Colossal - Art & Design →

I recommend this. 

So spectacular!!!

Eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon asks THE SUN; “Is There a Santa Claus?” on 1897.

“DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old. 
“Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. 
“Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’ 
“Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

“VIRGINIA O’HANLON.
“115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.”

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding. 

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

My expectation for 2012.

I want a president

“I want a dyke for president. I want a person with aids for president and I want a fag for vice president and I want someone with no health insurance and I want someone who grew up in a place where the earth is so saturated with toxic waste that they didn’t have a choice about getting leukemia. I want a president that had an abortion at sixteen and I want a candidate who isn’t the lesser of two evils and I want a president who lost their last lover to aids, who still sees that in their eyes every time they lay down to rest, who held their lover in their arms and knew they were dying. I want a president with no air-conditioning, a president who has stood on a line at the clinic. I want someone who has been in love and been hurt, who respects sex, who has made mistakes and learned form them. I want a black woman for president. I want someone with bad teeth, someone who had eaten hospital food, someone who cross dresses and has done drugs and been in therapy. I want some who has committed civil disobedience. 

I WANT SOMEONE WHO KNOWS”


Adapted from Zoe Leonard’s

Portraits of the homeless →

Such an overwhelming and great work!
I’m amazed. 

By Lee Jeffries

AFGHAN GIRL WITH HANDS ON FACE (Sharbat Gula)

By Steve McCurry

Brands are Human - They Need to Communicate as Such →

authenticmatters:

Thanks to the socialization of the web, brands have taken on very human characteristics. They’re conversational. They’re sometimes awkward. They’re nerdy. They’re intelligent. They’re jerks (sometimes). They’re cute. They’re welcoming. They’re darling. They’re ignorant. They’re self-righteous….

(Source: authenticmatters)

REAL Business Opportunity

Dear HBO 

First and foremost, I love your content. You’ve produced several of my favorite shows over the years, and the hits keep on coming. I’d love to watch Game of Thrones now, but I can’t. You see, the only way to get your service is to be a cable subscriber, and several months ago I cut the cord. 

The recent news that you’ve reached agreements with Cablevision and Time Warner Cable to make your iPad app, HBO Go, more widely available has plenty of people all excited. But to me it looks like a big turd sandwich. If I wanted cable, I’d pay for cable. I just want HBO, but you make it impossible.

I realize this is all about money. The cable companies send you a ton of cash and provide you with a great platform on which you are given prime billing to the elite tier customers. But the world is changing. And you need to get in front of it.

Though they’re going through a bit of a rough transformation right now, Netflix is clearly adjusting their cannons to aim right at you. In 2 years, they will be HBO — but better. Because they won’t require a goddamn bullshit cable subscription.

I’d gladly pay you upwards of $19.99 a month for direct access to HBO Go without a cable subscription. Netflix charges $7.99 a month for their streaming service right now, but thanks to your original programming, you’re worth a lot more. But Netflix original programming is coming soon, so your premium buffer won’t last forever. The time to strike is now.

If you could remove your lips from the cable company teet for a minute, you’d find hundreds of thousands — and likely millions — of customers happy to pay a premium for access to HBO Go without the cable requirement right now. That number is only going to grow. And fast.

Content is king, and you have the best content. If you do go cable-optional, a few of the cable companies may try to boycott you. But the ensuing customer relations shitstorm will only prove your value and will hasten the arrival of the post-cable world. You can lead this revolution.

So please HBO, I beg you, take control. Pre-empt Netflix and rise against big cable. Fulfill your destiny. Or I’m going to have to call on ESPN.

By Newsweek Reader

#Marketing

Saber reconhecer uma oportunidade de negócios dentre a tanta coisa já existente no mercado é o segredo para poder entrar oferencendo oque ninguém mais tem.

Se a HBO ainda não visualizou a real situação que o mercado apresenta, esse consumidor acaba de lhe esfregá-la. 

Chocolate — A True Guilty Pleasure?

Small farmers in West Africa produce most of the world’s cocoa and sell it at low prices to big companies such as Cadbury and Mars, who transform the beans into chocolate. In the new bookChocolate Nations: Living and Dying for Cocao in West Africa, Orla Ryan focuses on Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire, the two countries that together produce half the world’s cocoa output. Large numbers of West Africans rely on cocoa for their livelihoods, she shows, and politicians have long used revenues tied to cocoa exports to retain their holds on power. Reformers have expressed concern about industry practices, and Ryan ably discusses such issues as child labor on cocoa farms and the debates around free trade. She argues that an even greater source of concern is the long-term environmental sustainability of current approaches to cocoa production, and she advances the notion that chocolate prices might spike in the not-too-distant future.

#NiceReading