By Sean Gregory
Walmart loves to shock and awe. City-size stores, absurdly low prices ($8 jeans!) and everything from milk to Matchbox toys on its shelves. And with the recession forcing legions of stores into bankruptcy, the world's largest retailer now apparently wants to take out the remaining survivors.
Thus, the company is in the beginning stages of a massive store and strategy remodeling effort, which it has dubbed Project Impact. One goal of Project Impact is cleaner, less cluttered stores that will improve the shopping experience. Another is friendlier customer service. A third: home in on categories where the competition can be killed. "They've got Kmart ready to take a standing eight-count next year," says retail consultant Burt Flickinger III, managing director for Strategic Resources Group and a veteran Walmart watcher. "Same with Rite Aid. They've knocked out four of the top five toy retailers, and are now going after the last one standing, Toys "R" Us. Project Impact will be the catalyst to wipe out a second round of national and regional retailers."
Though that's bad news for many smaller businesses that can't compete, Walmart investors have clamored for this push. Despite the company's consistently strong financial performance, Wall Street hasn't cheered Walmart's growth rates. During the 1990s, the company's stock price jumped 1,173%. In this decade, it's down around 24% (Walmart's stock closed at $51.74 per share on Sept. 3). "Walmart is under excruciating pressure from employees and frustrated institutional investors to get the stock up," says Flickinger.
Many analysts believe that the store-operations background of new CEO Mike Duke will keep investors quite happy. Though the recession finally caught up to Walmart last quarter, when the company reported a 1.2% drop in U.S. same-store sales, Walmart was a consistent winner during the worst days of the financial crisis, as frugal consumers traded down. While most retailers are shutting down stores, Walmart has opened 52 Supercenters since Feb. 1. Joseph Feldman, retail analyst at Telsey Advisory Group, estimates that each store costs Walmart between $25 and $30 million. In order to continue the momentum that it has picked up during the retail recession, over the next five years the company plans to remodel 70% of its approximately 3,600 U.S. stores.
So what does a Project Impact store look like? One recent weekday afternoon I toured a brand new, 210,000-sq.-ft. Walmart in West Deptford, N.J., with Lance De La Rosa, the company's Northeast general manager. "We've listened to our customers, and they want an easier shopping experience," says De La Rosa. "We've brightened up the stores and opened things up to make it more navigable." One of the most noticeable changes is that Project Impact stores reshape Action Alley, the aisles where promotional items were pulled off the shelves and prominently displayed for shoppers. Those stacks both crowded the aisles and cut off sight lines. Now, the aisles are all clear, and you can see most sections of the store from any vantage point. For example, standing on the corner intersection of the auto-care and crafts areas, you can look straight ahead and see where shoes, pet care, groceries, the pharmacy and other areas are located. And the discount price tags are still at eye level, so the value message doesn't get lost.
"They are like roads," De La Rosa says proudly. "And look around, the customers are using them. We've already gotten feedback about the wider, more breathable aisles. Our shoppers love them."
The layout is also smarter. "You can kind of guess where everything is going to be," says Sharon Tilotta, 73, a shopper in the West Deptford store. The pharmacy, pet foods, cosmetics and health and beauty sections are now adjacent to the groceries. In the past, groceries and these other sections were often at opposite ends of the store, which made it more difficult for someone looking to pick up some quick consumables to get in and out of Walmart. "Under Project Impact, Walmart is providing more of a full supermarket experience within its walls," says Feldman. "The biggest complaint against them has always been that it takes a long time to get through everything. This definitely improves efficiency." De La Rosa also points out the party-supply section. Favors, wedding decorations, cards and scrapbooks are all in one area. "In the past, these products would be in three different places," he says.
And although Walmart won't admit to targeting specific competitors — "We're just listening to what our customers want," De La Rosa says — it's clear that, under Project Impact, Walmart will make major plays in winnable categories. The pharmacy, for example, has been pulled into the middle of the store, and its $4-prescriptions program has generated healthy buzz. With Circuit City out of business, the electronics section has been beefed up. Walmart is also expanding its presence in crafts. Sales at Michael's Stores, the country's largest specialty arts-and-crafts retailers, have sagged, and Walmart sees an opportunity. Stores are chock-full of scrapbooking material, baskets and yarns. "Look, they're selling the stuff that accounts for 80% of Michael's business, at 20% of the space," says Flickinger. "It's very hard for any company to compete with that."
Apparel, one of Target's traditional strengths, gets a prominent position at the center. The color palettes of the shirts and dresses are brighter and more appealing than they've been in the past. "Walmart has figured out fashion for the first time in 47 years," Flickinger says. "They've gone from a D to an A-minus." Briefs and underwear have been shuttled to the back. "That's a smart move," Flickinger says. "People know to come to Walmart for the commodity clothing. Now, they have to walk past the higher margin, more fashionable merchandise to get what they need."
Of course, Project Impact isn't perfect. You'd think that if Walmart was going to open a massive new store with a cutting-edge layout, the company would at least put a sign up. In West Deptford, it's easy to miss the entrance to the Walmart — which is buried in the back of a parking lot — while driving along a main thoroughfare. And of course, customers will always nitpick. One elderly shopper complained about a shortage of benches in the store (she needed a rest). Another had a more esoteric, yet legitimate, gripe. "Their meat is leaky," says Jeff Winter, 30, a West Deptford shopper. "And instead of giving you a wet wipe to clean it off, they give you a dry towel. How's that going to prevent E. coli or whatever?"
What analysts really want to see from Project Impact, however, is a faster pace of implementation. "The biggest hurdle facing Walmart is the speed with which they can roll this out," says Feldman. As more Project Impact stores pop up, the existing stores appear worse by comparison. For example, while the merchandise at the Project Impact store outside of Philadelphia really speaks to that particular market — there's tons of Eagles and Phillies gear — at one regular discount store outside New York City, Minnesota Twins and Seattle Mariners pajama pants wasted away on the racks. There were plenty of associates staffing the electronics section at the Project Impact store; at the discount store, five frustrated shoppers waited in line for help from a customer-service rep. Soon, it was closer to 10.
What about the friendly service? In West Deptford, the associates were sunny and bright. At the New York–area discount store, not so much. "You'll notice we've been in the store for two hours, and no one has even said hello to us," Flickinger says after he and I toured that store. He's right, we weren't feeling any love. But if Project Impact keeps picking up momentum, many more Walmart salespeople, and shareholders, should be smiling.
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9.08.2009
A skull that rewrites the history of man
It has long been agreed that Africa was the sole cradle of human evolution. Then these bones were found in Georgia...
By Steve Connor
The conventional view of human evolution and how early man colonised the world has been thrown into doubt by a series of stunning palaeontological discoveries suggesting that Africa was not the sole cradle of humankind. Scientists have found
a handful of ancient human skulls at an archaeological site two hours from the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, that suggest a Eurasian chapter in the long evolutionary story of man.
The skulls, jawbones and fragments of limb bones suggest that our ancient human ancestors migrated out of Africa far earlier than previously thought and spent a long evolutionary interlude in Eurasia – before moving back into Africa to complete the story of man.
Experts believe fossilised bones unearthed at the medieval village of Dmanisi in the foothills of the Caucuses, and dated to about 1.8 million years ago, are the oldest indisputable remains of humans discovered outside of Africa.
But what has really excited the researchers is the discovery that these early humans (or "hominins") are far more primitive-looking than the Homo erectus humans that were, until now, believed to be the first people to migrate out of Africa about 1 million years ago.
The Dmanisi people had brains that were about 40 per cent smaller than those of Homo erectus and they were much shorter in stature than classical H. erectus skeletons, according to Professor David Lordkipanidze, general director of the Georgia National Museum. "Before our findings, the prevailing view was that humans came out of Africa almost 1 million years ago, that they already had sophisticated stone tools, and that their body anatomy was quite advanced in terms of brain capacity and limb proportions. But what we are finding is quite different," Professor Lordkipanidze said.
"The Dmanisi hominins are the earliest representatives of our own genus – Homo – outside Africa, and they represent the most primitive population of the species Homo erectus to date. They might be ancestral to all later Homo erectus populations, which would suggest a Eurasian origin of Homo erectus."
Speaking at the British Science Festival in Guildford, where he gave the British Council lecture, Professor Lordkipanidze raised the prospect that Homo erectus may have evolved in Eurasia from the more primitive-looking Dmanisi population and then migrated back to Africa to eventually give rise to our own species, Homo sapiens – modern man.
"The question is whether Homo erectus originated in Africa or Eurasia, and if in Eurasia, did we have vice-versa migration? This idea looked very stupid a few years ago, but today it seems not so stupid," he told the festival.
The scientists have discovered a total of five skulls and a solitary jawbone. It is clear that they had relatively small brains, almost a third of the size of modern humans. "They are quite small. Their lower limbs are very human and their upper limbs are still quite archaic and they had very primitive stone tools," Professor Lordkipanidze said. "Their brain capacity is about 600 cubic centimetres. The prevailing view before this discovery was that the humans who first left Africa had a brain size of about 1,000 cubic centimetres."
The only human fossil to predate the Dmanisi specimens are of an archaic species Homo habilis, or "handy man", found only in Africa, which used simple stone tools and lived between about 2.5 million and 1.6 million years ago.
"I'd have to say, if we'd found the Dmanisi fossils 40 years ago, they would have been classified as Homo habilis because of the small brain size. Their brow ridges are not as thick as classical Homo erectus, but their teeth are more H. erectus like," Professor Lordkipanidze said. "All these finds show that the ancestors of these people were much more primitive than we thought. I don't think that we were so lucky as to have found the first travellers out of Africa. Georgia is the cradle of the first Europeans, I would say," he told the meeting.
"What we learnt from the Dmanisi fossils is that they are quite small – between 1.44 metres to 1.5 metres tall. What is interesting is that their lower limbs, their tibia bones, are very human-like so it seems they were very good runners," he said.
He added: "In regards to the question of which came first, enlarged brain size or bipedalism, maybe indirectly this information calls us to think that body anatomy was more important than brain size. While the Dmanisi people were almost modern in their body proportions, and were highly efficient walkers and runners, their arms moved in a different way, and their brains were tiny compared to ours.
"Nevertheless, they were sophisticated tool makers with high social and cognitive skills," he told the science festival, which is run by the British Science Association.
One of the five skulls is of a person who lost all his or her teeth during their lifetime but had still survived for many years despite being completely toothless. This suggests some kind of social organisation based on mutual care, Professor Lordkipanidze said.
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Historian says creating new Saskatchewan cities has 'great significance'
By Jennifer Graham
The last time two Saskatchewan towns became cities in the same year, Premier Walter Scott was walking the halls of the newly completed provincial legislative building, agricultural was the driving force of the economy and most of the province's nearly 500,000 residents lived in rural areas.
It was 1913 when North Battleford and Weyburn became the province's newest cities.
Nearly 100 years later, Saskatchewan is doing it again, announcing last week that the towns of Meadow Lake and Martensville have reached city status.
"There's a great significance to yet another city in Saskatchewan because in the national consciousness, Saskatchewan is a place that time forgot - of rural roads, country elevators, wheat fields," says Bill Waiser, a professor in the history department at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon.
"What people don't realize today is that Saskatchewan is essentially an urban province. More people in Saskatchewan live in urban centres than they do in the countryside."
For years, Saskatchewan was a place people loved to leave.
After reaching a high of more than 1,032,000 people in 1987, the province's population started to drop. It fell to below 992,000 in 2006 before things started to turn around.
Saskatchewan's population was at 1,027,092 in June, according to figures released by Statistics Canada. Most of the growth came from people moving to Saskatchewan from other provinces.
Waiser says two out of every three people in Saskatchewan live in urban centres - most in Regina and Saskatoon.
The historian, who penned the book "Saskatchewan: A New History," says people need to get away from the images of Saskatchewan as one big wheat field or as a small town where most people are engaged in agriculture.
"That's not the real Saskatchewan of today," Waiser says.
"The fact that Martensville is becoming yet another in the list of cities in Saskatchewan reflects the fact that there's this growing urbanization in Saskatchewan, that people are moving off the farms into the cities where they can get better services."
"Yes, Saskatchewan has that feel of a rural province because of the grid roads, the country elevators, the grain fields, but that rural population is becoming increasingly smaller as the urban population grows."
In fact, Waiser says a lot of smaller communities will likely see their numbers decline and might eventually disappear.
Such hamlets, villages and towns were put on the map a century ago to service the agricultural community so that producers didn't have to haul their crops too far. But Saskatchewan's economy has expanded into areas such as mining and oil and gas. Agriculture's contribution has declined, taking with it the need for all the small rural centres, says Waiser.
In Saskatchewan, a community must have a population of 5,000 or more to get city status.
Martensville has seen its population grow because of its proximity to Saskatoon, the province's largest city. Martensville is just 20 minutes north of Saskatoon, but it doesn't want to be seen as a bedroom community.
"We want our own identity," says Martensville Mayor Giles Saulnier.
Saulnier says the city is trying to move forward and grow with the Saskatchewan economy. He insists the personable image that makes small town life appealing won't change.
"It's the people. It's walking down the street and saying hello to your neighbour and that will continue to happen because everybody wants to lend a helping hand in Martensville," says Saulnier.
"It's a sign of what we are as a community."
Premier Brad Wall says two towns becoming cities in the same year is evidence that Saskatchewan is growing even during the recession. The growth in Meadow Lake is being driven by many factors, including agriculture, energy exploration and the potential of oil sands development.
But the situation is not all rosy.
Saskatchewan was the only province to experience a sizable deterioration in the job market in August, losing 3,200 jobs, according to the latest Labour Force Survey released by Statistics Canada. However, the province still boasts Canada's lowest unemployment rate at five per cent.
Waiser admits there are challenges with a shifting population and the current economy, but he says people should look forward to what Saskatchewan is going to do.
"It's not going to be an easy road ahead of us, it's going to be bumpy, but I suggest that Saskatchewan will find its own solutions to the challenges that it faces and that the rest of Canada should be watching closely."
Link
The last time two Saskatchewan towns became cities in the same year, Premier Walter Scott was walking the halls of the newly completed provincial legislative building, agricultural was the driving force of the economy and most of the province's nearly 500,000 residents lived in rural areas.
It was 1913 when North Battleford and Weyburn became the province's newest cities.
Nearly 100 years later, Saskatchewan is doing it again, announcing last week that the towns of Meadow Lake and Martensville have reached city status.
"There's a great significance to yet another city in Saskatchewan because in the national consciousness, Saskatchewan is a place that time forgot - of rural roads, country elevators, wheat fields," says Bill Waiser, a professor in the history department at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon.
"What people don't realize today is that Saskatchewan is essentially an urban province. More people in Saskatchewan live in urban centres than they do in the countryside."
For years, Saskatchewan was a place people loved to leave.
After reaching a high of more than 1,032,000 people in 1987, the province's population started to drop. It fell to below 992,000 in 2006 before things started to turn around.
Saskatchewan's population was at 1,027,092 in June, according to figures released by Statistics Canada. Most of the growth came from people moving to Saskatchewan from other provinces.
Waiser says two out of every three people in Saskatchewan live in urban centres - most in Regina and Saskatoon.
The historian, who penned the book "Saskatchewan: A New History," says people need to get away from the images of Saskatchewan as one big wheat field or as a small town where most people are engaged in agriculture.
"That's not the real Saskatchewan of today," Waiser says.
"The fact that Martensville is becoming yet another in the list of cities in Saskatchewan reflects the fact that there's this growing urbanization in Saskatchewan, that people are moving off the farms into the cities where they can get better services."
"Yes, Saskatchewan has that feel of a rural province because of the grid roads, the country elevators, the grain fields, but that rural population is becoming increasingly smaller as the urban population grows."
In fact, Waiser says a lot of smaller communities will likely see their numbers decline and might eventually disappear.
Such hamlets, villages and towns were put on the map a century ago to service the agricultural community so that producers didn't have to haul their crops too far. But Saskatchewan's economy has expanded into areas such as mining and oil and gas. Agriculture's contribution has declined, taking with it the need for all the small rural centres, says Waiser.
In Saskatchewan, a community must have a population of 5,000 or more to get city status.
Martensville has seen its population grow because of its proximity to Saskatoon, the province's largest city. Martensville is just 20 minutes north of Saskatoon, but it doesn't want to be seen as a bedroom community.
"We want our own identity," says Martensville Mayor Giles Saulnier.
Saulnier says the city is trying to move forward and grow with the Saskatchewan economy. He insists the personable image that makes small town life appealing won't change.
"It's the people. It's walking down the street and saying hello to your neighbour and that will continue to happen because everybody wants to lend a helping hand in Martensville," says Saulnier.
"It's a sign of what we are as a community."
Premier Brad Wall says two towns becoming cities in the same year is evidence that Saskatchewan is growing even during the recession. The growth in Meadow Lake is being driven by many factors, including agriculture, energy exploration and the potential of oil sands development.
But the situation is not all rosy.
Saskatchewan was the only province to experience a sizable deterioration in the job market in August, losing 3,200 jobs, according to the latest Labour Force Survey released by Statistics Canada. However, the province still boasts Canada's lowest unemployment rate at five per cent.
Waiser admits there are challenges with a shifting population and the current economy, but he says people should look forward to what Saskatchewan is going to do.
"It's not going to be an easy road ahead of us, it's going to be bumpy, but I suggest that Saskatchewan will find its own solutions to the challenges that it faces and that the rest of Canada should be watching closely."
Link
9.07.2009
Turning to Tie-Ins, Lego Thinks Beyond the Brick
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
FROM the outside, there is nothing playful about the drab, two-story Lego Idea House here, where designers gather in whitewashed rooms to dream up new toys. But upstairs, behind a series of locked doors accessible only to employees with special passes, is a chamber that might as well be toy heaven for kids — and more than a few adults.
Multicolored Lego creations in every imaginable size and shape spill from the shelves, from Indiana Jones’s biplane to Darth Vader’s fighter. Boxes stamped “confidential” hold potential future blockbusters, like Buzz Lightyear, the hero of the “Toy Story” animated films, as well as a police station bustling with miniature cops and robbers.
“It’s our way of looking at the world,” says Soren Holm, the head of Lego’s Concept Lab. “We have happy criminals; even they are smiling. The sun is shining every day.”
While that may be true of Lego’s toys, until recently it was hardly the case for Lego’s bottom line. But five years after a near-death experience, Lego has emerged as an unlikely winner in an industry threatened by the likes of video games, iPods, the Internet and other digital diversions.
Even as other toymakers struggle, this Danish maker of toy bricks is enjoying double-digit sales gains and swelling earnings. In recent years, Lego has increasingly focused on toys that many parents wouldn’t recognize from their own childhood. Hollywood themes are commanding more shelf space, a far cry from the idealistic, purely imagination-oriented play that drove Lego for years and was as much a religion as a business strategy in Billund.
Just as the toys are changing, so is the company. Jorgen Vig Knudstorp, 40, a father of four and a McKinsey & Company alumnus who took over as Lego’s chief executive in 2004, made it clear that results, not simply feeling good about making the best toys, would be essential if Lego was to succeed.
“We needed to build a mind-set where nonperformance wasn’t accepted,” Mr. Knudstorp says. Now, “there’s no place to hide if performance is poor,” he says. “You will be embarrassed, and embarrassment is stronger than fear.”
But the story of Lego’s renaissance — and its current expansion into new segments like virtual reality and video games — isn’t just a toy story. It’s also a reminder of how even the best brands can lose their luster but bounce back with a change in strategy and occasionally painful adaptation.
Founded in 1932 on the principle of “play well,” or “leg godt” in Danish, by a local carpenter, Ole Kirk Christiansen, this privately held company had a very Scandinavian aversion to talking about profits, much less orienting the company around them.
Mr. Christiansen’s family still owns Lego and its business may still be fun and games, but working here isn’t. Before Mr. Knudstorp’s arrival, deadlines came and went, and development time for new toys could stretch out for years; in 2004, the company racked up a $344 million loss.
Now, employee pay is tied to measuring up to management’s key performance indicators (K.P.I.’s, in Lego-speak). And cost-saving touches are encouraged when it comes to designing new toys.
That has helped to lower development time by 50 percent, with some new products moving from idea to box in as little as a year. Mr. Knudstorp’s bottom-line-oriented team, meanwhile, has shifted some manufacturing and distribution from Billund to cheaper locales in Central Europe and Mexico.
Nevertheless, Lego hasn’t entirely shed its Scandinavian sense of social mission when it comes to making toys. It kept quality high and never moved any manufacturing to China, avoiding the lead paint scare and grabbing market share when rivals stumbled amid multiple recalls.
Now, with profits swelling and the turnaround firmly in place, Lego is preparing for a future that moves well beyond the basic brick but carries big risks as well.
Last month, it opened its first “concept store” in Concord, N.C., where parents can bring children for birthday parties and classes with master builders; another concept store is set to open near Baltimore this fall. It’s all part of a broader retail expansion that will give Lego 47 retail stores worldwide by year-end, up from 27 in 2007.
In 2010, the first board game designed by Lego will go on sale in the United States, while its new virtual reality system, Lego Universe, will make its debut on the Web, with children able to act out roles from Lego games and build toys from virtual bricks.
Video games — yes, Lego is there, too — are increasingly important to the company, as are Lego’s legions of adult fans, who can now buy kits to build architect-designed models of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater and the Guggenheim Museum. What’s more, the company is in talks with Warner Brothers about a mixed live-action and animation Lego-themed movie that would move the company and its Lego brand even further into the Hollywood orbit.
“Developing a movie doesn’t come cheap,” says Soren Torp Laursen, a 23-year Lego employee who heads its North American operations. “But five years ago, we were in the midst of a crisis, and now we’re in a growth phase. We are definitely taking bigger risks than we previously did.”
WHILE that shift has disappointed purists and prompted worries from experts that some of what has long made Lego special may be in jeopardy, it’s paying off, at least in the short term.
Amid a 5 percent drop in total United States toy sales last year and the industry’s worst holiday season in three decades, according to Sean McGowan, an analyst at Needham & Company, Lego’s sales surged 18.7 percent in 2008. And despite a worsening global recession, Lego powered through the first half of 2009, with a 23 percent sales increase over the period a year earlier. It earned $355 million before taxes last year, and $178 million in the first half of 2009.
The numbers are all the more impressive given the sales declines this year at the two biggest toymakers, Mattel and Hasbro.
“I was stunned when I heard how strong Lego’s performance was,” says Mr. McGowan, who has covered the toy industry for 23 years. “How could an $80 Lego set sell better than a $10 action figure?”
The answer is as multifaceted as one of Lego’s most complicated brick creations — and, like the best children’s stories, contains elements of luck, hard work and the loss of innocence.
SOREN HOLM looks down at the machine gun atop Indiana Jones’s jeep and winces. By the standards of video games like Grand Theft Auto and of other childhood attractions, it’s mild stuff.
But here in Billund, toy weapons have always been a touchy subject. “I can tell you there’s been a lot of debate about how far we can take it,” Mr. Holm says. Right down to Indy’s gun? “Oh, yes,” he says slowly. “Oh, yes.”
Since Lego overcame its initial hesitation about rolling out a “Star Wars” series a decade ago because the word “war” would appear on the box, the company has grown more comfortable with conflict.
“We’ve opened up slightly,” Mr. Holm says. After all, he adds, “when you give boys a bunch of bricks, they build a gun.”
In fact, Lego has opened up more than slightly. Whether it’s the Star Wars Assassin Droids Battle Pack or the Indiana Jones Ambush in Cairo set — featuring a pistol-wielding Indy against a scimitar-swinging local — many of Lego’s most popular toys today seem inspired by the special effects and violence of the big screen.
In the United States, Lego’s biggest market and the biggest toy market in the world, games with themes like “Star Wars” and “Indiana Jones” were among the reasons Lego sales jumped 32 percent last year, well above the global pace. But experts like Dr. Jonathan Sinowitz, a New York psychologist who also runs a psychological services company, Diagnostics, wonders at what price these sales come.
“What Lego loses is what makes it so special,” he says. “When you have a less structured, less themed set, kids have the ability to start from scratch. When you have kids playing out Indiana Jones, they’re playing out Hollywood’s imagination, not their own.”
Even toy analysts who admire the company and its recent success acknowledge a broad shift. “I would like to see more open-ended play like when we were kids,” says Gerrick Johnson, a toy analyst at BMO Capital Markets in New York. “The vast majority is theme-based, and when you go into Toys “R” Us, you’d really be challenged to find a simple box of bricks.”
Lutz Muller, an independent toy analyst in Williston, Vt., who has long followed the industry, estimates that 60 percent of Lego’s American sales are linked to licenses, double the amount five years ago.
And the coming “Toy Story” sets have retailers salivating, as Disney prepares to release the latest movie in the hit series next June. “ ‘Toy Story’ is a fit made in heaven,” raves Jerry Storch, the chief executive of Toys “R” Us, which has increased the shelf space allotted to Lego in recent years.
Nevertheless, acquiring licenses to make toys linked to hot Hollywood properties like “Toy Story” carries risks. “It’s a slippery slope,” Mr. Johnson says, and today’s hit can quickly turn into tomorrow’s dud, adding volatility that Lego never faced in the past.
Indeed, unlike the Cabbage Patch Kids or Atari or the Beanie Babies, it was Lego’s seeming aloofness from the market that helped it endure, rather than ending up in the back of the closet like those toys of yesteryear.
For longtime Lego executives like Mr. Laursen, it’s a delicate issue, and his own comments echo Lego’s ambivalence over creativity and hallowed Lego traditions versus the appeal of more profitable, Hollywood-influenced toys.
He says that “we’re definitely more commercially oriented” and notes that licenses play a bigger role in the American market than overseas. But he says that “we’ve never sacrificed our values, and have never been a fundamentally profit-oriented company.”
In fact, he says that there is often a long debate about values when acquiring new licenses, and that “we’re far from always agreeing to take on new ones.” He won’t specify which movies or themes Lego has passed on, but says that “there are many licenses out there that represent a level of violence that is not suited to Lego and doesn’t fit with the trust of parents.”
As Lego ventures deeper into video games and virtual reality with Lego Universe, the question of violence, not to mention commercial temptations, will become only more charged.
One answer, Mr. Laursen says, is to make “violence not explicit, but humoristic.” For example, when a minifigure “dies” in a “Star Wars” or “Indiana Jones” video game, he dissolves into a pile of bricks and then springs back to life, cartoon style.
“We think kids really want to have this good-against-evil play; they want this fighting against each other,” says Charlotte Simonsen, a Lego spokeswoman. “But we want to do it with a wink.”
Analysts add that the recession has proved to be an unexpected boon for Lego, as parents favor spending more time at home with traditional toys instead of going out to the movies or taking trips with the children.
Even parents who won’t let video games in the house, like Alyson Richman Gordon of Huntington Bay, N.Y., say Lego has retained its innocence, especially when it comes to toys built around the traditional bricks. “It echoes back to a bygone era,” she said. “And I find as a parent that I’m drawn to things from my own childhood that inspired my creativity.”
Lester Munson, a father of two in Alexandria, Va., agrees, even though he sees a difference between the Legos of his own childhood and those favored by his 8-year-old son, Jonas. “The most exotic thing I could build when I was a kid was an ambulance,” he says. “Now Jonas can build the Death Star.”
“I still like Legos, and I’m 41,” he says. “Instead of watching TV or playing computer games, the kids are building something, and Jonas and I will build stuff together. The pieces and the sets are a lot cooler than they were 30 years ago, and if the price you have to pay is these tie-ins, that’s fine.”
IT’S not only children who fight over toys. John Barbour, a former top executive of Toys “R” Us, recalls “a series of truly frustrating meetings” with Lego officials in Billund and New York at the beginning of the decade, which climaxed when Mr. Barbour bluntly told them that Toys “R” Us cared more about the Lego brand than they did.
The most popular toys would run out, he recalls, and Lego was simply unable to ship more or manage the complex process of producing the plastic pieces for its most complicated sets.
That began to change in 2004, after Mr. Knudstorp took over in Billund and Mr. Laursen arrived at Lego’s regional headquarters in Enfield, Conn. Besides reaching out to top retailers and cutting costs, they untangled a supply chain that churns out 29 billion pieces a year.
The changes also filtered down to the ranks of Lego’s toy designers, says Paal Smith-Meyer, head of Lego’s new-business group. The number of different bricks or elements that go into Lego toys has shrunk to less than 7,000 from roughly 13,000, and designers are encouraged to reuse parts, so that a piece of an X-wing fighter from the “Star Wars” series might end up in Indiana Jones’s jeep or a pirate ship.
That’s very different from when Mr. Meyer joined Lego a decade ago. Though creating a mold to make a new plastic element might cost 50,000 euros. on average, he recalls that 90 percent of new elements were developed and used just one time.
Nowadays, Mr. Meyer says, “you have to design for Lego. If you want to design for yourself, go be an artist.”
For those would-be Lego artists out there, the company has created a Lego Certified Professional program, selecting adult Lego enthusiasts who don’t work directly for the company but whose creations are aimed at Lego’s vast population of adult fans as well as museum and gallery shows.
It’s part of another broad new effort at Lego — reaching out to those adult fans, who maintain thousands of Web sites and blogs, like GodBricks, which features Lego creations inspired by different faiths, and the Brothers Brick, which showcases all things Lego, whether a life-size Lego house, news, or advice on how to shine up yellowing bricks (hydrogen peroxide).
“There’s a huge community of people that treat Lego as an art form rather than just a toy,” says Andrew Becraft, a technical writer at Microsoft who created the Brothers Brick blog. His site pulls in 125,000 unique visitors a month, and Lego officials estimate that 915,000 people worldwide attended Lego conventions and other events in the first seven months of 2009. Five to 10 percent of Lego toys are snapped up by adults.
In the past, Mr. Knudstorp says, “we considered the adult fans like vintage cars, a bit bizarre.” But he called on another longtime Lego executive, Tormod Askildsen, to work with adult fans. Now Mr. Askildsen journeys to Lego conventions organized by adult enthusiasts, while working with 44 Lego “ambassadors” from 27 countries, seeking advice about new toys and heading off public anger when older lines, like Lego’s 9-volt train sets, are phased out.
Ultimately, Lego came up with a new, profitable train set, after inviting the 9-volt enthusiasts to two workshops in Billund to brainstorm and help design it. “If you rock the boat, people will notice,” Mr. Askildsen notes. “They were fighting furiously for us not to give it up, but we were able to turn tension into opportunity.”
The same might be said for Lego as a whole, as it navigates the fiercely competitive toy market and ventures into movies and virtual reality while clinging as best it can to the more innocent, Scandinavian values that made it so popular in the first place.
“In the end, you’ve got to go where your consumer is going,” Mr. Barbour says. “And the reality is that themes and movies are what kids want. There’s no point in developing the best product in the world if you can’t put it on the shelf.”
Link
9.06.2009
9.05.2009
Was 'Aliens' the Best Science Fiction Sequel Ever?
By Michael Simpson
"There Are Some Places In The Universe You Don't Go Alone."
So said the tag line advertising the main feature at London's Odeon Leicester Square in August 1986. The film on show was Aliens, the eagerly anticipated sequel to the 1979 sci-fi horror movie Alien. Fans of the first film had waited a long time to see what new horrors would be inflicted on Alien's heroine, Ellen Ripley, and her beloved cat. Some feared the cat might be the unfortunate host of writer and director James Cameron's new generation of stomach-bursting beasts. The young Canadian director was keeping the truth close to his chest, though.
Despite the secrecy, moviegoers and critics were optimistic that they would get something good from the man who had thrilled them with The Terminator. As one of them, I went to the Odeon Leicester Square to see Aliens one week after it went on general release in the UK (I'd wanted to go on opening day, but I slept though my alarm and missed the train). Yet, contrary to my expectations, I left the theater feeling slightly disappointed. It was only when I saw the film on VHS for the first time that I began to appreciate its excellence. Since then I have come to believe that Aliens may be the best science fiction action movie and the best sequel ever made.
Thanks to the franchise is spawned, Ridley Scott's Alien is now seen as a critical and commercial success. In the early 1980s, however, sequels to adult-oriented horror movies were not guaranteed. Consequently Alien II (as Aliens was initially and unimaginatively known) took a while to gestate. Part of the blame for that could rest with the producers of Alien. The story goes that Cameron initially met with two of them, Walter Hill and David Giler, to discuss another project that they had in mind. That project didn't interest him, but his ears pricked up when they mentioned a sequel to Alien. Cameron 's accounts of those meetings suggest, however, that they weren't enthusiastic about revisiting Ripley's nemesis.
"I felt like he was digging out an old bone in the backyard, dragging out something no one had been thinking much about," Cameron said in a 1986 issue of Time Magazine.
Thankfully, Cameron was a fan of Ridley Scott's film and was inspired by Hill and Giler to develop a treatment for Alien II. According to EOFFtv, he already had a concept for another project involving "predatory aliens tangling with highly armed space marines" that he had titled "Mother". Hill and Giler were supposedly also thinking of having soldiers in the sequel, so it seems likely that the two ideas fed Cameron's imagination.
Enlisting Cameron to develop Alien II was initially a bit of a gamble. He was relatively unknown in Hollywood when he first met Hill and Giler. He had directed Piranha II: The Spawning, a silly 1981 sequel to Joe Dante's Piranha, but had no major work for a big studio to his name. Between first meeting Hill and Giler and the start of production on Aliens, though, he scored big with The Terminator and his screenplay for Rambo: First Blood Part II (although he has said that the final script for the latter differed significantly from his own). These successes gave him the credibility he needed to take the best elements of Alien and use them as the basis for a story that referenced the original but (in the modern parlance) partially rebooted it.
With the benefit of hindsight, Cameron actually looks like the perfect fit for Aliens. The terrifying creature introduced in Alien was similar in its single minded determination and ferocity to Arnie's Terminator or the relentless war veteran John Rambo. Cameron also wanted to make a different kind of film from the one Ridley Scott had helmed. The scenes of future warfare in The Terminator introduced the conservative directing style and dour military-industrial design sensibilities that Cameron would carry over into Aliens. At that time he also reveled in action. This mixture of qualities meant that Aliens would have a different vibe from the slow pace and artistic imagery that characterized Alien. The result was a stylistic and thematic distance between Alien and Aliens that ensured the sequel was no inferior retread of the original.
Bearing in mind Cameron's different visual style, it was an inspired move on his part to set Aliens 57 years after its predecessor. It implicitly justified the different look of his film and meant he wasn't bound by expectations about the level of technology that humans had reached in Alien. For example, in Scott's film the crew of the Nostromo had to wear space suits when they landed on the moon where the alien was found. This led to one of that film's most memorable scenes (when Kane's mask is removed to reveal the face-hugger). However, it also slowed down the action because the suits were an encumbrance to the wearers. Cameron avoided this problem by populating LV-426 with terraformers. The result of their work was breathable air, which negated the need for suits. The changed climate also allowed for rain, which gave the outdoor scenes in Aliens a claustrophobic and chilling atmosphere that complemented other sources of tension. Meanwhile, the terraformers — men, women and children, alike — gave the aliens the means by which to multiply.
While the success of Aliens owes much to Cameron's directorial vision, the contribution of Sigourney Weaver cannot be underestimated. The script allowed Weaver to expand on the minimal characterization Ripley was afforded in Alien and bring the character through a process of maturation. Whereas Ripley quivered with fear at the end of Alien, she had grown into a strong, courageous, uncompromising heroine by the climax of Aliens. Along the way she was also able to show a caring, compassionate side that made her a fully-rounded personality to which the audience could relate. Weaver's performance earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in 1987.
One of Cameron's biggest difficulties in the script was finding a convincing reason why Ripley should agree to another face off with a creature that had terrorized her once already. He eventually settled on something suggesting catharsis and conscience; Ripley returned to LV-426 to destroy the aliens and help an investigation into the disappearance of the terraformers. She was also supposed to be under the protection of highly trained space Marines. The Marine's cocksure did not save her from another round of trauma, however. Instead they got the royal ass-whooping that provided the film with much of its action. This element of the plot also echoed Cameron's earlier works in that it was a vague reference to the United States' military adventures in south-east Asia. In an interview on the film's DVD release Cameron admits that Aliens was, in a minor way, meant to be a Vietnam movie in outer space.
To populate Ripley's military support, Cameron called on some past acquaintances. The character of sensible Marine Corporal Hicks was given to Michael Biehn, who had played someone similar (Kyle Reese), in The Terminator (Biehn would work again with Cameron on The Abyss). Cameron also drafted in another Terminator alumnus, Bill Paxton, to play a cocky and foul-mouthed Marine called Hudson. Paxton had played a minor role in The Terminator as one of the bikers accosted by a naked Arnold Schwarzenegger early in the film (and would work again with Cameron on Titanic). Rounding out the better known members of the cast were Lance Henriksen (Piranha II) as the android Bishop and comedian and writer Paul Reiser (Mad About You) as slimy company man Carter Burke. Canadian viewers may also recognize a young Daniel Kash (Due South, The Line) as the ill-fated Private Spunkmeyer.
Aside from Ripley and the Marines, the other principal character in Aliens was the little girl known as Newt. She was played by Carrie Henn and that role was to be Henn's first and only part. She left acting thereafter and went on to earn a degree in liberal studies and child development from California State University.
While Cameron may have got much of what he wanted with Aliens, the studio left its mark before the film's release. The theatrical cut was substantially shortened, resulting in the removal of some important character scenes and a sequence showing how the colonists initially become infected. In terms of the coherence of the plot, Aliens fared better from such editing than did Cameron's next film, The Abyss. Nonetheless, the restoration of missing scenes for the DVD release, amounting to an extra 17 minutes, was a welcome event.
The writers and directors of the sci-fi blockbusters Hollywood puts out today could take several lessons from Aliens. It proved that action films needn't be preposterous and over-the-top; that a successful sequel can be stylistically and thematically different from the original; and that suspense is a better buttress for action scenes than big explosions.
That said, Aliens is not without its faults. It starts slowly (especially the extended version) and the finale is both contrived and too similar to that in Alien. It also suffers from a false climax that is more stirring than the real one. Nonetheless, over 20 years after it was made, it remains one of the best action films to come out of Hollywood. It is a rollercoaster ride, comprising one memorable sequence after another, backed up by James Horner's fabulous score. Furthermore, the build-up to that aforementioned false climax is fantastic. The introduction of the now iconic alien queen was a masterstroke and the scenes in the nest were more macabre than any amount of gore.
Almost 23 years after my trip to the Odeon, I am intrigued to read that Ridley Scott will direct a prequel to Alien. It is a fascinating prospect. To pull it off, though, Scott faces an unusual challenge. His new film must not only match the quality of his own original work, it must also be a prequel that is as good as the sequel. James Cameron raised the bar with Aliens and no subsequent film in the franchise has reached it. I hope Scott succeeds and that the release of his film can be celebrated by viewing the hi-def remastering of Aliens that is overdue. Both would be fitting tributes to one of filmland's finest monster movies and what must surely be the best sequel ever made.
Link
"For my money, the film is still as intense as ever - it still rocks over 20 years later as non-stop pure adrenaline sci-fi action!"
"There Are Some Places In The Universe You Don't Go Alone."
So said the tag line advertising the main feature at London's Odeon Leicester Square in August 1986. The film on show was Aliens, the eagerly anticipated sequel to the 1979 sci-fi horror movie Alien. Fans of the first film had waited a long time to see what new horrors would be inflicted on Alien's heroine, Ellen Ripley, and her beloved cat. Some feared the cat might be the unfortunate host of writer and director James Cameron's new generation of stomach-bursting beasts. The young Canadian director was keeping the truth close to his chest, though.
Despite the secrecy, moviegoers and critics were optimistic that they would get something good from the man who had thrilled them with The Terminator. As one of them, I went to the Odeon Leicester Square to see Aliens one week after it went on general release in the UK (I'd wanted to go on opening day, but I slept though my alarm and missed the train). Yet, contrary to my expectations, I left the theater feeling slightly disappointed. It was only when I saw the film on VHS for the first time that I began to appreciate its excellence. Since then I have come to believe that Aliens may be the best science fiction action movie and the best sequel ever made.
Thanks to the franchise is spawned, Ridley Scott's Alien is now seen as a critical and commercial success. In the early 1980s, however, sequels to adult-oriented horror movies were not guaranteed. Consequently Alien II (as Aliens was initially and unimaginatively known) took a while to gestate. Part of the blame for that could rest with the producers of Alien. The story goes that Cameron initially met with two of them, Walter Hill and David Giler, to discuss another project that they had in mind. That project didn't interest him, but his ears pricked up when they mentioned a sequel to Alien. Cameron 's accounts of those meetings suggest, however, that they weren't enthusiastic about revisiting Ripley's nemesis.
"I felt like he was digging out an old bone in the backyard, dragging out something no one had been thinking much about," Cameron said in a 1986 issue of Time Magazine.
Thankfully, Cameron was a fan of Ridley Scott's film and was inspired by Hill and Giler to develop a treatment for Alien II. According to EOFFtv, he already had a concept for another project involving "predatory aliens tangling with highly armed space marines" that he had titled "Mother". Hill and Giler were supposedly also thinking of having soldiers in the sequel, so it seems likely that the two ideas fed Cameron's imagination.
Enlisting Cameron to develop Alien II was initially a bit of a gamble. He was relatively unknown in Hollywood when he first met Hill and Giler. He had directed Piranha II: The Spawning, a silly 1981 sequel to Joe Dante's Piranha, but had no major work for a big studio to his name. Between first meeting Hill and Giler and the start of production on Aliens, though, he scored big with The Terminator and his screenplay for Rambo: First Blood Part II (although he has said that the final script for the latter differed significantly from his own). These successes gave him the credibility he needed to take the best elements of Alien and use them as the basis for a story that referenced the original but (in the modern parlance) partially rebooted it.
With the benefit of hindsight, Cameron actually looks like the perfect fit for Aliens. The terrifying creature introduced in Alien was similar in its single minded determination and ferocity to Arnie's Terminator or the relentless war veteran John Rambo. Cameron also wanted to make a different kind of film from the one Ridley Scott had helmed. The scenes of future warfare in The Terminator introduced the conservative directing style and dour military-industrial design sensibilities that Cameron would carry over into Aliens. At that time he also reveled in action. This mixture of qualities meant that Aliens would have a different vibe from the slow pace and artistic imagery that characterized Alien. The result was a stylistic and thematic distance between Alien and Aliens that ensured the sequel was no inferior retread of the original.
Bearing in mind Cameron's different visual style, it was an inspired move on his part to set Aliens 57 years after its predecessor. It implicitly justified the different look of his film and meant he wasn't bound by expectations about the level of technology that humans had reached in Alien. For example, in Scott's film the crew of the Nostromo had to wear space suits when they landed on the moon where the alien was found. This led to one of that film's most memorable scenes (when Kane's mask is removed to reveal the face-hugger). However, it also slowed down the action because the suits were an encumbrance to the wearers. Cameron avoided this problem by populating LV-426 with terraformers. The result of their work was breathable air, which negated the need for suits. The changed climate also allowed for rain, which gave the outdoor scenes in Aliens a claustrophobic and chilling atmosphere that complemented other sources of tension. Meanwhile, the terraformers — men, women and children, alike — gave the aliens the means by which to multiply.
While the success of Aliens owes much to Cameron's directorial vision, the contribution of Sigourney Weaver cannot be underestimated. The script allowed Weaver to expand on the minimal characterization Ripley was afforded in Alien and bring the character through a process of maturation. Whereas Ripley quivered with fear at the end of Alien, she had grown into a strong, courageous, uncompromising heroine by the climax of Aliens. Along the way she was also able to show a caring, compassionate side that made her a fully-rounded personality to which the audience could relate. Weaver's performance earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in 1987.
One of Cameron's biggest difficulties in the script was finding a convincing reason why Ripley should agree to another face off with a creature that had terrorized her once already. He eventually settled on something suggesting catharsis and conscience; Ripley returned to LV-426 to destroy the aliens and help an investigation into the disappearance of the terraformers. She was also supposed to be under the protection of highly trained space Marines. The Marine's cocksure did not save her from another round of trauma, however. Instead they got the royal ass-whooping that provided the film with much of its action. This element of the plot also echoed Cameron's earlier works in that it was a vague reference to the United States' military adventures in south-east Asia. In an interview on the film's DVD release Cameron admits that Aliens was, in a minor way, meant to be a Vietnam movie in outer space.
To populate Ripley's military support, Cameron called on some past acquaintances. The character of sensible Marine Corporal Hicks was given to Michael Biehn, who had played someone similar (Kyle Reese), in The Terminator (Biehn would work again with Cameron on The Abyss). Cameron also drafted in another Terminator alumnus, Bill Paxton, to play a cocky and foul-mouthed Marine called Hudson. Paxton had played a minor role in The Terminator as one of the bikers accosted by a naked Arnold Schwarzenegger early in the film (and would work again with Cameron on Titanic). Rounding out the better known members of the cast were Lance Henriksen (Piranha II) as the android Bishop and comedian and writer Paul Reiser (Mad About You) as slimy company man Carter Burke. Canadian viewers may also recognize a young Daniel Kash (Due South, The Line) as the ill-fated Private Spunkmeyer.
Aside from Ripley and the Marines, the other principal character in Aliens was the little girl known as Newt. She was played by Carrie Henn and that role was to be Henn's first and only part. She left acting thereafter and went on to earn a degree in liberal studies and child development from California State University.
While Cameron may have got much of what he wanted with Aliens, the studio left its mark before the film's release. The theatrical cut was substantially shortened, resulting in the removal of some important character scenes and a sequence showing how the colonists initially become infected. In terms of the coherence of the plot, Aliens fared better from such editing than did Cameron's next film, The Abyss. Nonetheless, the restoration of missing scenes for the DVD release, amounting to an extra 17 minutes, was a welcome event.
The writers and directors of the sci-fi blockbusters Hollywood puts out today could take several lessons from Aliens. It proved that action films needn't be preposterous and over-the-top; that a successful sequel can be stylistically and thematically different from the original; and that suspense is a better buttress for action scenes than big explosions.
That said, Aliens is not without its faults. It starts slowly (especially the extended version) and the finale is both contrived and too similar to that in Alien. It also suffers from a false climax that is more stirring than the real one. Nonetheless, over 20 years after it was made, it remains one of the best action films to come out of Hollywood. It is a rollercoaster ride, comprising one memorable sequence after another, backed up by James Horner's fabulous score. Furthermore, the build-up to that aforementioned false climax is fantastic. The introduction of the now iconic alien queen was a masterstroke and the scenes in the nest were more macabre than any amount of gore.
Almost 23 years after my trip to the Odeon, I am intrigued to read that Ridley Scott will direct a prequel to Alien. It is a fascinating prospect. To pull it off, though, Scott faces an unusual challenge. His new film must not only match the quality of his own original work, it must also be a prequel that is as good as the sequel. James Cameron raised the bar with Aliens and no subsequent film in the franchise has reached it. I hope Scott succeeds and that the release of his film can be celebrated by viewing the hi-def remastering of Aliens that is overdue. Both would be fitting tributes to one of filmland's finest monster movies and what must surely be the best sequel ever made.
Link
"For my money, the film is still as intense as ever - it still rocks over 20 years later as non-stop pure adrenaline sci-fi action!"
9.04.2009
Hanging 10 with the Beach Boys' Mike Love
By Sean Daly
Back in the late '60s, when the rock 'n' roll template was chiseled in stone, the Beatles and the Beach Boys battled in brilliance. Blue-collar Liverpudlians and SoCal surfers, Lennon-McCartney against Brian Wilson, Pepper's versus Pet Sounds.
Who won? We did.
Four decades later, the Beatles continue to be deified; on Wednesday, they will be celebrated with an assortment of new box sets, video games and more. But despite their genius bloodlines and phenomenal songbook, the Beach Boys now reek of mothball nostalgia. Saturday, they'll play a free postgame show at Tropicana Field — a band with more sad, spare parts than '61-vintage ones.
So it was with a wrinkle of the nose and only middling curiosity that I sat in on a conference call with the controversial Mike Love, the sole founding member still touring under the Beach Boys shingle. (Bruce Johnston will be there, too, but he joined in '65 for California Girls.)
Although Love is not the reason the famously troubled Brian Wilson split the band — and Love's fractiousness certainly didn't cause the sad deaths of Carl and Dennis Wilson — he is nevertheless berated as arrogant and litigious, a loud, proud divider with a history of lawsuits against his musical family. (His most recent legal action against Brian was filed in 2005.) In '88, Love famously scored a dubious double-whammy: He insulted the Beatles and the Stones during the band's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Worse, he co-wrote Kokomo, the video that featured Full House dope John Stamos, now an occasional member of a once-indomitable band.
Love is synonymous with the Beach Boys' fall from relevance. But a funny thing happened on that conference call: I found the 68-year-old Love to be surprisingly interesting — or at least a little weird. Plus let's be honest: Love helped write Surfin' Safari, Fun Fun Fun and Good Vibrations, and his deep R&B voice lent great grooving counterpoint to Wilson's high hang-ten croon.
So I shouted out the first question, unafraid of being impolitic: Hey Mike, in 2011 the Beach Boys will celebrate their 50th anniversary. Any chance you, Brian and Al (Jardine, another founding member who left in 1998) will patch things up and reunite?
"There's a lot of thought going on in that direction," Love answered in a soft, methodical voice, both vaguely creepy and politely engaged. "There have been issues in the past...but for something that auspicious, yes, there's a lot of activity."
"Issues in the past"? Yeah, the Beach Boys had issues like Salem's Lot had vampires. Another reporter then asked who was in the band these days. Love responded: "As you may or may not know, my cousin Brian stopped touring with the Beach Boys in 1964..." Love said "my cousin Brian" as if he were casually wiping schmutz off his lapel.
For all his curious chatter — "I do transcendental meditation I learned from the Maharishi in September of 1967" — there was also just-plain-cool stuff. The Beach Boys "started out with a pure love of making harmonies," he said, inspired by doo-wop, the Everly Brothers, the Four Freshmen. "We wrote songs about surfing and cars and high-school life, and that subject matter was unique. It was the kind of stuff kids of all ages can relate to."
Love spoke of the late Ted Kennedy: "Because of our experience in the Beach Boys, we met quite a few of the family members. I was at Ted Kennedy's house one time. I took a shower there." That led to a story about Love and "cousin Brian" writing the devastatingly beautiful Warmth of the Sun on the evening of Nov. 22, 1963: "One of the most beautiful songs we've ever done. It's about losing someone who doesn't love you back — and that's a bummer."
I managed to sneak in another question, asking about that Beatles-Beach Boys rivalry: "The Beatles are unrivaled globally," he said. "But the Beach Boys have always been heralded as original. Paul McCartney has said that God Only Knows is the perfect song, and that Pet Sounds is required listening for his kids. It was a mutual admiration society more than a competition."
That creaky-jointed nostalgia was suddenly youthful, vital. But then Mike Love tried to instill confidence in the modern Beach Boys, his Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations was the most unique and most popular of our songs — eclipsed only by Kokomo. That's been our best-selling song."
Ugh. God only knows what Brian Wilson would think.
Link
Back in the late '60s, when the rock 'n' roll template was chiseled in stone, the Beatles and the Beach Boys battled in brilliance. Blue-collar Liverpudlians and SoCal surfers, Lennon-McCartney against Brian Wilson, Pepper's versus Pet Sounds.
Who won? We did.
Four decades later, the Beatles continue to be deified; on Wednesday, they will be celebrated with an assortment of new box sets, video games and more. But despite their genius bloodlines and phenomenal songbook, the Beach Boys now reek of mothball nostalgia. Saturday, they'll play a free postgame show at Tropicana Field — a band with more sad, spare parts than '61-vintage ones.
So it was with a wrinkle of the nose and only middling curiosity that I sat in on a conference call with the controversial Mike Love, the sole founding member still touring under the Beach Boys shingle. (Bruce Johnston will be there, too, but he joined in '65 for California Girls.)
Although Love is not the reason the famously troubled Brian Wilson split the band — and Love's fractiousness certainly didn't cause the sad deaths of Carl and Dennis Wilson — he is nevertheless berated as arrogant and litigious, a loud, proud divider with a history of lawsuits against his musical family. (His most recent legal action against Brian was filed in 2005.) In '88, Love famously scored a dubious double-whammy: He insulted the Beatles and the Stones during the band's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Worse, he co-wrote Kokomo, the video that featured Full House dope John Stamos, now an occasional member of a once-indomitable band.
Love is synonymous with the Beach Boys' fall from relevance. But a funny thing happened on that conference call: I found the 68-year-old Love to be surprisingly interesting — or at least a little weird. Plus let's be honest: Love helped write Surfin' Safari, Fun Fun Fun and Good Vibrations, and his deep R&B voice lent great grooving counterpoint to Wilson's high hang-ten croon.
So I shouted out the first question, unafraid of being impolitic: Hey Mike, in 2011 the Beach Boys will celebrate their 50th anniversary. Any chance you, Brian and Al (Jardine, another founding member who left in 1998) will patch things up and reunite?
"There's a lot of thought going on in that direction," Love answered in a soft, methodical voice, both vaguely creepy and politely engaged. "There have been issues in the past...but for something that auspicious, yes, there's a lot of activity."
"Issues in the past"? Yeah, the Beach Boys had issues like Salem's Lot had vampires. Another reporter then asked who was in the band these days. Love responded: "As you may or may not know, my cousin Brian stopped touring with the Beach Boys in 1964..." Love said "my cousin Brian" as if he were casually wiping schmutz off his lapel.
For all his curious chatter — "I do transcendental meditation I learned from the Maharishi in September of 1967" — there was also just-plain-cool stuff. The Beach Boys "started out with a pure love of making harmonies," he said, inspired by doo-wop, the Everly Brothers, the Four Freshmen. "We wrote songs about surfing and cars and high-school life, and that subject matter was unique. It was the kind of stuff kids of all ages can relate to."
Love spoke of the late Ted Kennedy: "Because of our experience in the Beach Boys, we met quite a few of the family members. I was at Ted Kennedy's house one time. I took a shower there." That led to a story about Love and "cousin Brian" writing the devastatingly beautiful Warmth of the Sun on the evening of Nov. 22, 1963: "One of the most beautiful songs we've ever done. It's about losing someone who doesn't love you back — and that's a bummer."
I managed to sneak in another question, asking about that Beatles-Beach Boys rivalry: "The Beatles are unrivaled globally," he said. "But the Beach Boys have always been heralded as original. Paul McCartney has said that God Only Knows is the perfect song, and that Pet Sounds is required listening for his kids. It was a mutual admiration society more than a competition."
That creaky-jointed nostalgia was suddenly youthful, vital. But then Mike Love tried to instill confidence in the modern Beach Boys, his Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations was the most unique and most popular of our songs — eclipsed only by Kokomo. That's been our best-selling song."
Ugh. God only knows what Brian Wilson would think.
Link
Beach Boys celebrate the 'Sounds of Summer'
By Scott Meeker
Mike Love remembers looking at the lyrics for the then-newly written song “Kokomo” and being disturbed by them.
Off the Florida Keys
There’s a place called Kokomo
That's where we used to go to get away from it all
“I thought, ‘Oh no. This sounds like some old guy lamenting his youth,” said Love, the lead singer of the Beach Boys. “My thought has always been to try to think about how (a song) is going to communicate what we want it to communicate to the widest possible group of people.”
At his insistence, writer John Phillips changed the line to “That’s where you wanna go.” The song would go on to be one of the band’s biggest hits.
Songs celebrating youth, young love, fast cars and good times are at the root of many of the Beach Boys’ greatest hits which the audience can expect to hear when the band perform Sunday at Downstream Casino.
Love said that the music has come to embody the title of his favorite release by the band, the 2003 greatest-hits package “Sounds of Summer.”
“We actually haven’t had a summer off in about 40 years, but that’s OK,” said Love. “Musicians love performing. And if you don’t, you better get out while the getting is good.”
That’s what Brian Wilson — the band’s founder and chief songwriter — did in 1964, being replaced on tour first by Glenn Campbell and then Bruce Johnston. Johnston still performs with the band today.
But it’s not a dig at his cousin, because Love credits Wilson as being “incredible” when it comes to music arrangement and a “master of harmonies.”
Love said that he can’t help but be amazed sometimes at how so much of Wilson’s music has found an audience with each successive generation.
“Three years ago, my daughter who was 13 years old at the time said that ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’ was her class’ favorite song.
“That song, the lyrics appeal to a young generation of kids who are in love. We may look at it nostalgically, but every successive generation has that boy-girl attraction.”
After Brian stepped back from touring and a combination of drugs and mental illness took their toll on his songwriting, the band struggled to find their footing and their place in the music world. Their constant touring helped the band find popularity as a live act, and the nostalgia inspired by their greatest hits helped secure them the title of “America’s band.”
Drummer Dennis Wilson died in 1983, and Carl Wilson succumbed to cancer in 1988. Brian Wilson eventually severed his ties with the band, as did original vocalist and guitarist Al Jardine. Lawsuits among the surviving members are not uncommon.
In reading what has been written about the band over the years, Love is not always portrayed in the most flattering light. There are plenty of allegations of condescension toward the direction Brian’s music was taking and a domineering nature when it came to how the band was run.
But Love said that those accounts aren’t accurate and that he feels he has been unfairly portrayed.
“A lot of that is just hearsay by people who weren’t even there,” Love said. “Some writers get all caught up in that and lose sight of the music.”
Much of the rumored acrimony, he said, came from a tumultuous time during the band’s history, when they fired Murry Wilson — the Wilson brothers’ father — as their manager.
“And then there was a time in the late ‘60s when the Wilson brothers got into drugs, and Al and I got into meditation,” he said. “There was definitely a division there, which led to some people making comments.
“But that’s pretty much in the past, and my personal relationship with Brian is great.”
Still, the surviving members of the band continue to tour separately — Love and Johnston as the Beach Boys, while Wilson and Jardine perform with their respective bands.
But Love said that fans of the band can take heart: with a milestone in the Beach Boys’ history approaching, there is a strong possibility of a reunion of some sort to come about.
“We’re looking at doing a 50th anniversary celebration in 2011, and that would entail seeing what we could get together and do recordingwise,” he said. “And the PBS show ‘American Masters’ is interested in doing a documentary about the band. There are a lot of interesting possibilities likely to manifest in the near term.”
Reunion or no reunion, though, Love said he believes that the Beach Boys’ legacy in the world of American music is already secure.
“I think the band’s legacy is already being realized to a pretty good degree,” he said. “Our music has been part of the soundtrack of America, and I think it will always be a super positive legacy because of the good feelings it has made people enjoy over the years.”
Link
Mike Love remembers looking at the lyrics for the then-newly written song “Kokomo” and being disturbed by them.
Off the Florida Keys
There’s a place called Kokomo
That's where we used to go to get away from it all
“I thought, ‘Oh no. This sounds like some old guy lamenting his youth,” said Love, the lead singer of the Beach Boys. “My thought has always been to try to think about how (a song) is going to communicate what we want it to communicate to the widest possible group of people.”
At his insistence, writer John Phillips changed the line to “That’s where you wanna go.” The song would go on to be one of the band’s biggest hits.
Songs celebrating youth, young love, fast cars and good times are at the root of many of the Beach Boys’ greatest hits which the audience can expect to hear when the band perform Sunday at Downstream Casino.
Love said that the music has come to embody the title of his favorite release by the band, the 2003 greatest-hits package “Sounds of Summer.”
“We actually haven’t had a summer off in about 40 years, but that’s OK,” said Love. “Musicians love performing. And if you don’t, you better get out while the getting is good.”
That’s what Brian Wilson — the band’s founder and chief songwriter — did in 1964, being replaced on tour first by Glenn Campbell and then Bruce Johnston. Johnston still performs with the band today.
But it’s not a dig at his cousin, because Love credits Wilson as being “incredible” when it comes to music arrangement and a “master of harmonies.”
Love said that he can’t help but be amazed sometimes at how so much of Wilson’s music has found an audience with each successive generation.
“Three years ago, my daughter who was 13 years old at the time said that ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’ was her class’ favorite song.
“That song, the lyrics appeal to a young generation of kids who are in love. We may look at it nostalgically, but every successive generation has that boy-girl attraction.”
After Brian stepped back from touring and a combination of drugs and mental illness took their toll on his songwriting, the band struggled to find their footing and their place in the music world. Their constant touring helped the band find popularity as a live act, and the nostalgia inspired by their greatest hits helped secure them the title of “America’s band.”
Drummer Dennis Wilson died in 1983, and Carl Wilson succumbed to cancer in 1988. Brian Wilson eventually severed his ties with the band, as did original vocalist and guitarist Al Jardine. Lawsuits among the surviving members are not uncommon.
In reading what has been written about the band over the years, Love is not always portrayed in the most flattering light. There are plenty of allegations of condescension toward the direction Brian’s music was taking and a domineering nature when it came to how the band was run.
But Love said that those accounts aren’t accurate and that he feels he has been unfairly portrayed.
“A lot of that is just hearsay by people who weren’t even there,” Love said. “Some writers get all caught up in that and lose sight of the music.”
Much of the rumored acrimony, he said, came from a tumultuous time during the band’s history, when they fired Murry Wilson — the Wilson brothers’ father — as their manager.
“And then there was a time in the late ‘60s when the Wilson brothers got into drugs, and Al and I got into meditation,” he said. “There was definitely a division there, which led to some people making comments.
“But that’s pretty much in the past, and my personal relationship with Brian is great.”
Still, the surviving members of the band continue to tour separately — Love and Johnston as the Beach Boys, while Wilson and Jardine perform with their respective bands.
But Love said that fans of the band can take heart: with a milestone in the Beach Boys’ history approaching, there is a strong possibility of a reunion of some sort to come about.
“We’re looking at doing a 50th anniversary celebration in 2011, and that would entail seeing what we could get together and do recordingwise,” he said. “And the PBS show ‘American Masters’ is interested in doing a documentary about the band. There are a lot of interesting possibilities likely to manifest in the near term.”
Reunion or no reunion, though, Love said he believes that the Beach Boys’ legacy in the world of American music is already secure.
“I think the band’s legacy is already being realized to a pretty good degree,” he said. “Our music has been part of the soundtrack of America, and I think it will always be a super positive legacy because of the good feelings it has made people enjoy over the years.”
Link
Beach Boys' Mike Love recharges at The Raj
By SOPHIA AHMAD
With its tight falsetto harmonies and sunny lyrics, the Beach Boys' sound is immediately recognizable to both young fans - who consider it a retro band - and to older fans who grew up on hits such as "California Girls" and "Surfin' USA."
The legendary ensemble that has been entertaining audiences since 1961 will perform Monday in Fairfield - a quick return trip to Iowa after a recent show Aug. 14 at Meskwaki Bingo-Casino-Hotel in Tama. But Monday's outdoor concert on Labor Day at a middle school in Fairfield also will deliver a different "vibration" for singer Mike Love.
"My main place for rest and relaxation and recharging has been the Raj and meditating in the domes," Love said last month during a stopover in Fairfield. The Raj is a Fairfield spa that integrates holistic practices into its treatments.
And Love routinely practices transcendental meditation (T.M.) inside the domes of Maharishi University of Management, founded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Love, one of the remaining 1960s members of the Beach Boys, will be named Energy Czar for the day by Fairfield Mayor Ed Malloy. He will also help unveil the city's 40-point Green Sustainability Plan, funded by an $80,000 grant from Iowa's Office of Energy Independence. The plan calls for energy conservation and support of local farms, among other initiatives.
"Energy independence is something that is close to my children and grandchildren and their children's heart," Love said.
Proceeds from Monday's concert also will benefit the David Lynch Foundation, which supports T.M. education, and the Fairfield Arts and Convention Center.
Love is a longtime fan of the eastern Iowa city.
"I've been going to Fairfield for a few decades," he said. "One time I came here for three weeks and did treatments every day, and that was fantastic. I never felt better."
Transcendental meditation is so important to Love that he wrote a song about its founder: "Cool Head, Warm Heart."
"Maharishi said once in a meeting, 'You need a cool head and a warm heart,' so I made a little sound out of it," Love said about his inspiration for the song.
Love, who performs nearly 150 concerts per year, said he has a special connection to Iowa and its "small-town environment." He recalled a recent memory of the "little gem in the heartland" when he landed at a Tuscon airport.
"This woman that drove me from the airport said she heard us at the Dance-land Ballroom in Cedar Rapids ... Now how ironic is that?"
Link
Al Jardine Emerges From Beach Boys' Shadow
By Winchester
I was a late-to-the-party Beach Boys fan. Sure, I loved all the classics, but when Brian Wilson dropped out, I somehow became more and more interested in that ensuing train wreck, than the group.
When Dennis Wilson released his amazing solo album Pacific Ocean Blue, I became quite enthralled; it quickly became the quintessential solo album. To me, it was right up there with McCartney’s first solo work.
When CBS re-released it late last year, I went on and on about it. It sounded better than ever. CBS even released it with his second solo album, delayed for years after Dennis untimely passing. It too, was fabulous.
When Tom Cuddy called with an invitation to joined him for a show by former Beach Boy Al Jardine at B.B. King, I was there in a flash.
Jardine, to me, never really stood out as a singular artist; he was always there with the Wilson Boys, Brian, Dennis and Carl. Now, seeing him front his own act, Al Jardine’s Endless Summer was one of the best shows I’ve seen this year.
His sons, Matt and Adam now handle the Brian-like vocals and boy, they are impressive. Also joining them was David Marks who was, one of the original Beach Boys, according to Cuddy, even replacing Jardine for a time. Boy, imagine having to live with that!
But tonight he was back and certainly impressive. Richie Cannata, late of the Billy Joel’s band was on horns, percussion and keyboards and was simply dazzling, adding a nice extra-texture to everything. Jardine will release his first solo album, A Postcard From California on Sept. 7, and on it he has guest spots from Brian, Neil Young, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Glen Campbell, Flea and Steve Miller.
The three tracks he did this night were terrific, reminiscent of The Beach Boys in many ways. He serve up their hits, including “I Get Around,” “Sail On Sailor,” and, “God Only Knows.”
Those songs proved one thing for sure: Brian Wilson is an amazing writer! Cuddy said, the irony of Jardine, is that his group sounds more like the Beach Boys than Mike Love’s current touring entourage.
If Jardine comes to your town, definitely check him out.
Link
9.01.2009
Earth as photographed in 1990 by the Voyager 1 from more than 4 billion miles away
"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there--on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."
Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, Random House, 1994
Disney to Acquire Marvel Entertainment
BURBANK, Calif. & NEW YORK, Aug 31, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE)
Acquisition highlights Disney's strategic focus on quality branded content, technological innovation and international expansion to build long-term shareholder value
--An investor conference call will take place at approximately 10:15 a.m. EDT / 7:15 a.m. PDT August 31, 2009. Details for the call are listed in the release.
Building on its strategy of delivering quality branded content to people around the world, The Walt Disney Company has agreed to acquire Marvel Entertainment, Inc. in a stock and cash transaction, the companies announced today.
Under the terms of the agreement and based on the closing price of Disney on August 28, 2009, Marvel shareholders would receive a total of $30 per share in cash plus approximately 0.745 Disney shares for each Marvel share they own. At closing, the amount of cash and stock will be adjusted if necessary so that the total value of the Disney stock issued as merger consideration based on its trading value at that time is not less than 40% of the total merger consideration.
Based on the closing price of Disney stock on Friday, August 28, the transaction value is $50 per Marvel share or approximately $4 billion.
"This transaction combines Marvel's strong global brand and world-renowned library of characters including Iron Man, Spider-Man, X-Men, Captain America, Fantastic Four and Thor with Disney's creative skills, unparalleled global portfolio of entertainment properties, and a business structure that maximizes the value of creative properties across multiple platforms and territories," said Robert A. Iger, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Walt Disney Company. "Ike Perlmutter and his team have done an impressive job of nurturing these properties and have created significant value. We are pleased to bring this talent and these great assets to Disney."
"We believe that adding Marvel to Disney's unique portfolio of brands provides significant opportunities for long-term growth and value creation," Iger said.
"Disney is the perfect home for Marvel's fantastic library of characters given its proven ability to expand content creation and licensing businesses," said Ike Perlmutter, Marvel's Chief Executive Officer. "This is an unparalleled opportunity for Marvel to build upon its vibrant brand and character properties by accessing Disney's tremendous global organization and infrastructure around the world."
Under the deal, Disney will acquire ownership of Marvel including its more than 5,000 Marvel characters. Mr. Perlmutter will oversee the Marvel properties, and will work directly with Disney's global lines of business to build and further integrate Marvel's properties.
The Boards of Directors of Disney and Marvel have each approved the transaction, which is subject to clearance under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act, certain non-United States merger control regulations, effectiveness of a registration statement with respect to Disney shares issued in the transaction and other customary closing conditions. The agreement will require the approval of Marvel shareholders. Marvel was advised on the transaction by BofA Merrill Lynch.
Link
8.25.2009
Apple's Animal Farm
Posted by Jon Fortt
I'm sorry, Microsoft. On behalf of Silicon Valley, I’m sorry.
We cursed you, mocked you, labeled you the Evil Empire. Your crime: trying to control the technology world. Sure, we had reason to be upset. During the dawning of the PC era, the Windows operating system made you the most powerful company in tech, and it went to your head.
Your detractors say you intimidated PC makers, crushed Netscape, and tried to turn the web into an extension of the Windows platform. As it turns out, local darling Apple (AAPL) probably would have done the same thing.
Just look at how Apple is behaving today with a fraction of the power you had.
Apple's iTunes has an estimated 87% market share in music downloads, a beachhead it is using to expand its influence in much the same way you used Windows to expand yours. What has Apple done with its dominance? It has refused to let other media players sync with iTunes. It has tried to strong-arm Hollywood into selling content on terms mostly favorable to Cupertino. It has tightly controlled the iPhone ecosystem, insisting that its own iTunes app store serve as the only way to broadly distribute software.
And now, in the Google Voice episode (more on that here), we see Apple blocking perfectly good software that competes with its ideas. When you tried this sort of thing, Microsoft, we called you a bully and went to the feds. Now that Apple’s doing it, we’re calling it … well, we’re not sure what to call it.
The most disturbing thing about the Google Voice (GOOG) dustup is Apple’s Orwellian claim that it didn’t reject the app. Apple did. Google submitted it and waited several weeks before Apple said it wouldn't be adding it to the app store. In the wake of the rejection, Google is working on a web-based version of the app that won't work as smoothly. Yes, Apple can always change its mind and accept the app, but that won't change the initial nixing. Note to Apple: Time Machine is an awesome feature in Mac OS X, but you can't use it to rewrite actual history.
So again, Microsoft (MSFT), I’m sorry we gave you such a hard time. Your sins weren’t unique after all. Yes, you pushed some people around. You trampled some ideas. Now, though, we can see the truth: We’ve been living the Silicon Valley version of Animal Farm all along. Like Napoleon the pig in the classic story, Apple promised us beautiful technology that would set us free to express and innovate.
Apple’s technology is gorgeous all right. But as Apple gets more power, a funny thing is happening on the farm. Innovation and expression on Apple’s iPhone platform are beginning to suffer, even as Apple insists that its restrictions are for our own good. And as we gaze out at the titans of the tech landscape, it’s getting difficult to tell which are the humans and which are the pigs.
Link
I'm sorry, Microsoft. On behalf of Silicon Valley, I’m sorry.
We cursed you, mocked you, labeled you the Evil Empire. Your crime: trying to control the technology world. Sure, we had reason to be upset. During the dawning of the PC era, the Windows operating system made you the most powerful company in tech, and it went to your head.
Your detractors say you intimidated PC makers, crushed Netscape, and tried to turn the web into an extension of the Windows platform. As it turns out, local darling Apple (AAPL) probably would have done the same thing.
Just look at how Apple is behaving today with a fraction of the power you had.
Apple's iTunes has an estimated 87% market share in music downloads, a beachhead it is using to expand its influence in much the same way you used Windows to expand yours. What has Apple done with its dominance? It has refused to let other media players sync with iTunes. It has tried to strong-arm Hollywood into selling content on terms mostly favorable to Cupertino. It has tightly controlled the iPhone ecosystem, insisting that its own iTunes app store serve as the only way to broadly distribute software.
And now, in the Google Voice episode (more on that here), we see Apple blocking perfectly good software that competes with its ideas. When you tried this sort of thing, Microsoft, we called you a bully and went to the feds. Now that Apple’s doing it, we’re calling it … well, we’re not sure what to call it.
The most disturbing thing about the Google Voice (GOOG) dustup is Apple’s Orwellian claim that it didn’t reject the app. Apple did. Google submitted it and waited several weeks before Apple said it wouldn't be adding it to the app store. In the wake of the rejection, Google is working on a web-based version of the app that won't work as smoothly. Yes, Apple can always change its mind and accept the app, but that won't change the initial nixing. Note to Apple: Time Machine is an awesome feature in Mac OS X, but you can't use it to rewrite actual history.
So again, Microsoft (MSFT), I’m sorry we gave you such a hard time. Your sins weren’t unique after all. Yes, you pushed some people around. You trampled some ideas. Now, though, we can see the truth: We’ve been living the Silicon Valley version of Animal Farm all along. Like Napoleon the pig in the classic story, Apple promised us beautiful technology that would set us free to express and innovate.
Apple’s technology is gorgeous all right. But as Apple gets more power, a funny thing is happening on the farm. Innovation and expression on Apple’s iPhone platform are beginning to suffer, even as Apple insists that its restrictions are for our own good. And as we gaze out at the titans of the tech landscape, it’s getting difficult to tell which are the humans and which are the pigs.
Link
Canadian scientist aims to turn chickens into dinosaurs
After years spent hunting for the buried remains of prehistoric animals, a Canadian paleontologist now plans to manipulate chicken embryos to show he can create a dinosaur.
Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.
Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.
Though still in its infancy, the research could eventually lead to hatching live prehistoric animals, but Larsson said there are no plans for that now, for ethical and practical reasons -- a dinosaur hatchery is "too large an enterprise."
"It's a demonstration of evolution," said Larsson, who has studied bird evolution for the last 10 years.
"If I can demonstrate clearly that the potential for dinosaur anatomical development exists in birds, then it again proves that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs."
The research is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canada Research Chairs program and National Geographic.
The idea for the project, Larsson said, came about during discussions with renowned American paleontologist Jack Horner, who served as technical advisor for the Jurassic Park films.
Horner recently wrote a book entitled "How to Build A Dinosaur," in which he refers to the embryo experiment as part of a quest to create a "chickenosaurus."
Larsson's team has previously worked to uncover prehistoric animal remains, including eight unknown species of dinosaurs and five new types of crocodile in Niger. He also recently uncovered the remains of a new carnivorous dinosaur in Argentina.
Link
"Here's something different - KFC might soon eat YOU!"
Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.
Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.
Though still in its infancy, the research could eventually lead to hatching live prehistoric animals, but Larsson said there are no plans for that now, for ethical and practical reasons -- a dinosaur hatchery is "too large an enterprise."
"It's a demonstration of evolution," said Larsson, who has studied bird evolution for the last 10 years.
"If I can demonstrate clearly that the potential for dinosaur anatomical development exists in birds, then it again proves that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs."
The research is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canada Research Chairs program and National Geographic.
The idea for the project, Larsson said, came about during discussions with renowned American paleontologist Jack Horner, who served as technical advisor for the Jurassic Park films.
Horner recently wrote a book entitled "How to Build A Dinosaur," in which he refers to the embryo experiment as part of a quest to create a "chickenosaurus."
Larsson's team has previously worked to uncover prehistoric animal remains, including eight unknown species of dinosaurs and five new types of crocodile in Niger. He also recently uncovered the remains of a new carnivorous dinosaur in Argentina.
Link
"Here's something different - KFC might soon eat YOU!"
Visual Effects: 100 Years of Inspiration
"Amazing - can't wait to see what the next 100 years will bring."
Man executed in Texas for murder now proved innocent
Cameron Todd Willingham case: Expert says fire for which father was executed was not arson
By Steve Mills
In a withering critique, a nationally known fire scientist has told a state commission on forensics that Texas fire investigators had no basis to rule a deadly house fire was an arson -- a finding that led to the murder conviction and execution of Cameron Todd Willingham.
The finding comes in the first state-sanctioned review of an execution in Texas, home to the country's busiest death chamber. If the commission reaches the same conclusion, it could lead to the first-ever declaration by an official state body that an inmate was wrongly executed.
Indeed, the report concludes there was no evidence to determine that the December 1991 fire was even set, and it leaves open the possibility the blaze that killed three children was an accident and there was no crime at all -- the same findings found in a Chicago Tribune investigation of the case published in December 2004.
Willingham, the father of those children, was executed in February 2004. He protested his innocence to the end.
The Tribune obtained a copy of the review by Craig Beyler, of Hughes Associates Inc., which was conducted for the Texas Forensic Science Commission, created to investigate allegations of forensic error and misconduct. The re-examination of the Willingham case comes as many forensic disciplines face scrutiny for playing a role in wrongful convictions that have been exposed by DNA and other scientific advances.
Among Beyler's key findings: that investigators failed to examine all of the electrical outlets and appliances in the Willinghams' house in the small Texas town of Corsicana, did not consider other potential causes for the fire, came to conclusions that contradicted witnesses at the scene, and wrongly concluded Willingham's injuries could not have been caused as he said they were.
The state fire marshal on the case, Beyler concluded in his report, had "limited understanding" of fire science. The fire marshal "seems to be wholly without any realistic understanding of fires and how fire injuries are created," he wrote.
The marshal's findings, he added, "are nothing more than a collection of personal beliefs that have nothing to do with science-based fire investigation."
Over the past five years, the Willingham case has been reviewed by nine of the nation's top fire scientists -- first for the Tribune, then for the Innocence Project, and now for the commission. All concluded that the original investigators relied on outdated theories and folklore to justify the determination of arson.
The only other evidence of significance against Willingham was another inmate who testified that Willingham had confessed to him. Jailhouse snitches are viewed with skepticism in the justice system, so much so that some jurisdictions have restrictions against their use.
Samuel Bassett, an attorney who is the chairman of the commission, said the panel will seek a response from the state fire marshal and then write its own report.
Contacted Monday, one of Willingham's cousins said she was pleased with the report but was skeptical that state officials would acknowledge Willingham's innocence.
"They are definitely going to have to respond to it," said Pat Cox. "But it's difficult for me to believe that the State of Texas or the governor will take responsibility and admit they did in fact wrongfully execute Todd. They'll dance around it."
Link
"The USA kills killers because killing is wrong. WTF?"
There Are More Slaves Today In 2009 Than at Any Time in Human History
By Terrence McNally
The world suffers global recession, enormous inequity, hunger, deforestation, pollution, climate change, nuclear weapons, terrorism, etc. To those who say we’re not really making progress, many might point to the fact that at least we’ve eliminated slavery.
But sadly that is not the truth.
One hundred forty-three years after passage of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and 60 years after Article 4 of the U.N.'s Universal Declaration of Human Rights banned slavery and the slave trade worldwide, there are more slaves than at any time in human history -- 27 million.
Today’s slavery focuses on big profits and cheap lives. It is not about owning people like before, but about using them as completely disposable tools for making money.
During the four years that Benjamin Skinner researched modern-day slavery, he posed as a buyer at illegal brothels on several continents, interviewed convicted human traffickers in a Romanian prison and endured giardia, malaria, dengue and a bad motorcycle accident.
But Skinner is most haunted by his experience in a brothel in Bucharest, Romania, where he was offered a young woman with Down syndrome in exchange for a used car.
Currently a fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and previously a special assistant to Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, Skinner has written for Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, Foreign Policy and others. He was named one of National Geographic’s Adventurers of the Year 2008. His first book, now in paperback, is A Crime So Monstrous: Face to Face with Modern-Day Slavery.
Terrence McNally: What first got you interested in slavery?
Benjamin Skinner: The fuel began before I was born. The abolitionism in my blood began at least as early as the 18th century, when my Quaker ancestors stood on soapboxes in Connecticut and railed against slavery. I had other relatives that weren’t Quaker, but had the same beliefs. My great-great-great-grandfather fought with the Connecticut artillery, believing that slavery was an abomination that could only be overturned through bloodshed.
Yet today, after the deaths of 360,000 Union soldiers, after over a dozen conventions and 300 international treaties, there are more slaves than at any point in human history.
TM: Is that raw numbers or as a percentage of the population?
BS: I want to be very clear what I mean when I say the word slavery. If you look it up in Webster's dictionary, the first definition is "drudgery or toil." It's become a metaphor for undue hardship, because we assume that once you legally abolish something, it no longer exists. But as a matter of reality for up to 27 million people in the world, slaves are those forced to work, held through fraud, under threat of violence, for no pay beyond subsistence. It's a very spare definition.
TM: Whose definition is that?
BS: Kevin Bales's. [His Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy was nominated for the 1999 Pulitzer Prize, and he is the president of Free the Slaves ] I'm glad you asked because he's not given enough credit. He originally came up with the number 27 million, and it's subsequently been buttressed by international labor organization studies. Governments will acknowledge estimates of some 12.3 million slaves in the world, but NGOs in those same countries say the numbers are more than twice as high.
Kevin did a lot of the academic work that underpinned my work. I wanted to go out and get beyond the numbers, to show what one person's slavery meant. In the process of doing that, I met hundreds of slaves and survivors.
TM: As an investigative reporter rather than an academic, you take us where the trades are made, the suffering takes place and the survivors eke out their existences.
BS: In an underground brothel in Bucharest, I was offered a young woman with the visible effect of Down syndrome. One of her arms was covered in slashes, where I can only assume she was trying to escape daily rape the only way she knew how. That young woman was offered to me in trade for a used car.
TM: This was a Romanian used car?
BS: Yes, and I knew that I could get that car for about 1,500 euros. While that may sound like a very low price for human life, consider that five hours from where I live in New York -- a three-hour flight down to Port au Prince, Haiti, and an hour from the airport -- I was able to negotiate for a 10-year-old girl for cleaning and cooking, permanent possession and sexual favors. What do you think the asking price was?
TM: I don't know ... $7,500?
BS: They asked for $100, and I talked them down to $50. Now to put that in context: Going back to the time when my abolitionist ancestors were on their soapbox, in 1850, you could buy a healthy grown male for the equivalent of about $40,000.
TM: When I first read such big numbers, I was shocked.
BS: This is not to diminish the horrors that those workers would face, nor to diminish their dehumanization one bit. It was an abomination then as it is today. But in the mid-19th century, masters viewed their slaves as an investment.
But here's the thing: When a slave costs $50 on the street in broad daylight in Port au Prince -- by the way, this was in a decent neighborhood, everybody knew where these men were and what they did -- such people are, to go back to Kevin's term, eminently disposable in the eyes of their masters.
TM: If my reading is correct, the biggest concentrations of the slave trade are in Southeast Asia and portions of Latin America?
BS: If you were to plot slaves on the map, you'd stick the biggest number of pins in India, followed by Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan. There are arguably more slaves In India than the rest of the world combined.
And yet, if you look at international efforts or American pressure, India is largely let off the hook because Indian federal officials claim, "We have no slaves. These are just poor people. And these exploitive labor practices," -- if you're lucky enough to get that term out of them -- "are a byproduct of poverty."
Let me be clear, the end of slavery cannot wait for the end of poverty. Slavery in India is primarily generational debt bondage, people whose grandparents took a debt.
TM: To go back to the definition: Forced to work against their will with no escape.
BS: Held through fraud under threat of violence for no pay beyond subsistence. These are people that cannot walk away.
I stumbled upon a fellow in a quarry in Northern India who'd been enslaved his entire life. He had assumed that slavery at birth. His grandfather had taken a debt of 62 cents, and three generations and three slave masters later, the principal had not been paid off one bit. The family was illiterate and innumerate. This fellow, who I call Gonoo -- he asked me to protect his identity -- was still forced to work, held through fraud under threat of violence for no pay beyond subsistence.
Since he was a child, he and his family and his children, along with the rest of the enslaved villagers, took huge rocks out of the earth. They pummeled those rocks into gravel for the subgrade of India's infrastructure, which is the gleaming pride of the Indian elites.
They further pulverized that gravel into silica sand for glass. There's only one way that you turn a profit off handmade sand, and that's through slavery.
TM: Another method you describe: Someone shows up in a poverty-stricken village saying they need workers for the mines hundreds of miles away.
BS: It's a massive problem in the north of Brazil. What's tricky about this, in many cases these workers want to work. But they don't want to be forced to work under threat of violence, beaten regularly, having the women in their lives raped as a means of humiliating them, and then not being paid anything.
TM: They are transported to the mines, and when they arrive, they have a debt for that transportation, which is greater than anything they will ever be able to repay.
BS: And if they try to leave, there are men with guns. That's slavery. In the Western Hemisphere, child slavery, as we spoke of before, is most rampant in Haiti. According to UNICEF, there are 300,000 child slaves in Haiti.
TM: Does that mean in Haiti or originating in Haiti?
BS: That means within Haitian borders.
TM: So with all the poverty in Haiti, there are still people who can afford 300,000 slaves?
BS: Well if they're paying $50 ...
I went back last summer with Dan Harris of ABC Nightline. He was pretty incredulous of my claim. In fact, it ended up taking him 10 hours from ABC's offices in Manhattan, but by the end of those 10 hours, he'd negotiated with not one, but three traffickers who'd offered him three separate girls.
As he put it, the remarkable thing is not that you can get a child for $50, but that you can get a child for free. When you go up into these villages, you see such desperation on the parts of the parents.
I want to make clear, I never paid for human life; I never would pay for human life. I talked to too many individuals who run trafficking shelters and help slaves become survivors. They implored me, "Do not pay for human life. You will be giving rise to a trade in human misery, and as a journalist, you'll be projecting to the world that this is the way that you own the problem." If you were to buy all 300,000 child slaves in Haiti, next year, you'd have 600,000.
TM: If you were to buy the 300,000 slaves in Haiti in one fell swoop, you would be telling traders, "Hey, business is good," and so they'd grab more slaves.
BS: You're talking about introducing hard currency into a transaction that in many cases hasn't involved hard currency in the past. You're massively incentivizing a trade in human lives.
TM: These are those who practice what they call redemptions, buying slaves their freedom. Who's doing it, and what's your analysis of it?
BS: On the basis of three months spent in southern and northern Sudan, two months in southern Sudan in particular. ... There was one particular evangelical group based in Switzerland, organized and run by an American who raised cash around the States. They'd go to a Sunday School or a second-grade class in Colorado, talk about slavery, and say, "Bring us your lunch money. If you can get us $50, we will buy a slave's freedom."
It was a very effective sales pitch. They managed to raise over $3 million dollars by my calculations over the course of the 1990s.
In theory, they were giving money to "retrievers" who would go into northern Sudan, and through whatever means necessary, secure the slaves' freedom and bring them back down into the south.
In the context of the Sudanese civil war, slavery is used as a weapon of war by the north. Northern militias raid southern villages, and in many cases, kill the men and take the women and children as slaves and as a weapon of genocide. That much is not questioned. There is no question that these slave raids were going on.
I found that redemption on the ground was enormously problematic. There was scant oversight. They were literally giving duffel bags full of cash to factions within the rebels that were at that point resisting an ongoing peace process.
What they risked doing, whether through recklessness or through intent, was to become essentially angels of destruction at a time when a negotiated peace was just beginning to take hold. Thankfully, at this point they've scaled back the redemptions.
TM: So they were collecting money in the States to free slaves, and then funding a rebel movement in a war, and ...
BS: Potentially prolonging the war.
Thankfully, in the end, the death of rebel leader John Gurang meant that a different faction came to be more powerful. From my perspective, however, what was going on there was largely fraudulent.
I went back and asked the rebel officials, "What do you do with this money?" and they said, "We use it for the benefit of the people." Which begs the question, "But I thought this was being used to buy back slaves. I don't get it."
And they said, "Well you know, there's clothes, uniforms ..." They didn't actually say arms, but they said all sorts of things that they needed hard currency for, and this was their way of getting the cash.
I don't blame the rebels. If I were in a similar situation, I'd probably do the same thing. The most important point is this: By the merest estimates there are still some 12,000 slaves held in brutal bondage in the north of Sudan, and the government has not arrested or prosecuted one slave raider, one slave trader, one slave master. And as long as that continues to be the situation, the government of Sudan is in gross violation of international law.
TM: How does the distinction between sexual slavery and other sorts of labor show up, and how does it matter?
BS: When we're defining slavery, fundamentally at its core it's the same in each and every circumstance. We're talking about people forced to work held through fraud, under threat of violence, for no pay beyond subsistence. If we're talking about forced commercial sexual slavery, forced prostitution, there's an added element of humiliation or shame, because we're talking about rape.
In many parts of the world and in many traditional societies, if a woman is raped it's her fault. If a woman is liberated and tries to go back to the village she comes from, she will never again lead a normal life.
I think it's safe to say even in the United States, which we assume is a much more welcoming, tolerant society, women who've been in prostitution, regardless if it's forced or not, have a difficult time leading a normal life afterward.
There is a school of thought that sexual slavery is somehow worse than other forms of slavery. I actually don't buy that. I think that all slavery is monstrous, and no one slave's emancipation should wait for that of another. At the same time, if some people are moved to fight sexual slavery and sexual trafficking at the exclusion of other forms of slavery, God bless them, as long as they're fighting slavery at the end of the day.
TM: Briefly, what is the situation in America?
BS: On average, in the past half-hour, one more person will have been trafficked to the United States into slavery. About 14,000-17,000 are trafficked into the U.S. each year and forced to work within U.S. borders under threat of violence for no pay beyond subsistence.
TM: What can people do?
BS: On a personal basis, they can support CAST (Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking) in Los Angeles. CAST has the oldest shelter in the country for trafficked women and has terrific programs that help victims of all forms of trafficking. It's a solid, mature organization.
They can also get involved with Free the Slaves. And they can talk about the issue more. Barack Obama is still setting his foreign policy agenda. He needs to hear from all of us that the true abolition of slavery needs to be a part of his legacy.
A quarter of Skinner's publishing royalties go to Free the Slaves.
Interviewer Terrence McNally hosts Free Forum on KPFK 90.7 FM in Los Angeles (streaming at kpfk.org). Visit terrencemcnally.net for podcasts of all interviews, and more.
8.24.2009
Shifting the Right of Way to the Left Leaves Some Samoans Feeling Wronged
Government Calls Traffic-Rule Switch 'Common Sense,' but It Sparks Road Rage
By PATRICK BARTA
APIA, Samoa -- Sometime in the early morning hours of Sept. 7, residents of this small Pacific island nation will stop their cars, take a deep breath, and do something most people would think is suicidal: Start driving on the other side of the road.
Samoa is about to become what's believed to be the first nation since the 1970s to order its drivers to switch from one side of the road to the other. That's spawned an islandwide case of road rage. Opponents have organized two of the biggest protests in Samoan history, and a new activist group -- People Against Switching Sides, or PASS -- has geared up to fight the plan.
The prime minister who hatched Samoa's scheme, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, refuses to do a U-turn. Road-switch opponents are just trying to rattle the government, he says. He has compared a prominent opponent of the switch to a local "avaava" fish -- a sea creature that swims in shallow waters and eats garbage, an insult in Samoan culture.
The main reason for Samoa's switch is that two of its biggest neighbors, Australia and New Zealand, drive on the left-hand side, whereas Samoa currently drives on the right, as in the U.S. By aligning with Australia and New Zealand, the prime minister says, it will be easier for poor Samoans to get cheap hand-me-down cars from the 170,000 or so Samoans who live in those two countries. It could also help more people escape tsunamis, says Mr. Tuilaepa.
It all "makes common sense," says Mr. Tuilaepa in an interview in his office overlooking the Pacific Ocean in the capital city of Apia. Mr. Tuilaepa, who sports a wave of fluffy whitening hair and wears flip-flops, has run the country for more than a decade.
Opponents and some outside experts fear the switch will turn many of Samoa's already-dangerous roads into disaster zones. Roads wind through mountainous jungle terrain with sharp turns, few traffic lights and pedestrians and dogs sharing the lanes. Critics say the switch will add further confusion with drivers likely to forget which side they're supposed to be on.
The move will also add costs -- like carving new doors into buses so passengers can get off on the opposite side of the road -- that critics say are unnecessary in a country heavily reliant on foreign aid.
For car owners, the switch is also expected to drive the value of their vehicles off a cliff, since about 14,000 of the country's 18,000 vehicles are designed to drive on the right. Although such cars will be allowed after the changeover, they are likely to become less desirable.
"To be really quite frank, we find [the change] ridiculous," says Sina Retzlaff-Lima, whose Apia Rentals rental-car company has 40 cars made for driving on the right side of the road.
Globally, about 70% of the world's population drives on the right-hand side of the road. But other parts of the world -- including many countries that were once British colonies -- remain committed to the left.
The root causes of the gap stem from preferences when countries developed their first road rules, says Peter Kincaid, an Australia-based author of "The Rule of the Road," which analyzes world traffic patterns.
Mr. Kincaid says American drivers of horse-drawn carriages tended to ride their horses, or walk alongside them, on the left-hand side of their vehicles so they could wield whips with their right hands. That made it necessary to lead carriages down the right side of the road so drivers could be nearer the center of the street.
A handful of countries have switched over the years, mainly to match up with neighbors that had different standards. Several former British colonies in Africa, including Nigeria, went from left to right in the decades after World War II. Sweden switched sides, from left to right, in 1967, while Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, did the same in 1970 for reasons that even today remain unclear.
Since the 1970s, says Mr. Kincaid, international road rules have remained largely the same -- until Samoa.
With only about 200,000 people and a handful of traffic lights in downtown Apia, Samoa is the western neighbor of American Samoa, an American territory. It is known for its close proximity to the international date line, which makes it possible for some visitors to arrive in Samoa the day before they left.
Samoa settled on right-hand traffic in the early 1900s, when it was under German control. But doubters long thought it made more sense to line up with Australia and New Zealand, and the prime minister agreed, unveiling his plan in 2007.
The idea caught on in some villages, where residents figured it would become easier to get old cars from relatives.
"In the beginning it will be hard, but we'll learn -- we're not stupid," says Leau Apisaloma, a 54-year-old village chief who collects entrance fees from visitors at a beach an hour from Apia.
In Apia, though, opponents are determined to fight the change. Having just taken delivery of an expensive Toyota Tundra from America in late 2006, local lawyer Toleafoa Solomona Toailoa shifted the resistance into high gear. With allies, he formed PASS and helped lead two protest marches, including one featuring a petition with more than 30,000 signatures.
The government refused to budge. Mr. Toleafoa launched his own political party, with plans to contest the next election in 2011. Supporters also took the plan to court, on the grounds that it breaches citizens' right to life by making Samoan roads too dangerous. The case is pending.
With the deadline approaching, the government is speeding ahead. It has added road humps to slow traffic and erected signs that, when unveiled Sept. 7, will remind drivers to stay left. In a TV address about the road change last week, the prime minister warned that "the only thing to fear is fear itself." He listed a series of other steps, including declaring Sept. 7 and 8 national holidays. The government has also set up a "training area" near a sports stadium where drivers can practice the fine art of driving on the left side of the road.
One recent Sunday morning, a bus was seen barreling down the right side of the road in the training area, the driver apparently oblivious to the fact that it was the wrong side. After nearly running head-on into a sport-utility vehicle, the bus driver swerved then returned to the wrong side of the road and chugged on.
Link
[They could always do like my grandfather told me.
"I only use half the road; right down the middle."]
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