Some Books are to be Tasted and Others Swallowed, And Some Few to be Chewed and Digested
Parliament is no more diverse now than it was in 1988 as political staffer ranks explode
Parliament is also in a time warp culturally and ethnically, a new study has found.
"Since Thatcher and Reagan decided neoliberalism was the way to go, the world has become a nastier, more competitive, more ruthless place," he says.
"There’s no perfect society, but I don't think it needs to be as brutal as it is now."
'Ruthless': David Williamson's new play puts showbiz under the microscope
The prolific playwright uses the brutality of show business to hold a mirror to the "intensely competitive and ruthless" nature of society in his new play.
Is Amazon Killing Incomes Of Writers? No, Protests Amazon
Amazon is frequently blamed for not just disrupting the way people buy books, but for making it difficult for writers to make a living. Now the company is fighting back, taking aim at an Author’s Guild report last week that detailed a catastrophic drop in author incomes. – The Guardian
Women Writers: Busting The Preconceptions For Commercial Success
Ann O’Loughlin: “All women writers face an uphill struggle to have their work recognised in the same way as their male counterparts, but for those of us writing bestselling commercial fiction, there is a mountain to trudge up every time.” – Irish Times
Solar Farms Shine a Ray of Hope on Bees and Butterflies Scientific American
Future of coffee in doubt as 60 per cent of plants now at risk of extinction Telegraph
The world's 15 hottest sites on Tuesday were all in Australia
Australia was home to all fifteen of the world's hottest temperatures on Tuesday, a feat it may well repeat on Wednesday and beyond as a huge swathe of the nation bakes
China Daily reported Friday that unnatural deaths have taken the lives of 72 mainland billionaires over the past eight years. (Do the math.)Which means that if you’re one of China’s 115 current billionaires, as listed on the 2011 Forbes Billionaires List, you should be more than a little nervous.Mortality rate notwithstanding, what’s more disturbing is how these mega wealthy souls met their demise. According to China Daily, 15 were murdered, 17 committed suicide, seven died from accidents and 19 died from illness. Oh, yes, and 14 were executed. (Welcome to China.)I don’t know about you but I find it somewhat improbable that among such a small population there could be so many “suicides,” “accidents” and “death by disease” (the average age of those who died from illness was only 48).
Here is the Forbes story by Ray Kwong, I am not sure how confirmed to treat this as being.
The Hunt for the Nazi Loot Still Sitting on Library Shelves - The New York Times: “The hunt for the millions of books stolen by the Nazis during World War II has been pursued quietly and diligently for decades, but it has been largely ignored, even as the search for lost art drew headlines. The plundered volumes seldom carried the same glamour as the looted paintings, which were often masterpieces worth millions of dollars. But recently, with little fanfare, the search for the books has intensified, driven by researchers in America and Europe who have developed a road map of sorts to track the stolen books, many of which are still hiding in plain sight on library shelves throughout Europe. Their work has been aided by newly opened archives, the internet, and the growing number of European librarians who have made such searches a priority, researchers say.
“People have looked away for so long,” said Anders Rydell, author of “The Book Thieves: The Nazi Looting of Europe’s Libraries and the Race to Return a Literary Inheritance,” “but I don’t think they can anymore.”
'Farcical': Sydney residents' claims over WestConnex cracking denied
Residents
in a street in North Strathfield say construction vibrations from work
on the M4 East tunnel section caused their walls to crack and crumble.
