Wall St. Gains On Hopes For Europe Bank Plan

Stocks rose on Monday after a renewed pledge by France and Germany to come up with a plan to tackle the euro zone debt crisis and support the region’s banks.

Wall St. Gains on Hopes for Europe Bank Plan

Backlink: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=ac4416890a3aa6dbc01b6ba71cc375e0

Columbia Pictures Hopes to End Oscar Drought

If “The Social Network” wins, the movie about the Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg will end some 23 years of Columbia going without top honors on Academy Awards night.

Columbia Pictures Hopes to End Oscar Drought

Backlink: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=a03a0d6923d7968c0501eb7e852f4da0

Experts Citing Rising Hopes for Recovery in Coming Year

The tax-cut compromise, rising corporate profits and an increase in consumer spending are some of the reasons for optimism.

Experts Citing Rising Hopes for Recovery in Coming Year

Backlink: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=3306ccec723e19883cb1afc84e30a3b1

DealBook: European Deal Makers Place Hopes in Emerging Markets

As confidence returns, some London bankers expect European takeovers to increase more than 15 percent next year from this year.

DealBook: European Deal Makers Place Hopes in Emerging Markets

Backlink: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=24d0beeae3d706d75b74aa05d11625d0

DealBook: Europe's Deal Makers Place Hopes in Emerging Markets

As confidence returns, some London bankers expect European takeovers to increase more than 15 percent next year from this year.

DealBook: Europe's Deal Makers Place Hopes in Emerging Markets

Backlink: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=24d0beeae3d706d75b74aa05d11625d0

UK supergroup records 4'33", hopes to top Xmas charts

A UK supergroup has recorded a cover of 4'33", John Cage's infamous "silent" composition. They're hoping to take their four minutes and thirty three seconds' worth of breathing noises, soft shuffling, and chair creaks to the top of the UK pop music charts this Christmas -- and more importantly, they're hoping to beat out whatever awful earworm the X-Factor TV programme foists on the nation. I say best of British luck to them!

Later today, Pete Doherty, the Kooks, Billy Bragg, Imogen Heap, Orbital and many more will gather in a London studio, collaborating in a bid for this year's Christmas No 1. But the strangest bit is not the team-up: it's that they are not recording a single note. The ad hoc supergroup is assembling in support of Cage Against the Machine, a charity campaign to take John Cage's infamous 4'33" - a composition of pure silence - to the top of the Yuletide charts.

The campaign has been gathering momentum over the past couple of months, winning celebrity endorsements, amused press coverage and around 60,000 Facebook fans. Their inspiration is obvious: last year's successful push to raise Rage Against the Machine's Killing In the Name, released in 1992, over X Factor winner Joe McElderry's The Climb. In 2010, instead of loosing a profanity-laden rap-rock tirade on the British public, Cage Against the Machine organisers want to unfurl the serene sound of silence, taking on whoever wins X Factor next week. The plan recalls a similar star-studded silence for this year's Remembrance Day.

Cage Against the Machine: pop stars to stage silent X Factor protest (via Making Light)

 

• Boing Boing: Video of John Cage on a 1960 game show
• John Cage's 639-year long song has started to play - Boing Boing

UK supergroup records 4'33", hopes to top Xmas charts

Backlink: http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/w_Abbr1ntyY/uk-supergroup-record.html