Minimal blood loss guaranteed, 12 easy steps, using household items.‘Wouldn't it be funny if you were sitting on the subway reading a book and the cover said something like, How to Murder a Complete Stranger and Get Away With It?' And yeah, I mean, just imagine what people around you would think -- especially when you finished it."The quote above came from Michelle Watters' husband and was the spark that got the ball rolling for Flapart a "company that could create, develop, print and sell covers that would make people laugh and have fun!"They currently have over have over 20...
Books Thriving: Online and Off
A new study released from Nielsen touts that 41% of all internet purchases worldwide were for books, an increase of 7% in the last two years and the number of people who shop online has grown 40% in the same two years.“Some of the biggest buyers of books on the Internet are from developing countries—China, Brazil, Vietnam and Egypt—indicating massive growth potential for online retailers that can specifically target these fast-growing markets" says Jonathan Carson of Nielsen Online.Here at home books made up 38% of all online purchases.While sales climb online sales at brick and mortar bookstores were up in...
The Visual Rage of Emory Douglas
From the 1967 until the early 1980's when the Black Panther Party disbanded Emory Douglas was their Minister of Culture. During that time he produced hundreds of pieces of graphic art to accompany the Panther message.The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles is hosting an exhibition of Douglas's work titled Black Panther: The Revolutionary Art of Emory Douglas. The exhibit, curated by Sam Durant with MOCA Chief Curator Paul Schimmel, presents almost 150 examples of Emory Douglas’s work.From the Press Release:"At a time when political unrest, war protests, and social inequality have again reached a boiling point, but where...
The Painted Pages of Annette Mangseth and Will Ashford
For writers it is the blank page, for artists it is the blank canvas but for a growing number of altered book artists the starting point for their work is the printed page.Norwegian artist Annette Mangseth has created an impressive body of work using the pages from old books as her canvas. Mangseth, working under the banner of Carambatack Design, infuses 19th century pages with colorful scenes, reinventing age old texts with a little playful pop surrealism.Girl on a Swing 8.2" x 11.6" acrylic paint, ink and marker on a printed page.I Fly Over Rain Clouds8.2" x 5.9 " Acrylic...
ABA Misguided In Their Support For An Internet Sales Tax
The American Booksellers Association (ABA) is once again calling on its members to contact their governors to support a sales tax on online sales.In the template letter they provide their booksellers to send to their governor they say the "sales tax shortfall will grow worse each year as online shopping grows. The Wall Street Journal reported that online sales this holiday season grew by a remarkable 19 percent. In contrast, retails sales this holiday season only rose 3.6 percent."Wouldn't you rather get in on the "remarkable" growth of online shopping than to try and deter it?I understand that having to...