Ask Stephen: the virtual booktour

Only Stephen Fry could get away with this, yet he may be starting a trend: launching a book via Twitter, cinema, webcasts and, later, YouTube, no doubt. And The Fry Chronicles is available in five formats simultaneously: book, eBook, iBook, audiobook and iPhone app.

Mr Fry is launching the tome by appearing at the various UK theatres to do augmented book readings on successive evenings: the add-on part comes from interaction with audiences in the venue and at 60 cinemas with some of his 1.8 million Twitter followers.

Real-time Q and A, and the Twittersphere will send #recommendation tags to their exponential readers. Already the Chronicles has toppled Tony Blair's Journey from the top of Amazon's UK book chart. Very smart.

All this commercial success without stepping into a television or radio studio, chatting to features journalists (although Mr Fry is doing his bit the old-fashioned way, too), going 'on the road' past the Oxford-Cambridge-London triangle, or getting your hair wet.

Where Stephen leads, other writers will follow, especially if they have a Twitter fan base.


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A room of one's own: an unattainable dream?

Where there's an online product, you'll soon find a hacker or a pirate.

The latest examples that confirm the human urge to scream 'Mine' very loudly are Andy Coulson's tenure as editor of the News of the World (phone hacking has been alleged by, most recently, the New York Times) and hacker success in distributing popular ebooks for free.

Even the unveiling of the Stig's identity on Top Gear smacks of the school playground bully, tearing off the wings of a butterfly.

At stake, personal and professional privacy, and the right to make money from electronic products.

This is a gold rush in reverse where, in a landscape where information wants to be free, no one is allowed to make money. This spells disaster to conventional business models for creative companies. The globalisation effects of YouTube, home recording and back-bedroom piracy will propel the media into a dangerous Wild West outlaw world where copyright is seen as red tape and creatives won't be able to earn a crust. The new billionaires will be the sharp-elbowed owners of the speakeasies at the edge of the law and beyond.

The likes of Mick Jagger, J K Rowling, Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood and Dan Brown represent the last of a dying breed: stars who get rich through their imaginations.


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In an octopus's Berchtesgaden

Tea leaves, I Ching, fortune cookies and spurious past history can all lay claim to predicting World Cup football results.

Paul the octopus can now be added to the list. The newly discovered global star at the Sea Life Aquarium in Oberhausen, Germany has been predicting results at the World Cup, with startling accuracy. Given the choice between mussels in transparent boxes adorned with the flags of countries the playing a match, Paul's predictions are taken as the first box he opens to reach his snack.

Oblivious to all the attention, Paul's success in predicting Germany's results (including losses to Serbia and Spain) has had two outcomes: death threats (from Argentines and, latterly, Germans); and increased soothsaying influence. Punters are placing bets with bookmakers based on Paul's preferences to such a degree that it's skewing the market.

For Paul's own safety, there is a news blackout on his predictions for the final between the Netherlands and Spain: one country or the another is going to blame the octopus, however irrational the thought. CCTV cameras may have to be installed.

Actually, though, with 50:50 odds, Paul's guess is as good as anyone's


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Let the plane take the strain

Ryanair takes the biscuit for no frills and paid added extras in the low-cost airline business. The latest additions to the rosta of pain are coin-operated loos and 'vertical seats' (i.e. standing room only). What would health and safety make of that?

Where will Michael O'Leary's money-making schemes go next?

• Choose your own destination, as long as you're going to Paris (approximately)?
• Fly your own plane?
• Pay-as-you-go oxygen supply in an emergency? (Otherwise you get mustard gas)
• Propellor-driven aircraft using clockwork technology? (The 'vertical' passengers turn the cranks)
• Seats that double up as commodes?
• No aisles? (People move around by swinging from a climbing frame bolted to the ceiling)
• Luggage roof-racks?

If not these, suggestions, there will be others along soon.

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Auf Weidersehen, England

The Germans won again at the World Cup footie, but this time England weren't even good enough to merit going out on penalties. Where do they go from here? Here are some suggestions:

• Renegotiate the number of English-qualified players turning out for Premier League sides;
• Invite Stuart Pearce to be the England manager as he got the Under-21 side to the final of the European Championships;
• Thank 'thank very much' to a bunch of aging England football players (Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard, Matthew Upson, John Terry, David James, Emile Heskey)
• Select the nucleus of the new England team from the Under-21 side;
• Build a team around Wayne Rooney, but allow everyone in the team to play in their best positions.

Will this happen? Probably not. But if Fabio Capello continues, he will have to adapt and learn from his mistakes. Perhaps Stuart Pearce will get more of a say within the current regime.

Now for the European qualifiers.

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Radiohead: In Rainbows and the lack of gold

Millionaire, Thom Yorke of Radiohead has a bleak message for musicians wanting to make their fortune: the record-label based music industry will be dead within months.

The business model of In Rainbows may be open to every bussing muso, but the market is saturated and bands need ways to stand out from the crowd: principally, it seems at the moment, by being famous already (witness Radiohead, Prince, the Rolling Stones, and Simply Red).

Perhaps the hip-hop solution can be applied to the industry at large. The most famous rappers are becoming hubs around which new talent can coalesce (an early example being Eminem's involvement of D12 and Obie Trice). The hubs will be the nouveau riche. 

Like viral blog recommendations and links, the goodwill and praise of a famous artist (for a percentage cut) may be sufficient to drive download sales. And online musico-dramaturgs will emerge in greater numbers, carrying the John Peel legacy on to the web (say, his sons: Tom and William Ravenscroft; and Tom Robinson). The sharing of music is much more than playing records; the title DJ does not encompass the revised job description of these new gatekeepers to the music.

The recording industry is dead; long live the recording industry.


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BP: for their next trick ...

BP is the oil-industry's equivalent of Tommy Cooper: except that the failed conjuring tricks they have been performing on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico not only don't work, they aren't funny.

So far BP has tried the 'top kill' approach to stopping the oil flow. This consists of trying to plug the gap with all shades of rubbish and capping the pipe: they have tried drilling fluids, mud, tyres, golf balls and cement. BP has also tried closing safety valves.

Now they are going for the grand finale: cutting the pipe in half further down its length to get a clean break,  and then trying the capping procedure all over again.

The tension is palpable. A good outcome, and Hollywood producers will be primed with chequebooks for an action movie starring Tom Cruise, Hugh Jackman and Angelina Jolie (Deepwater Horizon, anyone? No pitch required, ho ho); fail, and BP will be writing the cheques to the US Government and reading said writing on the wall. The directors may even be reading it on the wall of a prison cell if recent applications of the Anglo-American extradition 'treaty' are applied (e.g. Gary McKinnon, austistic hacker extraordinaire; the Enron bankers from NatWest).

If the above scenarios may be fantasy (for now), one thing is for sure: either way, BP will be picking up the tab. Barack Obama needs someone to blame, even if the disaster wasn't strictly his fault. Laissez-faire policies with respect to big oil are ingrained on the American psyche: the Bush presidencies of father and son need particular highlighting.

And Michael Moore won't be far behind with his particular brand of TV Nation reportage: Obama and Me; Fahrenheit 494.6 (the temperature at which gasoline burns); or perhaps even Slicker Uprising. All bets are off.


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Play nice with Synthia

Dr J Craig Venter is at it again. Ten years ago he was trying the trademark the human genome like the antithesis of Tim Berners-Lee. Now he has 'created' the world's first organism not created by natural selection.

Synthia is a synthetic single-celled creature, a new kind of bug. Like any stride into the scientific future, the good side can be contrasted with the bad: is this a road humankind wishes to rush down, or a dangerous cul-de-sac.

The achievement is startling, but the conversation has just begun.


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The torture defence

Hmm. Immigration policy may be tricky to implement this new parliament. Two Pakistani students, alleged to be linked to al-Qaeda, have been judged to be dangerous but impossible to deport due to the threat of torture or possible execution back in the old country.

Western values trumps the law of the jungle in this case. Perhaps there ought to be counter-madrassas, teaching against fundamentalist religion, here in the UK and perhaps in the USA? But who would teach the curriculum? Presumably moderate Muslim clerics?


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I wanna be elected

'I'm your top prime of meat, I'm your choice,' screamed Alice Cooper.

Is David Cameron 'a yankee doodle dandy in a gold Rolls-Royce'?

Do the 'kids need a saviour, a fake Gordon Brown'?

Are 'we all gonna rock to the rules Nick Clegg makes'?

We don't know yet, but we might know by the beginning of next week.

The LibDems and the Tories are playing footsie this evening talking about how the things they have in common might outweigh the things that keep them apart.


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Drill, BP drill?

President Obama has a problem, now, getting his climate reforms through the Senate with the BP oil rig disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

But this pales into insignificance alongside the travails of the Republican party on this issue.

Whither Sarah Palin? Should baby still be drilling? She has been more muted since the crisis began, apart from tweeting her condolences to the families of the dead oil workers.

Hmm. I suppose much rests how how much the American people will take when it comes to increased gasoline prices. Voters can have short memories, when environmental catastrophe comes up against people's personal budgets.


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Real Virtuality on the curriculum

An antidote to people's media sensitisation towards violence is been tried with success in Merseyside schools by the charity Support After Murder and Manslaughter (SAMM).

Young children are being shown stills from videogame franchise Grand Theft Auto and 'Itchy & Scratchy' from The Simpsons in the context of comparing violent images with what is going on in their own lives. Images are marked as 'bad real life', 'good real life' and 'not real'.

And the result? Kids are realising that comic-book violence is not real; in life acts and behaviours have consequences. And they report being disgusted by the stills.

Perhaps there is hope in clawing back civil society from the clutches of glamourised, depersonalised media violence.


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Those petrol emotions

A rubicon has been crossed. As of today, a full tank of petrol costs over £100.

Where climate change scientists argue the toss about 'peak oil', the power of the wallet may yet force people into considering public transport and hire cars for local trips.

Petrol will get ever more expensive, and alternative fuels will soon seem very attractive.


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Whatever lurve is ...

Not exactly an election antidote, but royal wedding rumours are gathering pace.

The odds on William and Kate tying the knot in 2010 have slashed, on the supposition of media stories and the fantasies of a bored nation. But punts like this can sometimes hit the mark.

The bookies must be wondering if the public have taken a liking to their proverbial shirts.


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Celebrity culture: next steps?

What will be the impact of the new CelebAround iPhone application? Created by MatrixPhotos.com, a paparazzi agency, for a gossip-hungry crowd at £1.79 a throw, fans will be able to track their heroes footsteps 12 hours after the famous soles have trod London's hallowed sod.

• It will simply advertise expensive haunts to ever more people. Just because Madonna may eat at the Ivy doesn't mean Jo Bloggs can afford it.
• Expect a massive increase in mobile video 'journalism'.
• The paparazzi agency may either be shooting itself in the foot or encouraging a new source of material: I can't decide, and it's probably a close run thing.
• Celebrity venues will get even more exclusive in an attempt to keep out the 'civilians'.
• Stars will still be able to wander the street incognito if they dress down sufficiently and don't court publicity.
• Stalking has just met Google Maps.
• Agents will try to get the application banned, as business may get more difficult to negotiate without sufficient camflouge.
• Private members' clubs will thrive.
• Ordinary people may often get mistaken for celebrities causing many false sightings that clog up the site.

In short, a dangerous, dog's breakfast of an idea that may drown under the volume its own shrill publicity.

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David Who?

Prediction time: David Tennant won't be featuring on British television until Matt Smith is firmly established as the new incarnation of Doctor Who. And, when he does, it will be in a radically different role.

Also Christmas telly in 2010 will not be the celebration of the coming of the Scottish one (see previous post, And the Zelig prize for most ubiquitous actor goes to ...), unless of course her name is Karen Gillan: the Doctor's new (nubile) travelling companion.

Television evolutionary jumps can be as swift and ruthless as neo-Darwinism. The Doctor is dead; long live the Doctor.


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No bad for a Muggle

Boffins have developed a device that renders 3D objects invisible, the first step in the development of a Harry Potter-style invisibility cloak.

So, what other benchmark gadgets might maverick scientists be working on behind the scenes?

• Teleporting beams?
• Telepathy helmets?
• Time machines?
• Superpower ability enablers?
• Perfect photography memory devices?

All of the above ideas have been inspired by fiction, written and visual. Perhaps even more creative work can be achieved where artists have yet to tread? Unless, of course, the artistic visualisation of a gadget has to precede the need to create it.

Which came first: the science or the art?


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Blue eyes, Mensa IQ to go ...

Welcome to HuxleyWorld: theme parks located at London Bridge and Virginia where the hot ride on offer is to enter a raffle for an egg of your choice for IVF.

Science fiction? No, this is a real publicity drive punching a coach and horses through ethical worries about the sanctity of new life. This is bingo for babies: the winner cries 'House' and takes the DNA home.

Whether the initiative is banned or not it has succeeded in promoting its services. And it proves that people will always push against the boundaries of taste and decency to get noticed. We have gone from surrogate mothers to surrogate egg farmers in 25 years.


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Non-contact Collider

The Large Hadron Collider under Geneva is turning out to have a fitness record worse than Michael Owen's.

The latest hamstring injury revolves around a new safety issue. The Collider currently operates at 7 trillion electron-volts, but is having to shut for a year in order to cope with twice that amount.

For a bunch of elite physicists, eminently bright, this lack of mathematical forecasting regarding the level of energy needed to recreate Big Bang conditions seems a little baffling.

Maybe the maths is developing at the same rate as the science? And, in the final analysis, will twelve months slip by before the boffins realise that 14 trillion electron-volts is not enough?

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Star-gazing in Hollywood

Recent successful movies have highlighted two Hollywood trends that are diverging.

First, there is the Marlon Brando effect: mega-expensive cameos, like the recent 'effort' from Julia Roberts in Valentine's Day at $3 million for six minutes.

Second, there is the 'who he?' law: leading roles for unknown actors, like Sam Worthington in Avatar and Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker.

The current situation will go one of two ways, neither of which is good news for the likes of Tom Cruise and Nicolas Cage. Continuing use of unknowns to tell the story, rather than showcase the star and/or making stars out of the unknowns, say Carey Mulligan from An Education.

So the major stars may have to smoke pipes and wear slippers in their Sunset Boulevard mansions for the foreseeable future.