mbf tod@y

The Italian Ivory Tower: Oldest Professors in Europe

"UNIVERSITA' italiana da svecchiare? Volgendo lo sguardo all'estero, sembra proprio di sì. I professori che insegnano negli atenei del nostro Paese sono i più vecchi d'Europa. L'impietoso panorama anagrafico è stato fornito dallo stesso ministero dell'Università che qualche settimana fa ha aggiornato i numeri relativi al personale docente. Il corpo accademico italiano, nell'ultimo decennio, non è mai stato così anziano come nel 2007. E il confronto internazionale ancora una volta ci colloca in coda alla classifica: siamo i più vecchi d'Europa.  [...] Nel nostro Paese, solo 4 docenti universitari su cento possono vantare meno di 34 anni. La percentuale di giovani schizza letteralmente in su oltralpe (il 21% di under 34 in Francia), Germania (32%) e Finlandia, dove le probabilità di stare "in cattedra" da giovanissimi è alta: 28%. Anche il Regno Unito dà molte chance (il 27% di docenti universitari con meno di 34 anni) ai propri giovani di intraprendere la carriera universitaria" (Salvo Intravaia, La Repubblica)

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Wu Ming 1 at MIT: The full lecture

"Slightly More Than Expected from a Band of Novelists: On How and Why a Group of Writers Called Wu Ming Set to Disrupt Italian (nay, European) Literature and Popular Culture (and then Came to Boston to Brag About It)

Wu Ming 1 is a founding member and representative of the Wu Ming Foundation, a collective of writers from Italy. Most members of the collective were deeply involved in the Luther Blissett Project, an international experiment in culture jamming, radical pranksterism and guerrilla mythology that ran from 1994 to 1999. During that time, a group of LBP activists wrote a controversial novel titled Q, which was published to much acclaim in 1999. In January 2000 the authors of Q founded the Wu Ming Foundation, which takes its name from a Chinese word meaning either "anonymous" or "five names" depending on how the first syllable is pronounced. The name is meant both as a tribute to dissidents ("Wu Ming" is a common byline among Chinese citizens demanding democracy and freedom of speech) and as a refusal of the celebrity-making machine which turns authors into stars" (MIT)

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Vero e/o Falso (Milano, via Dolomiti 11, Maggio 20 e 27)

Mockumentary: viaggio nel mondo del falso documentario
a cura di Carlo Prevosti Una passeggiata sul filo del rasoio, a cavallo del sottile confine che separa realtà e finzione, chiedendosi cosa è vero e cosa è falso seguendo un filo conduttore anomalo: il mockumentary. Un genere nuovo, capace di confondere le acque, di mescolare le carte delle regole creando un cortocircuito di stili e di linguaggi cinematografici. Una selezione di film per comprendere come si possa manipolare il linguaggio del documentario per costruire storie di finzione (in)credibili. Un fenomeno globale che coinvolge la cinematografia mondiale, ma che ancora non è emerso rivelandone le reali proporzioni. Quattro titoli, in due serate, che vogliono proporsi come la punta di un iceberg di cui ancora non conosciamo la parte sommersa, ancora tutta da scoprire.

martedì 20 - ore 21.30
Forgotten silver
Peter Jackson, 1995
Operazione luna
William Karel, 2001

martedì 27 - ore 21.30 
I Simpson - dietro la risata (behind the laughter)
Episodio BABF19
Mark Kirkland, 2000
Il cameraman e l'assassino
Remy Belvaux, André Bonzel e Benoit Poelvoorde, 1992

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e-commerce in Italy? Hopeless

"L'e-commerce italiano è un regno di paradossi: gli utenti crescono, sono arrivati a 5 milioni quelli che hanno acquistato online almeno una volta e, soprattutto, sono molto soddisfatti del servizio ricevuto. Peccato, però, che rispetto al resto d'Europa l'Italia sia ancora in forte ritardo. Non solo per il numero di acquirenti, ma anche per qualità dell'offerta: le aziende sono restie a mettere online la propria merce. [...] Paure che sanno di arretratezza culturale e che sempre più penalizzeranno il made in Italy sul piano della concorrenza internazionale, stimano gli esperti. I prodotti italiani, insomma, potrebbero e dovrebbero essere acquistati di più da utenti stranieri, se l'offerta fosse più ricca. " (Alessandro Longo, La Repubblica)

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The Perugia Murder: Amanda Knox vs. The Italian Legal System

"In early September of last year, Amanda Knox, an American college student from the University of Washington, arrived in Perugia, Italy, and joined the ranks of the 40,000 students, Italian and foreign, who flock there annually. This is a mixed blessing for the majestic town of 160,000, which has endured a number of invasions through the ages: first, the Etruscans, who built their elaborate tombs there, followed by the Romans, Goths, and, much later, Napoleon. But nothing has ever hit Perugia quite like Amanda—or, more accurately, the unspeakable crimes for which she was arrested: inciting two men to commit a sexual assault so brutal that it left her British housemate dead—and, in the wake of this murder, the media and judicial circuses that now engulf her. [...] In other words, the case is not going well. All anyone knows is that a girl who has been charged with nothing and is very likely innocent of murder will be languishing in an Italian jail for at least the next nine months, if not 30 years. The Italian legal system, ecclesiastical judge Count Neri Capponi informs me, will not work in Amanda’s favor. “Our system stems from the Inquisition and also from medieval law,” he explains. What this means, in effect, he says, is that justice in Italy “is based on the supremacy of the prosecution. This nullifies the fact—written in our constitution by the way—that you’re innocent until proven guilty.” (Judy Bachrach, Vanity Fair)

Amazing 6 page story on a very controversial crime that will inevitably become a movie. Here's the description: "The Italian police may have had their reasons for holding 20-year-old American Amanda Knox in connection with the “extreme sex” murder last November of her British roommate, Meredith Kercher: her callous reaction, changing story, and unsettling MySpace page among them. What they don’t seem to have is a case. In Perugia, interviewing Knox’s parents, the prosecutor, and other sources close to the investigation, the author asks whether the American is really the evil temptress portrayed in the media, capable of inciting two young men to an unspeakably brutal crime."

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Premio Duellanti 2008 (Triennale Milano, 28 maggio 2008)

Notizia collegata

The Renaissance of FIAT

"In common with most of the world's leading manufacturers, Fiat is expecting a good deal of its growth to come from emerging markets. In 2006, 37% of Fiat's vehicle sales, including vans and joint ventures, came from outside western Europe. By 2010, that is due to increase to 46%. Fiat is the market leader in the rapidly expanding Brazilian market, but apart from a truckmaking joint venture between Iveco and SAIC in China, it is weak in China, India and Russia. Fiat's performance in Russia, which will soon overtake Germany as Europe's biggest car market, has been particularly poor. Although (or perhaps because) Fiat designs were the basis of much of the Soviet car industry, the company sold only 2,000 cars there in 2006. However, the new, booted Fiat Linea, which is manufactured in Turkey and will also be made in China, India and Russia, provides ammunition it has previously lacked." (The Economist)

FIAT is a bit like Nintendo. A few years ago it was on death row, now it's back in the game and kickin' some butts.

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Less cinema and more security

"During his election campaign Gianni Alemanno, a former neo-fascist youth leader who is backed by Silvio Berlusconi, said that he aimed to downsize the festival staff and reduce the allocation for the event in the city's budget. One of his campaign's print ads carried the slogan, "Alemanno, for less cinema and more security" - a reference to his central plank of fighting illegal immigration. [...] Squitieri recently described the Rome festival as "useless", claiming that it provided just "another red carpet" for Hollywood movies. He has also hinted that he would prefer to close it down. "In Italy we have more film awards than films", he told the La Stampa newspaper." (The Guardian)

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Paolo Ruffino writes: "A few stats about Rome... From 2006 to 2007, the number of murders dropped from an average of 9 to 6 per year, sex abuses from 53 to 35, and crimes related to drugs or mafia dropped as well. The source is the police of Rome itself. It seems that this security issue is not an issue at all, just another excuse for the neo fascist politicians to raise paranoia, and get elected. The Left, in Italy, keeps on claiming that it is an issue, sharing the same racist and conservative position of their opponents, instead of pointing the real facts.What a sad situation I've found, Matt, coming back to Rome two days ago... ;)"

The Economist: Romania to surpass Italy by 2020

"In the euro zone, Italy is the country most likely to tip into recession in the next 12 months. [...]  In 2006 it was overtaken by Spain; next year it may fall behind Greece (see chart). Francesco Grillo, at the London School of Economics, suggests that, if current trends remain unchanged, Romania will overtake Italy in 2020. That may be fanciful, but it confirms that slow growth has become Italy's worst failing. It has persisted under governments of left and right alike. None has been bold enough to push through liberalising structural reforms to raise growth and productivity.Services are under-developed. Even in tourism, where Italy has a natural advantage, it has fallen from first- to fifth-most popular destination over the past 30 years. Education is a mess. Italy does worse than anywhere else in western Europe in the OECD's PISA tests. Universities seem to be run for the benefit of academics. Italy has no universities in the world's top 100. In 1970 30% of university teachers were over 45; today that figure is 70%" (The Economist)

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Italy's Hopeless Elections

"An election poster for the right-wing Northern League reads: "They accepted immigration, and now they live in reserves." (Der Spiegel, via We Make Money Not Art)

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Related: one and two.