Taking Action

Monthly Labor Review

Alissa has an article in the August Monthly Labor Review.

Crazy Fool

Thanks to Crazy Fool for a great show Saturday night...and putting us on the guest list.

A.D.

I've been listening to Solace's new album, A.D., since I got it from SR.com. It's my favorite Solace album since Further, and, I think, their most sonically dynamic release yet.

Although it's out on Small Stone Recordings, MeteorCity paid for it, so I kind of feel like it's my last contribution to the heavy rock scene.

I'm also pleased to see Paul Vismara return with the cover art.

PR Newswire

Excellent news for PR Newswire customers, not so great news for people skimming news headlines online: I was just reading an AP article (well-researched, sourced, nominally objective traditional journalism) when I saw a link in Yahoo News to a related topic.  I clicked on the link, then read the first two paragraphs with increasing puzzlement.  Finally I glanced up at the logo and realized I was reading a press release distributed through PR Newswire; the press release was not, of course, well-researched, sourced, or even nominally objective.  But clearly other readers didn't get it; the bottom of the page was filled with comments from people complaining that it seemed like a particularly biased news story.

Which, I guess, is a pretty good sign, because it means that many readers still do consider real reporting to be a desirable standard.

Walk With Us

Babylon

At the suggestion of a friend and artist, I've put together a synopsis for a children's book and a treatment for a graphic novel, both set in Babylon.  After working on them a bit, I find the ideas compelling, so we'll see if anything comes out of them.

Human Rights Book Update

The publisher has pushed the release date back again, this time to the end of 2011.

Human Rights Arts Festival

Today Alissa and I explored the first-ever Amnesty International Human Rights Arts Festival in Silver Spring, Maryland.  Among other events, we visited Kefa Café to see a new piece by Jeremy Austin and learned about the campaign for Fahad Hashmi.

I also had the chance to support some independent music stores, which, along with a used and rare bookstore, I'm proud to say are still alive and well just outside of downtown.  Long live art.

Women and democracy

I'm currently wrapping up the final draft of my human rights book to give to my editor.  I've decided to leave out the findings of M. Steven Fish's 2002 article "Islam and Authoritarianism" because they've been disputed and the debate doesn't yet seem to be resolved.  However, I do think they're interesting enough to mention here: according to Fish, the subordination of women has a downward pull on a society's democratization overall.

From art to reality in ten years

In 2001, I wrote a science fiction story called Glimmer in which people were named after corporations in exchange for cash.  In 2010, most of a decade later, science fiction is on its way to becoming reality.