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Adam Hanft
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Adam Hanft is a decoder of the consumer culture and our branded planet. He blogs for The Huffington Post and FastCompany.com. He is also the co-author of Dictionary of the Future and is founder and CEO of the marketing and branding firm Hanft Raboy. Follow him at Twitter.com/hanft. Journalist and co-author of Dictionary of the Future |
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 I love the instant wonkage that the web makes possible. Case in point: ReadTheStimulus.org: transparency manna for every stimulus fetishist. As their site coyly puts it "$850 Billion, 1588 pages, and counting… somebody needs to read it.” You can search the entire magnanimous-opus. View every draft of the bill, plus amendments, plus the CBO report. What's more, if you discover something objectionable on page 1492, you can add your own comments, and see the marginalia of other obsessives. And bloggers can link directly to any individual page. Disclosure: The site's partners are from the red frequency spectrum—the Heritage Foundation, the conservative Club for Growth and so on. But hey, I’m fine with the vast right-wing conspiracy doing constructive work like this. Next: how about a similar site for Dick Cheney's visitor log book. |
Adam Hanft
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Adam Hanft is a decoder of the consumer culture and our branded planet. He blogs for The Huffington Post and FastCompany.com. He is also the co-author of Dictionary of the Future and is founder and CEO of the marketing and branding firm Hanft Raboy. Follow him at Twitter.com/hanft. Journalist and co-author of Dictionary of the Future |
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I wonder what Lauren Bacall would make of this innovation in whistling. Ocarina is a hot new iPhone application that turns the erotic little plaything into a new kind of digital musical instrument. You blow into the microphone slot, use the keypad as a keyboard, and next thing you know you're playing Stairway to Heaven like they're doing in this eerie-zen YouTube video. The ingenuity of these iPhone application developers in creating an Industry of Distraction is impressive. |
Adam Hanft
Info
RSS
Adam Hanft is a decoder of the consumer culture and our branded planet. He blogs for The Huffington Post and FastCompany.com. He is also the co-author of Dictionary of the Future and is founder and CEO of the marketing and branding firm Hanft Raboy. Follow him at Twitter.com/hanft. Journalist and co-author of Dictionary of the Future |
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With all the palpable fear and panic in these parts, what's a masochist to do other than pick up Joanna Bourke's masterful Fear: A Cultural History. It's a sobering romp (that's no oxymoron) through decades of fear's grim manifestations. The chapters read like a cross between Kafka, Woody Allen, and FEMA: Death, Disasters, Nightmares, Phobias, Social Hysteria. As just one example of the enduring nature of fear, here's a tidbit from a sermon that was delivered by John Jefferson in the 1830s, although it is as fresh as today's cold sweat (particularly the last part) and tomorrow's headlines: "Difficulties the most anticipated and trials the most unexpected, continually arise. Health cannot be calculated upon for a moment; friends may suddenly be snatched from our embrace; riches 'make themselves wings and fly away.’" |
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