By Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke 9/19/12 11:13am

Shindigger

Rachel Fershleiser, Nick Douglas and Molly McArdle

Getting Lit: Brooklyn Book Festival Kicks Off

We have reached a stage in the life of New York or the life of literature (or both) where a glance at the bio of most contemporary authors inevitably ends with the words “lives in Brooklyn.” Not surprisingly, a literary festival exists to celebrate the borough’s bibliophiles. The Brooklyn Book Festival, which will take place this Sunday, means that many writers won’t even have to get on the subway in order to read aloud and sit on panels in front of enthusiastic readers.

To kick off the literary festivities prior to the literary Festival, Tumblr, Electric Literature, The New Inquiry and the Los Angeles Review of Books threw a party. (Book people love parties.) Shindigger, being notionally bookish ourselves, followed the parade of tote bags until we reached the Williamsburg event space Public Assembly. After getting a temporary tattoo stamped on our inner wrist, we entered the darkened hall. Read More

By Foster Kamer 8/20/12 4:34pm

Badvertising

rich kids romney

Know Your Ad-Demographic: Romney Campaign Advertising on ‘Rich Kids of Instagram’

Maybe you’ve heard of the buzzed-about Tumblr known as Rich Kids of Instagram? It’s a blog that chronicles the comings and goings of some of the world’s uber-rich children. It’s an unapologetic, hilarious display of extravagant wealth, the teenagers who have done little to fall into it, and the way they live their very-moneyed lives. Some people see it as voyeurism, others see it as a despicable celebration of undue wealth, and others see it as a others see it as a problem (like some of the parents of these children, who have found their own personal security compromised by their kids’ aggregated “contributions” to the blog).

But if you’re working the ad buys on a presidential campaign, you see it as an opportunity to reach a certain demographic. Read More

By Drew Grant 8/15/12 1:22pm

Crimes

120814022724-progressive-twitter-story-top

Update: Progressive Auto-Tweets to ‘Killer’ Claim, Matt Fisher Shoots Back

Read: Comedian Matt Fisher Claims Sister’s Progressive Insurance Paid for Her Killer’s Lawyer

The media has picked up the torch of New York comedian Matt Fisher, whose family has been battling Progressive Insurance since his sister was killed in a car crash in 2010. According to Mr. Fisher’s Tumblr posting, his sister’s insurance company actually got its lawyer to defend the driver at fault for the accident, just so it wouldn’t have to pay out her policy to the grieving family.

Yesterday, Progressive responded by auto-tweeting this statement to people who wrote about Progressive on Twitter: Read More

By Drew Grant 7/09/12 2:25pm

top of the tumblr

a.o.scott

A.O. Scott Zingers: The Tumblr

It’s a rare critic among us who can elevate the dissection of someone else’s work into its own separate art form. The New York Times‘ A.O. Scott, with his combination of whimsical praise and scorched-earth snark, happens to be one of them. His reviews are driven by movie narratives, but they are also mini-lessons on film theory, biting satirical commentary, and extremely literary. It’s worth reading his reviews of movies you aren’t even planning to see. (We still maintain that his Melancholia review might have been as beautiful and poetic as the film itself, if not more so.)

Really though, we read every A.O. Scott review secretly hoping he hated the film, so we can giggle over his  hysterically funny take-downs. (See: Shutter Island, perhaps our favorite non-Observer movie review of all time.) And now there’s a Tumblr for that, too! Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 3/07/12 9:27am

Post-Empire

james deen bret easton ellis

The Boyfriend Experience: Can Bret Easton Ellis Mainstream Porn Star James Deen?

The first time I met James Deen was in a co-ed bathroom. I couldn’t tell you where. He was in the middle of a foursome, having sex with a sweat-soaked blonde propped up against a porcelain sink who looked like she’d just swallowed all the MDMA in L.A. A friend told me one way to spot fake college porn is by the extras the producers hire to stand around and pretend to be students. Sure enough, a group of guys who might have trouble spelling the word “campus” were watching, slack-jawed, from the doorway. I was watching too, except from my MacBook in Brooklyn.

Read More

By Nitasha Tiku 2/29/12 3:23pm

Fashion Week Observed

Picnik collage

Fashion Week Etiquette Breach: Photogs Bemoan Bloggers With iPhones

As sartorialists make their biannual pilgrimage from New York to London to Milan to Paris, some veteran tent-dwellers still have a pebble stuck in their Louboutins from Lincoln Center.

The glossy editor’s anxiety over being edged out of the front row, it seems, has migrated over to the media riser and down to the pit. What was once the province of professional photogs, to hear them tell it, has been overrun by iPhone and iPad wielding bloggers who wouldn’t know a bounce flash from a zoom lens. And they’re hogging up the press passes for backstage beauty shots!

Shortly after they turned off the stage lights and sopped up the champagne, a handful of disgruntled photographers reached out to The Observer to kvetch. Slights ranged from being turned away from shows, to an errant iPhone interrupting their runway image, to discovering that the insolent photo-bloggers never learned the etiquette about getting your shot and moving on. Read More