A Little Of The Old In And Out



In: Hugh Jackman. The versatile Aussi Hugh Jackman -- he's played Wolverine and done song and dance onstage -- will host the Oscars, also known as "The Gay Superbowl." Clearly Hugh won't have trouble with the choreographed dance numbers. "Dependable" and "versatile" are often ways in which "People's Sexiest Man Alive!" is described, but he has the weight of a global franchise on his shoulders. If he fucks it up it will be infinitely worse than the stinky box office of Australia. From DeadlineHollywoodDaily:

"Hugh Jackman will host the 81st Academy Awards® telecast, the show's producer Laurence Mark and executive producer Bill Condon announced today in Beverly Hills. This will be Jackman’s first time center stage at the Oscar show, although he has previously been a presenter. 'Hugh Jackman is a consummate entertainer and an internationally renowned movie star,' said Mark and Condon in a joint statement. 'He also has style, elegance and a sense of occasion. Hugh is the ideal choice to host a celebration of the year’s movies – and to have fun doing it.'"

More here.



(image via stanford.edu)

Out: Larry Lessig, Stanford. Surprisingly, Lessig, the world's most famous Constitutional lawyer with a concentration in cyberspace issues, is not headed to the Obama administration as the Tech Czar (To his credit, he quelled the buzz by saying an IT expert or Silicon Valley CEo would be a better pick). Lessig is, rather, headed to Harvard. From Required Reading:

"As some of you remember, just over a year ago I reported that I was shifting my academic (and activist) work from free culture related issues to (what I called) “corruption.” At Stanford, a year ago, I outlined what this work would be: To focus on the many institutions in public life that depend upon trust to succeed, but which are jeopardizing that trust through an improper dependence on money. Read the New York Times Editorial of last week. Or think of medical researchers receiving money from drug companies whose drugs they review; legal academics receiving money to provide public policy advice from the very institutions affected by that advice; or Congress filled with Members focused obsessively on how to raise money to secure their (or their party’s) tenure. In all these cases, dependency on money in these ways tends to weaken public trust. Or so was my hypothesis when I launched on this project.

"... About six months ago, I was asked to consider locating this research at a very well established ethics center at Harvard University. Launched more than two decades ago, the Safra Center was first committed to building a program on ethics that would inspire similar programs at universities across the country."

More here.