- “Back to the Future” is the classic movie that cannot be killed. Maybe it’s the power of time travel, maybe it’s the likeability of Michael J. Fox, but the cult 1985 sci-fi movie still has relevance today. Faux hip-hopper Tinie Tempah proved it last year by spending $37,900 on a pair of Back To The Future-inspired sneakers at a charity auction in Los Angeles. Those kicks were one of just 1,500 pairs of the 2011 Nike Mag Sneakers manufactured, with the remainder auction off on eBay with the proceeds going to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Disease research. Broadway is proving it in the here and now by converting the movie into a musical and the film’s director, Robert Zemeckis, and screenwriter Bob Gale are both on board. The two men co-wrote the original screenplay and are reportedly working with composer Alan Silvestri on the new stage production. Turning the movie into a musical and recreating the same vibe on a Broadway stage will be difficult and not just because Dr. Emmett Brown’s brilliance in solving the riddle of time travel may not be possible to replicate. Fox played Marty McFly in a way that inextricably linked him to the character and finding an actor to fill the role and pull it off is a huge challenge. Having Zemeckis and Gale involved should help, but it may not be enough…………
- Google Earth has been a reason to brawl for a lot of people. When the Web search giant began sending out vehicles to map streets and put them online, some individuals decided it was go time and tried to drive the intruders from their midst. The online mapping project has caused other problems for Google as well and one of those issues arose not long ago when Google Earth started using images of the oceans to allow people to explore the depths and see the terrain under the sea. As with anything that goes up on the Internet, there are enough morons on the planet that it will be ruined, worn out or otherwise become odious. For Google Earth’s ocean mapping efforts, that downfall came from dorks who happened across what appeared to be a grid-like pattern on the sea floor. From there, these knobs put fictional two and nonexistent two together and began calling the grid the site of the fabled lost city of Atlantis. Google insisted the grid was actually caused by overlaying data sets from the sonar data used to map the ocean floor, but conspiracy theorists had already made up their mind. Now that Google has updated the application to remove the grid-like features from the ocean floor, those conspiracy theorists will undoubtedly claim the company is part of the cover-up and the shadowy cabal behind the effort got to it. Google’s ocean maps contained other errors as well, but those mistakes have reportedly been rectified and the program now has 15 percent of its sea floor images taken from sonar soundings at a resolution of 1 km, compared with 10 percent of the sea floor provided from sonar soundings with the bulk of the data provided by scientists using satellite exploration………
- Prepare to be stunned, world. A champion cyclist has been banned from the sport and stripped of a victory after being found guilty of doping. Spanish rider Alberto Contador became the latest to follow the battle-tested blueprint for cycling Saturday when a three-man Court of Arbitration for Sport panel upheld appeals by the International Cycling Union and World Anti-Doping Agency, which challenged a Spanish cycling tribunal's decision last year to exonerate Contador. The panel suspended the three-time Tour champion after rejecting his claim that his positive test for clenbuterol was caused by eating contaminated meat during the 2010 race. Contador argued that the tainted meat he consumed on a rest day led to his positive test and the tainted meat defense had worked in other cases over the past two years, so there was hope for him. However, the panel rejected the argument and only did Contador the small favor of backdating his ban, meaning he is eligible to return to competition on Aug. 6. "The presence of clenbuterol was more likely caused by the ingestion of a contaminated food supplement," CAS said in its ruling in Lausanne, Switzerland. With the suspension, Contador will miss the Giro d'Italia, the Tour de France and the London Olympics, but he would be eligible to ride in the Spanish Vuelta, which begins Aug. 18. The initial reaction to the decision is to say it tarnishes Contador’s resume as one of only five cyclists to win the three Grand Tours -- the Tour, the Giro and the Vuelta - and that might be true if cycling wasn’t the dirtiest sport of them all. It narrowly edges out track and field, but the next cycling champion who doesn’t test positive for some sort of illegal substance will be the biggest aberration in sports. With Contador’s victory ripped from him, Andy Schleck of Luxembourg, who finished second at the 2010 Tour, stands to be elevated to victory. The lesson, as always, is not to buy steak from a Basque producer and eat it during the biggest race of your life. That steak will probably be delicious, but it may also have elevated levels of clenbuterol. You’ll leave the table satiated, but some day your Tour de France title will be taken away and the results all races in which you compete for the next year will be invalidated………
- Grab that can of spray paint and get after it, kids. Graffiti is more profitable than ever, no matter what the naysayers tell you. You could even make $200 million for tagging the right wall or abandoned building - assuming you can get a rising social media genius with a website that will eventually become a massive financial success to notice your efforts. That formula worked well for street artist David Choe, who developed a connection with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg nearly a decade ago. On his blog, Choe even posted video of Zuckerberg helping spray-paint one of his murals. He began working with Zuckerberg’s company seven years ago and one of his finished pieces is on display at its Menlo Park campus. Facebook offered him cash or stocks for his work and he wisely chose the stock option. Factor in last week’s initial public offering (IPO) that took Facebook public and made Zuckerberg billions and Choe now stands to make $200 million when Facebook goes public. His work is well-known in the San Jose area and one of his murals adorns an outside wall of the Anno Domini gallery in San Jose. The gallery was the first to display his works and has continued to do so for the past decade. Brian Eder of Anno Domini gallery recalled the day when Choe first told him of his encounter with Zuckerberg. "He basically said he met this young 20-year-old who had started up this company called Facebook," Eder said. "He was asked to do a mural with him." From his humble origins, Choe has reached a point where he transcends street art and can sell his works for as much as $50,000. Of course, at this point he doesn’t need to sell anything ever again………
- Behold the power of protests. Romanians rose up against proposed new austerity measures and were able to compel Prime Minister Emil Boc to resign Monday with his government in a weak attempt to take the steam out of increasingly intense demonstrations. For more than three weeks, Romanians have marched, gathered and chanted against the measures and their efforts are paying off. Following Boc’s resignation, President Traian Basescu named the justice minister, Catalin Predoiu, a political independent, as interim premier. Predoiu will lead the government until parliamentary elections due to be held by the end of November, or until the angry masses drive her from office as well. Boc explained that he resigned “to release the tension in the country’s political situation, but also in order not to lose what Romanians have won.” Cryptic, odd…..but irrelevant. Implementing the austerity measures is part of a plan to bring the country back from the brink of financial collapse after public spending mushroomed out of control and the government was forced to seek a nearly $27 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund and the European Union in 2009. A brutal recession followed, accompanied by some of Europe’s toughest austerity measures. Even with those existing measures, Romania remains the EU’s second-poorest member five years after joining. Minor economic progress occurred last year, but the government continued to seek additional austerity measures. The IMF said in light of Monday’s resignations that Romania had made good progress on measures designed to maintain financial stability and boost growth, but added that further structural reforms were needed. “All IMF quantitative performance criteria for end-December were met,” the IMF said. “The authorities have made good progress in implementing program policies in a very difficult external environment.” Among the measures already in place were a 25-percent reduction in public sector wages and cutting benefits by 15 percent while hitting goods with a 5-percent increase in value-added tax. Citizens suffered those slaps in the face, but their anger exploded last month when new measures were proposed. Protests began in Bucharest and other cities, filled with cries of government cronyism and disregard for the welfare of its citizens. Opposition groups demanded early elections and with a brutal, record-settingly cold winter to exacerbate their misery, Romanians have continued to rage against Boc’s liberal democratic party ever since…………
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