Pop Culture News

Not an awful lot to link to – apparently pop culture took the week of the 4th off.  But I do have a few very interesting things.

First of all, apparently Japanese  adults are addicted to coloring.  I’m jealous.

This whole Cristal controversy thing is a really interesting case study in culture and class clashes.

Every year, the new dictionary entries are announced and its one of my favorite pieces of corporate PR of the year.

Ads on hooker’s thighs – if only it had been real.  Would have been better if the ads were in braille though.

I’ve mentioned the gradually increasing presence that China has in business and culture before and now they are taking matters into their own hands.

This one is for Meghan, who helps me so much with my research: a person was shot at a shoe sale in Turkey.  Best line in the article: "Shooting guns into the air is a not-uncommon method for dealing with emotional situations in Turkey, including weddings, soccer games, demonstrations and deals on shoes that are almost too good to be true."

And last but not least, two articles on the changing face of popular culture:

The Extinction of Mass Culture

The Rise and Fall of the Hit

These are probably two of the most important and interesting articles related to popular culture that you could read this year.  They really sum up the changing world of culture and how the internet has spread the control of culture among the masses.   I can now easily find more garage rock bands than I know what to do with and there’s all sorts of tools to help me find new music similar to what I already like and to help me discover new stuff.  Top 40 radio is probably far from dead, but it is definitely starting to write its own obituary.

I’m sure that if you examine your own habits, you’ll find that you’ve changed the way you watch, read, or listen to various media over the last few years, whether it be downloading music or satellite radio or frequenting a web site that caters to some obscure taste.