolute­ly
7 — It’s a night­mare
8 — Should­n’t of
9 — 24/7
10 — It’s not rock­et sci­ence

via The Tele­graph

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Joss Whedon: The Death of Orson Welles, The History of Women and Beyond

in Film, Television | November 10th, 2008

One of my friends from way back, Sheer­ly Avni, has just post­ed an inter­view with Joss Whe­don, who has now dom­i­nat­ed in four media cat­e­gories: film (Seren­i­ty), tele­vi­sion (Buffy the Vam­pire Slay­er), comics (Run­aways, The Aston­ish­ing X‑Men) and final­ly the inter­net. (Dr. Hor­ri­ble’s Sin­ga­long Blog). The inter­view was con­duct­ed for Moth­er Jones, so there’s a lot about pol­i­tics, gen­der, the writ­ers’ strike, and, yes, TV and film. It runs about 38 min­utes. Have a lis­ten.

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