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Honoring the Game: Pay as You Go or Pay as They Want?

It’s no secret that many major league baseball teams — even the Yankees! — are having a hard time selling season ticket packages this year, and one must begin to wonder if the economics of baseball, and major league sport in general, are forever changing for the betterment of the impulse buyer and to the detriment of the dedicated fan that these teams covet, and often, overcharge.

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Move Over Gangnam Style and Harlem Shake: Here Comes Grumpy Cat!

“Gangnam Style” is the Pop single from South Korean musician PSY. Released in 2012, thanks to social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter and the number of people who made their own versions, it became the most watched video ever on YouTube surpassing Justin Bieber in the number of plays it received.  But there’s a new cat in town…

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Justin Bieber Needs to Learn Insight Marketing

I wonder if Justin Bieber’s marketing and production team ever read the news beyond the current chatter about their teenage star.  I would love to know what they made of this morning’s juxtaposition of articles on the BBC about young Mr Bieber keeping his very young audience waiting for nearly two hours at London’s O2 Arena last night and a rather interesting piece about Insight Marketing which explore some of the techniques used by some advertisers and companies to deliver added value about their products and services.

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Mindy Got a Gun: Celebrity Death Trap or Rehab?

I woke to the sad news this morning that Mindy McCready — mother of two young children, country music singer, and star of Dr. Drew Pinsky’s “Celebrity Rehab” — was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Those of us who watched Celebrity Rehab could see this end bearing down on Mindy from afar, and the question was always not if she’d be run over by life, but when.  As of yesterday, we have our answer, and now the mourning for her children must begin.

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The Two Worst Television Commercials of Super Bowl 47

Super Bowl 47 was played last night — and while it was a great game — the whole spectacle of the Super Bowl is totally played out.  The halftime show is boring and unspectacular — how many times do we have to see Beyoncé bouncing her booty in our homes to get the point that she has an enormous butt?  The television commercials are predictable.  The “funny” commercials always end in a jokey, visual, “gotcha” you can see coming a mile away — while the “serious” commercials drip a sugary false-sympathy that enrages one to screaming and bloodletting.

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The Ravens Win Super Bowl 47!

The Ravens just beat the 49ers and won Super Bowl 47!

And Lucky O’Connell cried a little bit tonight in his dog dish.

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Beyonce Fakes Reality Once Again

Beyonce is at it again!  She’s faking reality and pretending that we don’t notice and are not offended by her intentional deceit.  Is this capacity for suspending disbelief part of the DNA of her itinerant celebrity status?  Pretending to really sing the National Anthem at Obama’s second inauguration was but the latest straw breaking our camel back.  Four years ago, we addressed the performance fakery of Yo Yo Ma at Obama’s first inauguration; and the second time around — we’re stuck with No Mo’ Beyonce.

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Human Equality Should Not Be Headline News

Every time a celebrity comes out of the closet and it is spread all over the blogosphere and makes the front cover of entertainment magazines, I pretty much always have the same reaction — to think to myself, “Why is this still considered newsworthy?” I would like to take you more thoroughly through this thought process with me.

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Howard Stein Rents a Revenge

As a graduate student at Columbia University, I recall one particularly challenging playwriting assignment from mentor, and teacher, Dr. Howard Stein: “Rent a Revenge.”

“Rent a Revenge” was one of the last, and most challenging, things for us to write because Howard would only give us the title of the assignment.  You had to figure out the rest on your own.  Many students would get stuck and whine and complain, but Howard would not budge with additional direction.  Ask him any question about the assignment, and all he would do is yell back at you, “Rent a Revenge.”

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From Instagram Fan to Hater: Why I Deleted My Account and Why You Should Too

Up until recently, I was a pretty solid fan of the Instagram service. I loved how it helped people to connect to one another through their photographs, whether those photographs had been artistically altered through filters or not. I really enjoyed how my friends could easily see the photos I took and give me a big thumbs up, so to speak, when they saw the photos they liked. All of this changed on Monday, December 17th, when Instagram suddenly announced that they were changing their terms of service — and it didn’t look like it was going to be for the better.

Continue reading → From Instagram Fan to Hater: Why I Deleted My Account and Why You Should Too