newsworthy: December 2003 Archives

Selected items of note

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Newsy

ArtsyCulture-y
  • Pitchfork Media has published their annual review of the top 50 albums and the top 50 singles of 2003. As one of my friends pointed out, the review for the #1 song, Outkast's Hey Ya! is brilliant: "You can approach pop music as cynically as your indieness mandates, but 'Hey Ya' is a monument to the idea that a really fucking great song will blow up because it's really fucking great. Mind-blowing, then, when the track sounds very much like a home recording by a guy with a couple guitars and keyboards." Well played.
  • While you're gathered 'round the Yule log, check out the newest release from 8bitpeoples - Christmas songs created using the music from classic video games.
  • Harold von Braunhut, creator of Sea Monkeys and X-Ray specs, died on Sunday (via Boing Boing).

Letters from Iraq

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Think what you will of Michael Moore - but I personally was incredibly moved by some of the letters he's received from military personnel in Iraq.

From: ________________
To: mike@michaelmoore.com
Sent: Monday, December 15, 2003 12:33 AM
Subject: re: thanks, from Ft. ______

wow, 130,000 troops on the ground, nearly 500 deaths and over a billion dollars a day, but they caught a guy living in a hole. am i supposed to be dazzled?

SPC _____________, US Army

Exactly.

Media Consolidation

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There's a great forum happening on Monday at Columbia University in NYC about media consolidation. If you're going to be in the area, I highly recommend checking out the debate between staffers from The Nation and The Economist. John Nichols and Jenny Toomey will take on Ben Edwards and the FCC's W. Kenneth Ferree. More information about the event is available at ActNow!

Just in case you need another reason to be concerned about this stuff, check out these media consolidation chart - all of them are somewhat out-of-date, but bear in mind that things have only gotten worse in the last few years - from Media Channel, The Nation, Columbia Journalism Review, and Frontline. Lots more information can be had on FAIR's telecommunications policy pages. And if you're still pining for more, check out Ben Bagdikian's book, The Media Monopoly. (I do realize that it's only slightly ironic that I'm linking to Amazon.com when mentioning books on my site. Here's the link to Powells if you'd prefer to buy it there.)

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This page is a archive of entries in the newsworthy category from December 2003.

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