Out now or thereabouts

Welcome to Idealog Weekly, the free email newsletter for New Zealand commercial creatives, entrepreneurs and anyone rich with ideas.

Out now, or thereabouts

We’ve been doing things Henry Ford’s way for ages, so why don’t we try Caroline Robinson’s? The artist would really like us to. Robinson developed her plans to reshape society for her ART Venture venture, while fellow participants just focused on little things like reshaping Auckland City. You can read about their efforts in the new issue of Idealog, out Monday. Inside the covers we also ponder on surviving goodwill fatigue, winemaking in a sheep station and how to be a one-man show—even when you’re a four-piece band. Read the contents of Idealog #15 online.

The evolution of Darwin

If you want to know what goes into coming up with a stick-able theory—besides an astronaut, a studio and an American flag—you can now read Charles Darwin’s private papers online. Today’s upload is the largest publication of Darwin’s manuscripts and private papers in history and you’ll soon—or later—see why: the complete Charles Darwin archive would now take two months to view it all if you download one image per minute. Nice quick conspiracy theory anyone?

A closer look

Ever wondered what the inside of a trumpet looks like? ’Course you haven’t. But if you’re wondering about it now, you should have a look at this exhibition of all things x-rayed.

Move aside Harry Potter

Spike Jonze must be ready for another G-rated challenge now that Where the Wild Things are is in post-production. Enter My Beautiful Mommy, the children’s book about cosmetic surgery that’s begging for a big-screen adaptation. With lines like “my new nose is not different, my dear—prettier!” Jonze should have no trouble finding the perfect actress.

Robocop: the reality show

You know we love us a robot, but we’ve seen so many now it takes a lot to get a ‘woah’. A robot that operates exactly like a person got one though. Turned out it was a person, just one wearing an aluminium exoskeleton that moves with the wearer, giving him super strength and endurance abilities. Now onto the next thing: what will we turn all our empty jails into once cops start putting Robo before their name?

The new soap opera

So you’ve tried advertising in magazines and on billboards, TV and perezhilton.com. But have you tried putting your logo in soap? And blowing it out of an artificial snow machine every 15 seconds? Maybe you should.

Wait for the Black Sheep joke

The Brits love our wine and beef—and it turns out they’re quite fond our dark murderous sheep too. Kiwi splatter comedy Black Sheep (see Idealog #8) reached #6 on the UK DVD sales chart in its first week of release, selling 26,000 copies, and hitting 40,000 the week after. No surprise there—if anyone was going to replace Jake the Muss as New Zealand’s international cinematic ambassador, it was always going to be a sheep.

Laugh it off

If you’d like to fall off your seat tonight for reasons other than drunkenness, you can still buy tickets to the Cadbury Crunchie Comedy Gala, which opens the Comedy Festival at The Civic in Auckland tonight.

We realise the unfortunately named ERUPT Lake Taupo Festival may sound a bit off-putting. But, when you throw in cheap tickets on for everything from theatre to visual arts, plus shoulder season accommodation rates, it could be worth a cautious viewing.

Quote of the week

“It’s time to redefine the industrial revolution”

—Caroline Robinson throws down a posthumous challenge to Henry Ford in The Venturers, Idealog #15

More at Idealog online

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