Truth vigilante.
Fascinating finding on people’s reactions to requests for help depending on the light in which the situation is presented from The Boston Globe 3/31/13. The blurb on the academic study frames it around charitable fundraising and asserts that asking people to “prevent a decrease” is more likely to attain a result than asking to “cause an increase”.
Tim Hetherington was a real inspiration to me, & Sebastian Junger (author of The Perfect Storm and War, who co-directed the incredible documentary Restrepo with him) made a portrait of the heartbreakingly short life of the fearless photojournalist, coming to HBO on the 18th.
Hetherington died in a mortar strike covering the civil war in Libya in April 2011 at the age of 40. Ajdabiya, a city near where he died renamed its largest public square after him, calling him one of their martyrs.
Science fiction’s most influential writer may not have lived to see the premiere of Blade Runner, the troubled and maligned-on-release adaptation of his novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? from director Ridley Scott, but unlike most everyone else during the run up to its release he predicted its immense impact to come. In this letter from the website of his estate (kudos to Open Culture for posting this!) he discusses his anticipation for it, while he was unfortunately wrong about its commercial prospects, the film has survived the studio’s fears and tampering and audiences’ initial confusions to become probably the most acclaimed science fiction film of all time and endures to this day as a most-watch film for all genre and film fans alike. It is sad that the studio’s cuts and horrid voiceover additions turned a high brow film into a more muddled mess and robbed the film of its chance to make a great first showing and has instead needed the vocal members of its cult believers to continue to spread its influence, but thankfully they have allowed Scott to slowly but surely restore the film to what he intended it to be with the much improved director’s cut and the incredible 2007 ‘Final Cut’.
It’s interesting that a large number of the author’s fans usually bring up how much it departed from the source material, and yet the closest thing we have to a reaction to it from the author himself is effusive praise.
"Thank God for stories—for those that have them, for those that tell them, for those that devour them as the soul sustenance that they are. Stories give shape to experience and allow us to go through life unblind. Without the, everything that happens would float around, undifferentiated. None of it would mean anything. Once you have a version of what happened, all the other good stuff about being human comes into play. You can laugh, feel awe, commit a passionate act, get pissed, want to change things"
Tomas Alex Tizon, reiterated in the Nieman Foundation’s excellent Telling True Stories
"Lee van der Voo tells Romenesko readers: I was just informed by State Farm here in Oregon, where I’m an independent investigative journalist, that they are dumping my office rental policy because of the kind of journalism I do. I asked whether if I were to write food reviews or puff pieces about bridal gowns they would insure me, and I was told yes, “just no controversial journalism."
No insurance for you, investigative reporter! | JIMROMENESKO.COM (via onaissues)
(via futurejournalismproject)
