Do you like Reggaeton music? Or Gospel? Or Beyonce? Chances are, you’re not the sharpest tool in the shed :) The “Music that makes you dumb” project shows that there is a clear relation between your musical taste and your intelligence. Or at least a relation to your chances to succeed in college, as defined by the average score in the SAT test, a standardized test for U.S. college admissions..
The x-axis represents the SAT score, while the colored boxes indicate either music genre or artist/composer. The chart maps the 133 most popular (out of 1,455) favorites from 1,352 different schools. This image shows the central piece of the chart. Click to enlarge.
Country beats Classical
Overall, fans of Lil Wayne’s music scored the lowest in SAT while the highest scorers were listeners of Read on…
As one of the authors of the book ‘The Age of Conversation 2’, when I talk about it the most asked question is: How do I, as a company, actually enter into a dialogue, a conversation? How do I know what people are saying about me or what they really think of my products?
Local data, but part of a worldwide trend: the Belgian Entertainment Association reports that in 2008, video games made 247 million euro, more money than either music or DVD sales.
Rapid growth
The growth of the share of games in the entertainment spend can be called spectacular. In 2006, games only had a share of 27% of all entertainment sales and the category was in 3rd place after music and DVD’s. In 2007 music sales were overtaken and in 2008 games had a share of Read on…
Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, is answering questions from readers on the New York Times website.
Of course, the most asked question, in one form or another, is: “How much longer can actual newspapers survive?”
I think Bill’s answer is interesting so here is his (only slightly edited) reply:
Ah, our existential question. Like everyone else who labors in the journalism business, or just loves it, I worry about our future, discuss it constantly with colleagues, and participate in some aspects of charting it. I’m an incurable optimist about the future of good journalism, and of The New York Times in particular. I’ve laid out my basic reasons for optimism on many occasions, and they still seem to hold water: Read on…
Proof for the point that internet video distribution through consoles is growing fast. Netflix, an American video rental service that started out renting out DVD’s through the post, is successfully crossing over into internet distribution by using the Xbox 360 game console to get movies on subscribers’ TV screens.
In the last few months, one million Netflix subscribers have downloaded and activated the Netflix app that enables Microsoft’s Xbox 360 videogame console to play normal and HD movies - streaming. And it’s not just that the application was installed often, it’s actually being Read on…
I really love companies that profile themselves with some flair. And the Hulu Superbowl Commercial is one of the best commercials I have seen in a while :)
Hulu is a joint venture between NBC Universal and News Corp that offers free TV shows from major studios to online viewers. In its recent Super Bowl TV ad, Hulu admitted that it is evil–and proud of it.
The Crispin Porter & Borgusky ad, called “Alec in Huluwood,” stars “TV star” Alec Baldwin narrating a 60-second spot that takes place in what appears to be an underground laboratory facility beneath the famed Hollywood sign.
According to Baldwin, because there’s loads and loads of TV content available on the Web now, you can’t possibly escape it anymore (”I mean, what’re you going to do? Turn off your TV and your computer?”) And Hulu, he says, was created with an ulterior motive: “Once your brains are reduced to a cottage cheese-like mush, we’ll scoop them out with a melon baller and gobble them right on up.”
As one of the authors of the book ‘
Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, is answering questions from readers on the 
Proof for the point that internet video distribution through consoles is growing fast.