Miami Fans Put HooDoo on Big D

When the New Orleans Saints made their Super Bowl run a couple of years ago, a few stories emerged about certain locals' use of voodoo to help their team win the championship. Of course, the Crescent City has an historic association with these "underground religious practices," as Wikipedia characterizes it.

Miami's version of the dark arts comes from Haiti, and is called vodou. Now, fans of the Miami Heat are buying vodou items to help the team win the NBA title. It's a breath of fresh air in a sport dominated by footwear endorsement packages.

The Miami Herald has the story. The photograph is by my wife, the fine art photographer Amy Becker.

Hedge Funds' African "Land Grab"

The Oakland Institute, a liberal policy think tank focusing on social, economic, and environmental issues, recently issued a report criticizing the African land acquisition activities of certain hedge funds. The BBC provided a story about it in today's editions.

The charges essentially evoke the bad old days of 19th Century colonialism, in which European nations carved up the mother continent in order to exploit its resources. The hedge funds are hardly the only "guilty" parties in this land grab. Various Chinese enterprises, many connected to the central state apparatus, have made their foothold in Africa. Energy companies from all over the world have strong connections to mostly unsavory governments in countries where oil flows. And some of the original colonial-era players remain, especially in francophone West Africa.

The land grab in Africa deserves more attention, and the Oakland Institute's report helps bring a spotlight to this troubling issue.

Fin Whales Find UK Waters Just Fine, Thank You

Fin whales, listed among the world's endangered species, have recently been spotted in record numbers in waters off Britain's Atlantic coast. The animals, the second largest on Earth, surprised scientists who saw them while conducting research on sardines. The BBC has the story.

Arts Blossoming in Miami?

Yesterday's Miami Herald ran a feature piece on how the arts have managed to survive and even thrive in the South Florida city. From the tenor of the piece, even the pro-arts drum beaters have been surprised by this unlikely event. The success feels like a top-down driven situation, with major local players such as the Arison family publicly involved. It's not clear how many working artists are feeling whatever magnetic pull the Miami arts scene has.

Still, one has to admire Miami's tenacity promoting the arts, especially in light of South Florida's dreadful real estate disaster and economic malaise.

The image shows a poster promoting a popular concert in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood.

Hollywood Directors Pan for TV Gold

A trend in the American movie making business is the movement of big-name Hollywood directors to television. The LA Times offers an interesting story on the topic in today's editions, including quotes from Curtis Hanson, Neil Jordan, and Michael Mann.

Intriguingly, the directors note that the current cable TV formats allow them to tell stories, develop characters, and use naturalistic locations. In contrast, they noted the current big screen tendency toward leveraging special effects, having characters straight from Fantasyland, and cutting corners on storytelling craft.

The Times story also notes some strong reasons why big screen pictures maintain their allure. Oliver Stone provides the quotes, and they're surprisingly reasonable.

How Apple's App Store Really Emerged

A fascinating interview in the Mercury News reveals how Apple nearly blew the success of the iPhone.

Mercury News columnist Chris O'Brien interviewed Bob Borchers (photo), Apple's former senior director of worldwide product marketing for the iPhone. Borchers was also part of the original iPhone team, according to the article.

The critical choice, according to Borchers, was the distinction between limiting the iPhone to Web apps and expanding its reach to native apps. Apple, which by all accounts grudgingly admits to the genius of others, listened to the market, especially game developers. By going against its own personality, Apple was able to make the iPhone a breakthrough product.

The article is interesting, and it's good to see someone pop Apple's balloon of insufferable arrogance and make the firm a far more human, and consequently more interesting and approachable, enterprise.

"Gunsmoke" Marshal James Arness -- RIP

James Arness, who played Marshal Matt Dillon in the Gunsmoke TV series, died this week at age 88. The New York Times obit does a reasonable overview of his professional and personal life. A couple of curiosities emerged from the obit. One was that Peter Graves, the Mr. Phelps of the Mission Impossible television series, was Arness' brother. Another was that John Wayne recommended Arness for the Marshal Dillon role.

Having grown up in the black-and-white TV era, I vaguely recall watching a Gunsmoke episode or two. My parents told me that, as a child, I rarely watched television programs. However, TV commercials fascinated me and I would stop whatever I was doing to watch them.

Consequently, Marshal Dillon didn't make a strong impression on me at the time. Many years later, I worked for an insurance company. Our department occasionally entertained top producing salespeople. One day, we were given the "honor" of entertaining an agent from Los Angeles the big shots wanted to avoid. I recall two things about the agent. He insisted on having lunch in the "executive dining room." After that, he let anyone who would listen know that wrote a policy for a number of Hollywood actors, including Jim Arness.

The insurance company had a number of "executive dining rooms" and we did, in fact, have lunch in one of them. The agent looked suspiciously around the room. "Is this the executive dining room?" My boss, a rare female in the boy's club, assuaged his doubts.

We all ate well that day, and I have Jim Arness to thank for it.

Ex-NPR Boss Lands On Her Feet At NBC

Remember Vivian Schiller? She was NPR's former boss who fell on her sword in the wake of a network fundraiser soliciting donations by characterizing the Tea Party as racist. That was in March.

Fast forward to June. Presto! Schiller has a new job. She's NBC's (read Comcast) "chief digital officer." The Washington Post version of events, taken from an AP story, provides the bare bones on Schiller's adios from the unemployment line.

What's got NBC/Comcast's heart palpitating so wildly? NBC President Steve Capus talked about Schiller's skill in building a "multi-platform organization." Oh, yes, he "raved about NPR's tablet app..." I see: she understands how to appeal to a liberal bourgeois audience.

What's ironic is that NBC News "has new digital properties in...theGrio.com...a site devoted to news particularly affecting black Americans."

The odds on Schiller hiring Juan Williams to be a commentator on theGrio.com start at a million to one.

Worms Discovered One Mile Under Earth's Surface

The current issue of Nature features an article in which two researchers claim to have found worms one mile under the surface of the earth.

They made their discovery while conducting exploratory experiments in a South African mine. One of the more amazing aspects of their research is that they conducted it so far beneath our collective feet. It makes one marvel at the engineering that can create safe conditions, with fresh air and light, so far from the earth's surface.

One also wonders how the pair of scientists set about discovering these multicellular creatures, called nematodes, whose existence in these extreme conditions had been the subject of speculation only a relatively short time ago.

The significance of the discovery was succinctly stated by Gaetan Borgonie (photo), one of the researchers. "It doesn't happen often," the Belgian nematologist said, "that you can redraw the boundaries of a biosphere on a planet."